My great-uncle

[Brant]

My great-uncle Ivan in Berlin of 1945. Painted from old w/b photo. Oil on canvas, 18"x24".

[KingCrimson]

Great job, it's tough working from old black and white photos. You did good!

[Brant]

Thanks a lot, John.

[Brant]

Another variant of photo. I took it with my cell phone. The colors here are more close to real.

[kentiessen]

Really nice work from a black and white reference- it is very convincing!

[Brant]

Thank you, Ken.

[jonc50]

Very nice work. I have a black and white from the 1950's with excellent detail that I hope to do soon. Most of the colours I remember from memory since I was there at the time. I may have to do some research on the plaids!
Jon C.

[edf]

Very very nice. No doubt the whole family is proud of his service.

[Brant]

Thank you very much, guys. I hope, I caught the likeness although the photo is not so good quality.
My great-uncle served in Red Army as infantryman from 1941 till 1945, and he was the only who survived among my relatives participated in that war. I started a portrait of my great-aunt, his sister, she was a fighter pilot, and she died in an air battle In 1943. I will show her portrait soon.

[edf]

Sergey,

I visited your website and can really appreciate your love of family and its history. Well done.

My question of you is in your "Portrait of Mother" done on wood board in 1988 is: how has it held up over the years? Is it an actual dimensional piece of wood or plywood? How did you do treat the wood foundation?

(I did a WWI "old world" painting of my grandfather in uniform, which my wife loves, thus my appreciation for your uncle Ivan's portrait. It memorializes him and that period wonderfully.)

[Brant]

Originally Posted by edf

Sergey,

I visited your website and can really appreciate your love of family and its history. Well done.

My question of you is in your "Portrait of Mother" done on wood board in 1988 is: how has it held up over the years? Is it an actual dimensional piece of wood or plywood? How did you do treat the wood foundation?

(I did a WWI "old world" painting of my grandfather in uniform, which my wife loves, thus my appreciation for your uncle Ivan's portrait. It memorializes him and that period wonderfully.)

Thank you for kind words about my works.
About your question. Portrait of mother was painted on plywood without any special preparation. As I remember, I just applied boiled linseed oil on foundation, and worked after drying of this layer. The portrait still looks good after almost 25 years, no crackles, no delamination of the paint layer. I hope, it will keep the same condition for next 25 years.

[KingCrimson]

Oh yea, the colors in that 2nd photo you took look a lot better.
Great job on that uniform!