Provocative Art: Mark Roberts and the stages of the painting...

Mark Roberts is a Birmingham born artist educated at the renowned Moseley School of Art. Following a career as an interior designer in retail, commercial and domestic arenas, Mark became a professional artist in 2007. Specialising in erotic art he became a member of The Guild of Erotic Artists.

Mark has exhibited at the Royal Society of Artists in Birmingham, Beaumont Hall Studios in St Albans, Whiteley's Gallery in London, Midland Gallery in Bedford and Vanilla Pod gallery in Ampthill to name but a few.

Following a successful exhibition at The Erotica Show in Olympia last November, Mark received several requests for paintings of Burlesque Models, a previously untapped market. After advertising for models on the 'Ministry of Burlesque' website, Mark was inundated with approaches from willing models  who loved the idea of being immortalised in a painting.

Here is the process of this project:

Have gone through a careful selection process I chose 6 different models to work with for the project. The idea being to create 6 to 8 very different paintings that captured the very essence of Burlesque, quite a task as this meant something very different to each individual.

One of the models selected was Luna Rosa, a stunning and dramatic burlesque performer from London. Mark arranged a photo shoot with Luna Rosa to attempt to capture the essence of her act.

'Luna Rosa was a brilliant subject, everything that I was looking for. Attractive, artistic, dramatic and passionate about her art. I knew that we could capture something worth painting. The pose is so important and Luna Rosa knew how to capture a movement.It was more than just a pose, I had to understand the act, the passion, the story. I needed to capture all of this in one brief moment. Luna Rosa instinctively knew how to produce this.'

'The painting still had to be representative of my style. Simple contemporary shapes and colours. How was I going to achieve this with complex costumes. It still had to be erotic, sexy and provocative. Furthermore Luna Rosa like so many contemporary Burlesque performers had tattoos that she also wanted to be represented in the final painting. This was something that had not been attempted before and something that I was not convinced would work in my style of work'.

This is the journey:-

(Picture Stage 1)

Following an extensive photo shoot Luna Rosa and I sat down to review the pictures we had created. I was delighted to find that we had captured several moments with different costumes that could be potentially make a great painting. The hard task was choosing just one. after some deliberation we made our choice.

The painting was going to be produced on a 36" x 24" canvas using Acrylic paints. Stage one is to print off the image as an A4 photograph. I then scratch a 24 x 36  grid onto an A4 acetate sheet and then fix this to the front of the photo.

Using a terracotta watercolour pencil, I then draw a 1" square grid onto the canvas. This then allows me to draw the image onto the canvas to the correct scale. Once I think I have the scale and proportion about right in outline, I re-draw over the image using 2H graphite pencil. This whole process can take several hours to get right. If the initial drawing is not right, the painting will not be right.

Picture Stage 2

The third day of the process is to start painting. I use a selection of Daler Rowney Acrylic paints. One should always try to buy the best materials you can afford. Often buying cheaper materials is a false economy. I also use Windsor and Newton artist brushes of various sizes. I choose Acrylic over oils simply because they are cleaner. It is much easier to wash brushes in water than turpentine. The down side is that they dry very quickly and need a number of coats to achieve an opaque colour.

I approach each painting differently, depending on the subject. Luna Rosa and I had decided that we wanted a black background to give dramatic effect to the pose and image. On this occasion however I had decided to leave the background until last. I went instead for the mid-tones of the body. From here I could work out the light and shade to form shapes and colour.

Picture Stage 3

Day 4. I wanted to work on the face and the head dress. It's important to get this element right. I never like to show my work unfinished. some people do not have the vision to see the end result. A face can look strange without hair for example as this is not usually how one sees themselves.

Picture Stage 4

By the end of day 5, I wanted to add in the hair, work on the face and add some further tones to the body. With Acrylic each colour has to be applied 2 or 3 times to build up the opaqueness. This is very time consuming.

Picture Stage 5

As we entered day 6, I needed to strengthen the outline and add more tone to the body. I still had the tattoo's and detail to do. Time would tell whether or not this would work with my style of painting and yet stay true to the model.

Further updates to follow...

To view Mark's website, click here:  www.provocative-art.com/