Frenchman (muted cool palette), 15" x 22"watercolor on gesso-textured paper
Myrna Wacknov has had a lifelong passion for painting figures and faces -- doing portrait commissions while she was still in high school and then working as a charcoal sketch artist at outdoor art shows for a number of years. Her focus of interest has changed over the years to capturing an expression and gesture rather than creation of an exact likeness, and recently she has been pushing the design potential of her subjects by working in series, keeping the image constant and changing the combination of elements from painting to painting. Her eagerness to experiment with processes and techniques provides endless opportunities for exploring her creativity.
Sketchbook portrait, 5" x 7"collage with pen & ink wash
Myrna attended Washington University and the Kansas City Art Institute and later received her degree in Painting and Drawing at San Francisco State University. Her work has been included in many national watercolor competitions and she has won awards in exhibits with the Rocky Mountain Watercolor Society, the San Diego Watercolor Society, and the California Watercolor Association, to name a few. In 2008, she won the CFS Medal at the American Watercolor Society Exhibition. She is a signature member of the National Watercolor Society and the California Watercolor Association. Myrna's work has also been featured in several magazine articles -- a feature on her portrait process in Watercolor Magic (October 2007), an article on 20 artists over 60 in The Artist's Magazine (March 2008), and a 2nd place in the self-portrait competition in American Artist (October 2008). Her work was also featured on the cover of Palette Magazine in January 2009. Myrna teaches several portrait painting workshops from beginning to advanced levels.
Rose, 18" x 24"watercolor on Tyvek
Advanced portrait class variations, 15" x 21"watercolor with dilute matte medium
Bill Cook the Housepainter, 18" x 24"watercolor
