Elizabeth Peyton

Elizabeth Peyton is an American painter living in Long Island, New York. She got some attention in the mid 1990s. Here are some of her drawings.

At first glance, I thought this painting was a picture when it was not enlarged. The woman gets her eyes and mouth widely open as if something startles her. The black background gives me a kind of depressed feeling but it is helpful for the light effect. My favourite part is the lilght.  I can tell exactly where the light is coming from since there is a kind of strong comparison between the left light part and right shadow part of her neck.  Here is another thing that I just wondering the part of her right arm. Where is it?

This picture depicts a skinny man. The gesture of this man makes him look like a professional of magic,  especially his hands which give me a kind of tricky feeling. Just like the painting displayed above, the artist pays much attention on the effect of light. Again, not only can I see the direction of the light, but also can I tell some planes that contains different lighting values. One example is the right and left sides of the top part of his trousers.

From this angle, we can observe the partial structure of a room. It seems that the artist really cares about the light effect which can be reflected by the blue door, the black floor and the top left corner of the room. I would say that the artist must spend more time on the left side of the painting compared with the rest as you can see the shelves and books are just like the detailed drawing we did in the class.  Another thing is about the colors. Without two colourful doors and black and yellow floors, the whole painting would be much more tedious.