This mixed media painting is a study for Tolmie’s monumental work The Ice Queen. The study’s smaller scale allows the artist to focus more closely on the glittering ornamentation; the study emphasizes texture and colour rather than volume. As in the larger oil painting, the mannequin’s facial features have been very realistically executed, creating the impression of a human figure imprisoned by its finery. The details of the figure’s ornamentation and the tonal richness of the whole piece are particularly fine.

The artist began in watercolours, completing the underpainting and beginning some of the details. He then set the study aside for many months as he turned his attention to his larger oil paintings. Inspired by the success of his recent mixed media experiments (notably Clocks: Window on Queen Street, Toronto), the artist decided to rework this study in oils. The result is a much more vibrantly colourful painting and a warmer tone. The artist has managed to carry over into the new medium the delicacy and energy of his wet-on-wet watercolour technique, particularly in the clothing on the upper body. This is a very challenging effect to achieve in oils.

There is a slide show of this painting’s preliminary stages.

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