Kai

This is Kai from a Kpop group called Exo. I think he's probably the best dancer in Kpop and perhaps I'm not wrong - he had the honour of dancing solo at the Winter Olympics 2018 closing ceremony before performing with the rest of Exo.

Again, I was drawn to the intense reflected light on the face and the hair colour. Kpop 'idols' are like chameleons with the continual image transformations, especially with their hair colours.

This portrait had quite a few challenges, not least to make the blue side of the face work. If I remember correctly, it's quite a lot of French Ultramarine blue with touches of Manganese blue. It blends into a flesh mix (a base of Burnt Umber, Cadmium Red, Cadmium Yellow, Titianium White and a touch of French Ultramarine blue) intensified with Dioxazine Purple and perhaps Aliz. Crimson - I should really keep a note at the time! The background is a mix of French Ultramarine blue and Burnt Umber which makes a beautiful rich black.

I noticed a couple of months later that after drying it looked very patchy so I tried 'oiling out' and it evened out the surface and gave it a lovely even sheen. I don't particularly want to varnish it so I'll see how it looks in a month or so.

6"x 6", oil on canvas.