Life on the Madrid Subway II

Recently I took a step beyond drawing subway riders to photographing them unobtrusively. When I was able to make some candid photos of unwitting models one day, I decided to make a series of oil paintings in which I would interpret the photos. The first of these shows a Japanese woman snoozing in her seat. I decided to convert her image into a mask portrait. Based her photo, I made a watercolor study to establish the color scheme. Then I painted the mask in oil on Masonite. Here are the photo, the watercolor and the painting:

Life on the Madrid Subway I

While eating in restaurants, sitting on park benches, on buses and subway cars, I draw. I find all human faces interesting, and I draw the ones I can capture without bothering the subject. Often the subjects never catch on; they're unwitting models. I have to work fast, because even a person who is absorbed by a book, newspaper or cell phone game will often move, and I never know when my models are about to reach their stop and get off. I carry a small drawing pad. Sometimes I use an array of felt tip pens of different shades of gray, sometimes I use a 4B  pencil.......: