Critically acclaimed wildlife artist Jonathan Truss believes that he has to do something different to stand out from the crowd of other wildlife artists.
So, he decided to hop into a cage in the shark-infested waters off the South African Coast in order to sketch the magnificent great white shark.
He believes that the exciting experience of observing animals up close and in their natural habitat produces different results than paintings done from photographs or zoos.
To Truss, the giveaway is in the muscle tone and scarring of the animal.
Truss spent 90 minutes underwater studying and sketching the sharks on a white plastic board with china-marker oil crayons.
During his sketching, Truss is able to properly study the animal.
He said, “I want to look into their eyes and see how they narrow, see how their brows lower. The idea is to really study something close up, to observe it first hand. Any underwater painting is going to be very crude but it gives me a framework and I begin to think how the painting might look, about the composition, the light, the colours”.
The underwater sketches are then used as a reference for the final product to create a more realistic painting.
[via Daily Mail]