Tom lived with his patron in Greenville South Carolina for one
year. While there he painted many works for his patron. This portrait
is of the children of one of his patrons law partners. This painting
took the regular direction of painting such a portrait.
There were three boys in the family and Tom would visit the home
frequently and shoot a roll of film. Slowly the composition came
about as he gathered photos and shared them with the family. Tom
takes his time while he gets to know the children. The middle one
shown here became very close to Tom as he was of the age to spend
the most time with the artist as he worked. Once individual images
of the boys were okayed by the parents Tom started painting. Once
the face was still wet Tom would have the child sit for him so he
could put in the fine details and essence of life that is important
for a good portrait. The portrait has each of the boys in white
pants and shirts. The background was their backyard. To get the
three boys into a 30” x 40” canvas Tom placed them in a diagonal
composition with the oldest one in the top left and the youngest
one in the bottom right. You can see pieces of the other two brothers
in this detail of the portrait. Tom entertained the middle son while
painting the the background by placing little bugs and other very
small details into the painting.
