Creating a portrait is always a bit of an adventure. I find out everything I possibly can about the person I’m painting. If it is somebody I know, so much the better. I want to catch the personality of the person along with their physical appearance. It takes both sides of a person, what’s inside and what’s outside, to do their portrait justice. Quite a few of the people who I didn’t know at the beginning of the commission have become good friends in the process of putting their likeness on canvas.