Tiffany Bisconer - My new Painting Project

This will be my new painting. I like to introduce Tiffany Bisconer, who is a very talented Belly Dancer. The planning for this painting started I think back in October and Tiffany has been a wonderful sport about my 1001 requests on reference material. Please go over to my Orientalist Gallery Blog and watch her do the Goblet Dance ~ it's unbelievable...

ATTENTION!
This will be an interactive project and I will give a drawing of one of the objects in the painting to the person who can come up with a cool title for this painting. So as you visit and see the developments, start thinking of some titles. All you have to do is leave me a comment on any post that says "Tiffany". When the painting is completed the person whose name suggestion I will choose, will receive the drawing. If several people should suggest the same name, I will have my son draw a name and announce the winner. Good luck!



In most Orientalist paintings harem girls, odalisques or dancers are shown in a frontal position or from a side view and therefore I wanted to try something different. Tiffany obliged and we ended up with a set of seated poses showing her back. After a series of quick sketches, I determine where I want my main subject to be on the canvas. I chose a triangular composition and made sure that everything about Tiffany lined up within the designated areas. You might still see some of the erased lines.

To create the illusion that Tiffany is a harem dancer, I had to create a proper setting for her and offer clues within the painting to allure to who she might be. Going through magazines, books and after a lot of web surfing, I found more stuff I wanted to buy for my home than to use in the painting. LOL!

Eventually I found a couple of things and had fun decorating without spending a penny!

The props:

Just Morocco
This Moorish Cordoba ($1,3000) sofa had a nice design to it and I love the colors. Just Morocco has beautiful things, so colorful. Oh, how I wish I could travel to Morocco....


One of their rooms had great curtains, so I picked those up as well. I took out the sofa in Photoshop, but I still have to fix the folds of the curtain and adjust the color.


Water pipe (Nargil) and Mother of Pearl inlaid table courtesy of Ange Tissier's painting "Une Algérienne et son esclave"

I love to copy Old Master's work, but there never seems to be enough time. So I do the next best thing and that's learn from their compositions and copy small pieces here and there to learn something new.



I noticed that in a lot of Orientalist paintings the artists showed off their skills at painting fur. I have never done that, so it's about time to pay homage to Izart's 'La Tasse de Cafe' and copy the rug. This will be a good learning experience, since the area is small.

Arabic Tabla, Dumbek and Riqq

I have done a montage of all these items to scale in Photoshop and have sent the preliminary design to Tiffany for approval. She liked everything and this means the painting is a go. Now that all the elements are in place, I will do a full on drawing to work out a couple of things such as lighting, proper folds for curtain, perspective issues, etc.

Additional Work in Progress links
Jan 15 - Drawing
Jan 19 - Drawing is Finished
Jan 21 - Grizaille is started
Jan 25 - Grizaille continued
Jan 30 - Grizaille Almost Finished
Feb 1 - The Prize - Image of Drawing
Feb 3 - Grizaille is Finished
Feb 5 - 1st Paint Layer is Finished
Feb 10 - 2nd Paint Layer
Feb 16 - 2nd Paint Layer Finished
Feb 26 - Tiffany is being Accessorized
Mar 4 - Tiffany's Painting is finished