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Featured Piece – Face Off #95

 It’s hockey season and I’ve returned to my series of paintings of my local ECHL team. It became clear last season that I was cursed, as every single player I drew or painted from our team was promptly moved up to the AHL or traded! This season, to be safe, I’m only painting the players that have already left our team, lol.

 One of the two career highlights I had in 2024 was this player, Joe Fleming, reaching out to me to purchase my painting of him after he saw it on Instagram. I still get giddy every time I think about it! 

Selling that piece gave me a good excuse to paint him again. As much as I love the movement in the first painting of him, the portrait artist in me disliked that he was looking down. Likenesses in painting sports can be a challenge. Mouthguards change the shape of their lips, pads hide a lot of their form, and helmets and visors obstruct our view of their face. 

 I keep going back to painting hockey scenes because it’s a joyous challenge for me to try and capture the movement, passion, and speed on top of dealing with the aforementioned challenges. Painting a face-off pose is more about their expression and trying to capture the tension in their bodies. I sacrifice the action for the portrait, so while I don’t want to fill the series with static poses, I loved the chance to capture the intensity and fierceness of this player. 

This piece is unvarnished at the moment, so I’ll update this page once it is and I’ve gotten a professional scan of it.