New painting: The great Buddha

I am very impressed by the marvelous statue of The Great Buddha of Kamakura, Japan. It is a tallest statue in Japan and is surrounded by sakura or cherry blossoms . The bronze statue is 43.8 ft tall. You can read more about this here. 

                                                                                                                                                                                                         Courtesy: Travelers digest

I wanted to make a painting of Buddha for a long time and after I saw the pictures of Kamakura's Great Buddha I made this sketch. 

Before starting to paint, I researched about the facial features of Buddha. According to the Buddhist scripts, Buddha has a glowing smooth spotless skin.His complexion has a golden sheen. His cheeks are radiant, fully rounded. His eyes are deep blue and has long thick eye lashes like an ox. His eyebrows are arched like a bow.His hair are thick black with curls and bluish tint to it. His features are sharp and slender. His head is in a shape of a turban. His ears lobes are long which almost reach his shoulders. His neck is not very long. He has even proportionate shoulders and neck. His mouth always has a beautiful smile.

I also researched about The great Buddha statue. Found a very good source here.

Color symbolism is used in a wide variety of fascinating ways in Buddhist art and ritual. In Buddhism, especially in Tibetan Buddhism, five colors (pancha-varna) symbolizes a state of mind. These colors are the five colors of white, yellow, red, blue and green. This site on Buddhist symbols has beautifully explained the meaning and how these colors transform the emotions.  

Accordingly I started painting. The canvas is huge- 3ft by 4ft. It is the biggest I have ever painted on till date. 

I painted with shades of red and orange for the face with golden tinge. I have incorporated all the five colors in this painting. This is how it looked like mid way through..

I think texture is the most important thing in a good painting. As you have seen in my earlier paintings ( Gulmohar and Peacock) I am trying out new textures in each one. In this one I have created texture for hair.

Then I painted cherry blossom with thick texture paint 

on both sides..

Then I painted lotus on the bottom side...





worked on the golden sheen on the face and silver glow behind the head..

I haven't varnished it yet.. heard somewhere that pregnant women should stay away from varnish and other chemicals..I will varnish it later.

I have another canvas of the same size on which I want to start painting now that this is done!!!