“Self Portrait” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on wood panel. 20″x16″ Working on achieving a likeness and realism, but with a more chromatic palette. “Self Portrait” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on wood panel. 20″x16″
“Self Portrait” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on wood panel. 20″x16″ Another quick self-portrait, on wood panel. Sketch in graphite and background painted on Day One. Portrait painted on Day Two. Total painting time five or six hours. I’ve been watching Sky Art’s “Portrait Painter of the Year.” Inspired by how those artists create their portraits in four hours, I’m trying to work quickly. This of course...
“Self Portrait” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on wood panel. 20″x16″ Self portrait on cradled wood panel (ran out of canvases). It’s different painting on panel. Less “tooth” and less absorbent. So the paint slides around a bit instead of sinking in. This makes it harder initially; but as the painting progresses, additional layers adhere well to bottom layers. This painting, however, was not painted in multiple...
Susan” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 24″x24″ A quick two session sketch in oils. Still working from graphite to darks, to midtones, to highlights. More or less a direct painting style with some additional glazing. Need to work on increasing chiaroscuro and expanding my palette. My direct paintings risk appearing a bit two-dimensional (Susan would say “cartoon-like.”) Perhaps that’s a function of the speed with...
“Sleepy” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 24″x24″ Working on less traditional portrait poses and developing my backgrounds. I continue to work quickly (and impatiently) typically finishing a painting in a matter of hours and just a few sittings. At some point I need to learn to take the time to really “lick down” the important areas of the portrait. Right now, all of it is expressive with visible brush strokes and...
“Thinking” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 24″x24″ I haven’t created the right set up to properly photograph my paintings, especially the finished ones. They are consistently low quality, with reflections and speckles, which I try to clean up using a noise reduction filter but, invariably, I lose a lot of the detail — subtle colors and reflections. Anyway, here’s my latest portrait of Susan. She was...
“Miss Demeanor” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 36″x24″ A rather impatient “sketch in oil” of Susan. Impressionistic dress and hair. Not enough attention to detail in facial expression. I think the initial drawing was better than the painting. Glazes applied quickly and without giving enough attention to preserving the detail or values of the drawing. The end result is not perfect, but I’m not in the...
Art for Art's Sake
Self Taught, I am nobody .... nobody's perfect
“Weasel” (2026). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 36″x24″ Portrait of Susan holding a weasel. Part of my Susan’s Pets collection. Her face. Pose and costume created with generative AI. Painted in oils on canvas.
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“Macavity” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 12″x12″ A fancilful creature. Part of a collection of portraits of imaginary spirits that we hang in our basement and boiler room. Protective hopefully. “Macavity” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 12″x12″
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“Self Portrait” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on wood panel. 20″x16″ Working on achieving a likeness and realism, but with a more chromatic palette. “Self Portrait” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on wood panel. 20″x16″
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“Self Portrait” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on wood panel. 20″x16″ Another quick self-portrait, on wood panel. Sketch in graphite and background painted on Day One. Portrait painted on Day Two. Total painting time five or six hours. I’ve been watching Sky Art’s “Portrait Painter of the Year.” Inspired by how those artists...
Learn More
“Self Portrait” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on wood panel. 20″x16″ Self portrait on cradled wood panel (ran out of canvases). It’s different painting on panel. Less “tooth” and less absorbent. So the paint slides around a bit instead of sinking in. This makes it harder initially; but as the painting progresses, additional layers...
Learn More
Susan” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 24″x24″ A quick two session sketch in oils. Still working from graphite to darks, to midtones, to highlights. More or less a direct painting style with some additional glazing. Need to work on increasing chiaroscuro and expanding my palette. My direct paintings risk appearing a bit two-dimensional (Susan would...
Learn More
“Sleepy” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 24″x24″ Working on less traditional portrait poses and developing my backgrounds. I continue to work quickly (and impatiently) typically finishing a painting in a matter of hours and just a few sittings. At some point I need to learn to take the time to really “lick down” the important...
Learn More
“Thinking” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 24″x24″ I haven’t created the right set up to properly photograph my paintings, especially the finished ones. They are consistently low quality, with reflections and speckles, which I try to clean up using a noise reduction filter but, invariably, I lose a lot of the detail — subtle...
Learn More
“Miss Demeanor” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 36″x24″ A rather impatient “sketch in oil” of Susan. Impressionistic dress and hair. Not enough attention to detail in facial expression. I think the initial drawing was better than the painting. Glazes applied quickly and without giving enough attention to preserving the detail or...
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“Susan” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 36″x24″ A portrait of Susan, inspired by John Singer Sargent’s detailed facial work and more abstract impressionist clothing and surroundings. “Susan” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 36″x24″
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“Susan” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 36″x24″ Continuing to experiment with generative AI, but this time using image prompts of street art that I liked, combined with a face swap of Susan’s likeness. Generated a composition that I am unaccustomed to painting. I’m not sure I’m much of an abstract artist, and I’m not...
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“Susan” (after recently discovered Klimt) (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 36″x24″ A painting by the Austrian artist Gustav Klimt, that was believed lost for 100 years, has been found in Vienna. A Portrait of Fraulein Lieser once belonged to a Jewish family in Austria and was last seen in public in 1925. Its fate after that is unclear but the...
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“Self Portrait” (after Rembrandt self-portrait dated 1690) (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 24″x24″ Self-portrait modeled after Rembrandt’s 1690 self-portrait that hangs in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC. He is credited with an unsparing depiction of the signs of aging in his own face, building up the paint in high relief to...
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“Susan with Rock” (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 24″x24″ AI inspired composition using Midjourney and prompt “A painting in the style of American primitive portraitist Ammi Phillips of a middle aged blond woman, dressed in 19th century garb, holding a rock in both hands, pastoral background reminiscent of an Andrew Wyeth scene.”...
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“Cat and Sparrow” after “In the Shadow” by Diane Hoeptner. (2025). Louis Cooper. Oil on panel. 12″x12″ Mastercopy of Diane Hoeptner’s “In the Shadow.” Executed as a quick alla prima wet on wet sketch in oils
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“Can Coon” (2024). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 24″x24″ One of the raccoons that lives under the deck of our house in Stockbridge, MA got his left arm stuck in a soda or beer can and can’t get it off. He hobbles around with his new peg leg. We were worried about his survival but he seems to be doing OK and the other raccoons don’t give...
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“Feeling Blue” (2024). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 24″x24″ Another portrait of Susan, composed using the assistance of Midjourney generative AI and Insight FaceSwap to substitute Susan’s features.
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“Mikko holding Susan” (2024). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 24″x24″ Generative AI image using Midjourney with prompt: /imagine: a portrait of a mature Dutch woman with thick blond hair in 19th century dress, holding a bobcat, oil painting, 19th century american folk art, detailed facial features, symmetrical eyes –chaos 25 –ar 4:5 Then...
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I modeled this portrait after one created by Mary-Jane Ansell, which won her a BP Portrait Award. Swapped Susan’s face, into the original, and painted a master copy in a less photo-realistic style, emphasizing expressive brushwork and more chiaroscuro effects. Here are the original and my version side by side. I admire Ansell’s composition, lighting and...
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Inspired by the portrait “Lotti” by Louis Smith. I borrowed his pose and sitter’s costume and swapped in Susan’s face. This worked nicely because of the similar features of Lotti and Susan. Susan much more beautiful of course. Painted Alla Prima. “Dreamer” (2024). Louis Cooper. Oil on wood panel. 24″x18″
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A portrait of my sister Elisabeth. She works in the vegetable garden and healing plant garden at Camphill Village, Copake, NY. Her community also raises cattle, pigs, sheep, goats, etc…. She is a soulful one and very much in touch with nature. Hands in the Earth. But she hates to be called a Farmer. “I am not a Farmer! I am a Lover and a Healer!”...
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A portrait of Susan wearing an oriental robe. She has been teaching herself Mandarin Chinese, which led to the title for this portrait. In addition to continuing to use Generative AI to assist with painting composition, I have been trying to combine realism with a more impressionistic rendering of clothing and backgrounds. Homage to John Singer Sargent. “Wo Yao...
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Continuing to experiment with Generative AI and Face Swapping as a means of generating inspiration for paintings. Note the lace head-covering Susan is wearing. Something inspired by a Rubens? “Spacesuit” (2024). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 24″x24″
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A wedding gift for my nephew Owen and his fiancée Dora. Generative AI used to compose the scene with the prompt: “an oil painting portrait of a happy couple in the style of John Singer Sargent, 19th century dress, background reminiscent of a gilded age mansion, detailed facial expressions, symmetrical eyes no moustache –v 6.0” Then swapped in the facial...
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Continuing to experiment with Generative AI to compose painting ideas using Midjourney. This time used a number of images instead of words as prompts. Photographs of the lilies in Lily Pond which abuts our home in the Berkshires, combined with photographs of Susan. “Lily Pond” (2024). Louis Cooper. Oil on canvas. 24″x36″
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Continuing to experiment with Generative AI to compose painting ideas using Midjourney. In this case my prompt was: “A 19th century clean-shaven Norwegian man with short hair dressed in a sailor’s smock, oil painting, self-portrait, in the style of Caravaggio, intense chiaroscuro, mysterious lighting, detailed face, symmetrical eyes –no beard, –chaos 25...
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Continuing to experiment with generative AI (Midjourney) to help with inspiration and create compositions that I then paint in oils. Generative AI can generate surprising connections between themes and images that I suggest as inputs. I am still learning how to create the most useful prompts that affect the quality and direction of the lighting, the degree of detail,...
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I am experimenting with the use of generative AI to compose images that I will then paint in oils. It allows me to play with a number of ideas and create surprising compositions. I use a variety of sources and draw ideas from popular culture, other artists and my own images. I then use AI to assist with transforming a likeness to that of my model (typically Susan of...
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