Memorial Portraits of a Loved One, Hand-Painted From Photographs

A memorial portrait is painted from whatever photographs exist, and there is no hurry. Send us everything — the framed print, the scan from a cousin, the blurry phone photo from the last holiday — and we look at them with you and say plainly what they will support. Different photographs supply different things: one the likeness, another the colouring, another the expression the family remembers.

The age, and the person you remember

You choose the age they are painted at. Most families choose the age they think of first, which is rarely the last photograph; if you have a photo from that time, send it. Signs of illness can be softened within what the photographs allow. The digital proof is where the family — the only judges of a likeness like this — tell us what to adjust, and the painter adjusts until you say yes. Nothing is varnished or shipped before then.

Painted into the family

A person who has passed can be painted into a group they never sat for: a grandparent with a grandchild born after them, a parent at a child’s wedding. From separate photographs, matched for scale and light, with a sketch of the arrangement first. It is one of the most common commissions we receive and one we take the most care over.

Medium, level and lettering

Oil on canvas at the Refined or Hyperreal level is what most families choose; the extra layers give the painting the presence people are looking for. Charcoal or graphite on paper makes a quiet, drawn piece, often from a black-and-white photograph. A name, dates or a line can be painted on the canvas or set on a brass plate on the frame. Pet memorial portraits have their own page.