Scott Mitchell: Realism from Portraits to Wildlife Art with a Passion for Conservation
Meet Scott Mitchell
I began my art career painting portraits and have been lucky enough to send my work to clients in all corners of the world. I paint in oil paint, aiming to make these paintings as realistic as possible, and enjoy finding new techniques to create different textures and bring my paintings to life. I find how something was done just as enjoyable as the end result, and it’s something I enjoy when seeing work from other artist as I consider how I’d have tackled that ‘problem’ myself.
Recently I have branched out into creating wildlife art and plan to help use my love for animals to support conservation efforts for various species around the world. An example of this is my latest piece, ‘Running with Sage’, where I worked with Ashia Cheetah Conservation to capture the beauty of one of their Cheetahs, named Sage. I am finding these wildlife paintings are giving me and opportunity to capture animals in motion, something I’m finding I’m really enjoying since it is quite a stark contrast to the stillness of regular portraiture. I find it an interesting thought that I spend so much of my time capturing one fleeting moment in an animals life, which is then preserved in time through my paintings.
I have also began to develop my own series of tutorial videos to show my processes. Those of us who are lucky enough to get to paint for a living get so much time to learn new things through trial and error, that we are continually learning new ways to create textures the way we desire. I realised there was no reason others should have to learn in such a time consuming way when I could share the techniques I had learned myself, and am really looking forward to the opportunity to help new artists create pieces they are proud of. ~ @scottmitchellportraits