Third in the group is a completely made up Santa. Perhaps surprisingly, that’s not an easy thing to do. As a classically trained painter, I render a subject from direct observation. In other words, I’m trained to paint what I see. This fellow was created to express kindness and peace. So I went deep inside my imagination to find a face to convey that. Curiously, the subject stayed within the limits of the traditional Santa stereotype - an older, white male. Conformity is not necessarily my approach. But there could be another force at play: my father died decades ago, and I think those might be his eyes.
