Colin Davidson will show you how to really paint a portait

WHEN you speak to Irish artist Colin Davidson, his thoughtfulness is evident. Nothing is throwaway or said for the sake of filling space. Davidson is a thinker, a philosopher of sorts. 

This won’t come as a surprise to people who are familiar with his warm and textured portraits — and that makes it all the more surprising to hear that, for him, the most important element in his portraits is in fact the parts he leaves out.

“If somebody says when looking at a painting of mine they sense the spirit of the person in it, I can’t lay claim to that,” says Davidson. “It’s the bits I leave, those unfinished bits or parts that are less than perfect which allow people in to fill the gaps.”