"Dear Nathaniel" was a commission that I did in 2025. It is 20"x 24". My pastor and his wife had requested that I do a painting of their youngest son with Jesus. They gave me full creative liberties. I started with a few different concept sketches in my journal, then deliberately created a proposal sketch. "Dear Nathaniel" is based on the concept of Jesus's love and care for all children.  I often babysit for this family and their son, just like my younger brother, is full of energy, so I wanted to show that no matter who you are or what's happening in your life, you can always sit down with Jesus and have this personal moment. Throughout working on this piece, people who saw it in progress often asked me if the child had died. This idea did not cross my mind at all while sketching and painting this commission. I decided that it was a perfect reminder that even in our worldly lives, we are still able to have this amazing, peaceful relationship with Jesus and our Father. I wanted to show an intimate relationship with Jesus, and that's why I put the little boy sitting in Jesus's lap, Jesus's hands wrapped around him.  You can also see that their eyes are closed and their faces are relaxed—this aids in giving the viewer the idea of peace and comfort. Placing the young boy's feet on top of Jesus's feet was also an important sign of support and love. Often, people forget that we can have this intimate and peaceful relationship with Jesus on Earth in our normal lives. 

Throughout this assignment, I learned and improved my skills to be able to blend two completely different, contrasting colors without it looking muddy. I took a huge risk by painting such significant value changes to achieve the amount of form, value, texture, and emphasis. You can see this on the skin, hair, clothes, and in the glow around Jesus.  I used so many layers, especially on the skin, to achieve a skin-like appearance. When you look at skin, you can see all the different layers of color that are built up in our body to give an appearance. To help create some more depth, I would think about what colors I didn't see as much and added them as non-local color. I used it to elevate parts of Jesus's hair, the feet, hands, the facial structures, and so much more. Even though this isn't my first portrait, this assignment largely taught me new skills with acrylic paint and how to create so much depth and realism.