Twins 10th Portrait: John Wentz to the Rescue

Disclaimer, this post was lost somewhere in my little universe. I swear I wrote this post somewhere. For the life of me I cannot find it anywhere. Picture it, it’s 2021 and I am chatting with an artist to do the twins 10th portrait. Conversations like these take time, depending on the artist. What I have learned over the last 16 years, patience is key. Great things come in time. Whether its fast or slow! Now, with the aftermath of COVID, the kids portraits got backed up, namely because I was caught up with way to many things on my plate. Fast forward, the original artist conversation shifted to incorporate a year delay for their portrait. I dropped the ball and found myself in scramble to catch up in 2023, because I thought I needed the piece done and I wanted to make sure the next artist had the time to finish the work.

Enter John Wentz. John presence in our collection is heavy. I’ve been a great admirer of his work since I bought my first piece back in 2015 from a group show at Spoke Gallery. This piece has been one of my all time favorites has been hanging permanently in the HK5corner since the day I purchased it. I’ve talked with John every so often about doing a portrait commission of the kids and this was the perfect opportunity. The plan originally was always to make this birthday commission to be a two piece portrait. After I reached out to John, the plane took off and the pieces came together quickly and perfectly.

What I love about John’s work is the roughness and realness mixed together. Since 2015, I’ve added 4 other pieces to our collection. All of them include a portrait of woman in some part of the pieces. Both of these commissions were to be portrait layout pieces with earthy background to them. Initially artists send over a sketch but John jumped right into the sketch portion and start building the painting. He sent me the photo of these two “sketches”, which in their current state, could have been finished pieces. I was sold 100% in the direction he was going and the twins were loved how distorted they looked. They also immediately responded to the color selections on their paintings.

When I say these pieces came to life really quickly, that’s an understatement. I contacted John in mid-August and by early October the pieces were finished. I think we received the dried pieces by mid-November. I’ve never had two paintings happen so quickly. I am always very clear with all the artists I work with, time is not of the essence. The more time they need, the better. I know some artists like to finish quickly because having a piece sit their in the studio, can eat away at them. Don’t we all notice the little things after we finish things? When we received delivery of the paintings, the portraits were displayed on the fireplace in our rental. So far everyone has loved the pieces. I cannot wait to get them up on the wall. I hope to some day have John do a piece of piece of me. Emphasis on hope. I am not getting any younger.

Lessons taken from this chapter of portrait commissions. Time is not of the essence!!! From 2022 to today, the kids portrait timelines have been stretched. And, honestly. I am not in this to be a marathon. Having these pieces in our lives till we die is truly the gift. What do you think of the two portraits? Please share your thoughts in comments. Here is the first piece by John Wentz in our collection IMPRINT NO. 28 - 2015