Ephraim’s Shark

My husband’s great grand father was Ephraim Knowlton Hanks. He is most known for his role in rescuing the Martin Handcart Co. But before he did that, even before he joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, he was a teenager who got into trouble early one Sunday morning. Because it was the Sabbath, his father decided to wait to give him a licking until Monday. In that 24 hours, he decided to leave home to avoid it.

He ran away and became a sailor on the USS Columbus. There is a family story that says that one day he decided to try to catch a shark. Since family stories can be embellished, my husband decided to go to the national archives and comb through the logs for the USS Columbus to see if he could find anything about the alleged shark.

We were delighted when in the logs there was a simple entry that read: “Caught a shark”

My next “Saints and Angels” Painting is of Ephraim catching that shark.

I’m in the middle of working on the color study. Since the finished painting will be 2 ft by 3 ft, I’m doing smaller color studies in paint.

Here are the two options I’m considering:

The first one has a cerulean blue underpainting and the second one is a mixture of burnt sienna and yellow Ochre. The last picture is my color study from Photoshop.

I have rules for each of the Saints and Angels paintings. The canvas will be painted one color that will show through as the lines and there are elements of drawn and photographs that are collaged into each piece.

So the under painting color is important. Which underpainting color do you like most?