You might wonder how this artist has managed to make her subject look so life like in the portrait above. Well, it's because said subject is actually a real person. 24 year old artist Alexa Meade (based in Washington DC) incorporates real people into her paintings by painting them so that they blend into her canvas and appear part of the picture, providing they stay perfectly still. She calls them "Pop-Out Paintings."

She starts with an underlayer of base colors and a more detailed top layer which makes up the final "living" picture. Like her canvas, Meade paints her live subjects with acrylic paint creating the same textures on their skin as on the canvas and paints the clothing too. She then photographs them against her backdrop to create portrait photographs.



It's a novel concept but it's the whole process that makes it interesting rather than the actual art at the end of it Her photographs appear as any other 2-D painted portrait but its the process and people that make it interesting. Watching her create the tableau from start to finish and then watching the subject get up and leave the picture at the end of it.







Here's a video interview with the artist where she talks about the whole process:


link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BnZks0BCCiw&feature=player_embedded

I wonder how easy it is to get all that paint off your skin after...