Couple portraits
A couple portrait, composed rather than copied
Two people on one canvas, which is a composition decision before it is a likeness decision — and usually built from two photographs taken years apart.
Two faces on one canvas is a different job from two portraits hung side by side. The painting has to say something about the space between the two people: how close the heads sit, which shoulder comes forward, whether one person turns into the other or both face out. Get that right and a competent likeness becomes a portrait of a relationship. Get it wrong and you have two passport photographs sharing a frame.
Commissions usually arrive as two separate photographs, one of each person, taken years apart in different rooms. That is workable and it is most of what we do. But the composition has to be built rather than copied: heights reconciled, heads turned towards a common centre, light brought onto one side, hands and shoulders arranged so nobody appears to be floating above the other. We will also tell you when a photograph will not work at all — a face turned into shadow cannot be turned back towards the light without inventing the far side of it.
Two people on one canvas is a composition problem
The default mistake is symmetry: two heads the same size, the same distance apart, both facing front. It reads as a formal record and flattens the picture dead centre. The correction is small — one head slightly higher, one body turned a few degrees, one person overlapping the other's shoulder — and it is the difference between a painting that breathes and a diagram of two people.
The gap between the heads matters as much as the heads do. Too wide and the couple look separated; touching and the painting turns into a valentine. A hand's width of space at eye level, with the shoulders meeting lower down, is the arrangement that most often works. We test it in the mock-up at the exact canvas size, so you see it before the drawing is fixed.
Combining two solo photographs
Three things have to be reconciled. Height: if one photograph is taken standing and the other sitting, we need the real difference, so send a photograph of the two of you together even if it is a poor one — a phone snap at a wedding will do. Light: the key has to come from the same side in both. Scale: head size against shoulder width, which is where mismatched lenses show. A wedding photograph taken from three metres away is the most reliable height reference most couples own, even when the faces in it are three millimetres high.
Clothing is the fourth, quieter problem. A summer shirt beside a winter coat looks wrong even when both are painted well, so we either adjust the palette or suggest changing one garment — always in the mock-up, never silently. The composite is $60–$70, the same as restoring a photograph, and it is quoted at the start rather than added at the end.
There is one more decision clients rarely expect: the moment. Two photographs taken years apart can be combined technically, but the expressions have to belong to the same minute — one laughing and one formal reads as a collage, however good the drawing is. When the expressions clash, we usually suggest the quieter pair, which is also the pair that survives twenty years on a wall without becoming tiresome.
Cropping, hands and the size that follows
Cropping decides more than size does. Head and shoulders at 16 × 20 in is the standard couple commission: two heads at roughly five inches each, enough to read an expression from across a room. Half length — hands, a chair, a doorway — wants 20 × 24 in so the faces do not shrink to make room for the rest. Full length with a dress or a uniform needs 24 × 36 in.
Hands are what clients worry about and what is most often painted badly. A hand resting on a shoulder is four or five shapes and a shadow, not five fingers drawn separately, and the same goes for a hand holding a glass or a dog lead. If hands were cropped out of every photograph, say so early: we can compose around it, and the painting is often better for it. A hand that disappears into a sleeve is usually the better drawing; painters who insist on five separate fingers tend to produce a claw.
What it costs
Price is set by canvas size and the number of subjects — not by the occasion, the deadline, or how much detail you ask for. The table below is the same one used on every painting page, so there is no quote to wait for.
| Canvas | Metric | 1 subject | 2 subjects | 3 subjects | 4+ subjects |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8 × 10 in | 20 × 25 cm | $189 | $259 | — | — |
| 12 × 16 in | 30 × 41 cm | $289 | $379 | $459 | — |
| 16 × 20 in | 41 × 51 cm | $389 | $499 | $619 | $749 |
| 20 × 24 in | 51 × 61 cm | $549 | $699 | $849 | $1,029 |
| 24 × 36 in | 61 × 91 cm | $789 | $1,059 | $1,290 | $1,560 |
| 30 × 40 in | 76 × 102 cm | $1,090 | $1,449 | $1,749 | $2,090 |
| 36 × 48 in | 91 × 122 cm | $1,390 | $1,849 | $2,249 | $2,690 |
Shipping is free worldwide. Framing is optional and quoted separately — most customers have the canvas stretched by a local framer for $60–$120.
How it works
Send the photograph
One sharp phone photo is enough. Tell us the deadline, the wall it is going on, and anything that must or must not be in the picture.
See the mock-up within 24 hours
A digital composite at the exact canvas size and crop, so size and composition are settled before any paint is bought. Nothing is charged until you approve it.
Watch it being painted
Three to five weeks in real oil, with two progress photographs. You can raise a concern at either one — that is what they are for.
Approve, then it ships
You see the finished canvas first, with one free round of adjustments. Then it travels rolled in a rigid tube, tracked and insured, with the numbered certificate inside.
Real oil, not a print
Hand-painted on cotton canvas, varnished, signed. Brushwork you can see in raking light.
You approve before we paint
A digital mock-up at the exact size and crop, within 24 hours, included in the price.
Numbered certificate
Every painting ships with a signed COA stating artist, medium, size and year.
Free worldwide shipping
Rolled in a rigid tube, tracked and insured. No minimum, no distance surcharge.
Questions
Questions we actually get
A couple is two subjects: $289 covers 12 × 16 in, $389 the 16 × 20 in most couples choose, and $549 the 20 × 24 in for a half-length composition. Framing and stretching are quoted separately. Shipping is free worldwide, and combining two separate photographs is $60–$70 on top of the canvas price.
Yes, and it is the normal case rather than the exception. Send one good frame of each face, plus any bad photograph of the two of you together for height reference. The mock-up shows the combined composition at the exact canvas size, and nothing is painted until you are happy with the arrangement.
We can take out a temporary thing — a plaster, a harsh shadow, an unkind angle of the jaw. We will not restructure a face, because the result stops being you and everybody who knows you sees it immediately. What we do instead is choose the photograph and the light that are kindest, which is most of the effect people are actually after.
12 × 16 in works for two heads if the crop is tight, but the faces drop to about four inches and the likeness softens at any distance. 16 × 20 in is the honest minimum for head and shoulders, and 20 × 24 in if you want hands, a chair, a doorway or a dog in the picture.
Three to five weeks of painting plus three to five business days in transit. The mock-up arrives within 24 hours and two progress photographs follow. Rush delivery is three weeks including painting for $90, which is worth it if the painting has to be on a wall for a date you cannot move.
Send the two photographs
Send one frame of each of you, plus any bad picture of you together. We will come back with a composition, a size and a fixed price.