Watercolor Painting: John Glenn, 2015

I have always had a deep interest in the history of space flight, including the very earliest flights made by the pioneering group of astronauts, the "Mercury 7" - including John Glenn.  So I have created a painting that was a culmination of my research of John Glenn's flight in his capsule, Friendship 7 (so named because of the seven astronauts in this first group).

I tried to show the view of Friendship 7 as it would have appeared at the end of its last orbit, during the beginning of the re-entry into the atmosphere.  Due to the possibility that the heat shield was not firmly attached, the flight controllers instructed John to keep the retro rocket pack attached to the underside of the capsule.  This made for what was already a risky venture even more of a dramatic and dangerous flight.  The retro rocket pack is shown at the bottom of the spacecraft as it began melting away because of the heat of re-entry.

In the picture, I tried to represent the Mercury 7 by the placement of the Big Dipper constellation (Ursa Major) on the upper left.  In reality, I think the constellation should have appeared on the right at the time represented by the image and tipped on its side... so I am taking artistic license in moving the stars!  The placement of the Friendship 7 capsule is fairly accurate, since the "splashdown" occurred in the Atlantic.  I also tried to lineup this picture to have the spacecraft seemingly fly over Ohio - John Glenn's birthplace.

This picture was completed during the Christmas and New Year holiday period between 2014 and 2015, but I had been researching the possibility of completing a portrait of John Glenn since early 2014.  My goal is to have this picture be one in a series recognizing Ohio fliers.  If I can finish the other pictures, the John Glenn portrait is number 2 of 3. 


The painting was made on 20 by 30 inch Arches art board with a cold press finish.  The Winsor and Newton paints (almost completely tube-based) included:

• French ultramarine
• Permanent rose
• Raw sienna
• Burnt sienna
• Zinc white (Gouache)
• Hookers green
• Paynes grey
• Lamp black 
• Manganese blue
• Cobalt blue
• Cerulean blue
• Cadmium red
• Davys grey
• Cadmium orange
• New gamboge
• Emerald

I am including a series of photo's that show various stages in this work.  Again, I used tracing paper to transfer the details from a variety of photographs (color and black-and-white) to create the desired layout.