Studio services
Six ways to commission a painting from the atelier
Hayden Smyth Art LLC paints custom oil work from a small studio at 928 Amberly Dr, North Salt Lake - 84054-5063, United States (US), and offers six clearly defined services so that a client always knows what is being made and how long it takes. Each service below begins with a conversation and ends with a varnished, hang-ready painting. The studio does not sell prints, does not resell stock imagery and does not pass another painter work as its own. Everything on this page is made by one pair of hands on prepared linen.
Ready to talk about a commission write to the studio
Oil Portraits from Photos
This is the heart of the studio. A client provides one or more photographs, ideally a clear image with honest light and an unobstructed view of the face, and the studio translates that photograph into oil on stretched linen. The painter does not trace the image. Instead the face is rebuilt from a grisaille underlayer through thin veils of colour until skin carries the right temperature, the right shadow and the small asymmetry that makes a person recognisable. Working from photographs allows families to commission a portrait of someone who can no longer sit for one, or of a moment that happened years ago and was caught only once on film.
Portrait sizes run from a small head study to a full figure, and the studio always records the light source before beginning, because a face lit from a window reads very differently from a face lit from above. Backgrounds are kept quiet, often a broken neutral or a deep stretched-ground tone, so the sitter remains the subject. The studio emails progress images at two agreed points so that the client can see the likeness arrive rather than waiting in the dark. Delivery is fully dried, varnished and ready to frame. A portrait from Hayden Smyth Art LLC is expected to hang for a lifetime, not a season.
Pet Portraits
Animal commissions are painted with the seriousness usually reserved for people, because a companion animal is not a decoration in the room where it lived. The studio studies the direction of fur or feather, the shape of the eye and the specific set of the ears that distinguishes one dog from every other dog of the same breed. A pet portrait can be a single head, a seated full body, or a pair of animals painted together in one landscape. Clients frequently send several photographs and ask the studio to combine a good expression from one with the posture from another, and the studio will say honestly when that will work and when it will not.
Fur and feather are built in overlapping strokes rather than blended into a blur, so the surface keeps its bite when seen from across a room and rewards a closer look. The studio often paints a small preparatory sketch of the animal at no charge during the enquiry stage, which gives the client a chance to approve the pose before the full canvas is committed. Pet portraits are popular as memorial pieces and as gifts for a person who has just brought a new animal home. Each one is varnished and framed exactly like a human portrait, because the standard does not change with the subject.
Home and Venue Paintings
A building can be a portrait too, and this service treats it that way. Houses, cottages, barns, chapels, gardens and wedding venues are painted from photographs taken on location or supplied by the owner, with attention to the exact roofline, the fall of the afternoon light and the particular era of the architecture. The studio will not romanticise a building into something it is not, because the point of the painting is recognition. Clients commission these works as housewarming gifts, as records of a family home before it changes hands, and as keepsakes of the place where a wedding or a reunion took place.
The colour ground is chosen after the studio sees a photograph of the wall where the painting will hang, so a warm interior does not receive a cool canvas that fights its surroundings. Skies are built in thin layers to keep atmosphere, and foreground planting is kept loose so that the eye travels back to the building rather than snagging on detail. Where a client wants people included, the studio can add figures at the scale and distance that reads naturally, which is often a small silhouette at a doorway rather than a crowded group. These paintings are among the studio most requested gifts, and they are handled with the same patient method as any face.
Commission Studies
A commission study is a small painting made before a large one, and it exists to remove guesswork from the final piece. The studio uses studies to test the pose, the crop, the colour plan and the way light will fall across the subject. Because a study is small it can be painted quickly and revised without the pressure of a large investment of time, and the client sees the plan before the full canvas is stretched. Many clients keep the study as well as the finished commission, since the two paintings tell the story of how the work was decided.
This service is the right first step for any portrait where the composition genuinely matters, such as a group, a full figure or a scene that must fit a precise wall. The study price is credited toward the final commission when the client proceeds, so the exploration carries no penalty. The studio will also paint a study for its own archive when a subject is unusually demanding, and it shares those studies with the client because transparency is part of the working method. Commission studies are the quiet reason the finished paintings hold together.
Framing and Varnishing
An oil painting is not safe the moment the last stroke lands. The surface must cure, then receive a protective varnish that guards it against dust, light and the small accidents of a lived-in room. The studio waits the proper interval before varnishing, then applies a removable varnish so that a future conservator, decades from now, can clean the painting without harming the paint film underneath. This is patient work that clients never see, and it is the reason a Hayden Smyth Art LLC canvas can be dusted and lived beside without fear.
Framing is chosen for the wall the painting will actually occupy. The studio asks for the dimensions of the room and a photograph where possible, then recommends a frame profile and finish that supports the painting rather than competing with it. Simple hardwood mouldings suit most portraiture, while venues and landscapes sometimes take a wider profile. Hardware is brass, hanging points are set level, and the backing is sealed so that insects and damp cannot reach the canvas. When a commission leaves the studio it is genuinely finished, which spares the client a second set of decisions and a second set of costs.
Gift Certificates
A gift certificate from Hayden Smyth Art LLC gives someone the chance to commission a painting on their own schedule, once they have chosen the photograph or the place that carries meaning for them. The giver provides the occasion and the budget, and the recipient decides the subject, the size and the timing. Certificates are issued in writing with a clear value and no expiry pressure, and the studio honours them for as long as the recipient needs. This is a gift that does not clutter a shelf and does not expire into a drawer.
Certificates are a common choice for weddings, anniversaries, retirements and memorials, and the studio is glad to write a short note to accompany one if the giver prefers not to explain the mechanics. There is no obligation to commission immediately and no penalty for waiting until the right photograph appears. When the recipient is ready, the process is exactly the same as for any other client: a conversation, a study where the composition warrants one, and a finished painting that is varnished and framed. A certificate simply holds a place on the stretch wall until the person is ready to fill it.
How the process works from start to finish
The process is deliberately simple. A commission starts with an enquiry by email to art@haydensmythart.hair or by telephone at +18145544377. In that first exchange the studio asks what is being painted, who it is for, where it will hang and roughly when it is needed. The studio then replies with a quotation covering the canvas size, the estimated timeline and any framing, with no hidden extras added later. From there the work moves through a study where needed, into the full painting, and finally into curing and varnishing. Progress is shared at agreed points, never in a flood and never in a silence.
Payment follows the same honest pattern: a deposit reserves a place in the studio schedule and the balance falls due when the painting is approved. Shipping is arranged from North Salt Lake with the canvas protected in a rigid crate, and local clients are welcome to collect by appointment. If anything about a commission is unclear at any stage, the client is encouraged to ask before the paint goes down rather than after the varnish is dry, because the studio would rather adjust a plan than repaint a finished face.