Orca Bates

Orca Bates (born 1976) was the favorite model for artist Jamie Wyeth.[1][2] He was first painted in late 1989, and numerous times over the next five years.[3] Orca was a "wild child",[4][5] described by Jamie as "more of a seagull than a person".[6] Orca's parents, Daniel and Amy Bates, had divorced by the time Orca was 12. Both remarried and continued to live on Manana Island (adjacent to Monhegan island, about 10 miles [16 km] off Pemaquid Point on the mainland), where they were neighbors of Jamie Wyeth. Orca and his younger sister, Kila, split their time between the two households.[7]

Orca currently lives in Pine Island, New York. He married Colleen Dougherty in 2011.[8] Orca's younger half-brother, Cat Bates (born 1986), also modeled for Jamie Wyeth in 1995.[9]

Wyeth's paintings of Orca Bates include:

• "Portrait of Orca Bates," 1989, oil on panel, 50 x 40 in., William A Farnsworth Library & Art Museum, standing holding a large bird
• “Orca Bates,” 1990, oil on panel, 40 x 40 in., collection of Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas
• "Orca" 1990, Standing in blue uniform, 50 x 44 in.
• Screen Door to the Sea, 1994, oil on panel, 36 x 30 in.