[Tom Edgerton]

Dan--

Hope I didn't waste too much of your time with other suggestions and subsequent confusion. But now you know what you want to do, and the simplicity of this approach will work just fine.

Jim's right about the gradation of the background ending above her left eye--our right. I have always had a devil of a time with something this simple, as in deciding where to change tones behind the figure. I painted really "patchy" backgrounds as I started, and still do sometimes.

What if the gradation followed the diagonal axis that you've already established from lower left to upper right corner. It would tend to break somewhat lower on the dark side of her head, and the lower half of her face and shoulder would start to emerge from it on that side. Might give you an opportunity to (somewhat) lose the edges on that darker side. Might heighten the drama.

When I started to look again at this issue in Sargent, I began to realize that if the PERFECT background value is set behind the head, the tonal variations can be very subtle and compressed and still give a real feeling of space and atmosphere around and behind, without a lot of patchy value change. I'm only beginning to get it, and have to fight hard for it.

Best--TE