Garth, the name of the painter is Oscar Ghiglia. I stumbled on a catalogue of an old exhibition of his work. I must say that not all of them are as nice, infact just a few, I will scan them and post them. Ghiglia belongs to a group of painters who worked in Livorno, a town on the coast of Tuscany, you can see their works here.
http://www.comune.livorno.it/arte_cu...ori/autori.htm
Thank you for the great example, I understand what you mean by pushing something back, specially seeing the actual colour of that... whatsit. In my case I did not manage to create such a strong dialogue inside the painting, also it would have taken away from the boy. But... did you notice how the presence of a background easily turns the portrait into a painting, I mean a self sufficient one? I never had many "marbled" backgrounds, but I decided I won't paint them anymore, even a piece of cloth behind the subject will be enough for me.
Timothy, I am ashamed to say I went for the easy solution and just painted over it... as you say it would have taken too much effort! I had in mind to try and blur the rail, but then there would have been too many vertical lines to blur, I think it might have looked weird. I am planning to try and include the rail in a still life, just to take the challenge.
Linda,
Rembrandt painted himself with circles drawn on the wall behind him, the painting is in Kenwood house (the Iveagh bequest) here in London; Also my favourite English painter has some circles behind his models, I would post them but I think I can't post nudes.
Thanks to all
Ilaria