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The first muscle in my face that goes when I'm tired is somewhere around my right eye, so that the lid drops about 1/3 of the way. I'm aware that this affects my appearance about 1/3 of my day, but I'm not sure I'd want a portrait to capture it -- though, it might just be that certain je ne sais quoi dash that differentiates the work. Perhaps I shall hire a portraitist to arrive in the evening for our sessions, to determine whether this is true.
Daniel Greene told a story at a workshop about running into a portrait subject with obvious asymmetry in his facial features, and Greene struggled with whether to capture that, or to "correct" it. He chose to paint what he saw, and later met another member of the family, who exhibited the exact same features. So Greene was "vindicated," in that he realized that he'd actually caught a family trait faithfully.
The 19th Century Australian impressionist Sir Arthur Streeton made his first sale to the Art Gallery of New South Wales only after he'd made some adjustments to the painting, at the request of a trustee. Nonetheless, Streeton is revered and beloved in that country in a way unknown here.
I'd be inclined to make the changes that a commissioned-portrait client asks for, and be delighted to delight her.
And if I refused the request, I'd want to make darn sure I was right about my own perception. In the face of such an objection on such an important assignment, I'd probably run it by a trusted artist friend, to see if there might be something to the objection. At the very least, you'd get a cuppa tea with a friend. Our experience on this Forum is that an artist very often is able to profit from a fresh pair of eyes viewing the work anew.
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