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My good friend Nicholas Delbanco, a prolific author and the Robert Frost Distinguished Professor of English Language and Literature at the U. of Michigan, wrote in a recent book about artists who died young that essential to the portrait painter is the ability to be self-effacing. It's one of the few things Nicholas has ever written that I disagree with, and strikes at the heart of your excellent observations, Mike, about the distinctions between painted portraits and photographs. To me the painted portrait is as much about the artist as it is the subject. And whereas a photograph captures an instant of the subject's life, the painting is a record of the relationship between artist and subject over the period of time it takes to complete the work. We the viewers get to observe the subject through the artist's lenses and filters, as opposed to those of the camera.
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Threaded Mode
