The business suit in portraiture

The business suit has to be the least interesting element in portraiture. A suit is a suit is a suit is a suit. If you have seen one havn't you seen them all?

Artists often emphasize the body with disproportionately long arms and legs, large hands and shoes. They draw the head undersized and the body elongated. Interesting portraiture focuses on something unique in an individual. The head and face capture personality yet 90% of the canvas ends up being the generic, stiff, routinely posed body clothed in the ever-dull business suit. Any number of heads could be interchanged with these suited dummy bodies without detection.

At least unbutton the coat and strike a pose, maybe add some interesting light and shadow from a window, fireplace or candle. Or maybe add the glistening of water from a nearby glass, bottle of vintage wine or rain hitting a window? Wrinkle the suit with folds from a relaxed posture instead of the typical postmortem-totem pole stance. People are more attractive when they are relaxed anyway and you know they want to look their best in a portrait.

Are we artists with creative license and imagination or mere technicians?

[Tom Martinez]

We are servants to the client. It's the Money Rule. The one with the money rules. Those paintings with stiff business suits are corporate paintings made to impart an aura of success. You can't do that with open collar poses and wine bottles in view. The client will always tell you how the painting will look. It is our abilities as artists to make it look that way with an artistic look about it. And we, professionals and business entrepeneurs, will follow the age old saying of " The customer is always right."

[Michael Georges]

I agree with Tom that most portraits of men in suits "suit" a purpose - to portray a successful gentlemen in his business environment. Further, they are usually meant to be displayed in a corporate environment, an office or boardroom.

Certainly if you are doing a personal portrait for someone, where the setting will be more casual and the portrait will be displayed in a more family or home environment, then loosening up the suit, and/or adding some flare is completely appropriate.

[Stanka Kordic]

I also think we have the choice of which genre to paint and specialize in.

[Jim Riley]

Michael,

You said-"The business suit has to be the least interesting element in portraiture. A suit is a suit is a suit is a suit. If you have seen one haven't you seen them all"?

Absolutely not!

If you believe that, don't paint suits. They all look the same only if you believe it's so. A suit can describe the subject almost as well as the face. The posture, shoulder line, and width and form are very important and they should be an important part of the composition. Take a look at the Z.S. Liang painting under Legal/Judicial on SOG and note the beautiful shape of the tie and shirt as defined by the suit lapels. I couldn't find an example to illustrate but have seen some wonderful treaments of suits where the play of light and reflected light made the lapel on one side appear dark against light and light against dark on the other.

Chase said: "
" Do not try to paint the grandiose thing. Paint the commonplace so that it will be
distinguished." I subscribe to that.

As a topic of discussion my comments are intended to describe the commonplace treatment of the business suit in portraiture. It really goes without saying that the client is responsible for selecting the theme and clothing for the commisioned portrait. What the artist does with these limitations is their strength or weakness.

I am speaking of the paper doll treatment that the business suit receives in countless portraits. There are exceptional artists who have made the most mundane elements interesting. My suggestions hint at making something more of a very dull ingredient. Even a brush stroke can accomplish this by the hand of the skilled artist.

Portraiture benefits from the individual style and unique qualities in the subject and in the artist's abilities. Sometimes it is attention to detail (leave it in/out or enhance) and awareness of things overlooked. It happens to make me uncomfortable to view a portrait with someone sitting in an awkwardly stiff and rigid posture. People do not normally sit or stand this way and I either credit or fault the artist for a remedy. The phenomenon stems from the ignorance of substructure and anatomy and should not be confused with a posture that may replicate the client with precision.

I am not suggesting we clothe executives in pajamas for my sake. I am advocating making the most of everything. By some chance we might elevate the painting to a level of art beyond cookie cutter portraiture, with regards to the business suit at least.

[Jim Riley]

A poor painting is a poor painting. It never occurred to me that suits might be a contributor any more than other elements of the composition and think I have seen fewer bad suit paintings than any other outfits and that may be due in part because formal business/executive commissions are not as likely to be trusted to the less skilled artist.

Maybe it is like thinking of a carrot. When something bothers you in a certain way you see more of it everywhere.

I don't think the business exec is an art afficionado and the commissioning of a portrait is out of his field of expertise. It is a decision likely resting on company tradition or a referral from a colleague.

This opens another can of worms dealing with fashion, fame, popularity and simple convenience. The art world is driven by this machine. I can't leave out politics either.

It takes a knowing eye to see where talent and skill leaves a tool behind. There will always be an artist raising the bar and a buyer defining the lowest common denominator. When money is an issue art often suffers. I need money to live but I would rather die than lose my ability to see the ideal.

[Jim Riley]

Suits/Exec's

Attached is the suit painting I referenced earlier in this thread. It's by Thomas S. Buechner and I can't imagine doing a better job of it. I will keep it as a humbling and inspiring example of what can be done with a suit.

I also must defend executive portraits. Having made a design career within 3 major corporations as Designer, Manager, Design Director and 9 years as Vice President of Color and Design I would say it a mistake to to think them any less open to possibilities then the doting mother or grandmother or any other portrait subjects you might face in this profession. In every case it's neccessary to define the end goal and sell the client.

You might be surprised how much the guy at the top has in his bag of skills. It's common also to assume that engineers and research are not creative but all artist are. Not true.

And I guess "money dictates" in the sense that if you make something and nobody is moved to buy it. But that seems to apply to all products.

I hope, Micheal, that you can pursue your ideals and live a long successful life in doing so but can't help noting that the painter Lucian Freud who has already achieved fame, fortune, and world wide recognition, painted Queen Elizabeth's portrait in what we must assume, (until we learn differently), was up to his ideals and check out what our fellow artist (the bar raisers?) had to say in Cafe Guerbois.

Drat! As Karin would say. The attachment didn't attach here but can be found below in my next post.

[Jim Riley]

Again, The suit image.