Portraits

According to a recent survey, many people would rather spend time with dogs than with other people. I love my dogs too, but people are fascinating, especially when I try to paint them. For me, drawing and painting nudes is the second-most challenging task of an artist. Drawing and painting portraits is the first, because the artwork has to be an accurate likeness of the subject. There are exceptions: Picasso is reputed to have answered a critic who complained that his famous portrait of Gertrude Stein didn’t look like her by replying, “Don’t worry, it will.” When you think about it for a moment, you realize how right he was.