Quotes

Like Chekhov, I am a collector of souls… if I hadn’t been an artist, I could have been a psychiatrist.

The ultimate achievement in portraiture is to produce a great painting that happens to be a portrait; a piece of art that would be desirable to someone who is not even acquainted with the subject.

The portrait is one of the most curious art forms. It demands special qualities in the artist, and an almost total kinship with the model.

What a joy it is to capture the likeness of another human being. It has been said that the eyes are the window through which we glimpse the soul. That’s my favorite thing to paint – souls!

Faces are the most interesting things we see; other people fascinate me, and the most interesting aspect of other people – the point where we go inside them – is the face. It tells all.

Notice how, in a portrait, Rembrandt reduces the modeling of clothes to the essentials, emphasizing the head and the hands.

I want to paint men and women with that something of the external which the halo used to symbolize, and which we now seek to give by the actual radiance and vibrancy of our colorings.

The face is not a secondary billboard for our internal feelings. It is an equal partner in the emotional process.

I try to do as little coaching as possible, believing that the natural posture the subject assumes plays a large part in the overall likeness.

Usually my first impressions of personalities and lifestyles stay with me and are the foundation on which I build my portraits.