I Believe in Angels

Comment

Comment by Resident Curator on November 18, 2019 at 11:17am

Curator’s Comments:

 

When this piece entitled I Believe in Angels was posted back in 2009, it was identified in the caption as a work in progress. Since there never appeared to be a follow up on the site with another version, I wonder if you ultimately came to the same conclusion that I did, that it was actually finished? The painting appeared in a random viewing on the site today, and I found the slight ambiguity of form to be quite pleasing. While no part of the composition looks unfinished, I recognized the smoothly blended blue and warm sepia tones in the figure’s head and neck have considerably less detail and chiaroscuro than the rest of her body and glossy garment.  The silhouettes in the background appear to be her cast shadows, although they contain similar mid-range values used in other areas of the work.  The expression on the young subject is beautifully pensive, as she emerges from the darkness. The title of the painting expresses a belief in the supernatural, and I enjoy the irony of the idyllic figure being bathed in a more natural, earthbound light source of her control.