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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=460650" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>0181 Mr and Mrs Andrews Seated In Their Estate</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">Beware, if you’re a portrait painter, <br>of being born in England. And if<br>you’re skilled at background –<br>the rolling landscape which they're<br>so proud to own – or painting highlights<br>upon a silk or satin gown…be doubly hesitant –<br>we ruined Holbein and we ruined Van Dyck, <br>with our demands to make us victorious, <br>happy and glorious, long to reign over others<br>in our stately home, later in<br>the auction house, in<br>the ‘collection’ of the recent millionaire, in<br>the public gallery; though while you live, Sir Portrait Painter<br>we'll enrol you in our club as temporary gent…</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Beware - if you’re a potential patron -<br>of being painted by the great: <br>in the corners of their flattery<br>whose price you resent but need in greed to have, <br>lurks truth. You, sir, looking so judicious, <br>why are your lips so meanly pressed? <br>You, young man, aspiring to a lordly rank, <br>why are your eyes already lined <br>with wenching, gaming, debt? </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Beware - if you’re an ‘art critic’ or a lecturer -<br>of your so ready, easy, redbrick politics<br>which masquerade as ‘context’ – for<br>there may be traps..</div><div style="margin:10px 0">‘Here, ladies and gentlemen – would you<br>stand back a little so that everyone can see? –<br>are Mr Robert Andrews of Sudbury, Suffolk, and <br>his wife Frances, painted by that <br>enchanting painter Thomas Gainsborough<br>around 1748 to 1749… they chose<br>the right man for the job: here are the rolling miles<br>of this royal throne of kings, this<br>sceptred island, this jewel set<br>in a silver sea, this earth, this realm, this –<br>England – which they have the impertinence<br>of the nouveau riche to think they own – note, <br>in contrast to Gainsborough’s customary lovely touch, <br>how awkwardly they pose – is this the<br>first black cloud that presages the fall<br>of ancien regimes? The first comment<br>on social class in England’s much-delayed<br>Enlightenment? The socialist critic Peter Berger<br>says of this revealing document in paint…’ <br>etc.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Alas for theory <br>about this awkward pair: the painting’s raw<br>because it’s not quite finished and now<br>over-cleaned, no mellowing brownish final varnish; <br>and notice the bedroom shadows under<br>her eyes, above the prim finishing-school mouth<br>that almost smiles: they’ve only married this very<br>month: he’s twenty-two, she’s just sixteen.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">and they have had their <br>first lovers’ tiff: should Gainsborough<br>paint in the pheasant which her Bob’s just shot, <br>which is already outlined in her lap -<br>and spoil her new, so sky-blue satin dress? </div><div style="margin:10px 0">They haven’t yet decided; Gainsborough’s left<br>the painting unfinished, while they kiss, make up, decide; <br>he has another appointment booked.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">How much more interesting than what we know<br>is what, alas, we don’t.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Michael+Shepherd">Michael Shepherd</a><div class=q>
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<script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=460650" data-title="0181 Mr and Mrs Andrews Seated In Their Estate de Michael Shepherd" data-description="Beware, if you’re a portrait painter, 
of being born in England. And if
you’re skilled at background –
the rolling landscape which they're
so proud to own – or painting highlights
upon a silk or satin gown…be doubly hesitant –
we ruine..."></div>
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