In 1895, the American Realist painter, Thomas Eakins, painted the Portrait of Maud Cook. The forthcoming paragraphs are a critique of this work of art.
What struck me about this particular painting was the strong chiaroscuro, which is the extremes of light and dark. The background, for instance, is a dark umber or van dyke brown, which envelopes the emerging figure like a blanket. The woman’s face emerges from this cloak, looking away from the audience in a listful, aloof expression. Her expression is nearly blank, possibly reserved, as she looks away. Perhaps the woman is thinking of how tired she must be, having to stand for so long in the artist’s studio.
Upon closer examination of this portrait, we see a mixture of soft and hard edges. The hardest edge of the entire piece is along the upper cheek, below her right eye. I find it interesting that the brightest point of the piece is her forehead, but the hardest edge is along her cheek, which mirrors the highlight.
The clothing has a bit of a glow, which is the essence of the soft edge. The brushstrokes that create the clothing flow around her shoulders, culminating in the V-neck, like two rivers joining into one large, body.
The tinted crimson lips and clothing lead the eye upward toward the light, and eventually to the eye, which refuses to break the thought that she is otherwise engaged. Her disinterest in the world around her reminds us all of those moments that we step back from our surroundings and introspect. The yellowish skin tones formed around the red and brown shadows link her to her pink garment, and to the dark browns in the background, to form a striking, earthy color scheme.
Image Source:
http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/full.php?ID=10340
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