Circus Dreams, The Artist's Eye

This new piece of work was built on the portrait I painted last week of a model wearing striped leggings, a short miniskirt, and a tank top. I posted her in the last blog entry so you would see just the beginning of an idea. As I painted, I began to see her as a past acrobat in a circus, or a clown, perhaps. All this week I couldn't shake this image in my head of how she kept returning to dreams of her past life. As I began to explore the idea, I realized how many artists had painted circus themes, some from reality, some from imagination. Then, they too, became part of the images floating in my head, It consumed me as I went about exploring imagery that might become a part of her imagined past. Below are  some of the details I included in the painting. I loved the involvement with works of great Master's of the past, and I was driven by the need to incorporate them seamlessly into my own painting. SEE BELOW. Click on each to see them enlarged for detail.

Upper left...Picasso's painting of  circus acrobats, followed by a vintage Barnum and Bailey poster.

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To the right of the model's head is a Chagall painting of the simultaneous events that take place at a circus

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Seurat's painting of the Circus and its acrobat appears above Emmet Kelly the famous  clown's photo, with Renoir's young acrobat/jugglers below right, actual performer's in  their father's circus.

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In the lower right, below the Chagall circus is a part of a circus painting of two young girls, acrobats and jugglers who actually were performers in the circus owned by their father.

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