Gentleman with... rats?
This picture reminds me of summer. It was around the end of summer when I decided to enter a little contest somewhere on the internet, which was about to create a rework of chosen masterpieces.
It was hot and I was sitting in the backyard garden in the company of growing onions, carrots, and a fluffball cat who after a time just got annoyed with the sun and had to be let inside the house. It was our daily routine you see, visiting the garden drawing and staring at next door cats as they try to go on their business, stopping for a minute or two to stare back at us.
So why did I rework Leonardo da Vinci’s famous painting in this way?
Have you researched the story behind the picture and who it portrays? And what’s with the ermine? And that for some reason Leonardo painted her hand bigger too?
As I read these stories about love, big hands, and how it seems as if it would be a caricature of a woman getting a hold on her lover, the idea came that in the world of gender equality and other gender-related expressions, I should go with a possessive male with long nails threateningly curling around the body of the dependent little rat clinging to him.
I especially loved how the composition turned out with the two rats and the hair of the gentleman making the eye move around the picture. I wonder though if Leonardo’s original picture’s background wouldn’t have been overpainted with black: how it would have looked like? In what environment the Lady would have looked out of the picture?