Sonnet 3: Thou art thy mother's glassLook in thy glass, and tell the face thou viewest Now is the time that face should form another; Whose fresh repair if now thou not renewest, Thou dost beguile the world, unbless some mother, For where is she so fair whose unear'd womb Disdains the tillage of thy husbandry? Or who is he so fond will be the tomb Of his self-love, to stop posterity? Thou art thy mother's glass, and she in thee Calls back the lovely April of her prime: So thou through windows of thine age shall see Despite of wrinkles this thy golden time. But if thou live remember'd not to be Die single, and thine image dies with thee.William Shakespeare |
January 2012 |
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The painting borrows its motive and its overall conceptual structure from Eduard Manet’s last unfinished painting, where a large mirror behind the girl’s back reflects a man talking to her – be it the viewer or someone she thinks of. The portrait of the young man comes from Titian’s “Man with a glove”. I did not wish for the character of my painting to be a “copy” of Titian’s in any sense, but rather to be recognisably the same man – one of the most iconic images of a Renaissance young and beautiful nobleman in the history of art. |
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