Um quadro

American Collectors de David Hockney

There they stand, Fred and Marcia Weisman, two LA plutocrats in their expensive sculpture garden - he with one fist clenched and leaking paint (art and money flowing through his fingers); she wearing a 60s hostess gown* and a weirdly wonky smile that is far too big for her face and looks somewhere between caricature and collage. Not just something but everything wrong about the mouth.

Except, of course, that her ungainly grin is echoed in the toothy smirk of the totem pole leering just behind her, a piece of pricey native American art. The mouth is not wrong but right, in the truest sense, possibly cruel but with a touch of affectionate humour. And everything from the manicured lawn to the abstract reflections of glass and the graphic set of her jaw gets its own distinct stylistic notations. It is a very smart and intelligent portrait. [daqui]

*Este quadro suscitou um acesso debate no nosso último jantar. Punha-se a questão de saber se aquela senhora se apresentava desleixada de roupão (opinião da maioria) ou num vestido estilizado (dizia eu). A discussão tinha razão de ser:

The hostess gown appeared to be a cross between a robe and an evening dress, which the hostess would wear to serve her guests. It combined both the formality of the evening dress and the relaxed "at home" feel of a robe. Hostess gowns were often difficult to separate from negligees, robes, or evening gowns, as they had characteristics common to all of these. [daqui]