Ernest Egbert Blyth, Last Mayor & First Lord Mayor of Norwich 1911

This is William Orpen's portrait of Ernest Egbert Blyth, painted with oils on canvas. Look at the way Orpen has built up layer upon layer, the subtle shift in the light on his face, the bright white of the ruffled lace and ermine trim, the almost comic pomposity of the man himself. When he was making this painting, maybe Orpen was thinking about the grand tradition of portraiture. Like, how do you capture someone’s essence? How do you make a painting that speaks to both the individual and their role? The textures are amazing; the fur looks so soft you just want to reach out and touch it, and the way the light catches the chain… It’s all so carefully observed. And that’s what’s so cool about painting, right? It's the way one artist can riff off another, echoing and answering and questioning across decades and centuries. There are no fixed answers; just a continuing conversation, that each artist joins in their own way.