Nick Nerney contacted me a couple of days ago with the news that his family had a painting of his Aunt Virginia by my grandfather. He and his daughter tried taking photographs on two different days (the first was rainy and they could not get decent light). The second day however, the image came out beautiful! What a stunning portrait of a lovely young woman who died far too young. My grandfather painted the portrait from a photographic image taken to celebrate her graduation from Simmons College in 1932. Here it is:
What a beautiful portrait! What eyes! To learn more about Virginia, her family, and the portrait click on the following "hot" link to where I have uploaded the image in one of my galleries: portrait of Virginia Stanhope Nerney.
While I have been excited about this project since beginning anew, seeing COLOR images of the paintings by my grandfather -- most of the documentation photos I have were done in B&W -- has been like the difference between a being and its ghost! My sincere thanks and gratitude to the Nerney family.
For a short while, I imagined families all over RI (and maybe beyond) contacting me abut wanting to share THEIR Duphiney portraits. I thought maybe I should do a press release to encourage more contact and sharing. Then I thought, no, this was a kind gesture, but not something others might do...until tonight! I received another email from someone who had seen the gallery on www.pbase.com and also left a message. This indidual has TWO portraits she would like to share. She did not know the sitters of the portrait -- a Dr. and his wife -- but had purchased the portraits. I can't wait to see them!
My grandfather was an incredibly prolific portrait painter. And I have begun to think that reaching out to the people of RI may bring this project to a level that I never imagined in this project. It could be that the portraits of Wilfred I. Duphiney speak on a collectively intimate level that makes his work more important than, and in ways I never realized, when I started this project.
UPDATE: 4/11/2011
I received two images today taken by a cell phone camera -- she will take better photos later but just wanted to share. They are of Dr. and Mrs. Duschene and were painted in 1948. More info later, in the meantime here are images of the lovely couple.
