El Greco

[Carlos Ygoa]

I have attached a study I did of El Greco's "Knight with his Hand on his Breast". I was fortunate enough to have done this in front of the original, in the museum, from start to finish. It took me about 20 sessions--El Greco is quite complicated and it was the first study I had done of this artist.

The original image is taken from the museum's website and I'm afraid the image is not very good. I have a photo of the original here at home in a book but it is a photo of the work before it was restored some years ago. There is a great abyss that separates the look of the painting before the "cleaning" and the way it looks now. I'm sure everyone is more familiar with the older version (with a black background and everything else just generally darker).

It was a very good experience to copy this painting, just as it is to copy any old master. Fun, but very taxing mentally. I find this artist to be unique in every sense of the word. And way before his time. I recommend him for those who want to study, if only to exercise one's sense of colur, if we can look beyond the Mannerist distortions of his figures.

This is my first time to send an attachment. I hope I do it well. I cannot send other works as of yet on account of the technical problem I still have with my other computer where all my files are. Hope to solve this soon.