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Portraits as a symbol and the meaning of the ending

posted 9 years ago by thenicotinefairy
3 replies | jump to latest

Portraits as a symbol

The symbol of portraits was the main theme of the movie. A portrait is a forgery in itself. If you look at Virgil's paintings, they were all of women posing for the painting. None of them are candid. We don't know anything about those women's thoughts, ideas, visions, desires, hopes or fears. All we know is the pose they struck, which is a forgery of who they are rather than an illustration of their authentic selves. This is due to the painter's own choice. The painter chooses to have a subject strike a pose rather than illustrating something authentic about the subject.

I'm reminded of an informal study by OK Cupid about which online dating profiles have the most success. They found that many people strike a pose for their photos, so you have men showing off their abs and women showing off their cleavage. Those dating profiles get the most attention, but most of that attention is useless and fails to develop into a real relationship. Then you have photos of someone actually doing something that shows who they are. They had an example of a woman playing a guitar, not even showing her face as it was looking down at the guitar. Then one of a man scuba diving, his face also obscured by the scuba suit. Those photos get less attention but have a much higher rate of making a real connection that develops until a real relationship.

In his obsession with portraits, Virgil was specifically choosing "forgeries" (women in faked poses, not showing their real selves). He never had any interest in seeing anything authentic about a woman, which is why he had never made a connection with one. So in a way, this is a story of "Be careful what you wish for." He preferred the fake side of a woman, what was just for show, instead of a real authentic connection with another person. That's exactly what he got.

The ending

There's a lot of discussion about the meaning of the ending and some have pointed out that he is not wearing his gloves in the end. I believe there is a key line in the movie that explains the significance of this. When he identifies a painting as forged, he says that it is still a masterpiece and worth a great deal, just nothing compared to the original.

Connect this to the main "forgery" in the movie. His fake relationship with Claire was still wonderful and it was still of great value to him, even though it turned out to be fake. It did change him enough that he could permanently stop using his gloves, and that is valuable. It's nothing compared to authentic love and connection, but definitely still worth something to him.

[–] LilyDaleLady 9 years ago

You have clearly never painted a portrait, LOL.

There are no "candid" portrait paintings like there are candid PHOTOS. Photos take an instant. A decent painting (most that Virgil owned were lifesize oil portraits) takes weeks to months, and can take YEARS. I believe that Leonardo Da Vinci spent 7 years painting the Mona Lisa (though that is extreme).

Oil paint doesn't even DRY for weeks. So by necessity, any PAINTING would have to be composed, by both artist & sometimes the sitter.

Before the invention of photography (around 1840s), there was nothing BUT paintings or drawings. Even early photography, you had to sit perfectly still for a long time. You don't see really candid portrait photos until the 20th century.

BTW: there is nothing original about the photos people put online for OK Cupid or Match.com....LOL, a photo of someone trying to act like they kayak all the time (when they are really couch potatoes) or helping orphans or something similar, is just as fake as a coquettish pose in a painting. Maybe more so.

Photographs online in dating sites are not proof of ANYTHING. It is a very new form of communication, while paintings are thousands of years old. Also: those paintings were only very rarely for the purpose of attracting a mate. They are more likely a record of the lives of wealthy people, and also acted like "photograph albums" to preserve how someone looked in their youth, or at the time of a marriage or coronation. Needless to say, they were almost entirely paintings of the very, very rich or royalty.

[–] casualmoviegoer5 9 years ago

LilyDaleLady,

You're criticizing the previous comment for saying or implying that portraits can be candid. But I don't think the previous comment argues says or implies that.

Instead, it says "A portrait is a forgery in itself." While it does say about Virgil's collection of portraits, "None of them are candid," I don't read that to say that other portraits are candid. Even if thenicotinefairy meant to say that some portraits are candid, it wouldn't change the point of his or her review.

Still, some pictures can tell the truth about the sitter. There's is a photo by Steichen of J.P. Morgan, and a photo of Churchill by Yousef Karsh, both of which illustrate the sitter's characters. Certainly that applies to some oil portraits, too.

thenicotinefairy also doesn't argue that all OK Cupid photos showing people doing things are honest but that they are more likely to disclose real info about the sitter, if the sitters include objects from their own lives that matter to themselves. Sure, as you say, people can fake that. But I think thenicotinefairy's point still stands.

Some portraits and photos reveal or depict the character and nature of the sitter, and some portraits and photos do not reveal or depict the character and nature of the sitter.

[–] PaulDowsett 9 years ago

The symbol of portraits was the main theme of the movie. A portrait is a forgery in itself. If you look at Virgil's paintings, they were all of women posing for the painting. None of them are candid. We don't know anything about those women's thoughts, ideas, visions, desires, hopes or fears. All we know is the pose they struck, which is a forgery of who they are rather than an illustration of their authentic selves.

I agree with you. All the way through, it's clear to the viewer that Virgil's relationship with Claire is very superficial. This is reflected in his relationship with all the other "women" in his life (ie the portraits).