The Singing Butler

[sg]

In this painting by Vettriano, have you noticed that the big mistake is that the woman is leading?
Why is this the most popular painting in Britain (as the One Show has just told us)?

I think it's rubbish! What do you think?

[sam100]

You watched the One Show too then :)

[jno]

I've always thought it looks rather nice, but as a print or an image - I don't know what the original painting actually looks like. But sooner that than Damien Hirst, thank you.

[jake-the-peg]

I've always thought there's a lot of snobbery in the art world about art that people rather snearingly call "illustrative".

It's as if a picture that is directly representative of its subject is not as good as one that is more abstract or impressionistic.

The real double standards though seem to come in with regard to the pictures date. This rule only seems to apply to paintings that are post-photography.

I've yet to see someone turn their nose up at a Rembrandt and say "Yes but it is very illustrative though isn't it?"

Vettriano seems to fall into this a lot - plus the fact that his art seems to chime with people who don't have an art background - so he commits the dual sins of being illustrative and popular.

I must say I wouldn't have it on my top ten - not because it's rubbish but because there is so many better.

Is this popular paintings that are in Britain or those that are popular with the British?

In the case of the former and in no particular order I'd probably go for
Jackson Pollock - Summertime
Stubbs - Whistlejacket
Turner - Rain Steam Speed
Bellini - Portrait of Doge Leonardo Loredan

What about you?

[Huderon]

And what does it matter that the woman is leading ? I've been led by a woman when dancing - admittedly she was learning to dance man and I was learning lady at the time.

And of course there is the memory of Some Like it Hot and the dance sequence with Jack Lemmon and Joe E Brown ("Daphne, you're leading again") :-)

[sincnoel]

i watch the one show only for bleakley's legs. fabulous!

[sincnoel]

... and a work of art in their own right!!!

[fredpuli47]

As the One Show said, Vettriano copied from an artists' modelling book, containing depictions of the body in various postures in the correct proportions (cheaper than using live models, as he said ). Now, it may be that the couple were depicted mirror fashion so that the outline could be traced on tracing paper and transferred, the marks on the tracing paper being pressed face down ,thereby giving the image outline the right way around, but Vettriano didn't appreciate that and copied the image straight from the page. He then enlarged the outline using a pantograph as needed (or , alternatively,they were right originally but he used tracing paper !).

As a picture, it succeeds as what picture dealers and collectors call 'a conversation piece' , a picture which hints at some story.Working out what the story is or may be gives rise to conversation ( hence the name). As such, it works beautifully ..

[dundurn]

We used to have a copy of the book Vettriano used. My daughter may still have it, actually. The photographs were too small for there to be any thought of tracing them. In most cases there would be anything up to 18 or 24 pictures of the same pose all fitted on to 2 (approx) A4 pages. The camera position was moved around the subject so you got front/ rear/ side/ profile shots and there were three height variations also.

When I first saw his paintings they did seem uncannily familiar. It was only much later when we were moving house and came across a lot of our daughter's A-level Art coursework, including the source book in question, that I realised why this was.