I find that redrawing some of my favorite pieces by my favorite artists gives me some additional knowledge. I’m not saying that it’s an improvement, but sometimes I correct what seems to me an oddity. Sometimes it’s just a common style. Women with arms the size of most men’s legs for example. Often during the Renaissance the women looked more like football lineman.

Now, it could be said that the models were exactly like that, who is to say? We don’t have photographs!

But we do have some photos of the models for some of the later art movements. When I come across some of the more high resolution photos, I try to render the image more or less in the style of the artist.

This is the favorite muse/model of Gustave Klimt. Her name is Emilie Floge. She is the source of dozens of images by Klimt. She was an important fashion designer in Vienna and a successful businesswoman. She was also a lifetime partner of Gustave Klimt and inherited half of his estate when he died in 1918. Emilie died in 1952 at the age of 77.