Perfection 1948

Gil Elvgren made this painting called “Perfection,” but when, and where, I don't know. I'm just saying that as an artist myself, sometimes I think the title is the last thing you think of. Anyway, what do you think Gil was trying to say about beauty, and being a woman, and flowers? He must have been thinking a lot about the Renaissance, with all that milky skin and soft light. There’s such a tenderness to the way he paints the figure, with its smooth, soft curves. It must have been amazing to watch him mixing colors, that precise eye, and that sure hand. There’s something about the way she's holding the flowers, like she's trying to find some perfect ideal. But maybe there's a suggestion that perfection isn't really attainable. I can imagine Gil, brush in hand, working away, trying to get everything just so, maybe he was chasing that same ideal too. We all are! But that’s what makes paintings so great: the artist’s pursuit of that idea, and their labor, is never truly finished but exists in this eternal, unresolved state.