Charles Cundall 1926

Here we see a portrait of Charles Cundall in his studio, etched by Francis Dodd in 1922. Cundall is captured in the act of painting, holding his brush as a scepter of creation. Behind him, we can see that Dodd has included an icon on the wall. This inclusion suggests an invocation of the sacred act of image-making, a connection between the earthly and the divine. We see a similar theme in medieval icons, where the painter was considered a conduit, channeling spiritual truth onto wood panels. Consider also the motif of artists including paintings inside paintings, which appears throughout the Renaissance. These symbols speak to the idea of art as a mirror reflecting not just reality, but also the artist's inner world. The gesture of painting, immortalized here, becomes a timeless act, constantly re-enacted through history.