I love these paintings by Feliks Topolski. Turn it into a game to see if you can guess who the subjects are before peeking, then come back here to tell me which one is your favourite!
20 Literary Greats Gripe About Feliks Topolski’s Portraits [courtesy of The Daily Beast]
A Small Press Life: Books. Art. Writing. Life. Tea. 
Reblogged this on Clatter & Clank.
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Writers like these are idiosyncratic people with distinctive personalities. I like these paintings very much – he is not pandering to vanity but taking it to the other extreme, almost presented as monsters or caricatures. But I like it – you can see what they were and that the portraits are full of life.
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I love these paintings for exactly that reason. There is a total absence of perfection in these portrayals, no sucking up to the famous sitters. They are entirely individual.
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Exactly. A little Lucian Freud – human in all their glory.
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It is probably no surprise that I love Lucian Freud.
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C.P. Snow is my fave. Those glasses are hilarious. They remind me of the old “Herman” cartoons.
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I cannot choose just one, but I really like Betjeman, Snow, Eliot, Waugh, Priestley and, of course, the much earlier Shaw painting. The “Herman” comment cracked me up; I totally see that now.
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TS! Thanks for this 🙂
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You are welcome!
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Reblogged this on Henrietta Richer and commented:
Love these although I couldn’t figure out who most of the portraits represent. I wish I could get paid for painting like this.
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It was really hard. I recognized about half, after some squinting! I love the style of these portraits so much; more power to you if you could do something similar.
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