I'm always on the lookout for contemporary examples of the themes we explain. The Artist as another Artist is one of the most important given the common feeling among them that they pursue the same goal in their own unique way, that in some sense all true art is by one and the same artist just as we are all human sharing the same essence. Alan Feltus was the subject of a recent post but I have since come across another early work by him obviously inspired by the mid-20th century American painter Arshile Gorky. It's a self-portrait with two other figures. Feltus has said of it:
"I made what I called the Gorky that Gorky never painted, using a photograph of Gorky with his daughter on his shoulders and André Breton. Basing it on Gorky's portrait of himself as a boy with his mother in the Whitney Museum collection (below)."
Gorky painted it using a photograph of himself as a boy. Why, though, was Feltus attracted to Gorky? I cannot say for certain but I wouldn't be surprised based on what earlier artists have done that Feltus not only admired Gorky's work but identified with him too. Why?....
...they looked alike. Or had the same moustache.
What's interesting is that Feltus did not do what so many others have done: painted himself resembling another artist or, vice versa, painted another artist resembling himself. While his style and composition he used is clearly similar to Gorky's, there is no physiognomic link in the painting itself. It's based on background knowledge, a sly way of referencing artistic tradition without being blatant about it.