Feeling what your portrait feels

It was very strange, as I was painting the surprise portrait of a friends' mother, I started to cry. I had a lot of emotion, the painting -that I was painting- brought me to that state. Looking at her eyes, at her glance, that no doubt it is a key to this series, I felt sadness, and I wondered, what is 'she' feeling what is she thinking about? I hardly know the real person I am painting so I have no real answer to this questions. But I wanted to console her, to make her feel better, after a while, her glanced changed and we had again dry eyes. Now that I write this I think of an interview I just saw of Salman Rushdie where in a way he was describing this same situation as he was writing about one of his characters in his last book.

Don quixote
Yesterday I went to see the group show I am participating at the International Press Center. The Spanish Embassy asked 17 artists to work on Don Quixote. I had right away the idea of what I wanted to show, only finding my 'actors' to portrait Rosinante, Don Quixote and Sancho was the problem. I am very happy of the result because the people know right away what I am talking about, I could have not imagined better models and the triptych is very near to what I imagined 3 months ago when I've got invited. Today is the last day before they move the show 200 meters away to the Central Library also in the Hague. It is fun to see how the paintings will work in different places.