EvelynLast week’s Mail carried a wonderful story about a self-taught Suffolk artist Heath Rosselli and a striking and beautiful nude portrait of a friend. The painting is to displayed at the Louvre as part of an exhibition to 'the changing face of breast cancer'. The painting will line up beside Rembrandt's famous painting Bathsheba At Her Bath. The portrait is of Evelyn Satterlee who posed for after a mastectomy.
Simply titled Evelyn, the portrait was simply a way of showing that life goes on. 'The whole point of doing it in the first place was to remove the stigma attached to mastectomies and the idea that people think it is grotesquely disfiguring,' Said Miss Rosselli. 'I wanted my portrait to show it is not an ugly thing.... The aim of the painting was to show that Evelyn remains a beautiful and whole woman, enjoying a full life, a happy marriage, and good health.'
When the portrait was unveiled in 1997, Mrs Satterlee said: 'I consider my missing breast as just a blemish - in the same way I think my thighs are too big and I have more wrinkles than I used to. Posing was a way of me saying that I am done with cancer now and that part of my life is now in the past.'
Miss Rosselli of Worlington in Suffolk, had taken up painting to support herself and her two children after her marriage fell apart.
BathshebaHeath Rosselli’s work is stunning and succeeds absolutely in portraying Evelyn Satterlee as a beautiful woman in her prime. Mrs Saterlee now teaches English in South Korea... Life goes on...
10 comments:
Heartbreakingly gorgeous!
Thank You for sharing this. She really is beautiful in the true sense of the word xx
My talented cousin Heath Rosselli asks me to let you know she is very chuffed to have such recognition in Ireland, as would Evelyn be if she knew.
Heath can really be counted as an Irish artist - her mother Ann was raised in North Tipp on the banks of Lough Derg, and Heath is a regular visitor to family still living here. My photo here is of a fine portrait she painted of me and my wife in 2007!
An enormous thank you is extended to the lovely, life-loving and courageous Evelyn for posing. An applause and a big thank you to Heath for painting the beautiful portrait. And thank you Jams for presenting the story.
It is a portrait of immense beauty and hope.
Beautiful. Cheers for sharing.
Thanks everyone. I am glad you find it as striking and as beautiful as I do
I prefer realism to the glossed-over, impossible-to-attain stick figure women on modern magazines.
(I'm especially loving that Bathsheba has a prominent belly roll.)
Absolutely EEWBL. The mastectomy scar does not make her any less beautiful
What a wonderful story Jams and so pertinent for the many women who face this prospect. I hope it will help them to come to terms with the fact that indeed life does go on and the loss of a breast does not affect the person you are.
Thanks for sharing it with us.
I'm glad you found the stoy as inspiring as I did jmb. Thanks
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