Henri de Braekeleer, Belgian
It Wasn’t Until Kent Put on His Glasses That He Realized He’d Mixed Up His Plates and Painted Half the Thing With His Veal Parm, 1876
Oil on canvas
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/// When a painting’s repair is required,
The Retoucher is sought out and hired.
He can mix any hue
and match all brushwork, too.
His original works? Uninspired.
/// What he does calls for patience and skill.
It’s a job that not many can fill.
When he’s done you would swear
there had been no repair;
as the art looked when new it looks still.
/// He repairs damage, fixes mistakes
that a poorly trained retoucher makes.
Adept in any style,
he’ll be drawn in a while
to get rich as a forger of fakes.
/// Since a masterpiece he can retouch,
I’d imagine it wouldn’t take much
to see if he could match
a whole painting from scratch.
(Just forget laws and morals and such.)
/// If a copy that’s perfect you seek,
he can master and ape each technique.
Yet duplicative art
needs great hands, but not heart.
All his work that’s not copied is weak.
/// He dipped veal into oil paints in haste,
and his death was a terrible waste.
As for how he could eat
toxic-paint-covered meat,
he apparently never had taste.