Patience in Art Collecting

Patience is a virtue, especially in art collecting, and I certainly needed to exercise this virtue when we wanted to purchase this painting. When we started out in our married life, it was one or two pieces of furniture a year. When we saw this painting in a make shift antique mall in Baltimore, it impressed me very much, mostly because of my faith, and because of its great beauty. My husband told me he would be willing to pay x, when the dealer quoted the price, it was four times that. Well let's just say that was out of the question, but here's where the patience comes in. I called one year, the price went down. Two years the price went down. Three to four years later, the price was what my husband wanted to pay. It's a possibility this is a study of the Spanish Baroque artist Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, who lived from 1617-1682, or it could have just been an art student studying his craft. In any case, it was special to me. Its large size creates a focal point in the room which is what I call an anchor, sometimes you see rooms where everything appears to be floating. As in painting, so also in interior design there needs to be dominant, subordinate and less subordinate pieces and objects in a room. The eye travels from the dominant to the subordinates, and depending on room size this process can repeat. I never tire of this painting and have always appreciated it being the focal point in our living room.