Bourgeois Portrait Print

I draw in my sketchbook every day. The subjects tend to be places, people, diagrams, imaginary maps, unlikely architecture, visual puns. This is from category 2. He isn't anybody in particular. I began at the feet, the wingtip shoes, the crossed legs, the carefully buttoned coat and vest, the wing collar. Then I drew the kind of face that would fit atop such a costume. I don't know any petty officials from a petty state in the 19th century, but this might be such a person. I suspect the moustache and the eyeglasses served him as a disguise, something to hide behind when asked questions or favors. An imagined portrait requires the viewer to fill in the biography of crime or virtue. With this kind of character it's hard to tell which side he falls on. This drawing appeared in the Hamish Hamilton magazine FiveDials in 2019.