Rat Boy

an acrylic painting for my painting2 final project. It's an "appropriation" of Van Gogh's painting "Young Man With a Cap". The assignment was to take an old painting by a classic artist, change it in some way, and add stuff to it to make it different. One thing I noticed about Van Gogh's portrait paintings is that they aren't usually happy looking. That's what I decided to change with this and the rats crawling on him are the reason he is happy. It's hard not to giggle when playing with a favorite pet.

(the two rats are inspired by my own fuzzy pet rats. Below, Marge is the black and white one and Marilyn is the blond)