Posthumous Portraits
Tucker Civil War era portraits
In the 1980's Tom created two posthumous portraits for
the Tucker family. Both of these were begun with small
tin type photos taken in the 1800's. These small delicate
early efforts at photography measured approximately
2 x3 inches and were of a grey brown color.
For the Richard Murphy Tucker portrait, on
the left, Tom rented clothes to replace the casual ones
Richard was wearing in the old tin type in order to
make a more formal portrait.
Tom also had to 'remove' the slouch hat that
Richard had been wearing during his photos session.
By applying his knowledge of anatomy and also studying
surviving members of the Tucker family, Tom arrived
at his rendition of how the head appeared and where
the hair might have been parted etc.
John Alonzo Tucker, on the right was wearing
a plain suit and sitting next to his first wife. The
family wanted to commemorate John's participation in
the Civil War, so Tom rented a Civil War uniform and
was able to change the clothes in the painting using
manikins and stand in models.
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