Recently the National Portrait Gallery in Washington unveiled official portraits of Bill and Hillary (their second).
Mrs. Clinton's portrait depicts her in profile against a brown background, and it is said that the painting's style borrows heavily from 14th-century Italian art. Hillary's new portrait can be found here, and at least with this painting she is not depicted in one of her ubiquitous pantsuits, unlike her full-body, official White House portrait.
"It's an odd experience to have your portrait done," she told her small audience at the private unveiling ceremony. "Many of my predecessors played a major role in our nation's history. One only has to read the stories to know this."
The artist who was chosen by Hillary is Ginny Stanford, who said she used Renaissance-style painting because Mrs. Clinton's face is so "iconic," and she wanted to invoke "a timelessness."
Stanford also noted that "she's got a great profile."
Stanford was commissioned to do the painting in 2001, after interviewing for the job in 1998. While neither Stanford nor the museum would disclose how much Hillary's portrait cost, the artist that Hillary chose to depict her husband is known to charge $200,000. The portraits will be available for all the public to see after the national gallery reopens July 1st.
