The paintings were stored at the home of his student, neighbor and good friend, Frolic Weymouth.Įxplaining the series, Wyeth said, 'The difference between me and a lot of painters is that I have to have a personal contact with my models. The sessions supposedly were a secret even to their spouses. Wyeth asked Testorf to model for him in 1971, and from then until 1985 he made 45 paintings and 200 drawings of her, many of which depicted her nude. There she raised a family of four children, and acted as caretaker to farmer Karl Kuerner, an elderly neighbor who was a friend and model for Wyeth. By 1961 they were living in Philadelphia, where she worked in a tannery, and they soon moved to Chadds Ford. In 1957, she met John Testorf, a German-born, naturalized American citizen, whom she married in 1958. After becoming seriously ill she left the convent and lived in Mannheim, where she studied to be a nurse and a masseuse.

To John Updike, her body 'is what Winslow Homer's maidens would have looked like beneath their calico.' īorn in Germany, Helga entered a Prussian Protestant convent chosen by her father in 1955.

Helga 'Testy' Testorf was a neighbor of Wyeth's in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, and over the course of fifteen years posed for Wyeth indoors and out of doors, nude and clothed, in attitudes that reminded writers of figures painted by Botticelli and Édouard Manet. 1939 ) created by American artist Andrew Wyeth between 19. The Helga Pictures are a series of more than 268 paintings and drawings of German model Helga Testorf (born c.

Some of the works-in-progress are even messy, with paint spatters.Testorf portrayed in Braids (1979) by Andrew Wyeth “It’s interesting to see the studies with the finished works, how he’s working out different ideas and compositions, how he tweaked things. “The studies are what make this a great exhibition,” Klein said. Some studies have been paired with finished works, giving museum-goers an insight into Wyeth’s artistic process. A few works are on loan from the Adelson Galleries in New York City. The Greenville exhibition includes one large tempera painting and several watercolors and studies. “He was really interested not only in painting them but developing a relationship with them and transforming them through his paintings and studies.” “The vast majority of his models were family or very close friends,” Klein said. Testorf and her husband lived near Wyeth in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania. “That’s the million-dollar question,” Klein said, with a laugh. But why did Wyeth keep his Helga pictures a secret so long?

The helga pictures