Part of the "Reflection series". Funny how concepts change as the painting progresses. I have attached  some of the references used for just the details. 
 Originally inspired by a feeling like I had to do a male figure, as that is what I thought people wanted. Lesson: Paint what is real for me, not what I think the public wants. I have to relearn this over and over. In the unfinished painting, two figures were part of the drama, all the way to the end. The second figure sitting, looking lost and hopeless while the other broke his way out of the gilded cage that they were kept. The meaning of the painting for me was that we can still be imprisoned while surrounded by beauty. If you look closely, the wooded green behind them is a back drop, torn in places and creased with age. It is not reality unless one chooses to be in the prison of that reality. Like a terrarium for lizards when I was a little kid, it was not substitute for nature.