Ritual and tradition play a large part in Tuymans's work, drawing on the solace in repetition, the blind faith of unquestioned custom. Taken from a funerary tribute photo, the type of memento circulated to grieving loved ones in Tuyman's native Belgium, Portrait is an image of both commemoration and inconsequence. The woman's melancholic expression and sickly pallor serve less a reminder of a vibrant life, than a lingering forbearance of death; her cherished memory a mere ghost, faded and shrinking, as if she never was. Only her black dress and glasses remain, sinister and anonymous props, lonely relics without sentiment or intimacy.