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| Rembrandt Head of an Old Woman ca. 1631 etching Morgan Library, New York |
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| Giuseppe Garofalo after Annibale Carracci Head of a Woman ca. 1750 etching (for drawing manual) Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Louis-Marin Bonnet after Sébastien Leclerc Head of a Young Woman turned away 1774 hand-colored stipple engraving Yale Center for British Art |
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| Edward Scriven Study of Sculpted Head (Renaissance Woman) ca. 1820 aquatint Princeton University Art Museum |
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| Andrew Geddes Head of an Old Woman ca. 1820 etching Tate Gallery |
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| William Strang Head of a Woman ca. 1881 etching Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh |
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| Alphonse Legros Head of a Young Woman ca. 1880 etching and drypoint National Gallery of Art, Washington DC |
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| Alphonse Legros Head of a Woman ca. 1890 etching and drypoint Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio |
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| John William Waterhouse Head of a Woman 1896 lithograph Yale Center for British Art |
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| Jan Toorop Head of Marguérite Adolphine Helfrich 1897 drypoint National Gallery of Art, Washington DC |
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| Augustus John The Woolen Hat 1919 etching Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri |
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| Pablo Picasso Head of a Woman 1925 lithograph Yale University Art Gallery |
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| André Derain Tête de Femme - Rêverie no. 2 1927 lithograph Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri |
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| John Souter Head of a Canadian Woman ca. 1930 etching Yale Center for British Art |
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| Gerald Brockhurst Head of Anais 1944 lithograph Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh |
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| Roy Lichtenstein Modern Art II 1996 screenprint Tate Gallery |
A Portrait
For Gertrude Buckman
Yes, she craves diminutive things:
The sea shell and the carousel
Obliquely seen through an opera glass,
And the faint colors on the wind that pass;
Not the red of the loud bell
But the shadow echoed in the well.
Yes, she is aware of innuendo:
The splendid underscoring of these things;
A skull is therefore Mexico,
And the hummingbird sings
Loudest. Not the jay, nor the gull,
But the ultimate infinitesimal.
Yes, she believes in overtones:
The statues alive at twilight;
Not the word said, but the word unspoken,
Not the gift, but the token.
To her, a pinpoint instant star
Is the history of all incredible light.
– Howard Moss (1946)