This LoRA is a tribute to the Scottish painter Jack Vettriano OBE (born Jack Hoggan, 17 November 1951 – 1 March 2025), who sadly passed away recently. He was known for his distinctive figurative style, often depicting scenes of romance, mystery, and nostalgia. Largely self-taught, Vettriano gained international recognition with his 1992 painting The Singing Butler, which became one of the best-selling art prints in the UK.[1]. To see his works, please go to
Trivia: the title of the LoRA is a reference to Lust, Caution, a 2007 erotic spy romantic mystery film directed by Ang Lee, based on the 1979 novella by Eileen Chang.
From ChatGPT:
The Weight (2010): A self-portrait of Jack Vettriano.
Jack Vettriano (1951-2025)
"The People's Painter" or "The Rebel of the Art World"?
🎨 Overview
Jack Vettriano (born Jack Hoggan, 17 November 1951 – 1 March 2025) is a self-taught Scottish painter best known for romantic, noir-infused figurative paintings that evoke vintage mystery, sensuality, and cinematic drama. His most famous work, The Singing Butler (1992), became the best-selling art print in the UK—despite being derided by critics.
📍 Background
Born: November 17, 1951, Methil, Fife, Scotland, as Jack Hoggan.
Self-Taught: Began painting in his twenties after receiving a set of watercolors as a birthday gift.
Breakthrough: Submitted two works to the Royal Scottish Academy’s summer exhibition in 1989—both sold immediately.
He adopted his mother’s maiden name “Vettriano” to mark his artistic reinvention.
🖼 Signature Style
Vettriano's paintings often feature:
Suited men and elegant women in ambiguous, flirtatious, or emotionally charged scenarios.
Settings like beaches, ballrooms, dimly lit hotels, or windswept promenades.
Art Deco and 1940s-50s aesthetics.
Themes of romance, desire, solitude, and mystery.
A clear influence from film noir, Edward Hopper, and Old Hollywood.
Though his work is often photorealistic and commercially styled, it’s filled with narrative tension, leaving viewers to imagine what happened just before or after the moment captured.
📉 Critical Reception
Critics have often dismissed Vettriano as kitsch, derivative, or "soft porn in oil."
Some accused him of using projectors and posed photographs, though he never denied referencing photography.
Despite this, he has a huge popular following and his art prints outsell Monet and Van Gogh in the UK.
As he once said:
"I don’t paint for critics. I paint for people."
🎤 Famous Works
The Singing Butler (1992) – A couple dancing on a beach, served by a butler and a maid in the rain.
Dance me to the End of Love (2013)
🧭 Influence & Legacy
Often referred to as "the people's painter" in Britain.
His widespread appeal challenges notions of “high” and “low” art.
He influenced a generation of narrative painters and commercial illustrators who prioritize emotional atmosphere and storytelling.
🧩 Did You Know?
The Singing Butler sold for £744,500 in 2004—making it one of the most expensive Scottish paintings ever sold at the time.
He’s been described as the “painter of unspoken stories”, his work likened to stills from untold films.
Would you like suggestions for contemporary artists influenced by Vettriano, or perhaps an analysis of how his work compares to Edward Hopper or Helmut Newton?
Artists Influenced by Jack Vettriano
While Vettriano himself is a fusion of old-school glam and narrative tension, a number of modern artists and illustrators carry on his legacy in different ways:
🖼️ 1. Fabian Perez
Style: Sultry, Latin-tinged romanticism. Dark backdrops, candlelit scenes, tango dancers, and dramatic shadows.
Why the link? Like Vettriano, Perez portrays moody, sensual figures in ambiguous emotional states. Both romanticize elegance and isolation.
🖼️ 2. Todd White
Style: Stylized, caricatured figures with theatrical expressions—often mid-scene in glamorous nightlife.
Why the link? White blends narrative moments and stylized sex appeal, echoing Vettriano’s emphasis on mood and storytelling.
🖼️ 3. Jack Vettriano-inspired illustrators
There’s also a growing set of commercial illustrators in fashion, advertising, and pop art channels who borrow from Vettriano’s cinematic angles, nostalgic fashion, and emotional freeze-frames.
Comparison: Vettriano vs. Edward Hopper vs. Helmut Newton
These three artists come from different worlds, but their work often explores stillness, sensuality, and voyeurism in strikingly distinct ways.
Artist
Jack Vettriano Oil painting (Late 20th–21st century)
Edward Hopper Oil painting (Early-mid 20th century)
Helmut Newton Photography (Mid–late 20th century)
Themes
Romance, mystery, vintage glamour
Isolation, urban quiet, existential stillness
Eroticism, power, fashion, voyeurism
Mood
Seductive, nostalgic, cinematic
Quiet, detached, melancholic
Bold, provocative, sometimes menacing
Stylistic Notes
Film noir lighting, retro dress, suggestive poses
Stark geometry, cool light, minimal emotion
High contrast, gloss, sharply styled high fashion
Figures
Often in duos or love triangles, caught mid-action
Often alone, lost in thought
Stylized women in dominant or submissive roles
Influence
Posters, pop culture, romantic storytelling
American Realism, modern loneliness
Fashion, feminism, erotic art, power dynamics
Description
This is epoch 12. Other epochs can be downloaded from tensor.art/models/851719237641747337/Jack-Vettriano-P1-CapD8A3Cos5-2025-04-09-22:42:50-Ep-12
FLUX.1 - dev-fp8
Trigger: jackvettriano1 painting
Repeat: 20 Epoch: 4 (Trained on 45 512x512 images for 3600 total steps)
Then trained for another 8 epochs for 10800 total steps
Unet LR: 0.0005 Scheduler: cosine Optimizer: AdamW
Network Dim: 8 Alpha: 4
Epoch Loss
1 0.376
2 0.359
3 0.350
4 0.340
Prompt: painting. A woman and a black bear sitting in a park for a picnic in gloomy rainy day.
5 0.348
6 0.329
7 0.312
8 0.305
Prompt: javet1 painting. A woman and a polar bear drinking coffee on top of a iceberg
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10 0.310
11 0.285
12 0.275<-lowest
Prompt: jackvettriano1 painting. A man and a blonde woman are seated around a table, engaged in conversation. On the left, a woman in a pink dress, holds her hands together in front of her chest and looks into the distance. On the right, a man, shown in side profile, wears a brown suit with a red tie and holds a pipe. The table is covered with a checkered tablecloth, and a glass of water is in front of the woman. In the background, a burning building with flames and smoke rises.