had a lot of fun painting these portraits. You might see the influence of Vermeer in this work. I painted it in Holland and I often got to see several Vermeer's, like Girl With the Pearl Earring, any afternoon I wanted.  I also offered tribute to Ayn Rand, the writer, by included a framed portrait of her on the wall. And to Velázquez,  the painter, by including his magnificent painting Las Meninas behind the man's head. Its an extremely tricky problem to try to make the real people in the painting feel real and distinguish them from the portrait and the other painting on the wall. I went out of my way to make sure that the artworks on the wall were much more abstract.