So many of these are preliminary drawings - Helga's face in different lights and poses, drawn 'til he got it right. But don't expect a lot of completed, polished works. "The Helga Pictures" - opening Sunday at the National Gallery of Art - are more than 140 drawings and watercolors, more than half of the series. The mystery woman turned out to be Helga Testorf, a German immigrant and mother of four, a Wyeth neighbor in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania. He had been drawing and painting her for 15 years, and no one, not even his wife, knew the extent of his work. She is Helga, who rocked the art world last August when she was revealed as the subject of a major suite by Andrew Wyeth. Lying naked and asleep, she's more still-life or landscape than living woman. She gazes off into a corner of an orchard, as if searching for something unattainable. At times there's a resigned stoicism to the way she poses. SHE IS NOT beautiful, this modern Mona Lisa.
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