Episode 52 – Wizarding Portraits: Paint Me Like One of Them French Girls

A few thoughts!

Filch’s job as a caretaker could include:

• being in charge of the house elves. Basically being their line manager. Yes, elves do the bulk of the work, but someone will still be in charge. Caretakers in the past might have been wizards, and even though Filch is not, his title as a Caretaker of Hogwarts (endorsed by Dumbledore) is probably enough for house elves to accept his authority.
• lots and lots of filing. There appears to be an archive of detention records + all the stuff confiscated. Filch seems to be in charge of keeping it all together (with varying degree of success)
• he probably oversaw some minor detentions or used to be in charge of minor corporal punishment when it still existed. You don’t need magic to hit someone with a ruler or a cane.
• being a mischief deterrent for students from misbehaving. Sure, older students don’t give a shit, but he’s plenty intimidating to the younger ones.

Regarding portrait painting:

• pre-photography became widespread, portrait painting was more of a trade than art as we understand it in the modern world. You would apprentice to a portrait painter in your teens and learn the trade.
• Aristocracy and aristocracy-adjacent people, like the sacred 28, would probably have an established relationship with a particular painter (I imagine the trade could have run in families for generations, like wand-making for various Ollivanders throughout centuries), so they won’t have to try that hard to pretend to like the subject of the painting. It’s business and they are professionals.
• regarding people not liking to be in random paintings – artists used to routinely use models for painting, who were paid. So it was a source of income for someone, even if they didn’t get a “named” painting from it.

Regarding learning art/portrait painting in Hogwarts:

• I think this would have been considered not a core subject (like Charms, Transfigurations, and Potions, for example). So it was probably only taught when there was a teacher at Hogwarts with particular interest in this.
• This is not uncommon in the UK – some subjects’ availability comes and goes with staff, e.g. my son’s school used to offer GCSE Psychology, but no longer does it because the Art teacher who used to teach it has left. She was hired to teach Art, but was qualified to teach psychology as well, so not as crazy as it sounds 😀