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By the 20th century, when popular taste had long since caught up and the value of a Rembrandt oil soared to the million-dollar mark, American artists like John Sloan pored over his etchings for inspiration. Russian-born Chaim Soutine sat entranced through a whole day before Rembrandt's The Bridal Couple. Even Picasso, that great imitator, once paid Rembrandt the supreme compliment of confessing one failure. Beginning an etching, he says, "I started to doodle. It became a Rembrandt. I even made another one right away, with his turban, his furs, his eye—you know what I mean, his elephant's eye. I'm still working on this plate to get his blacks. You don't get them right away."