[omnimus]

I think you romanticize it quite a bit. Painters/artists like any professionals are mostly there just to do the work. Even with Mona Lisa It's very likely that nobody that day cared about smell of the model it was just one other day at the office.

What copying does really teach you is how to actually put the paint on the canvas, how to actually make the image, how to see the details. That's the reason why copying is one of the most common learning techniques in visual arts.

Good luck painting by smelling the emotions and atmosphere of the moment.