young woman in pink dress (new work, new directions)

young woman in pink dress (own work, 2012, 50 x 76 cm, click on the image for an enlargement)

this painting is new in more than the sense of being just finished. i'm working in new directions, actually i'm looking for a new way of painting people.

this because i realize that i want to depict human relations, human feelings, etc. from a very personal point of view. so it's time to develop that point of view, and for this i need to experiment with various forms of realism as well. but never for the sake of realism, but simply because i now feel the need for Form in a way that i have not felt before. so i'm actually willing to also go into clumsiness, childlike style, whatever, if it gets across what i want to get across. (also see the previous post!)

strangely enough, i discovered that my sense of 3D form has only improved during the past years, even though i haven't been practising on it in any way. however, i'm also using some new techniques, in fact i want to incorporate my drawing styles and skills into my paintings...since in drawing i am the most free. the result in this painting can be seen mostly in the facial features, where i drew as well as painted.

also in this case the background/foreground colour contrasts were resolved with the glazing techniques discussed in the previous posts. 3D is only barely suggested, but that is how i think it should be here. naturally, i also drew on many inspirations from portrait art history.

chuck close: more than realism?

what struck me with some of chuck close's works was the intensity of some of the portraits. an intensity which, in retrothinking, i would ascribe to a combination of ` harsh' realism (non-prettified i mean) with an extra layer of (is this a word?) deconstruction of reality [oh oh i'm starting to sound like ralf kwaaknijd here...].

by ` deconstruction' i mean his pixel-like approach, where each pixel is just a small abstract element. but in the best works it seems to me he added to this also extra abstract expression in these pixels. and freedom with respect to the size and placement of the `pixels'.

and then suddenly, the work for me starts to shimmer, vibrate, i don't know. it's an effect which i do not experience with the small reproductions on internet. i think you must go and see the work for real.



chuck close, maggie (photo by ellen page wilson, courtesy of PaceWildenstein, new york, ©chuck close [and i hope ellen and chuck don't mind]

but in other works i did not get much vibes beyond the realism. i wonder where chuck close will take his work in years to come!

st francis

st francis at night, 2008

i've been drawing st francis a number of times in the past years. my reason for this is not religious - to me spirituality (human compassion, kindness, love) needs no religion and is often confined by it. i'm specifically touched by the idea that st francis loved animals so much, that they came unto him soft of heart and without fear.

to me the science fiction idea of `gaia' - a world where all living beings are one, and also (on some level) aware of this oneness - appeals as high ideal for which we could strive on earth.

but is it so high as to be a tower of babel? this seems very likely, especially considering what people are willing to do to animals not even out of misunderstanding or malice, but simply out of economic gain. i believe that anything we do to animals is something we will also be willing to do to humans if the circumstances are just a little tight.

i'm not saying that we are automatically responsible for solving the moral problems that nature faces us with once we start looking at animals as fellow creatures(cruelty, survivalist savagery, etc.). but i think we can lift ourselves to a level where at least the heartless human exploitation of animals which are obviously a lot like us in feeling and even understanding is abandoned.

responsibility for the innate cruelty of nature...this is where i think human understanding is vastly too limited. this is where i can understand people needing a concept of things which are way over their head. too bad these concepts to me often look as if turned into a fairytale. but perhaps we all need fairytales to make our lives meaningful.

st francis, 2003

millais & van gogh - realism & more (monet also)

how looks can be deceiving. knowing millais primarily from reproductions, my expectations were enough to visit the current exhibition in the van gogh museum amsterdam. unfortunately, i found millais' paintings to be little or nothing more than photographs, sometimes attractive, agreeable, but often a bit cloying, too sweet to my taste. and i couldn't find anything lifting me to a level beyond what the eye can see at first glance. the use of paint i found very traditional and limited, no experiments, no texture/brushstrokes/layering expression...etc.

john everett millais, portrait of louise jopling


of course, in the van gogh museum there is plenty to enjoy so it wasn't a wasted trip. i am always (i never use the words always or never since they are so absolute as to contain no real meaning) inspired by van gogh. i don't need to consider every painting of his to be a masterpiece, for me to be uplifted by his clear intention of looking beyond what the eye can see at first glance to what the heart feels when the eyes are looking soulfully.

vincent van gogh, self portrait

[postscript 1 dec 2008:] somehow i added `monet' as a label to this post...and i now see from statistics that people looking for monet come to this post... so let me add a little from and about claude monet.

claude monet, the seine at argenteuil

monet here is a true impressionist, with a realism that is still very sharp, but already coming under attack from the brushwork and the colour enhancement. the painting already wants a bit to break free, to go beyond what the eyes see at first glance. later, monet throws off many previous shackles, but still retains a ever weakening link to depicting reality. abstract art is a fingertip away.

claude monet, waterloo bridge (one of many from an ever light-changing series)

maria sybilla merian

in the question what art can bring, when discussing with others i tend to discount so-called realism (which is a difficult term to me, philosophically speaking). this discounting is due more to balance -i have to come back to that term also- than to my personal appreciation.

because, frankly, there are many artists working `realistically' who in some way spark resonance in my heart.

but on the other hand i'm quite fed up somewhere with the general attitude that art depicting `reality' (whatever that may mean) in a more or less photographic fashion needs no explanation, deeper motivation, ... just because, according to our culturally determined value, transferring 3d to 2d (or other 3d) using something similar to straight-line projection requires enough skill to be art.

maria sybilla merian, cayman with false coral snake

how did i get to maria sybilla merian? well, she is one of many artists who depict nature, especially flowers and animals, in a very precise `realistic' way. see also john james audubon. i doubt that these names are known anywhere nearly as well as velazquez, say. but i'm amazed and pleased at their incredible detail, the precision, the colours.

so the question `art: what, why, for whom?' seems to have so many answers that towers of babel are inevitable. my own rather ivory tower looks out on art bringing more than `realism in the flat sense'. reality to me is more than what a disspirited camera captures in pixels. we add dreams, visions, feelings, emotions, associations to whatever our eyes tell us that they see. in fact, i believe we only see what our brain/heart allows to pass, and this heavily photoshopped by our preset value system.

and, talking about photoshop...compare the above image to the one on the website of the british museum:

maria sybilla merian, cayman with false coral snake - british museum

and tell me honestly, which version do you prefer? and what is realism in this version-issue?