artamaze by Katherine Hilden

https://www.google.com/search?sa=X&sxsrf=ALeKk00NtVLvp_9fxsvDJ3pTLcGm675gEw:1620835332636&source=univ&tbm=isch&q=The+Last+Supper&ved=2ahUKEwiqq_aRwsTwAhXJQs0KHQt3DGcQiR56BAgmEAI&biw=1378&bih=837

George W. Bush Holds a Brush

Posted in faces, Failed Effort, literalness, Semiotics, Therapy on May 12, 2021| Leave a Comment »

Isn’t it great that he took up painting, hired tutors and practiced! It’s an activity that can lead to self-reflection and insights into all sorts of things, like other people’s lives, how we conceptualize …cultural assumptions, uncertainties…

These paintings by Bush are not presented as a documentation of what he has learned so far, as evidence of effort. They are presented to us as finished work, as art worth looking at. When something is presented as art it’s ipso facto interesting and important to think about.

Let’s do a thought experiment: would my neighbor George have a chance of having his paintings shown in a gallery or published in a book? He has been painting diligently since he retired ten years ago. His portraits are indistinguishable from Bush’s.

Whether or not George, my neighbor, can get his paintings shown depends on what we know about George. What’s George’s story? Is he blind or paralyzed or recovering from a stroke? Is he autistic or dyslexic or epileptic? Was his father a Greek immigrant or an African genocide survivor or a Russian spy or a US president? In our present social climate and art world hype these questions weave the scrim through which we see images.

Try another thought experiment: you buy a portrait at a yard sale that’s just awful but it looks like oil paint and it’s the right size. You plan to use it as a waterproof mat in your mud room at the side door to your garden. As you take it out of the frame you see the signature “John Wilkes Booth.” You know he was an actor. Couldn’t he also have been trying to paint? It’s a terrible painting but you think you’d better have it authenticated because this could be worth something. Inept as it is, the name will override the awfulness.

A 2014 review in the Guardian agrees with me: [George W Bush’s] portrait of Putin actually looks like something you would find in one of America’s trash-rich Salvation Army stores and buy to laugh at. It’s got a classic amateur clumsiness and oddity to it. Bush has attempted to render shadow and shape in stylish blocks of fawn and woodchip and cookies ‘n cream, but they don’t sit right and the whole head looks mildly crazed. Perhaps this mad look is what is meant by revealing Putin’s “soul”, but it seems inept rather than insightful.

No, wait. The Salvation Army stores used to stack their “art” in bins so that you could page through them. I had a student a few years ago who used to go there to buy awful paintings because she needed stretched canvas to re-use—much cheaper than buying canvas in art supply stores.

I went to my local Salvation Army store last week to see if they had anything as awful as the portraits by Bush, walked straight to the back and found all pictures neatly displayed. Somebody stood there facing the display, entranced by a copy of Leonardo’s Last Supper. It looked as if it had been painted on a slab of wood. I couldn’t get close because after about a minute the Entranced One unhooked it to take it to check-out.

The original is a fresco covering one wall of the dining room in a monastery in Milan, Italy. Leonardo labored over the perspective to create the illusion that the Last Supper is taking place in that very monastery refectory so that the monks would be edified by saintly company.

Along with much of High Renaissance art, this painting has been adapted in countless Kitsch mockeries. Here are some:

Sorry about that tangent. I didn’t mean to associate Bush with the Renaissance in any way, only wanted to clarify the reference to the Salvation Army.

Back to Bush. A more recent Guardian article, from 2017, refracts the whole portrait project in the context of Bush’s presidency, stating: In his new book Portraits of Courage, the subjects of the former president’s paintings are the very men torn to shreds, quite literally, by his own policy.

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2017/mar/06/george-w-bush-art-painting-portraits-in-courage

Painting can be therapeutic. If Mr.Bush engages in painting to heal his guilt, let him.

If “idiocy has its charms” (quoting that article here), please, Mr. Bush, show us how you worked through that stage of charming idiocy and then finally developed insights for us to contemplate.

We hope you heal, Mr. Bush.

There is, of course, plenty of commentary on Bush’s paintings, for example:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-yaSAiXkRtg

Next, let’s take a closer look at how Mr. Bush does not see eyes.

Orazio Gentileschi’s Finding of Moses

Posted in Color, Composition, literalness, Semiotics, Technique and Demo, tagged Artemisia Gentileschi, Charles I, Charles IV, composition, Finding of Moses, Orazio Gentileschi, Prado, Velazquez on March 9, 2021| 2 Comments »

Orazio Gentileschi was born near Florence in 1563. From 1626 on he lived in England and worked for the Stuart king Charles I, who on the occasion of the birth of his son in 1630 commissioned Gentileschi to paint “The Finding of Moses” as a gift to his wife, Queen Henrietta Maria.

As moderns we are accustomed to seeing all art—musical, literary, pictorial—as invention. We know that the artist constructs his work. He plans out his composition. It’s always been done that way.

Let’s take apart this invention, this construction called “The Finding of Moses.”

What a lovely English landscape we have here in the background, with meadows leading to a river–the Nile/Thames–and a verdant hill on the other bank. The women are gathered in front of a stand of tall trees, in full summer foliage, possibly maples or elms. Not a palm or papyrus reed in sight. Gentileschi had never been to Egypt and neither had Henrietta Maria, so all’s well with the English shrubbery here.

The pharaoh’s daughter, in gold-yellow, is eight heads tall. We know that our ancestors, including royals, were shorter than we are now. No matter, tall looks commanding and besides, a tall figure will display more fabric, which allows the painter to create a more colorful painting.

The figure on the left is Moses’s mom, a slave and also six heads tall. Gentileschi wants her tall because that way the he aligns the tops of the heads in a horizontal line. Thinking ahead, we now notice that on the right the bodies are also aligned in a straight vertical line. He clusters the figures together into a compact geometry, which makes the composition cohesive and easy to read.

Now what about all these arms?! The two women pointing over yonder to the Nile/Thames clarify where the baby was found. Compositionally these two arms lead the viewer into the center of the drama. Three more arms converge on the center of attention, the baby in a basket. And what long arms they are. Gentileschi gets away with this anatomical distortion because the bodies are kneeling. If the two women in the font were to stand up, their hands would dangle at their knees. No matter. Composition rules. Composition directs the viewer’s attention. That’s what counts.

The baby is contentedly lying high on bedding piled up in the basket. So high, that it would have tipped over while floating in water. No matter. You’re a painter; therefore you invent what needs to be invented to make the picture work. The picture works if it FEELS right to the client and the occasion.

The baby is naked. And it’s a boy! The ancient Egyptian princess, dressed in 17^th century English royal garb, is pointing to his genitals. Queen Henrietta Maria must have been pleased to project a parallel into this painting between Moses and her own newborn son. Gentileschi knew his craft, technically and politically.

Perhaps an ambassador described the charms of this painting to Philip IV, king of Spain, who might have expressed a desire to have a painting by Orazio Gentileschi. The king was known to appreciate art, visiting the studio of his court painter Velazques to sit quietly in his own regal chair just to watch Velazquez paint. Gentileschi, ever the diplomat, then painted a copy of “The Finding of Moses” for Philip IV and engaged his son to personally deliver it to the king in Spain.

Notice that he changed the overall composition. He makes two alterations to change the composition from a rectangle to a quarter of a pie. The two arms pointing to the Nile are gone and the woman at the far right who is kneeling while holding the basket is now heavily draped and conspicuously plump compared to the other women in the group. She is plump because she has to support the curve of the composition.

This painting hangs in the great central gallery at the Prado. Eight women in a painting! You can see from a long distance away that this has to be a Gentileschi.

His daughter, Artemisia Gentileschi, will be next.

https://www.dw.com/en/why-beethoven-snubbed-princes-and-put-his-music-first/a-19544501

Beethoven’s 250th birthday

Posted in inspiration, Quotes, Therapy, tagged Beethoven on December 16, 2020| 1 Comment »

Ludwig van Beethoven was born on this day 250 years ago. It was customary to baptize babies the day after they were born and since his baptismal record in Bonn shows December 17^th as the date, it’s safe to assume his birth date is December 16, 1770.

The inexpressible depth of all music, by virtue of which it floats past us as a paradise quite familiar and yet eternally remote, and is so easy to understand and yet so inexplicable, is due to the fact that it reproduces all the emotions of our innermost being, but entirely without reality and remote from its pain. In the same way, the seriousness essential to it and wholly excluding the ludicrous from its direct and peculiar province is to be explained from the fact that its object is not the representation, in regard to which deception and ridiculousness alone are possible, but that this object is directly the will; and this is essentially the most serious of all things, as being that on which all depends.– Schopenhauer (1788-1860)

All art constantly aspires to the conditions of music.— Walter Pater (1839-1894)

Beethoven once stopped playing when an aristocrat was talking in the front row: “I’m not playing for such pigs.” (Für solche Schweine spiel ich nicht.)

Being an Artist takes courage, it’s work and you have to risk being misunderstood.

https://www.google.com/search?sxsrf=ALeKk00_5B1hIExLDZoTfK3KAWVvje7PqQ:1607908360102&source=univ&tbm=isch&q=clyfford+still&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjgh4q1pcztAhVBeawKHQQ7A9MQiR56BAgnEAI&biw=1462&bih=836

Clifford Still

Posted in abstraction, Achievement, Color, Composition, Left-Right, Negative space, tagged Clifford Still, Clifford Still Museum on December 13, 2020| 2 Comments »

I came across this drawing recently and can’t get it out of my mind.

It’s small, 12x9in. Pastel on paper. 1951

All I can think of doing to it is flip it horizontally and, behold, it doesn’t work in this view.

What we have here is a non-representational image of such internal tension that it cannot be altered.

It looks like nothing. Nothing?

When I look at this drawing–the original, on top– I want to project a vertical structure or a tree trunk between the red and black lines. But that vanishes immediately. What’s left is the quick markmaking, apparently unconscious, and the dominance of “negative space.”

The choice of deep yellow paper is uncanny. Imagine the paper gray or green or blue. No go.

Clifford Still is known for his huge paintings, as seen in the Clifford Still Museum in Denver.

This painting, PH812, also from 1951, measures 115 x 104 inches.

https://artamaze.wordpress.com/2020/12/06/kitsch-101/

Capturing beauty—gotcha!

Posted in Composition, Fluxus, Illustration, Imagination, inspiration, Seeing, Surreal, Technique and Demo, tagged capturing beauty on December 12, 2020| 2 Comments »

In the last post we started by looking at something beautiful and ended up by suggesting that beauty may be a trap. A breathtaking view becomes a trap if you think you can –how to say this—trap it. The common word for this is “capturing it.”

“Oh, you captured that perfectly.”

“That is so beautiful; I want to see if I can capture it in my painting.”

People talk about “capturing” all the time. In music, painting, in a novel, a movie. As if art making were some sort of hunting sport: you hunt the beauty down and then—gotcha!–you corral it in a fenced lot. You killed it!

So, art making is a form of execution. If that’s too strong a word, how about strangulation.

In any case, “capturing” results in lifelessness.

We don’t want lifelessness, do we.

The reason that a painting that duplicates a photo would result in lifelessness is that it would make something monumental, i.e. static, out of a fleeting moment. That would be a lie.

So, how can you allow yourself to be inspired by this image without deceiving yourself?

You can allow yourself to be mesmerized by a small passage that does not refer to a recognizable corner of reality. It does not illustrate anything.

Now, that you can paint—or draw! Not as a copyist, not directly, not in detail, but in gesture, in complete self-abandon. If you pivot your mind into that level of fiction, you may be onto something.

Onto what? We can’t predict. Let’s see.

Imagine the Shock

Posted in Achievement, Color, Imagination, inspiration, Landscape, Semiotics, tagged Andre Derain, Fauvism, Henri Matisse, Les Fauves, London paintings., Louis Vauxcelles, Maurice de Vlaminck on November 29, 2020| Leave a Comment »

It’s 1906. Imagine these law-abiding citizens of Northern Europe, who dress well, behave politely and enjoy going to cultural events, like art exhibitions. One Sunday afternoon they put on their hats and tell their coach man to take them to that new art exhibit in the hope of finding edification in high art. They find themselves confronted by this.

André Derain was born near Paris in 1880. He grew up in Victorian clutter, in rooms with flowered wallpaper; velvet tasseled curtains; heavy carved furniture; and gilded this and that. His family was comfortably middle class. He had the means to travel. When he came back from a trip to London, his family and friends must have eagerly awaited nice touristy paintings, like scenic post cards. Instead, he had this to show.

In 1906 nobody knew that this was the art of the future and that 100+ years later people like us would paint our walls white so that nothing would distract us from contemplating the painting.

The critic Louis Vauxcelles called these artists –Derain, Matisse and Vlaminck—“Les Fauves,” which means “the wild beasts.” To be called a wild beast was pretty close to being called an idiot.

Imagine what it took to paint like this at that time. That’s all, just imagine that.

The Fauvist painters:

André Derain, 1880-1954

Henri Matisse, 1869-1954

Maurice de Vlaminck, 1876-1958

P.S. Some of our contemporaries now want to make a quick buck by teaching you a formula: “How to paint Fauvist style.” Such trash! You can find this mindless how-to on Pinterest, for example.

Momentary Constellation

Posted in Fluxus, inspiration, Seeing, Technique and Demo, tagged attention, constellation, Derain, practicing scales on November 28, 2020| Leave a Comment »

Last post I said you can practice turning your attention to ON. Yes, you can, and it’s wise to practice.

Musicians, for example, practice. Even very advanced performers practice scales. This practice will shine through when they’re performing on stage in thrilling, ecstatic passages of a piece. The practice itself made this ecstasy possible, but the practice itself is not ecstatic. It’s discipline.

I walk into my kitchen one morning, my to-do list for that day writ large in my brain. As I turn to the fridge, my jaw drops and my eyes pop. I either had never seen this light effect before or it happens every morning but I’m just always behind in my “attention practice.”

I grab my camera and click.

This is not a great moment in the history of photography.

Why, then, is it valuable? Because it records a constellation: the alignment of

the angle of the sun
the placement of that bamboo plant
the moment I entered that room
my attention on ON

The photo reminds me that such an alignment is possible. It happened. It doesn’t happen every day and it’s worth paying attention when it does happen.

Next, we’ll look at Derain.

Attention

Attention

Posted in Composition, literalness, Pattern, Quotes, Seeing, Technique and Demo, Therapy, tagged attention, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, Nicolas Malebranche on November 24, 2020| 1 Comment »

NOW WHAT!! You want us to look at your boring geraniums in your boring kitchen???!!!

What caught my attention was how the afternoon light made the stems glow. On the right, see that? See how the stems are outlined in yellow?

How would my camera see that? As I framed the shot, before I zoomed in on that light effect, I noticed intimations of the Golden Section.

Not one, but two. In the green lines, the square is on the left. In the pink, the square is on the right. As a bonus, the red blooms define the corner of the next square in the Golden Section sequence.

In my peripatetic readings I recently came across a quote from Nicolas Malebranche: “Attention is the natural prayer of the soul.” He had to talk like that because he was a Catholic priest trying to stay alive in 17^th century France. He’s classified as a rational philosopher, working in the shadow of Descartes: notice the word “natural” in front of “prayer.”

1600 years before that, Epictetus said: “You become what you give your attention to. If you yourself don’t choose what thoughts and images you expose yourself to, someone else will … and their motives may not be the highest.” Epictetus was born a slave in the Roman Empire and became the teacher of Marcus Aurelius.

So, the difference between boring and ta-dah! is not out there in those overwintering geraniums but in that switch in your brain. You can practice throwing your attention switch. You can pivot from worry about your to-do list to…attention, now.

Nicolas Malebranche, 1638-1715

Epictetus, 50-135

Marcus Aurelius, 121-180

Light Slivers

Posted in abstraction, Color, Composition, Illustration, Landscape, Pattern, Seeing, Technique and Demo, tagged color vs. black/white, composition, landscape, light effect on November 21, 2020| Leave a Comment »

After you’ve identified this photo as a so-what view of a lawn, check that off and see if this might have some formal element worth noticing.

It does. You can see it better in black/white.

The light zig-zags down from top to bottom with increasing looseness as if it came from some juggler’s pen light.

That’s it? Yes, for this little exercise in seeing it’s enough to notice that the slivers of light appear to be superimposed on a surface.

The light slivers exist on one plane and the grass on another. If you also notice that the grass makes vertical lines and the light forms horizontal lines, you’ve got a composition worth contemplating.

I’d like to print this up in high resolution, 6 ft high, and position it at the end of a long hall way.

My camera clicked it in color. We are used to seeing images in color. But color is not necessarily more powerful than b/w. Do you agree that the b/w is a more stimulating image?

Btw, all this is relevant to both photography and painting. Not such a little exercise, after all.