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Academy, art, artist, canvas, Cezanne, create, Duchess of Cambridge, Henry Ward Beecher, Hockney, Hyper-Realism, Impressionists, Jackson Pollock, Kate, Michelangelo, National Portrait Gallery, Nelson Mandela, Neo-Classicism, NPG, oil painting, paint, painter, painting, Paul Emsley, RA, Romanticism, Royal Academy
Life and work have been, well… hectic lately. Lots of things are up in the air, as if life has been hit by a fast moving whirlwind. You know, the kind the Tasmanian Devil from the Warner Bros cartoons would produce, knocking everything up into the air as if hit by a bomb!
Part of the chaos has been preparation for the regional art show and other British open exhibitions that all seem to come up at this time of year. It’s like it’s Open Season for exhibitions.
It was reading the rules for entering the National Portrait Gallery BP Portrait Award that made me frown (mostly because a work I wanted to submit was created utilising a photo) and contemplate just how far we’ve come in portraiture since the Impressionists first reacted against the strangle hold of the academy system. Neo-Classicism and later, Romanticism had become somewhat “formulaic”. One painted in a particular way, the academy way. One didn’t just follow academy techniques, but academy values too and I wonder, has much really changed?
You see every now and again a generation of artists tears away from the accepted methods of how a picture must be constructed. The now much loved Impressionists tore away from the methods of the previous generation, Cezanne started to pull away from them and Picasso went even further, until by the time we got to the likes of Duchamp and his urinal, the idea alone was king. But still the likes of the NPG take a very traditional line and insist a picture must be constructed a particular way.
With the NPG (National Portrait Gallery) in order to enter the illustrious yearly competition your work must be a “life study”. Now, I’m not against life studies, they’re great and invaluable to the development of any artist that studies the figure. The problem with life studies is that having someone “sit” for you almost never captures much of interest about the sitter/subject. Partly because they have to hold a set pose for hours, which is far from spontaneous!
In fact a great deal of life studies have the feel of a Neo-Classical piece, as if they were painted in 1813 not 2013 and some are just plain dull! Impressive, but dull. Take the new portrait by Paul Emsley of the Duchess of Cambridge. Technically it’s beautiful. Paul is obviously, technically a very talented artist, but to me it has the look of a picture that might hang in a spooky mansion in an episode of Scooby Doo. So why do we insist on the subject sitting for a portrait?
In this case the traditional method didn’t help poor, young, vibrant Kate. All life and spontaneity has been squeezed out of her in the new portrait. Why couldn’t Paul Emsley have taken some sketches, done some studies and taken a handful of expressive photo’s to work from? Because that would be cheating of course. Rubbish!
Mind you judging from his approach the Mandela commission, he does tend to err on the serious and far from spontaneous side of life.
*
It’s worth noting at this point that although the NPG insists on entrants painting “from life” to enter the NPG portrait prize competition, NPG prize winner Paul, himself has worked from photographs, most notably when he painted Nelson Mandela. Emsley himself said of the commission, “I had to ask him to stop smiling (what a shame) as my intention was to do a fairly ‘serious’ portrait.” Emsley worked from fourteen photographs that he’d taken during meeting Nelson Mandela.
**
So why the insistence on “life” studies NPG? After all most of make use of the technology to hand, as did Degas and other “greats”. I expect if Michelangelo could have taken reference shots for his Sistine Chapel work, he would have done. He would probably have used a digital projector too, to get his sketches onto the Sistine ceiling. What! Outrageous! Maybe, but almost certainly true. Funny to think of Michelangelo or Degas being barred from the NPG for doing so though.
And yet… there is a real tension between the use of technology to assist the process of producing art and that technology itself replacing the art in art. In my view, if the technology helps in the process but doesn’t get in the way of the artist’s expression of him or herself in the work, then why not make the most it? Look if Hockney can produce work on an iPad that gets shown in the Royal Academy (RA), painters can use photo’s for reference, National Portrait Gallery!
But what about “photo-realism”? Now, this might be a little controversial and I certainly don’t want to offend anyone, but if a picture drawn, or painted from a photo looks exactly like the photo it’s taken from then, in my opinion, that isn’t art.
Any work where the artist acts like the human equivalent of an ink/paint/pencil jet printer, producing a picture that in indiscernible from the original, although sometimes amazing, isn’t art. You may as well have the original photo enlarged and printed on canvas and give appropriate credit to the photographer, clever it may be, sometimes amazing, but not art. I myself gasp when looking at a stunning photographic quality picture that’s been created with a handful of ball point pens, but again I can’t help but conclude it isn’t art. If it is, then my Epson printer is an artist.
Actually, if you think about it there must be a lot of great photography where the poor photographer isn’t getting the credit he deserves. We may gasp in awe at the drawing of water pouring off someone that looks so realistic that it “looks like a photo’”, but although an impressive feat of skill, surely the photographer deserves equal, if not more, credit than the artist.
Art has to have been, in some way, an expression of the artist. You should be able to recognise the artist – good or bad – in the pictures that they produce, even if they’re boring! In the words of Henry Ward Beecher:
Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures.
Also Jackson Pollock:
Every good painter paints what he is.
*(Photo – courtesy of the NPG via the BBC)
**http://www.iart.co.za/news/2010/04/06/paul-emsley-a-portrait-of-nelson-mandela/
I agree with you re:photo realism. I also think that lifting the intent and composition from a photographer’s image is not right. But, technology can assist artists greatly. If the artist is also the photographer, it’s ideal. My camera has become an important tool for reference-not for photo realism but to inform my form.
Thanks Elena. I love my camera too. Wouldn’t be without it and it helps make sure all my source shots are free from copyright problems too
I think if the photo’ is good enough as is, then publish it that way, or fiddle with it in Photoshop if you must, but sometimes it’s just the starting point for an artwork that outgrows the source.
Thanks for commenting. I’ve been enjoying your work lately by the way. Always look forward to your posts.
Some very interesting thoughts Ian. I’m in agreement with you on some people’s idea of realism… it’s impressive but doesn’t provide anything that the original image hasn’t already provided,
There are all kinds of realism, though. Chuck close does some very interesting things with his work because the image changes your perception of the work depending on whether you’re looking at it close up or from further back.
Some of my favourite ‘realistic’ images are from the Renaissance period. The first and last time I saw an oil painting done by a Renaissance master was in a museum in London. I was so mesmerized I could have fallen to my knees and wept.
Yet, it’s a different realism than what you refer to, which is a realism that is a copy of the original. Just as you pointed out, there is nothing original there, as impressive as the skill of the artist might be. The ‘concept’ of the image and every element in art that makes up a visual image already exists.
Hi Filio. I’m not against “realism” either, but “hyper-realism” is a very clever exact copy of a photo’ and although really clever, it leaves me a bit cold.
I’m a big fan of Chuck Close and the Renaissance, both of which use realism, but in a way that enhances the artist’s style and message, not removes it. I remember taking a trip to the National Gallery in London as a school kid in my teens and standing amazed at the breathtaking beauty of the Renaissance section and I still love visiting those same paintings whenever I go back, but now I’d probably be more drawn to Chuck’s work if they had a Chuck Close section. I guess although I still love old favourites, tastes change and new things grab your attention
I think what I love most about good art, is seeing the hand of the artist and hopefully feeling a bit of them as a person represented through their style in their work. I used to try very hard to eradicate all brush strokes, but now the challenge for me is quite the opposite, showing the brushstrokes and being confident enough to be proud of them instead!
Thanks for the comment Filio. Always enjoy your blog.
“So we use the tools to hand, but for a painting to be art, we should see something of the artist in it too.” I’ve never thought about it this way before, thank you for sharing!
Thanks for taking the time to read it
Not everyone sees things that way, but surely one of an artist’s goals is to have his work recognised in the same way that he is recognised by those that know him/her. In that way we kind of paint ourselves into our work.
Thanks for the comment Disashi, much appreciated.
Great title and good argument. And the use of Duchess of Cambridge was a splendid example. It’s a horrible looking portrait that focuses prominently on the most anemic, blurry eyes imaginable. I can’t see how this finished piece became approved. I also especially like that you weren’t afraid to name names. Artists have a responsibility to confront such issues. Nice job..
Thank you and thank you for taking the time to read the post and comment. When the majority of site appreciation is for visual posts it’s really encouraging to have a response to a written piece.
I don’t do a lot of wildlife photography but I’ve done a lot of wildlife illustration. I got into wildlife photography literally for reference purposes for animals that I’m not familiar drawing or painting. Beyond that, I put the camera away.
Wildlife is notoriously uncooperative when it comes to staying still so that it can be painted
An intriguing post & subject. An interesting point about photo-realism. There are , of course, two approaches to the technique. The artist can create a new piece of art that emulates the aesthetics, codes & conventions of a photograph. Yhe other is to recreate a photograph in anew medium. So is the second approach just a copy or an artistic re-interpretation of the original work ?
similar issue arises in dealing with the “life-study”. Much the life study be a moment frozen in time, as is a traditional photograph, or can the artist interpret the long sitting into a moment of physical art ? Must it be a true physical representation? Or can it include the artist’s insight into the person.
One of the principles I stressed with my students in Media Studies is that “All Mass media constructs a reality that contains values, beliefs& ideologies”. So, in actuality, even the moment in time is contrived/constructed.
Thanks for visiting my blog. It is much appreciated.
BTW I have a couple of posts tagged/ concerning the concept of Necro-Media. It is related to some of the concerns you raise in this post.
So, we do indeed “paint ourselves” into our work. In fact that’s probably what I love about great paintings, the sense of energy and of making the media bend to the artist’s will.
Thanks for taking the time to reply, fascinating!