All posts by Norma Smith

Vincent Van Gogh 1853 – 1890. The Potato Eaters 1885.

Practice, The Arts, ,

 

original potato eaters

 

On the news recently I heard discussed the growing number of families who have to rely on food banks to supplement their meals, I was thinking about the next painting blog at this Christmas time and thought I  would discuss the subject of an early painting by Vincent Van Gogh where peasants are seen eating a meal of potatoes.

Van Gogh was born in Neunen, the Netherlands, his father was a Calvanist minister and his mother  has been described as a moody artist. Many of us will have heard of the difficulties Vincent had throughout his short life dealing with epilepsy, depression and his eventual suicide, I was surprised to learn that in the ten years he spent painting he created nearly nine hundred oil paintings and over a thousand water colours. Originally he wished to follow in his father’s footsteps but he was rejected as unsuitable on two occasions and decided to become an artist in 1880. In 1882 Van Gogh moved to Dreuthe and led a nomadic life, he studied Japanese art and Eastern philosophy, he wrote in ‘my own work, I am risking my life for it’, he wrote extensively about his work. He returned to Neunen in the north of Holland where he painted The Potato Eaters in 1885, the work is considered to be one of his earliest master pieces, he made several versions and preparatory sketches, working on the composition, this is his only group painting, he hoped the painting would promote his career, unfortunately not until after his death was it seen for what it is. Van Gogh felt very close to the peasants, he saw them as hard working and honest people who tilled the ground, planted and lifted the potatoes they were eating, he was also poor and struggling in his own way. The main character has her back to us, there are four women and a man, they may be related,original potato eaters who are sitting around a square table with rough edges on which is placed a large dish of potatoes, their faces are lit by the low- hanging lamp but the rest of the room is dark and cramped, we can see the rafters, a supporting wall which juts into the room and a picture on the wall, no light seems to be coming in the window at the back of the room. The characters are rather ugly and their hands are gnarled portraying the life of manual labourers.

Van Gogh knew the work of the Impressionists but he was more influenced by the Hague school, his brush strokes were long and bold, in the room the colours are muted, black, dark green and brown, not until he moved to the sunshine of the south of France would his palette be more colourful, the bright yellows of his many  sunflower paintings or the violets of irises, the reds and greens in his scenes and portraits, he made several self portraits of great intensity and insight.

Van Gogh hoped to set up a group of like minded artists and rented a house in Arles, he invited the painter Paul Gaugin to share it with him but they quarrelled and Gaugin left. Van Gogh become increasingly ill, his younger brother Theo with whom he remained close exchanged many letters, Vincent’s were filled with his theories and plans for paintings and his emotional state of mind, which he attempted to portray in his work, Theo arranged for him to live in a hospital in Auvers under the care of Doctor Gachet, he was given two rooms so that one he could use as his studio, he would set off to paint in the country side each day and return to the hospital in the evening, until his suicide. Van Gogh did not know how much his work would later be admired, he failed to make a living from his work.

I wish you all a happy Christmas.

Image from wikipedia.

 

Paul Signac 1863 – 1935 and Joseph Albers 1888 – 1976. Two Colour Theories

Practice, The Arts, Uncategorized, ,

Colour is used by painters in many ways, cave painters would grind the earth around them to mix with water to create reds, ochres and browns to draw animals, Italian Renaissance painters would often depict the Virgin Mary clothed in blue, blue paint was derived from very expensive lapus lazuli to symbolise the esteem in which she is held in the Catholic Church,  another symbolic colour is gold that was used by Byzantine artists. As time went by many new colour theories arose, here are two .

Pointillism. Capo di Noli Italy. 1898.

Paul Signac was born on Paris and began his career studying architecture but then changed his mind and took up painting when he was eighteen after seeing the work of Matisse, he studied the colour theory explained and used by Georges Seurat, they were two French painters who belonged to the group called Neo-Impressionists , Seurat developed the use of pure colour which he applied to his canvases in the form of dots which became known as the Pointillist style having abandoned the Impressionist method of painting with short brushstrokes,  it was slow patient work, this experiment meant using scientifically  juxtaposed small dots of pure colour which were intended to blend not on the canvas but on the eyes of the viewers.  Signac learnt a great deal about this technique from Seurat, they became friends. Signac liked to sail around the coasts of Europe painting landscapes and making water colour paintings of French harbour scenes, the sunlight on the south coast produced sparkling seas and heightened colour. He had met Seurat and also Monet in 1884, Van Gough and Gaugin were also painting at this time. Signac was very interested in the ideas of anarchist communism but had to tone down these ideas in order to gain public acceptance.

I have chosen the painting called Capo di Noli 1898. The sparkling colours expressing the sunshine of Italy are  seen in this sea – side view, whether or not you think the colours have merged to create a flat plane is left for the viewer to decide, the brush strokes of the Impressionists  rather than dots of colour are perhaps more easily accepted? The shadows are in pale to dark violets set alongside the yellows of the sandy ground. Matisse experimented with pointillist painting but just for a short time.

Paul_Signac_-_Capo_di_Noli 200px-Josef_Albers's_painting_'Homage_to_the_Square',_1965      Homage to the Square 1965.Joseph Albers.

Joseph Albers was a German-born American artist who after studying with Johannes Itten at the Bauhaus school was asked by its founder and director Walter Gropius to join the stained glass department to teach foundation students, he also worked with Paul Klee designing glass and furniture. In 1925 the school moved to Dessau, there Albers met a student, Anni, whom he married, he worked there until in 1933 the Nazis closed the school and the artists dispersed. Albers went to live and work as a professor of art at the art school Black Mountain College in North Carolina. In 1950 he left to head the department of design at Yale University, he retired in 1958.

In 1963 he published ‘interaction in Colour’ to demonstrate his theory ‘that colours are governed by an internal and deceptive logic.’ He favoured a very disciplined approach to composition and painted hundreds of works in ‘ Homage to the Square’ in which he explored the chromatic interactions with nested squares. I remember when we students would experiment in a similar way with colour, for example we painted the same colour with a different coloured background, this showed clearly how the colour seemed to change, becoming darker or lighter, or more bright, our colour perception was changed.  Albers paintings consisted of three or four squares of solid planes of colour nested within one another. These studies made very interesting viewing I think, although we see a flat surface which seemed to contain no symbols or metaphor in a left brain hemisphere way  they do possess a beauty and balance that enriches our sense of colours working together. I wonder what you make of this painting. Mark Rothko painted large canvases with what looks at first like simple flat colour, but there is activity at the edges of the squares and oblong shapes he uses, the intensity and depth of colour can envelop the viewer – perhaps.

 

images from wikipedia.

Max Beckman 1884 – 1950. German The Journey of the Fishes 1934.

Practice, The Arts, , ,

 

 

IMG_0721 (2)

Max Beckman was born in Leipzig, Germany, when he was ten years old his father died and the family moved to Brunswick in Lower Saxony, his parent’s birthplace. Beckman attended the Grandducal Art School in Weimar in 1900, three years later he stayed in Paris and in 1904 he goes to Berlin, then in 1906 he travels to Florence where he spent six months, in 1905 he joins the Die Brucke art group which was formed in Dresden, – there is an earlier blog on this site about that art movement. Beckman’s work is called German Expressionist although his work is figurative, he rejected the description and became a member of a group called New Objectivity along with the painter George Grosz among others, they looked forward with a certain amount of cynicism, having seen the results of war.  Beckman was to become even more outraged by the activities of the Nazis after the 1930s  Returning to his early years, on the move again he  moves to Berlin in 1907, in 1908 he and his wife have a son, Peter.   At the outbreak of WW1 in 1914 he enlists in the German army field hospital corps but on health grounds he is discharged a year later. Max Beckman’s work was influenced by the experiences of living through both world wars, his time in the army was very traumatic and left a lasting impression which impacted on his art producing strong, raw images of people in different places with hard faces without laughter, at the circus, on the dance floor or sitting at a table in a restaurant, he also painted several self portraits.

In 1925 he married for the second time and taught art in Frankfurt for eight years, he exhibited work in New York, Hammheim and in Berlin. In 1933 the Nazi regime dismissed him from his post, Max Beckman moves back again to Berlin, his work is taken out of exhibitions by Hitler and along with the work of other painters that Hitler rejects an exhibition is set up called ‘Degenerate Art’ opened for the public to visit and ridicule. In 1937 Beckman and his wife move to Amsterdam where he is very productive, also spending some time in Paris. During a visit to London he gives a lecture called ‘On My Painting’ it was an anti- Nazi discourse. He exhibits work in the ‘Exhibition of 20th century German Art’. During 1938/9 he lives in Paris, he seems to be a constant wanderer, in 1947 the family moved to New York where he spent more settled years although he toured around the USA and taught in Washington until his death in 1950. I think the life that Beckman led and his experiences, especially the year working in an army hospital are reflected in his work, his paintings are not easy viewing.

I have chosen a painting called The Journey of the Two Fishes,  oil on canvas completed in 1934. We see a couple who are bound together and strapped to two fishes, a strange craft, Beckman’s mythology was his own but he was interested in Babylonian lore and myth which portrays a god named Dagon, a fertility symbol who has the head of a fish and a similar god called Oannes who brought wisdom to humankind. The fishes are diving to the depths of the ocean, the woman stares into the distance, the man is very afraid knowing that they are ‘heading for perdition’, both have removed their masks, their shallow lives revealed, for Beckman the fishes were a symbol of overpowering sexual desires, he had seen medieval paintings depicting the Last Judgement such as in the fresco at Composanto at Pisa, also Hindu myths. The black colour at the lower edge of the work is ‘ a tragic symbol of hopelessness.’ We can also see a glimmer of hope in the sailing ship on the right hand side, its mast is the shape of a cross, a coincidence or not?

Information from wikipedia, the image is taken from the book Beckman, written by S Luckner.

Henri Matisse 1869 – 1954, Fauve Movement The Joy of Living 1904-5.

Practice, The Arts, ,

359px-The_Joy_of_Life

Henry Matisse was born in northern France, he studied Law in Paris before realising that he wanted to be an artist, from 1891 he studied in Paris. He wrote that while painting he had discovered ‘ a kind of paradise.’ He was a leading member of the Fauve movement or the Wild Ones, the Fauve painters were revolutionary, Matisse wold develop new styles of painting as the years passed but the Wild Ones were a link to modern art, another bridge. Matisse was a leading figure in this art movement while remaining an upholder of the classical French tradition studying work by artists like Chardin, Poussin and Watteau. He spent time in London and saw the Turners there, when he was more financially secure he lived in Algiers and Morocco absorbing the art of Islam, he knew the work of Van Gough and became a lifelong friend of Picasso whom he met in 1906, he also admired Manet and Japanese art, all these influences will have been stored to use in his own way. He had a daughter called Marguerite with his model Caroline Joblau, he then married Amelie Noelle Paryre, they had a daughter, Emilie took on the care for Marguerite.

Matisse drew what he saw but changed the colour if required to bring balance, ‘the colour became the subject of the painting as well as its expression, ‘ He was a master draughtsman and his colour theory was bold, he would use reds against greens, violets against yellows for example, complementary colours that affected each other making them more vibrant, he wrote that he did not paint what he saw literally but how he felt about it, the emotion it produced in him in an embodied way. I admire Matisse’s work enormously he is one of my favourite painters, his colours are magnificent.

The Joy of Living, Le Bonheur was painted in the years 1905 and 1906, the symbolism is carried in its title, the painting is a nostalgic return to the Garden of Eden where clothes are not necessary, work is not a trial and sadness does not exist, what bliss! The yellow beach stretches out far to sea, tree trunks are coloured aqua marine and violet, the leafy canopy ranges through pale ochre, orange, green and violet, a patch of sky above the tree on the right hand side is a delicate pink/purple. The curves of the figures are echoed by the sinuous tree trunks which form a curtain on this stage, the main lovers are bounded by a shady outline, as though they are immune from what is going on around being only involved with each other. The figures are not to scale, we are invited to enter the painting and view them from different perspectives, there is some perspective we see the distant horizon, the colours are not as we see them, why should a sky be blue in a dream? Matisse wrote ‘ Slowly I discovered the secret of my art. It consists of a meditation on nature,’ the fauna and flora around him. It is ‘the expression of a dream which is always inspired by reality’.

Matisse was non-political, his daughter Marguerite was an activist in WW2 she was captured and tortured by the German authorities, it can be imagined how distraught he felt, she managed to escape while being moved to a concentration camp. He became ill in his old age but continued to work in his sick bed, with the help of assistants he created large coloured paper cut outs, many of which were exhibited in London recently. He died after a heart attack in 1954

 

Image from wikimedia commons.

Sliman Mansour 1947 – Palestinian Artist. Salma, a Poster 1988

Podcast, Practice, Society events, The Arts, Uncategorized, ,

Sliman_Mansour_poster_1988

Sliman Mansour was born in Birzeit, Jerusalem in 1947, he went to a boarding school in Bethlehem. He is a painter, sculptor, writer and teacher, he played a part in the Liberation Art Movement in Palestine and was one of the New Visions group of Palestinians, he also served as the head of the League of Palestinian Artists from 1986 to 1990 and served as a director of the Al-Waihi Art Centre in Jerusalem, he organised exhibitions from 1990, his work is exhibited in Palestine, Israel, across Europe, Norway and America, he has written two books on Palestinian folklore and in 1998 he won grand prize at the Cairo Biennial. His work is aimed at reminding the Palestinian community of their roots and identity since territory was occupied by Israeli forces. The history of Palestine is far from simple, in the 18th. Century the population of Palestine was 250,000, 6,500 of them were Jews, by 1897 there were three times as many inhabitants, the majority were Gentiles and more than half a million were Arabs.

Mansour started experimenting with mixed media, such as mud, henna, lime on wood and assemblage materials, the idea behind their use was to use home produced materials and boycott paints from Israel. Mansour was working towards giving Palestinians their identity back while still being ruled by Israeli governments, the second intifada saw the death of 3,000 Palestinians and 1,000 Israelis which ended with the PM Ariel Sharon and President Mahmoud Abbas committed to keep the peace in ‘Roadmap for Peace’. Mansour said ‘art helped and is still helping a kind of revival of Palestinian identity. And through art we helped in creating that…. creating symbols for Palestinian identity through art.’

 
I have chosen a poster, probably painted in water colour of a young Palestinian women called Salma, dated 1978, she wears traditional embroidered clothing, she holds a bowl of oranges, the fruits of the land with her labourer’s hands, the orange tree is a symbol of ‘catastrophe,’ – the occupation of Palestine, more about that later. Mansour is among the intifada group of artists who follow a third way of non – violence, ‘not succumbing to occupation nor getting overwhelmed by hate in confronting the occupation, keeping dignity in everyday life, connecting to the land, culture, religious rights and identity and having respect for the other’s source of identity,’ they were concerned too with Moslem- Christian relations.

Background to the conflict – with reference to a recent review I read in the London Review of Books by Nathan Thrall called My Promised Land; The Triumph and Tragedy of Israel by Ari Savit, the grandson of  Herbert Bentwich who in 1897 sailed to Jaffa with a delegation of twenty one Zionists to investigate whether Palestine would make a suitable site for a Jewish national home. Bentwich shut out the fact that non Jews were already living there, he failed to notice the Arabs and Gentiles only planning a Palestinian land for Jews, soon 25,000 mainly secular Jews moved into Palestine and lived in communal agrarian settlements. By 1935 a quarter of the population was Jewish, in 1936 to 1939 there was the Arab Revolt against the British Mandate and Jewish immigration, ethnic conflict had become almost inevitable. In May 1948 Arab armies invaded the territory called Lydda, any rebellion was crushed by the Israeli forces, called the ‘ Catastrophe,’ tensions still exist. The UN idea to divide the land was rejected by the Arabs and fifty six per cent of the land was given to the Jewish population. Sliman Mansour was part of the second intifada working towards a resolution to the conflict. Shavit wrote ‘ that if Zionism was to be then Lydda could not be’ which perhaps  condones the actions taken. Although ‘ Ben Gurion was enlightened,’ his wishes to resolve the conflict did not last long.

 
Mansour painted a series village paintings to remember those inhabitants uprooted in the Jezreel Valley to provide new homes for Israelis. Mansour’s work was often seen as subversive by the Israeli government, he spent time in prison. Art critics see his work as possessing great maturity which shows an awareness of international currents in art. In other posters by Mansour like Salma we see a young woman in traditional dress, often the female image is used for the mobilisation for Palestinian Resistance filled with ‘complex meanings of nation, rootedness, resistance, fecundity and Palestine itself.’ Another poster called The Camel of Heavy Burdens, 1980, the camel depicted is an iconic description of a camel which goes on giving milk in times of drought.

 
On Youtube there is a clip showing Mansour’s work with music called Baghranni (I sing) sung by Amal Markos.