Chuck Close

This artist is contemporary and in a drawing class I took 2 years ago I became exraordinarily transfixed on him. He's an american painter born in 1940 who achieved incredible recognition through his massive-scale paintings and his work using photorealism and hyperreailsm. He is the amazing Chuck Close.

Photorealism is the genre of painting based on making a painting from a photograph; it began in the late 1960's. It eveolved from pop art as a reaction to Abstract Expressionism.

Hyperrealism is simply considered to be an advancement of photorealism. Hyperrealist painters and sculptors use photographic images as a reference source from which to create a more definitive and detailed rendering, one that unlike Photorealism, often is narrative and emotive in its depictions. Photorealist painters tended to imitate photographic images, often omitting or abstracting certain finite detail in order to maintain a consistent overall pictorial design.

Now, Cuck Close is a fascinating individual and his story powerful and sad. The beginning is semi-standard. He graduated Yale with an MFA and taught art at the University of Massachusetts. His first one-man show was at the New York Museum of Modern Art in 1970.

His work was innovative. I studied and observed and learned all about his technique. To create his grid work copies of photos, Close puts a grid on the photo and on the canvas and copies cell by cell. Typically, each square within the grid is filled with roughly executed regions of color (usually consisting of painted rings on a contrasting background) which give the cell a perceived 'average' hue which makes sense from a distance. His first tools for this included an airbrush, rags, razor blade, and an eraser mounted on a power drill. His first picture with this method was Big Self Portrait, a black and white enlargement of his face.

Just look at the amazing detail and handiwork. Its diffcult to imagine it isn't a photograph. His work is calculated and masterful. I mean this painting is 9ft x 7ft so I can only imagine how long it took, about 4 months apparently. He used acrylic paint and an airbrush to include every detail. This was the first of his large-scale works and he just got more outrageous and daring from this point.

This piece and detail is Mark (1978-1979). This one took him 14 months to complete, he used acyrlic paint and applied it in a series of airbrushed layers that basically imitated how printers work today. Just look at the size and the detail. I can't get over the level of skill. I'm just blown away.

Look at that iris! Its phenomenal and unprecedented.

He soon implemented another technique.

This one is Lucas (1986-1987).
Just as beautiful as the one before, but stylistically more interesting. It's quite reminscent of the "pixelated" look with overblown digital photographs, which makes this idea more than impressive. If you look close enough at the detail yuo can evn see the pencil lines. Some would say it's sloppy, but I find it charming.

I have tried to utilize this technique (feel free to give criticism):

It has no name since it as purely practice for me (2007).

I think I did a decent job at imitation, but my medium was oil pastels.

Close's story only gets more interesting from this point. On December 7, 1988 he went to New York to give an art award, but he felt a pain in his chest. He managed to give his speech and then he quickly ran to the hospital. By the time he had been admitted and examined he was paralyzed form he neck down and it turned out he had a rare spinal artery collapse. Close would, so intimately, call this day "The Event". Close was in rehab for several months strengthening his muscles; he soon had slight movement in his arms and could walk, yet only for a few steps. He has relied on a wheelchair since.

Close continued to paint on with a brush strapped onto his wrist with tape, creating large portraits in low-resolution grid squares created by an assistant. I can hardly fathom how difficult physically and emotionaly it had to be for him. He could no longer paint as meticulously as before and no longer could he achieve that very fine detail. His work was still beautiful and extraordinary.

He painted many people who are household names today. They include people like Bill Clinton, Kate Moss, Willem Dafoe, and Brad Pitt, along with his wife and children.

I strongly encourage anyone to view his work. Simply wonderful.

Here are some of his paintings, and you will be amazed:

Maggie (1996).

This is the one tried to imitate.

John (1971-1072).
Your mind was blown, right?

Eric (1990).

Color Theory

Color theory can be immensely complicated sometimes, but once you figure out one part of it the rest is easy to pick up on. The idea of subtractive color is what most painters use.
Subtractive color: where mixing the hues will create black.

Grasping this theory will help you understand many things like understanding why certain colors "work" together and others don't. Or how paintings are deigned, because color is a vital element of the comosition. Learning how to simply mix the colors will be better understood, you will better recognize the individual properties. And you will understand the basic principles of painting.

Start with color. Colors are classified by three properties: hue, purity and value. People tend to confuse the terms and misunderstand them. It should be known that colors will mix and appear differetly on a computer screen.

Hue: color (it really is that simple).

Purity: The freedom from other color admixtures.

Value: The luminance — brightness or dullness — of a hue, as measured by the amount of light reflected. Also called tone or tonal value.

To tint a color you would add white while a shade would be adding grey or the compliment of that color.

In order to understand how complimentary colors work you need to understand mixing colors as well as primary colors, scondary colors and tertiary colors.

The primary colors are red, yellow, and bue.

The secondary colors are the mixing of 2 rimary colors, orange, green and purple. Example - red plus yellow equals orange.

A secondary color mixed with an adjacent primary (on the color wheel) will create a tertiary color.

Colors also have a temperature. Colors are commonly described as warm or cold. Warm colors lie at the orange-red end of the spectrum, and are 'active', causing them to 'advance'. Blue colors, particularly when dark and/or undersaturated, are 'cool' and tend to 'recede'. Other areas of the spectrum remain neutral. I personally tend to have difficulty mixing colors and trying to get just the right teperature and if I want perfect color harmony I really need to get that down. I demand some sort of thermometer for paint.

There are a few approaches to having successful color harmony.

Monochrome
One hue. Composition is achieved entirely through adjusting purities and tones. A limited but powerful approach, that always makes a good exercise.
In this detail from his Diana and Callisto (1556-9. National Gallery of Scotland. Edinburgh), Titian has used a simple orange hue throughout, not far from that shown above in the color purity strip. The marvelous variety comes from modifying purity and tone with glazes and scumbles — which demonstrates the power of old master techniques. (The whole picture uses a wider color range, including blue and a pink-red.)

Complementary
Composition uses one hue and its complementary — e.g. blue and orange. The hues can be mixed in various proportions, and tones added with white or black (or preferably earth pigments).

The detail comes from a famous painting by Monet of the Beach at Trouville (1870). It was painted on the spot. Though seeming a careless, even clumsy, improvisatory sketch, it is nothing of the sort. Monet served a traditional apprenticeship, and is here playing off an orange in beach and flesh tones against chalky tints of blue.

Analogous.
Composition using just 3 hues of 12-color wheel - e.g. orange, orange-red and red. As before, the hues can be mixed, and their tones adjusted.
This scheme can be further divided into:
1. one pure hue and the other two semi-neutral (i.e. mixed, muddy, low intensity). The pure tone will advance more than the others, whether is warm or cold.
2. high key pure hues. Usually applied in a broken fashion so that hues of the same value shimmer when seen close to, but group to broad areas of color from a distance.
3. one dominant, one subordinate and one minor. The dominant is varied with different purities and values.
The detail is from Eugene Delacroix's Death of Sardanapolis. 1826. Musée du Louvre. Paris. The whole picture employs an analogous color scheme of red, red-orange and orange.

Split Complementary
Like analogous, but with the addition of the complementary of the mid-hue of the analogous range. A warm/cool balance is more easily introduced with this scheme.

This intimate painting by Mary Cassatt (The Bath. c. 1892. The Art Institute of Chicago) uses tertiary hues, and falls somewhere between a triadic scheme and a split complementary one of red-purple against hues of green-blue. The background repeats the foreground colors but in muddier and darker colors.

Triadic
Uses all three hues that are equidistance on color wheel. Hues may be varied in purity and tone as usual, and the scheme is further divided:

1. Primary colors only: very difficult to use outside posters and graphic design.
2. Secondary triadics, e.g. scarlet, mauve and viridian. Very beautiful effects can be achieved, probably because all colors contain some of the other two secondaries.
Green, blue and yellow appear in this detail from Vermeer's The Music Lesson (c. 1664. HM The Queen's Royal Collection. St. James's Palace). Harmony has also been achieved by very skillful use of tone.

I'm certain this wasn't exactly enlightening, but there no better way to learn other than reading and practicing. And I'm a compulsive note-taker....this blog is kind of enabling me.

Hellenistic Art, part 3

I left off discussing the eroticism in this era, but vicory and nobility in defeat are equally important. There is one piece which personifies all that is triumphant.
The Nike of Samonthrace (190 BCE) by Phidias is the perfect example. I should probably say explain what a Nike is first. A Nike is was a goddess who personified triumph throughout the ages of the ancient Greek culture. She is known as the Winged Goddess of Victory. The Roman equivalent is Victoria.
Originally she was placed on a cifftop overlooking the sea. And she even sees to have been designed that way. Her wings flap in the wind and her drapery is swept behind her. I love the way it bunches and folds. The setting amplified the effect the artist was trying to convey.
The damage done to this piece leaves some to be desired. The head and arms have never been recoered but we do have an idea of what those pieces were doing. Her right arm was probably raised to her face, the hand cupped as she shouted a cry of victory. The left arm was most likely outstretched like one would in a battle. Its a beautiful piece and moving. I feel like I can actually hear the spalshing water when I look at it.
While victory was often portrayed, so was defeat and tragedy; like the story of Lacoon and his sons.

This piece; Lacoon and his sons (various dates have been suggested for the statue, ranging from about 160 to about 20 BCE) was sculptued by Agesander, Athenodoros and Polydorus.
The story behind this a classic Greek tragedy. Lacoon had attempted to expose the ruse of the Trojan horse and serpents were sent by Poseidon to punish Lacoon and his sons.
We can see the intensity of the struggle. You see one serpent biting into Lacoon's left hip and him crying out in pain. And you can also feel his agony as his sons suffer alongside him, punished for the acts of their father. This piece is actually a bit reminiscent of the great friez on the Altar of Zeus at Pergamon.
Many have attributed some homoerotic ideals to this piece, and while the Greeks are known to be "boy lovers" this idea was mostly very far from the minds of the scultors.
After seeing all these pieces I have to wonder why some would disregard this era. The art shows amazing work and talent; its dramatic, emotional, sensual and powerful.

Painting Techniques: Layered Painting

I continue to branch off from my art history posts a little bit.

Bare with me.

I really felt like painting today but had neither the time nor materials at my disposal. I need more money as I've run low on acrylic paint and water colors, I'm not one for using oil much.

So I decided to read through my technique and history books, which did not quench my desire to paint, it merely exacerbated it.

I've been trying to improve my layering technique and thought reading about it and looking at various examples would help; it certainly wouldn't hurt. The method is a lengthy one, and is best suited to miniatures, photo-realism, and painting that requires a very high degree of detail and surface finish.

Following the steps properly are crucial, if you rush too much it won't have the same look or effect, which is the problem I run into the most...I always rush.

1. You begin with the idea of course and lay down some thin pencil lines and some broad washes of color.

(a broad wash of color is like a thin glaze, should be transparent for the most part)

2. Dry

3. Lay in another thin body of color.

4. Dry

5. Lay in second thin body color, within the contours of the first layer or overpainting it.

6. Continue building up the underpainting in a long, continuous process of trial and error. You can use a full range of techniques during this step.

7. Dry thoroughly

8. Lay in glazes and work wet into wet as neccessary.

9. Dry

10. Lay in thicker glazes, modifying previous glazes where necessary.

11. Add body color to recapture areas glazed too heavily.

It is also possible to alternate body color and glaze rather than leave all glazing to the end. Shadows may be created by glazes, and the final picture harmonized.

Here are some examples of finished pieces using layered painting technique-

This shows a good glazing thechnique, note being abe to see the music notes in the sky and the darkening around the edges and corners.

This is another good example.

Layering is good when you want nice transitions between different values and highlights.

Wet into wet — wet color into, over or alongside other wet color

Glazing — layer of transparent color: laid on when paint below is practically dry: any color can be used with glazing medium but transparent colors are best.

I think I might try and paint a bit this weekend, but with all my midterms coming up next week I probably shouldn't get wapped up too much in it...

Severance

I still have a part 3 of the Hellenisitc Era coming, but I'm taking a small detour into literature.

Awhile ago I stumbled across this book called Severance. I was intrigued, very intrigued. It is a collection of short, very short stories by Robert Olen Butler.

There are 62 short stories, all written form the point of view of a person or creature immediatley after being decapitated.

According to this book and several other sources the human had is believed to remain in a state consciousness for one and a half minutes. And in a heightened state of emotion, like that one, people speak at a rate of 160 words per minute. So basic mathematics suggests we would speak or think at least 240 words. So every story is exactly 240 words. Interesting, yes? The people he chose to represent is quite engaging as well. Some are factual and some are fictional and one is his own death, but all the stories and the way they're told encite some panic and leave you feeling oddly invasive.

-Mud, 40,000 BC

-Medusa, 2000 BC

-Marcus Tullius Cicero, 43 BC

-John the Baptist, 30 AD

-Valeria Messalina, 48 D

-Dioscorus, 67 AD

-Paul (Saul of Tarsus), 67 AD
-Matthew, 78 AD

-St. Valentine, 270 AD

-a Dragon, 301 AD

-St. George, 303 AD

-The Lady of the Lake, 470 AD

-Ah Ballam, 803 AD

-Piers Gaveston, 1312 AD

-Gansnacken, 1494 AD

-Thomas More, 1535 AD

-Anne Boleyn, 1536 AD

-Catherine Howard, 1542 AD
-Lady Jane Grey, 1554 AD

-Mary Stuart (Queen of Scots), 1587 AD

-Walter Raleigh, 1618 AD

-Brita Gullsmed, 1675 AD

-Louis XVI, 1793 AD

-Marie Antoinette, 1793 (I feel the AD is unneccessary at this point)

-Marie-Jeanne Becu (Comtesse du Barry), 1793

-Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier, 1794

-Andre Chenier, 1794

-Maximilien Robespierre, 179

-Pierre-Francois Lacenaire, 1836

-Ta Chin, 1838

-Jacob, 1855

-Angry Eyes, 1880

-Chin Chin Chan, 1882

-Dave Rudabaugh, 1886

-Agnes Gwenlan, 1899

-Charles H. Stuart, 1904

-Rokhlel Pogorelsky, 1905

-John Martin, 1921

-Henri Landru, 1922

-Paul Gorguloff, 1932

-Benita Von Berg, 1935

-Nguyen Van Trinh, 1952

-Alwi Shah, 1958

-a Chicken, 1958

-Vera Jayne Palmer, 1967

-Le Van Ky, 1968

-Yukio Mishima, 1979

-Robert Kornbluth, 1984

- Jennifer Hadley, 1989

-Nicole Brown Simpson, 1994

-Mohammed Aziz Najafi, 1996

-Lydia Koenig, 1999

-Claude Messener, 2000

- Lois Kennerly, 2001

-Isioma Owoabi, 2002

-Hanadi Tayseer Jaradat, 2003

-Earl Dagget, 2003

-Maisie Hobbs, 2003
-Robert Durand, 2003

-Tyler Alkins, 2004

-Vasil Bukhalov, 2004

-Robert Olen Butler, 2010

Apparently the author himself can forsee his own death, and thats coming up pretty quickly. Hmm, curious.

These stories are unique and captivating. I was particularly interested in the stories surrounding them women beheaded by their husbands, hundreds of years ago and today. The story of Ta Chin I found incredibly impressive and engrossing. She lived during the early 19th century and was decapitated by order of her husband. She seems so sad, but peaceful despite it all. She talks of her footbinding and how painful and reressing that is. Her last line is "please, before my head cut off my feet".

This post sort of rambles, I just stumbled across something ineresting.
I recommend this book to anyone really. Its unusual and magnetic.

Hellenistic Art, part 2

I left off before discussing the Seated Boxer, one of many pieces depicting men as strong, but defeated. These gave men dignity and displayed honor, they had a fairly obvious purpose here, but some are confusing with their meanings. One such piece is Old Market Woman (150 BCE - 100 BCE).

Preceeding this era all Greek art consisted of beautiful pieces of the young, strong, attractive and powerful. But this piece shows something quite the polar opposite of the norm and is very characteristic of this age. Here we see a woman wrinkled, tattered, bent with age and her spirit broken. She is weak and haggard. Despite her less than desireabe physical condition she still carries on, but not because she enjoys any pleasure form life anymore, but because she simply must.

I find pieces like this quite interesting. They aren't something most people find aesthetically pleasing, nor do they glorify any particular individual. I believe that this artist, though unknown, wanted to depict things the way they truly were and how he saw the common people around him. It is sort of a precursor for Realism when you think about it. Though a lot of Hellenistic overdramatizes some things this is truthful, but emotional all the same.

Hellenistic art was aiming to depict a social climate much wider than we have seen before. We see soldiers, fighters, and the old or dying. They handle it with sensitivity, but they still maintained some traditions in art, such as scenes including eroticism.

A very famous sculpture that openly explored eroticism is Venus de Milo (150 BCE - 125 BCE) by Alexander of Antioch-on-the-Meander. The area where the artist signed has been lost since. This piece is a roman copy and the use of marble made it a bit more vulnerable to damage, which is obvious in the lack of arms. From the information we've gathered we know that her left arm - which is seperately preserved - is holding an apple, the one Paris awarded her when he judged her to be the most beautiful goddess. And we can only surmise hat the right arm is doing. We tend to believe hat her right hand was loosely grasping at the fabric covering her in an attempt to keep it from slipping futher. This is to intentionally tease the viewer; it plays with sexuality without being outright sexual or crass.

I consider this piece to be more sexual than say the Aphrodite of Kindo where she is entirely nude. One of the many things that arouses people is not knowing and hiding her lower half form the viewer entices them. This makes her more desireable than she might have been had she been entirely nude....though I doubt all would agree with me on that. I guess some would prefer less mytery.

This next piece is more overtly sexual in it's nature, depicting the same goddess; Aphrodite, Eros, and Pan (100 BCE) - artist unknown.

Here you see Aphrodite is resisting Pan's unwanted advances and Eros rushing in to try and protect her from very unspeakable acts. The composition and set up here is quite tense, which was clearly intentional. Her archaic smile smile is interesting here, the detail work is incredible and the positioning of the bodies and twisting makes it very dynamic. I love her stance, you see how defensive she was and feel her panic and her son rushing to her aid is quite heart-warming, despite the situation.

Actually I'm a tad irked by Eros' appearence. Previous to this era he is representd as an adolescent and full of promise, this pudgy-winged-infant is laughable. He looks like the putto depicted in many other works. They were attendants to many maidens. Another issue is how babies are often rendered almost as miniature adults, but that mostly had to do with a lack of understanding of the fragile form. They even seemed to have personailites to match their unusal form. But I can fully air these annoyances another day.

But this piece, which was commissioned by Dionysios of Berytos, is exuding sex and dominance. And considering it was displayed in a buisnessmen's clubhouse you have to wonder about their tastes, though pieces like this were commonplace during this era so it could all just boil down to trends.

Another equally erotic piece is Barberini Faun, also known as Sleeping Satyr (230 BCE - 200 BCE) by Gianlorenzo Bernini. We see a satyr who has consumed too much wine and threw down his panther skin onto a nearby rock and fell into an intoxicated sleep, though it seems a but estless when you note his furrowed brow. It seems to me that this man might be playing the part most female nudes in art tend to; helpless and exposed.

While it has never been unusual to portray a male nude in greek sculpture, I can't really recall it ever being intentionally sexual too often. Sculptures like these are the product of Hellenistic scultors exploring sexuality of the human body.

Hellenistic Art, part 1

I had immersed myself in Rococo art or the past few weeks, but a conversation with Joshua led me to seek out Hellenistic art this morning. This resulted in this blog; somewhat unorganized (like most) and a bit rambling. I always ramble when I talk about this era.

The Hellenistic era is marked mostly by the dath of Alexander in 323 BCE and lasted nearly 3 centuries until 31 BCE when the Battle of Actium took place, which led up to the roman invasion. Though other sources might say it ended in 146 BCE. I tend to lean towards the former.

The art of that time is primarily characterized by using a very decadent style and being very emotional and moving. It becomes quite romantic and dramatic. Most art preceeding this period was created almost solely for the glorification of man and it’s accomplishments. It exalted particular individuals such as emperors and worshipped the Gods. Sculptor Epigonos is responsible for the creation of two incredibly moving and dramatic pieces, they also represented a group of people not often protrayed; the Gauls, shown previously as barbarians. In this era they began to be shown with dignity and character.

A good example would be The Dying Gaul (230-220 BCE)by the sculptor Epigonos (who created the Hellenistic baroque style). While it is a roman copy, the work is still extraordinary, though I still get a bit upset when I know the Greek originals were made of bronze while these are stone. The use of stone caused some issues when it came to weight...but I disgress.

This piece is powerful. This man is a trumpeter who has collapsed from injury. There is a gash on his chest gushing blood; he is dying. The muscles in his body are relaxed, his face tense and agonizing. Just look at these details; the lines in his face, his veins, the feet always catch my attention a bit. They seem to be tensed and I feel like there is so much life in such the smallest detail. And one should note how strong he truly looks even with his body relaxed. It suggests he was inredibly strong and that whoever tok him down had to have been even more so.

Another piece about the Gauls is Gallic Chieftain Killing Himself and His Wife (230-220 BCE), also by Epigonos. This one is quite moving and always tugs a bit at my heartstrings. Here we see a man commiting an act of desperation. It shows and chieftain from Gual, who, following the demise of defeat; chooses suicide over surrendering to his enemies and kills his wife to spare her being sold into slavery. These acts are very hard to understand or accept outside of times, but they boil down to love and honor.

His face is intensely expressive; pained and heavy. His body is powerful and twisting in posture while his wife’s is limp and lifeless, hanging dramatically forward. This singular act can only really be appreciated in true Lysippan tradition by walking around it, it’s theactrics and intensity can only be wholely absored in this fashion. Just look at the cloth and how incredibly realistic the bodies are. Her body, covered in the cloth; makes it hard to truly picture. But that doesn't take away from the power and intenstity.

The work never fails to astound me.

Another piece representing a man defeated but glorified is the Seated Boxer (100-50 BCE). Thankfully the original is stil intact. Though the boxer is not victorious here, or young, he is a battered veteran who may or may not be looking at the man who just defeated him. Despite his age he is still respected and clearl he still retains his strength and poise, his muscles are still very toned. The other details here are also quite revealing of his life and trials boxing. His nose is broken, as are his teeth, he also has what is commonly referred to as "cauliflower ear". His face is scarred from the leather thongs used to protect their hands.

These pieces all show the strength and resilience of men in this era.

Stay tuned for more hellenistic art and my unorganized rambings.