Tuesday, September 08, 2009

Scottish artists - The Scottish Colourists

Last night there were two programmes on BBC4 about Scottish artists

Iona Landscape: Rocks (1925-37)
by Samuel John Peploe
Oil on canvas, Size 40.90 x 46.00 cm
National Galleries of Scotland
  • Michael Palin - the man who highlighted the work of Vilhelm Hammershoi and triggered an exhibition at the Royal Academy of Art - provided an overview of the lives and works of the Scottish Colourists. (For UK readers it's repeated on BBC4 on Saturday and I need to remember to try and have the record button working this time! It seems that you can't see it BBC iplayer and this might be to do with the fact that it's a documentary originally made in 2000.

Michael Palin explores the lives and paintings of four Scottish artists known as the Colourists: John Duncan Fergusson, George Leslie Hunter, Samuel John Peploe and Francis Campbell Boileau Cadell.

Their works hang in 10 Downing Street, but in their own lifetimes their vibrant vision shocked the critics.

  • Peter Capaldi then provided a rapid overview of prominent Scottish artists in A Portrait of Scotland (available to see again on BBC iplayer)
Peter Capaldi explores the story of Scotland's art. He had a talent for drawing and a love for art that took him to art school in Glasgow, but soon after graduating he became an actor.

Capaldi spends time with the paintings and the artists that have made Scottish art special. He sketches some of the most important Scottish portraits, and by focusing on the tradition of portraiture that goes back 500 years, Capaldi shows how Scotland's art has reflected the changing face of the nation.
This post and the one tomorrow (about the artists identified in the Capaldi programme) are going to be by way of a list. I've been intending to get round to researching the Scottish Colourists, the Glasgow Boys and various other artists for some time and these posts will be a handy aide memoire of links - and notes I made while watching the two programmes!

Hopefully some of you will also enjoy travelling through the art of Scotland courtesy of the hyperlinks.

The Scottish Colourists
Though the Colourists were entirely serious painters, their work is not complicated. It carries no hidden agenda. What you see is what you get.
Michael Palin
I've found some articles which seem to be asociated with when this documentary or a remarkably similar one which date back to 2000.
Scottish Colourists
Group of four Scottish artists, Cadell, Fergusson, Hunter, Peploe who were among the first to introduce the intense colour of the French Fauve movement into Britain
Tate Glossary - Scottish colourists
The four painters became known as the Scottish Colourists because they grafted their knowledge of contemporary French Art – Monet, Matisse, and Cezanne - onto the painterly traditions of Scotland, redefining the qualities of light and colour in their still life, landscapes, figurative paintings and drawings into their own singular styles.
Explore Art - Scottish Colourists
John Duncan Fergusson
George Leslie Hunter
Samuel John Peploe

I really like Peploe's work - he's the reason I first got interested in the Scottish Colourists
Francis "Bunty" Campbell Boileau Cadell
There's an exhibition The Scottish Colourists – Paintings from the Fleming Collection, Pallant House Gallery, Chichester, until November 1 2009. This article Diverse display of British trendsetters in Scottish Colourists at Pallant House Gallery, Chichester tells you about the Scottish Colourists and the exhibition.
Comprised of four artists, Samuel John Peploe, Francis Campbell Boileau Cadell, George Leslie Hunter and John Duncan Fergusson, the Scottish Colourists were among the most forward-thinking British artists of the twentieth century, combining a knowledge of contemporary French art with the painterly traditions of Scotland. Widely recognised as the finest collection of Scottish art in private hands, this is the first showing of The Fleming Collection in the South of England.
The exhibition continues until November 1st.

Making a Mark reviews......

Posted by Making A Mark on Tuesday, September 08, 2009 3 comments
Categories , , , , ,

Monday, September 07, 2009

You cannot copyright nature

Did you know that you can't copyright nature?

I've recently come across a couple of blog posts which highlight some potential copyright pitfalls for artists who draw and paint nature in terms of:
  • natural history subjects,
  • animals and wildlife,
  • flowers and plants and
  • natural landscapes. 
Red Cabbage
coloured pencils on Art Spectrum Colorfix
copyright Katherine Tyrrel

If that includes you I suggest you read on!

The Art Law Blog has a couple of posts which explain the issues:
I'm adding these into my information site Copyright for Artists

Below you can find my bullet point summary of the points made in the posts - however you really need to read the original posts to grasp the full extent of the points being made.
  • you cannot copyright nature because you cannot claim ownership as the author
  • consequently you cannot corner the market in depicting a particular aspect of nature
  • you can only copyright those elements which are the artistic elements of the work - the aspects which you personally add to what nature created and make it distinctively your own work
  • you can only prevent other artists from copying the elements you added - ie those aspects which make your work unique
To understand what copyright protection you can claim for a work. Tobias Butler suggests that you should:

  • Carefully think about what could be considered your original elements.
  • If you find a similar work that was made before yours, make sure you have additional original elements and think about removing their original elements.
  • Keep an eye on people who had access to your works and development processes.
Copyright Pitfall No. 2: When Nature Inspires Your Art, Make Sure You Copy Only Mother Nature
What are the implications?

Here are some aspects which occurred to me:
  • does photorealism work against copyright? It seems to me that people using a photorealism style - as opposed to a more painterly style - are likely to have more difficulty identifying the artistic elements which make the work unique to them. (ie if somebody stood on the same spot and took a photograph of exactly the same aspect of nature they could create an exact copy if working in photorealism). The only elements they can copyright may be limited to the overall design of the image. However if somebody else took the photo then presumably the copyright for that element resides with the photographer not the artist and any painting is always a derivative work? So what elements are left for the photorealistic artist to copyright?
  • what is 'nature'? I began to wonder where the borders of nature began and ended. If nature includes all plants and animals and natural landscapes - would it not also include homo sapiens?
  • what about portraiture? Are portraits of people also included? If you paint a realistic painting of your daughter can you copyright it because you were a collaborative partner in the authorship of creation? (My tongue is not entirely in my cheek!)
Some questions for my readers

What's your reaction to this information? Did you know it already or are you feeling slightly stunned right now?

Does our inability to copyright nature suggest any more questions to you?

If you create art from nature, do you know what the elements of your own work are which sets it apart from what nature created?

Do you ever think about copyright before you start to create?

Making a Mark reviews......
Posted by Making A Mark on Monday, September 07, 2009 11 comments
Categories , , , , , ,

Sunday, September 06, 2009

6th September 2009 - Who's made a mark this week?

Los Angeles fires
copyright Pat Reece

This is a watercolour sketch by Pat Reese (Pat Reece Design) of the fires burning in the hills on the outskirts of Los Angelese. You can read her blog post about making this sketch in Los Angeles County

I've featured this because, apart from one person, I can't seem to find anybody else who is drawing, sketching or painting the wildfires or their effects. I have however found some artists who have painted subjects linked to the wildfires in the past.
Wildfires are still burning out of control in Southern California near my home. The photo was taken in my neighborhood Monday morning when I set out with my paints to capture this awesome sight in oils.

As I created this painting on location small bits of ash fell and became embedded in the oil paint. They can easily be brushed off when the painting is dry but I decided to leave them now, as they impart a sense of history to this piece.
My thoughts are with all my blogging friends who live in Southern Califoria and who are experiencing the impact of the wildfires.

Congratulations to...
Art Blogs

Drawing and sketching

Have you taken a look at some of the city based Urban Sketchers blogs? Here are is the one for Seoul and some of the contributors blogs. Nice to get an eastern perspective on the urban aspects of life.

sketches of Seven Dials and Neal's Yard
Coloured Pencils and Pastels
Illustration and Fantasy Art
Painters and Painting
  • Tracy Helgeson (Works by Tracy Helgeson) is Going Abstract, Baby! - looks interesting
  • while Sarah Wimperis (The Red Shoes) has been painting at night! Check out The Night Garden and Night Light and Helford Regatta.
  • I though I must have included this previously - but apparently not - check out Outdoor Art Materials by Sadie Valeri (Sadie J Valeri) in which she reviews her kit for painting outdoors - and a few items she's got her eyes on which are used by other people.
  • Whoops! Hackney Council have been at it again - Banksy art used by Blur erased. The weird thing is that despite the zero tolerance for graffiti - even graffiti art which brings fans and visitors to Hackney from all over the world - it still took Hackney years to get round to implementing their zero tolerance policy. Maybe their arts officer could advise about the economic impact art has on its enviroment?
  • One of the reasons for my poll this month was reading artists commenting commenting on style including Robert Genn - A methodical pursuit of style

Art Business and Marketing

  • An interview with Jack Vettriano - about the money side of being an artist Jack Vettriano - including what happens when the company producing your prints goes bust!
  • Alyson B Stanfield (ArtBiz Blog) had a couple of posts this week about running artist groups. Salon is an interesting word!

Art and the Economy / Art Collectors

Art Education / Workshops / Tips and techniques

Art Exhibitions

I've been to two private views and had three posts reviewing exhibitions this week. First I posted twice about the Threadneedle Prize this week
Plus there's my Exhibition Review: Society of Feline Artists 2009 - Gayle Mason and I are both in the window!

[Update - Denise Laurent (The Painted Cat - on the Easel) and official SOFA photographer has now posted her photos of the exhibition to Flickr and this is a slideshow of work in the SOFA annual exhibition]

Art Galleries and Museums

Art History

Book Reviews

Damien Hirst

I'm not a fan as you may have realised by now.

Opinion Poll

Two posts this week:
The three most important ways you've sold art in the last 12 months are:
  • via traffic to/from your own website and/or blog (21%)
  • through commissions (21%)
  • via a gallery - as a gallery artist (15%)

Websites, webware and blogging

and finally........

Can I just seek your help please?

If you fancy two free Eurostar tickets to Brussels please read Wanted: an art competition! as I've got to come up with a good way of working out who is the most deserving person - and pretty quickly!

I hasten to add that all these references to Eurostar aren't generating any more free tickets to me. However I will be riding under the English Channel again soon because I booked and paid for our Eurostar tickets to Paris this morning for my trip to France later this month - of which 'more later' as the saying goes!

Now to start reading the Paris blogs............
Posted by Making A Mark on Sunday, September 06, 2009 6 comments
Categories , , , , , ,

Saturday, September 05, 2009

Selection for Threadneedle Prize & my shortlist

Beck at the Table by Aishan Yu
78 X 90 cm, Oil on Board
Winner of the £5,000 Federation of British Artists Emerging Artist Prize

I've looked at the The Threadneedle Prize shortlist. Now it's the turn of other works in the Threadneedle Prize Exhibition which is showing at the Mall Galleries until 19th September. You can see the works online by clicking the exhibition link. You can also vote for which one should win the £25,000 Prize - but only for the works selected for the shortlist and only until noon on 14th September.

Selection

Which Threadneedle piece gets your vote? is an article written by Brian Sewell, the art critic of the London Evening Standard about the selection process for this exhibition. He was one of the jurors last year and observed the selection process this year. Personally I think Sewell is good value once one accepts he does have very decided views on things. One might not always agree but at least it's interesting!

First, three cautionary notes:
  • If you submitted a work this year you might not want to read the article;
  • If you're thinking of submitting a work next year you also might not want to read it; and
  • Those who have had work accepted into the exhibition this year might not want to read it either - and one of the reasons why is highlighted in the extract below!
For everybody else, it's a jolly good read about a process which always causes much comment and debate. Getting an account of it from the inside is always an education!

The salient comment is this
Time after time, ambitious pictures were rejected for being ambitious (including one that in my view should have been the outright winner), twee little things included for being twee, and the downright incompetent praised for honesty and charm. And at the end, when the shortlist of seven from which the winner is to be selected by public vote had been assembled, one of the three judges with gravitas uttered the damning words: “Not one of these pictures is worth £25,000 [the value of the prize] — there is no winner here.”
That's the point for me.

This exhibition is full of interesting pictures and some good sculpture but in my view the overall competition needs many more good quality entries and/or - if Sewell is right - jurors who are in sympathy with the purpose of the Prize.

If this competition is to become what it aims to be - a showcase for the best in contemporary representational and figurative painting and sculpture that retains a strong reference to the real world - then I think it is absolutely imperative that artists enter their very best work rather than an example of their work. I know the work of some of the artists and have looked at the websites of others and that remark is not made at all lightly.

My shortlist for the Threadneedle Prize

I love being a jury of one - there's none of those pesky alternative perspectives to deal with! Here's my choice of an alternative shortlist. I'm not choosing any of the official shortlist on purpose - although I would have given serious consideration to a couple of the pieces.

The list is ordered alphabetically and I'm not going to tell you my favourite although I think some people might guess (feel free to try!). I have to say that the first three contenders came quickly and the last two slowly and there were about another three or four in contention.

The Airfield - evening VII by Michael Fairclough

The airfield - evening VII (£6,850)
oil on canvas, 116cm x 126 cm
The sky is a vast canvas, to understand its complexities one mst be flying through it. I am now doing this having learned to fly gliders, soaring with buzzards.
I've highlighted Michael Fairclough's paintings of skies before on this blog as part of a review of the 2008 NEAC exhibition.

There's nothing complex about them - other than the complexity which is entirely natural. Very simply, he is an acute observer of the subtleties of skies, cloud formation and light. He's also a member of the New English Art Club and exibits regularly with them and at the RA Summer exhibition and his galleries.

This painting is the sort of one which I'd love to have done myself.

Corner Shop Customers by Beatrice Haines

Corner shop customers (£2,800) by Beatrice Haines
Pencil on paper bag - 98 x 114 cms
Stuck in a tiny corner shop in New Mills boredom overcame me. I recorded scenes of everyday life on the paper bags that the shop provided for pick and mix and pastries.
This work comprises 20 paper bags on which are drawn portraits of customers of the shop. The heads and the goods they have bought are drawn in detail while outlines are used to indicate posture and clothing.

This is one of those "you really need to see it for yourself" pieces as you can't get the very fine quality of the portraiture drawing with a photograph. These are all pencil drawings and they're done on corner shop paper bags - almost certainly made from wood pulp and hence not archival. As such the work will probably need careful preservation.

I loved the way it presented me with twenty portraits of people living in New Mills, a portrait of a corner shop and a portrait of the interests of the person working behind the counter - all in one composite work.

It seems to me that this work is both emphatically figurative and about the real world!


The Prospector by Roland Hicks

The Prospector by Roland Hicks £3,500
Oil on canvas - 76 x 76 cms
"The prospector shows a tumbleweed of hairy household fluff pausing on its long journey across a domestic prairie."
Domestic fluff as a macro Still Life! I thought the concept was amusing and it certainly makes a change from most of the still lifes I see in exhibitions - bravo for looking afresh at the domestic landscape!

This is one of those quiet paintings which lingers. I'm not entirely sure why I liked this one - but I did. Maybe it's the variation in mark-making and very subtle tonal colour variations which make up the painting?

Plus of course the humour of having something which looks like a highly abstract painting actually being a portrait of a ball of fluff! One has the feeling that the artist really enjoyed writing the description of the work! ;)

Accumulation by Sara Rossberg

Accumulation is a tight cluster of people on the edge of a river, which is formed of thick waves of translucent paint, ebbing off into the calm flatness of suggested water.
This piece kept begging me to go over and look at it from the other side of the room.

I like the complexity of it. So few figurative artists tackle groups of people these days and even fewer manage to paint groups NOT in a pose for a commissioned portrait! I also like the fact that there isn't a single individual highlighted for our attention - instead our eye has to travel around the whole of the painting exploring all aspects - much as one does in the real workd when encountering a group.

Detail of Accumulation by Sara Rossberg £9,800
Acrylic and pigment on canvas - 170 x 170 cms

However what I also liked about this painting were the colours and how these have been achieved. I've seen David Brayne work with pigments and acrylic gels but he doesn't produce a surface anything like this painting. I'm not quite sure what the artist is doing but it certainly makes for a really fascinating surface. However I did find a description of the process she uses for painting on the web - and I wonder if this description is in any way linked to the painting in the exhibition.

I also liked her earlier watercolour work I found on the web - and wish I could have found a website!

Overall an imposing painting which has a voice.

Beck at the Table by Aishan Yu

You can see this work at the top of the post. This work has already won a prize as part of this competition - the Federation of British Artists Emerging Artist Prize. Part of it is on all the flyers for the competition.

I loved the glazing and the brushwork within this work. I always like paintings which make me want to look and look as this one did - and then come back to them again and take another look. I also liked the work on this artist's website and look forward to seeing more in exhibitions in London.

Aishan Yu was born in Chongqing, China in 1981 and now lives and works in London

Other works I liked included:
A second portrait by BP Portrait Prizewinner Peter Monkman is included in the show - however I prefer the one that won the BP.

I went to see the works on Tuesday and took the photos of my shortlisted works while there.

I was consequently rather pleasantly surprised to find that two of my shortlist also got highlighted by Michael Glover in his review in The Independent - see The Threadneedle Prize, Mall Galleries, London

What's your shortlist?

Do feel free to submit your shortlist by leaving a comment. Nice to have a list, even better to have the reasons why. Please also say whether you have seen the work in person or have created your shortlist from the digital image (remembering that this is the way that works get selected for exhibition in very many art competitions these days!)

The future

I've every confidence that the Threadneedle Prize will grow in stature and become a prize which artists are very proud to have on their CV. It won't happen overnight and it might take longer because all artists need to live or work in the UK - however it will happen.

Will you be entering next year?


Making a Mark reviews......


Posted by Making A Mark on Saturday, September 05, 2009 2 comments
Categories , , , , , ,

Friday, September 04, 2009

Wanted: an art competition!

Grand Place Brussels on a Saturday afternoon

Following on from my recent Little Art Break in Brussels and visit to the Magritte exhibition at the Magritte Museum, I've been offered two FREE tickets for another Little Break to Brussels. The problem is that I have to give these away to one of my readers and in order to do that I have to come up with a competition.

So I thought the fairest way of doing it would be to get you all to suggest what would be a good competition - just to be fair about this. :)

What's on offer
  • a free pair of Leisure Select tickets on Eurostar to Brussels - travelling from and returning to St Pancras, Ebbsfleet or Ashford (assuming the train you want to travel on stops at either Ebbsfleet or Ashford. You have to make your own way to and from one of these stations.
  • The break can last as long as you like but has to be taken before the end of November
  • How you get about in Brussels and where you go is entirely up to you!
This is the Little Break Big Difference website for Brussels. You can check out dates and times of tickets in the ticketing menu bottom right of the website.

What the competition needs to involve

Here are my initial thoughts - but I'd love to hear yours as well.

The basics:
  • The competition will run this month - probably starting next week.
  • It has to be a competition! Simply put there has to be something about it which enables me to differentiate between entries
  • The theme of the competition needs to be something to do with how a little break makes a big difference
  • Since this is an art blog it would be very appropriate to have an element of art involved!
  • Post your entry on your blog and then leave a link to it in a comment on this blog
  • The people who arranged my trip and who are offering these tickets will shortlist the five most amazing/funniest/brilliant responses.
  • I then get to pick the final winner - and the winner gets the free trip to Brussels!
My idea for the competition: Draw pictures of what you (or your partner/friend) look like 'before' and 'after' a Little Break - but in the style of Magritte! Which basically means using pictures and objects in a symbolic way to reflect how you'd feel - and why you need a Little Break
I make use of painting to render thoughts visible"
René Magritte
It also seems kind of appropriate to have people try out the surrealist style while this month's poll about which art style you use is running.

What's your idea? Now over to you and your creative juices. What do you think would be a good idea for a competition which fits with the basics. No prizes for this I'm afraid other than the kudos!

Anybody can suggest how the competition might run - and I can't wait to hear your ideas!

I'll round ideas up at the end of Monday and see what everybody has come up with! I reserve the right to think my idea is still best! :D (You can tell I'm quite taken with it can't you?)

Do let me know also what you think of my idea as well - and feel free to shoot it down if you've think you've got a better one!

Making a Mark reviews......

Posted by Making A Mark on Friday, September 04, 2009 3 comments
Categories ,
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)