Friday, December 04, 2009

Exhibition Review: New English Art Club - Annual Exhibition 2009

I always look forward to visiting the Annual Exhibition of the New English Art Club (NEAC) - but for various reasons have visited rather later than usual this year. The 2009 exhibition finishes at the Mall Galleries on Monday 7th December (at 1pm) and I recommend visiting if you can before then.

This year the exhibition includes 410 works of contemporary British figurative art - drawings, paintings and fine art prints. If you're unable to visit in person you can see work of NEAC members in the online shop of NEAC's trading arm - there's lots to look at!

I started by reviewing the catalogue which was wholly admirable with lots of pages of full colour plates of work in the exhibition. If you have ever thought of submitting work to this exhibition I recommend trying to get hold of a copy of viewing the work in the online shop as both give a very good flavour of the type of work which is favoured by this exhibition.

Changes this year


I noticed a few people displaying:
  • triptychs and similar series demonstrating how colour changes with the light during the course of a day. Charlotte Ardizone had a triptych of the view out of a window while Ken Howard produced a series of paintings about the different Light effects in Calle Larga Galliana in Venice which made a great display when hung together. Such a pity that these are being sold singly rather than as a group.
  • either the stages that a work goes through from sketchbook to painting to print. I particularly liked Richard Bawden's work in this respect- and his drawings, a watercolour painting and a linocut print of a view out an an Aldeburgh window
This year, possibly in an attenpt to emulate the Summer Exhibition's Small Weston Room of small figurative paintings, they've created a new room within the gallery called The Small North Room in which are hung a lot of small paintings by members and non-members.

Personally I think this is a much better approach to the presentation of small paintings which can sometimes be swamped by larger works if hung in the main gallery. The Small Weston Room always enjoys good sales. Personally I think that's not just because they are more affordable prices. I think it's also becaause there are paintings hung from waist to ceiling which means people stay longer and scan and look more than in other rooms. It's always inteersting to see how really good work always stands out even when surrounded by similar sized works. My view would be that NEAC should experiment and try hanging even more work in here next year.

I also noticed that the sponsorship has changed. Two smaller galleries have pulled out but they now have a major new sponsor in Messums.

Displays

The exhibitions includes feature displays of work by:
  • Honorory Life Members Bernard Dunstan (artwork) b.1920 and his wife Diana Armfield (artwork) and
  • the late Leslie Worth PPRWS. I always looked forward to seeing any new work he produced. It's always sad to view work 'for the last time' ie when you know you won't ever see any new work and may indeed have difficulty seeing any work at all in the duture.
Prizewinners

The prizwinners were:
Artwork I Liked

I particularly liked the attention that had been given to provide a large display of drawings and monochrome fine art prints. It's always really interesting to compare how an artist draws to hoiw they paint.

a wall of fine art drawings and prints (various artists)
copyright the artists

Although there was a lot of work I liked, I noticed that a goodly proportion of it was done by women artists - both members and non-members.


(Left) Girl in Shallows (egg tempera) by Ruth Stage
(Right) Jakob's Ladder (oil) by Charlotte Sorapure
copyright the artists
  • I'm completely intrigued by the technique that Ruth Stage NEAC uses for her contemporary and very appealing egg tempera paintings. There appears to be some sort of resist involved given the effects she gets.
  • Jakob's Ladder by Charlotte Sorapure NEAC was quite simply intriguing. I particularly like the perspective she uses for some of her landscape subjects.
  • Ann Wright's oil painting of Hot Street, Santorini which positively radiated heat
  • I found small oil paintings by Judith Gardner RBA to be very atmospheric in a very low key way (you can see more examples on the RBA website)
  • June Berry RWS NEAC's wonderfully colourful paintings - as always appealed to me. I think it's the fact that I always spend time looking at them pondering the narrative element which they always have - coupled with the sense I've personally just spotted this scene from over a hedge or a wall.
(top) Picnic by the river
(bottom) The Photo
copyright June Berry RWS, NEAC
The exhibition also provides an opportunity to view two watercolours by HRH the Prince of Wales.

The artist who puzzled me the most was award-winning portrait artist Benjamin Sullivan RP, NEAC who produced three watercolour landscape paintings of English scenes (two of Oxford and one of Finchingfield) whose colours seemed to me to be veering very close to the "chocolate box". I like both his oil paintings and drawings a lot - and have previously highlighted them on this blog. However these watercolours just left me wondering whether he's an artist in search of a subject outside his own home.

Links:
Posted by Making A Mark on Friday, December 04, 2009 1 comments
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Thursday, December 03, 2009

Review: The Wallace Collection

The Wallace Collection is a national museum in an historic London town house. In 25 galleries are unsurpassed displays of French 18th century painting, furniture and porcelain with superb Old Master paintings and a world class armoury.....The Wallace Collection presents its outstanding collections in a sumptuous but approachable manner which is an essential part of its charm.
The Wallace Collection is housed in Hertford House in Manchester Square - which is north of Oxford Street and west of Marylebone Lane. I visited last week for the very first time - and I can't quite work out why I've never visited before.

You can see my sketches from the visit of this post Sketching at the Wallace Collection on Travels with a Sketchbook.

Hertford House was the main London townhouse of the Collectors, the first four Marquesses of Hertford and Sir Richard Wallace, the illegitimate son of the 4th Marquess. The Collection was bequeathed to the British nation by Sir Richard's widow, Lady Wallace, in 1897 and opened to the public as a national museum on 22 June 1900. It's somewhat ironic that the collection now bears the name of Sir Richard Wallace's mother rather than the family name of the Marquesses of Hertford.

The Wallace Collection was assembled in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and the paintings have remained at Hertford House ever since - apart from they are leant to exhibitions. As a museum, this makes it uniquely different to the other national museums. When you step into the House, to use an old but useful metaphor, it's like stepping back in time. I really couldn't believe I was less than 5 minutes walk from Oxford Street. Although a museum, many of the rooms successfully attempt to display paintings in a domestic setting alongside furniture and items of decorative arts (porcelain, glass, clcoks etc) giving a much better impression than most museums do of how such paintings might have been hung during the lifetime of their owners.

What's also interesting is that under the terms of the bequest it is a closed collection. Nothing may be added or taken away. However works which formed part of the Wallace Collection in other properties were dispersed on the death of Sir Rochard Wallace and can now be found all over the world.

The collections cover:
The Wallace Collection displays an array of European oil paintings from the fourteenth to the mid-nineteenth century which, among museums in England, is surpassed only by those in the National Gallery.
  • Ceramics - particularly 18th-century French Sèvres porcelain and the Italian Renaissance maiolica.
  • Works of Art - including gold boxes and goldsmiths’ work, silver and base metalwork, jewellery, enamels, glass, hardstone carvings and illuminated manuscript cuttings.
  • Furniture - including some very impressive items of French furniture
  • Sculpture - nearly 500 works in many different materials and with all the main European schools represented, from the Middle Ages to the nineteenth century
  • Arms and Armour - very impressive!
For me one of the utter delights was coming across paintings by Meisonnier who is an artist I'd been learning about as I read The Judgement of Paris on my way across France in October.
in the late 1830s he also began to establish a reputation as a painter of historical genre scenes. Their small scale, meticulous detail and historical accuracy made them enormously attractive to many collectors. Within a decade he was the most expensive artist in France, his paintings largely the preserve of the financial and social elite.
Wallace Collection - (Jean-Louis-) Ernest Meissonier (1815 - 1891) - Biography
To turn a corner into the new display of French Paintings in the basement and see Polichinelle one of the paintings highlighted in the book was a huge surprise. I never knew it lived in the UK - although I had learned while reading the book that Sir Richard Wallace was a huge fan of Meisonnier's work.

One of the things I particularly noticed was the excellent condition of many of the paintings and other artifacts. It was a real pleasure to be able to look at so many paintings free of the muck of centuries! The Dutch Still Life paintings in the Wallace Collection compare extremely favourably with those I recently saw in the Louvre where many of the paintings looked like they desparately needed a clean. It's so nice to be able to see paintings in a manner more skin to the way artists intended. On reviewing the website it's apparent that a very great emphasis is placed on conservation. The Museum has its own conservators and treats in-house wooden objects (eg. furniture), and the arms and metalwork (eg. arms and armour, numerically the largest part of the Collection).

The Wallace Collection was recently rated the 7th most popular attraction in London by the people at Trip Advisor

The part of the Wallace Collection website which is actually devoted to the Collection takes a bit of exploring before you begin to realise what it can reveal and is well worth 'the trip'!

The Centenerary Project enabled a radical improvement in the space and the scope to display works at Hertford House. A glazed roof was put over the central courtyard and the basement area was opened up to provide space for four new galleries (Reserve Collection Gallery, Conservation Gallery, two Temporary Exhibition Galleries), a Study Centre (Lecture Theatre, Meeting Room, Education Studio, Visitors’ Library and two Archive Rooms) and a Sculpture Garden - which is used in the daytime as a restaurant and in the evenings for corporate events. Altogether it's a most impressive building project.

Damien Hirst Exhibition - The Wallace Collectiom

The Wallace Collection currently plays host to Exhibition: No Love Lost, Blue Paintings by Damien Hirst. I gather it has also hosted exhibitions in the past by painters such as Lucian Freud - and one can only imagine that Hirst aspires to the same credentials.

However, the facts and opinions on this exhibition are as follows...........
I found it ironic that Hirst is displaying his work in the same Museum which houses such a very large collection of work by Meisonnier. Jean-Louis-Ernest Meisonnier was once known as the artist who produced the most expensive work in France. Only the financial elite could afford to collect his work - although now he is virtually unknown. Something for Mr Hirst to to reflect on maybe?

Links:
  • Wallace Collection - website
  • The Wallace Collection, Hertford House Manchester Square London W1U 3BN
    Telephone +44 (0)207 563 9500
  • Google Maps - Wallace Collection
Posted by Making A Mark on Thursday, December 03, 2009 6 comments
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Wednesday, December 02, 2009

Imaginative Realism - highly recommended

This is rather later than I anticipated, but you can now read my Book Review - Imaginative Realism by James Gurney on Making A Mark reviews......

It gets a HIGHLY RECOMMENDED rating from me and this comment
This long time artist and author produces what he wants to do the way he wants to do it. He's writing about what he knows, he writes from a position of many years expertise and he shares an absolutely amazing amount of content and material.

It's very important to note that, at a time when many publishers of art instruction books are finding yet more ways to regurgitate existing content that they've already paid for into yet another format or cover, James Gurney confounds all the myths about the publication of art books.
  • He tackles complex topics - and renders them easy to understand.
  • He creates a book which appeals to those starting out and those who are experienced in this field.
  • He packs a huge amount of information into one book rather than delivering a publication which is very thin in content terms.
  • He tackles traditional concepts without any sense of the 'same old same old'.
This is emphatically NOT a book which is just for artists involved in fantasy and fictional art. Anybody involved in figurative art and portraying subject matter in a realistic way - even when imagined - will find it very useful. It also has a very good section on composition which alone makes the book a good buy!

This is what James Gurney (Gurney Journey) had to say about the book earlier in the year
This is the main project I’ve been working on during the last year. The material comes from my art school lectures and also from this blog. The reason I wrote the book—and this blog—is that there’s a lot of information that I think is crucial to imaginative picturemaking but I’ve never been able to find it in how-to art books.

Adapting material from a blog into a book turned out to be a much, much bigger job than I first imagined!
Link to book review:
Links to previous mentions of the book on this blog
Posted by Making A Mark on Wednesday, December 02, 2009 0 comments
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Tuesday, December 01, 2009

BP Portrait Award 2010 - Call For Entries

BP Portrait Award 2010
National Portrait Gallery website

The National Portrait Gallery in London has published the Call for Entries for the BP Portrait Award 2010. The closing date for this very prestigious competition is 14th February 2010 and you can find out who can enter and how to enter below.
The Portrait Award, now in its thirty-first year at the National Portrait Gallery and twenty-first year of sponsorship by BP, is an annual event aimed at encouraging artists to focus upon and develop the theme of portraiture in their work.
Who can enter

Basically if you are over 18, live anywhere in the world and can paint a portrait of a human figure then you should study the entry requirements. Winners of this competition tend to enjoy very significant benefits to their careers after winning the BP Portrait Award. Just to be selected for the exhibition is a very real and significant achievement.
Many artists who have had their work exhibited have gained commissions as a result of the considerable interest in the Portrait Award and the resulting exhibition.
BP Portrait Prize: The competition is open to all artists living anywhere in the world who are aged 18 and over on 1st January 2010. This is in recognition of the outstanding and innovative work currently being produced by artists of all ages working in portraiture.

BP Young Artists Award: All entrants from the 18-30 age group will automatically be considered for both the BP Young Artist Award and the BP Portrait Award, but an individual cannot win both. Artists must be 30 years of age or under on 1 January 2010 to be eligible for the BP Young Artist Award.

BP Travel Award: All 2010 exhibitors will be eligible to submit a proposal for the BP Travel Award. The aim of the Award is to provide the opportunity for an artist to experience working in a different environment, in Britain or abroad, on a project related to portraiture which will then be shown as part of the BP Portrait Award 2011 exhibition and tour in 2011-12.

Exhibition

As always, the winners and selected entries will be exhibited at the National Portrait Gallery, London before touring the country. Dates and venues are as follows
  • National Portrait Gallery - 24 June to 19 September 2010
  • Usher Gallery, Lincoln - dates in 2010-11 to be announced
  • Aberdeen Art Gallery - dates in 2010-11 to be announced
Awards

The awards are as follows:
  • the first prize is a cash award of £25,000, plus, at the judges' discretion, a commission worth £4,000, to be agreed between the National Portrait Gallery and the artist.
  • two runner-up prizes (2nd Prize £8,000; 3rd prize £6,000)
  • the BP Young Artist Award of £5,000 for entrants under the age of 30 on the 1st January 2009 - which aims to continue to competition's role as a showcase for young artistic talent.
  • BP Travel Award 2009: £5,000.
How to Enter

Deadline

Last things first - the deadline for your entry is Sunday 14th February 2010.

Entry forms

You can obtain an entry form by post or complete your entry form online.

The Rules

There are a lot of rules and they're written in small type on the website so do take the time to read them very carefully. (Remember also that using the Control and + key can enlarge type on your screen). There is nothing more frustrating than to create a work for a competition and then to realise that it isn't eligible or you can't present it in the right way at the right time!

Note in particular that works can be disqualified even if selected for exhibition if they have not adhered to the rules!

In brief the rules are:
  • the competition is open to all those aged over 18 on 1.1.10.
  • each artist is limited one entry per artist.
  • The work must have been completed after 1 January 2009.
  • the work entered
    • MUST be predominantly painted in oil, tempera or acrylic and MUST be on a stretcher or board, preferably framed and unglazed. (No watercolours, works on paper or pastels will be considered.)
    • SHOULD be a painting based on a sitting or study from life; the human figure must predominate.
  • Minimum size: 25 x 20cm (10” x 8”) unframed. Smaller works will not be considered.
  • Those not eligible for entry are employees of the National Portrait Gallery, BP, and their agents, and previous first prize-winners of the Portrait Award since 1980.
  • The entire competition is judged, on an equal and anonymous basis, from original paintings. There is no segregated judging by region or country
  • Entry forms and registration fees must be submitted to the NPG by 14th February 2010
  • All entrants will be notified if their work is selected (or not) for exhibition by 7 April 2010
  • There are lots of very detailed requirements as to submission and collection of the actual painting - my advice is to read it all very carefully!
  • All artists will need to insure their works
  • International artists should also pay particular attention to their financial liabilities (eg import duities etc) and what they are required to do.
  • The Gallery is not be responsible for wrapping works or providing wrapping materials
    for any works being returned to artists located in the UK and charges a fee to international artists.
New rules this year (I think) include:
  • All correspondence with artists will be via email!
Delivery Dates

Delivery dates: Regional and courier to London
  • Belfast Mon 15 – Wed 17 March 10.00–16.00
  • Bristol Mon 15 – Wed 17 March 10.00–16.00
  • Coatbridge, near Glasgow Mon 15 – Wed 17 March 10.00–18.00
  • Leeds Mon 15 – Wed 17 March 12.30–17.30
  • London For works arriving by post or courier: Wed 17–Thurs 25 March, 09.00–17.00 (excluding weekends)
Delivery Dates - Hand delivery to London Collection Point

For works delivered to the London collection point in person:
  • Mon 22 March 09.00–17.00
  • Tues 23 March 09.00–17.00
  • Wed 24 March 09.00–20.00
  • Thurs 25 March 09.00–20.00
  • No entries will be accepted at the London collection point after 20.00 on Thursday 25 March 2010. A Gallery representative will provide a receipt on delivery of the work.
Further Information from the NPG

If your question is not answered by information provided on the website or in the information leaflet you can contact: BP Portrait Award 2010
  • National Portrait Gallery, St Martin's Place, London WC2H 0HE
  • 020 7321 6600
  • bpaward@npg.org.uk
So you want to know more about the BP Portrait Award ?

For those wanting to find out more about artists who have won this award in the past, my information site Portraiture - Resources for Artists now includes a module which provides a complete listing of all the BP Portrait Award winners - then and now.

This section of the website lists:
  1. links to the image which won the first prize in the BP Portrait Awards (if available - for some reason the NPG website seems to failed to archive some of the exhibitions and winners) and
  2. the winning artist's current website (if available).
You can also find out more about past competitions in my posts from previous years detailed below

So that's it - good luck if you decide to enter!

Links:

These are all posts on Making A Mark. You can find all posts on Portraiture - Resources for Artists

BP Portrait Award 2009
BP Portrait Award 2008 and 2007
Posted by Making A Mark on Tuesday, December 01, 2009 1 comments
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MaM Poll (Dec. 2009) - Which art gift would you like for Christmas?

This year your fairy godmother is granting you one wish when choosing a Christmas present for yourself.

Assuming you've primed all your nearest and dearest to supplement your art supplies, I've suggested below a set of options which are a little more difficult to achieve.

Copying a painting in the Musée d'Orsay
(Julie Manet (1887) by Pierre Auguste Renoir)
photo copyright Katherine Tyrrell

So, if you got your wish, which gift would you choose?

Here's your options:
  1. An extra dollop of talent
  2. Your choice of a workshop with the best artist / tutor
  3. Your very own concept (unique, satisfying & marketable)
  4. Sponsorship to travel and paint overseas
  5. More time in the studio to make art
  6. A studio assistant to do all the messy/boring tasks
  7. Expert advice/sponsorship by a really good framer
  8. Recognition (eg Winning a major art competition)
  9. Better tools & confidence for marketing your art
  10. An invite to be a gallery artist with a great gallery
  11. An invite to teach art in a prestigious location
  12. Art Business accounts with a healthy bottom line after tax
You can find the poll in the right hand column of this blog just above "bloggers who follow this blog".

If you have any other ideas as to what you'd really like for Christmas just leave a comment below. Or maybe tell me what you'd do if you got your wish?

This poll finishes at midnight on Christmas Eve and I'll be posting the result after the holiday.

Do feel free to link to this poll on your own blog or share it with your friends - the more the merrier when it comes to responses! :)

[You can see the results of the November poll here - MAM Poll (November 09) Results: What makes a good art teacher?]

Making a Mark reviews......

Posted by Making A Mark on Tuesday, December 01, 2009 8 comments
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