RED #4

final painting

Red #4   Oil, wax on panel    50x50cm

 

one of the first stages of the painting

This painting was a challenge for me both mentally and physically. 

Begun at the end of 2014 it has taken  months to arrive at a conclusion. I started with the paint that was left on my palette, no ideas, I didn't want to waste the paint but just wanted to cover the panel as a start.

Continuing, I had difficulty putting my head and heart into what I was doing.  Then with the new year, my flu session and other challenges caused a major block.  I was stuck, working but without a vision of what I was doing. This happens at times. Until, suddenly, reason sets in unexplainably, and the road straightens.

The path is clear.

See Blog Post:  Presenting a New Year Resolution.

Back to Work

 new work (in progress): ... oil on canvas 50x70"

This is a quick beginning for new work, still with reds but new in approach

Amazing is the way a painting can grow and develop in my head without thinking, without touching a color or brush. It's just there.

When finally I put myself in front of a virgin canvas and start to make marks and create color fields it explodes.

Maybe the pause in time is the triggering force.  Maybe it's the need, after a pause, to start afresh, try something new, new color schemes, new breath, new peace.

Whatever . . . I'M BACK TO WORK. . . a continuing process.

The Monuments Men

Up to now I never knew much about  the Monuments Men.

When a few years ago the press and TV spread news about  George Clooney buying  rights to a book about soldiers in World War II called the Monuments Men,  I thought it  interesting but nothing more. Maybe there weren’t enough  details about these men and their mission  to catch my interest at the time.

Then, just over a month ago, I received this invitation in my mail:

 

The Loggia of the Uffizi Gallery.  The door to the library is on the left.

 Ilaria Dagnini Brey's talk on 'Saving Italy's Art during the War' is on Monday 5th May, at the  Biblioteca degli Uffizi, at 5 p.m

Memorial Day was coming soon and there were plans in the air for  celebrating the 70th anniversary of the Allies landing in Europe. I decided to attend for two reasons: to see the Uffizi library as well as to hear the  speech not knowing that she would be talking about these Monuments Men.

The beautiful library of the Uffizi Gallery. The small door at the center opens onto the Loggia of the Uffizi.

 The speaker, Ilaria Dagnini Brey, is a journalist, Italian but now living in NYC with her family. She  learned of the monuments men, the subject of her 2009 book, while researching the 1944 bombing of Ovetari Chapel in Padua, Italy, her hometown. Much of her research was done in this very library in the Uffizi. Her book, "The Venus Fixers", was written much before the book "The Monuments Men" by Robert M. Edsel which was the base for George Clooney's film.

It could have been the amazing setting of the library, it could have been the gentle speech of this lovely woman, her vibrant enthusiasm, but now I wanted to know more about these men and the valorous work they did during the war. Never having experienced war on my own homeland, I was eager to know more about what had occcured in Florence, my new home, suddenly realizing the danger that all of her art treasures had faced.

The two dramatic photos below are taken from Mrs. Brey's book and from her article at the link below.

Thick black smoke clouding the sky over Florence's Duomo and the bell tower after a bombing raid.

Michelangelo's David.A wall of bricks was built to protect him  during bombing raids.

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/how-monuments-men-saved-italys-treasures-180948005/


The amazing thing about these men is that they were all scholars, architects, art historians,  and artists
in their own right. And they were low ranking soldiers sometimes unable to convince officials to listen. Some had spent time in Italy studying and knew the language therefore being valuable to the allies for translation. Along with some of the  Italian superintendents of museums, these men were instrumental in  saving  much of Italy's treasured art from German pilfering and bombing.

The difficulties were many, lack of transportation, shortage of gasoline, etc., but the effort was
spontaneous and strong. The huge statues and paintings that are now taken for granted in all of the most famous museums in Europe were removed from their peaceful settings to safer places in the outskirts of important cities to avoid possible bombing, ruin and theft.

I have just finished Mrs. Brey's book and, recently, have been to a lecture by Mr. Edsel on his book "The Monuments Men", and am about to start  the most recent book by Robert Edsel, "Saving Italy", which will become a movie soon. I recommend that you, too, read about this mission  ignored for too long.

Robert Edsel, at the end of his lecture, posed this question to his audience: In your opinion, if a choice had to be made between saving a work of art or a human life, what would be your reaction?

DOUBLE IMAGES

Two images for the abdominal section of the body. The complexity of the abdomen, the force of the body, the viscera. . . stomach. . . point of physical access to spiritual power and spritual strength. The solar plexus. Yet our bellies also embody our species' life-renewing power,  the womb.

This is Connection 3 (30cm x 30cm, 12x12", oil on canvas)  the series of 5 paintings representing the human figure. In the abdominal area, straight lines are more numerous connecting the internal shapes which are soft and  floating.

Connection 3 - 12x12"- 30x30cm. - oil on canvas

 This is Connection 4 of the series. Note the figures that appear only here in this canvas. The abdomen is also site of the womb, the birthplace of the figure. These figures are placed in a series of   cubical structures, their habitats. Here is the corrispondence between the human body and geometry.

Connection 4  - 12x12" - 30x30cm - oil on canvas

Leonardo da Vinci believed the workings of the human body to be an analogy for the workings of the universe.

CONNECTIONS

Connections 2  oil on canvas - 30x30cm - 12x12 in.

This is Connections 2 (30x30cm, 12 X 12in. oil on canvas)  the series of 5 canvases representing the human figure. (the first painting is shown in the previous post) Here we are at the trunk of the body, from the neck to the belly, shoulder, heart, and spinal column. Again the straight lines connect the internal shapes representing the structural and architectural parts that I believe  interact.

As you see, I've named this series Connections thinking of  the white lines  which appear in each painting.  At times disecting and at other times knitting each of the works into a harmonious unit,
they form the protective structure for the whole, the architectural and the anatomical whole.  

I must admit that I have difficulty with titles, difficulty in the sense that I feel that most titles are too confining for most art observers. My interpretation, my idea as I paint, is not the only possible way to look at a painting.  The beauty of abstract art is that there is room for a variety of interpretations and that close and frequent observation of an abstract painting can and should open up a world of seeing unknown to observers before. There should never be fear to make an error.

A PERFECT ENDING . . . A NEW BEGINNING.

packed up canvases and other materials for home "studio"

   

The New Year is just a few days away.  Lists of new year resolutions,  promises in some way to make a change, throw out the old and let in the new,  just what I am about to do, what I have been waiting for.

Approximately 2 months ago, checking in on the artist blogs that I follow,  I discovered that one of these blog artists, a professor of art and abstract artist, was offering a program of mentoring on line, ie., a series of 4 private sessions which would be a guide and a source of inspiration to me as an artist. Just what I  have been wanting for the longest time. Someone with whom I could exchange ideas, who would give me and my work a critical eye, something that doesn’t exist normally.  Now-a-days artists keep pretty much to themselves. There is no real exchange of ideas nor discussion.

 I confess that I was a little frightened by the thought of this contact, (a 45 minute conversation via Skype).  What would we talk about, what would I have to say?...etc.etc. Our first trial run was  a complete disaster.  My computer was too slow to maintain contact with the Skype call. My mentor could hear me but I couldn’t hear but a split second of her voice.  We could see each other but only with text messages were we able to communicate.

Our second try was much better, a limpid image and clear sound so we had our first contact where the minutes flew and we established a strong contact.

But now I have homework to do for our next session, . . . next month, . . . next year. And, since it is holiday season, I won’t have the possibility to go to my studio in the city.  I packed up materials and canvases and have set up my “studio” at home in a covered terrace - a little cold but flooded with light.

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO YOU!!!

http://janicemasonsteevesartwork.blogspot.it            /http://janicemasonsteevesartwork.blogspot.it/