WOMEN IN ART: MARY CASSATT

A very widely known American woman artist is Mary Cassatt. I remember learning about her when I was still in elementary school. She was born around Pittsburgh, PA and moved closer to Philadelphia for her childhood but then lived most of her adult life in France (where she became friends with Edgar Degas). At a young age she traveled around Europe and was able to go to Paris World's Fair in 1855 to see many many amazing artists (Ingres, Delacroix, Courbet, Corot). This is where she began her first artistic impulses even though her family didn't support her becoming a professional artist.

Eventually she moved to Europe and was a huge part of the Impressionist Movement. She studied under many artists and became friends with Degas who greatly influenced her work. "Degas had considerable influence on Cassatt. She became extremely proficient in the use of pastels, eventually creating many of her most important works in this medium. Degas also introduced her to copper engraving, of which he was a recognized master, which strengthened her control of line and overall draftsmanship. She became the subject in his series of etchings recording their trips to the Louvre. They worked side-by-side for awhile, and she gained considerably from his technique and knowledge."

Mary Cassatt, Little Girl in a Blue Armchair, 1878

Here's another one of her pieces that set her in the Impressionist movement:

Mary Cassatt, Summertime

Later on in her career she began to become influenced by Japanese drawings, like many artists had, and so her works became more illustrative. With great simplicity and blocks of color she was able to create a beautiful collection of aquatints.

Mary Cassatt, The Coiffure (study)

She was a great and prolific painter of her time and was rubbing elbows with the best of the best. Mary Cassatt's work has sold millions of dollars and she is highly influential and original. Whether you enjoy her Japanese influenced aquatints, her super Impressionist paintings, or her Degas inspired pastel drawings she is a one-of-a-kind artist that is necessary in Art History.

Citations:
All information and pictures were found at www.marycassatt.org

WOMEN IN ART: JENNY SAVILLE

One artist that many painters seem to find very influential is Jenny Saville. Her work is very grotesque and unique making her opinions heard. For this post I will briefly discuss what I know about her and show you her work. 

Saville became quite famous at a young age while finishing up college. In her 20s she was creating huge pieces of the human figure. "(Flesh) is all things. Ugly, beautiful, repulsive, compelling, anxious, neurotic, dead, alive." which I feel perfectly sums up her work. Her pieces mainly show flesh and she has perfected an active way to paint it. 

Jenny Saville, Red Stare Head IV, 2006-11, oil on canvas, 99"x73"

"Fascinated by the endless aesthetic and formal possibilities that the materiality of the human body offers, Saville remits a highly sensuous and tactile impression of surface and mass in her monumental oil paintings. In the compelling Stare paintings she renders the contours and features of the face and the nuances of skin texture and color in strokes both bold and meticulous. Enlarging the facial features of her human subjects to a vast scale and rendering them in layer upon layer of paint, she imbues in them with a sense of mass and weight that is almost sculptural and at times wholly abstract. Intense pinks, reds, and blues erupt through pale skin tones, disclosing the internal workings of the painting like the flesh and blood of a living organism."

While Red Stare Head IV relates to her older paintings of hanging meat, she always painted figures in hopes to show how foreign and uncomfortable bodies can feel.

Jenny Saville, Propped, 1992, oil on canvas, 213cmx183cm

Her use of text and linework in throughout most of that certain collection in subtlety. But the underlying tones really brings almost a feminist feel to her pieces. There are tons of impressive pieces in this collection I highly suggest looking into because I can't even begin to put them all in here. Because of her interest in bodies and modifying she took some time and just observed plastic surgeons. This helped her to understand the mindset of the person getting something done and also why and how they went about it.

Her newer pieces were all based around Motherhood and she portrayed herself with her child. These newer pieces still have the same fantastic Saville skin tones and brushwork but also included more drawing and line work. The line work really pushes the idea of movement and how children are constantly wiggling and growing.

Jenny Saville, The Mothers, 2011, oil on canvas, 106"x86"

Ever since this collection we haven't seen much work out of Jenny Saville, but hopefully she is continuing working and creating these beautiful contemporary masterpieces.

Citations:
Red Stare Head IV and quotes: © Jenny Saville 2011. Courtesy of Gagosian Gallery http://www.gagosian.com/artists/jenny-saville
Propped: http://www.saatchigallery.com/aipe/jenny_saville.htm

INSPIRATION CAN COME FROM ANYWHERE

I think a lot of artists think that only artistic inspiration is important and that we always must know other artists who are inspiring us. A lot of people think the opposite and that it is important to have other influences like nature. I find that the combination of the two is very important and it shouldn't be a battle of which is more important.

Having a list of artists who influence your work is very crucial to growing and improving. Following big name artists or really any professional artist will allow you to see things within their work that influence your own. For instance, Jenny Saville, an artist who I will talk about later in the month, has a variety of influences one of them being Francis Bacon. So just to see the connection lets compare two of their pieces:

Jenny Saville, Rosetta 2, 2005-6, oil on watercolor paper mounted on board

Francis Bacon, Self Portrait with Injured Eye, 1972

When you first look at the two paintings there are obvious similarities, like portraiture. But going beyond that there are similar ways of how their paint and the colors they use. Both of these artists use colors not necessarily noticed in real skin tones, they're slightly exaggerated. For instance in Saville's Rosetta 2 there are beautiful purples and blues throughout the piece and in Bacon's there are purples, blues, and reds. Another similar characteristic is the brushwork they use. There are parts which are carefully worked but others that are just one generic swoop of the brush like in under the right ear and on the chin of Bacon's and on the left cheek into the neck of Saville's. 

On the other hand it is important to be influenced by what is around you and other things not related to art. Subjects from Geology and Nature to the mechanics of a car can be used for inspiration. This is the basis of what we do and what motivates us. When we find something we find beautiful we want to create art from it and that could be anything. An artist like John F. Simon Jr. who does multimedia pieces is inspired by Geology. You might not be aware of it from first looking at the piece but once you make that connection everything has a different meaning. 

John F. Simon Jr, Endless Bounty, 2005

As artist's we are allowed to be in awe of really strange things. We should take advantage of that and not allow ourselves to get embarrassed for staring at a tree for an abnormally long time in public. Own it and fully let it inspire your work so that you can be the best artist you can.

Photo Cites:
Rosetta 2: http://www.gagosian.com/artists/jenny-saville/selected-works
Self Portrait with Injured Eye: http://www.queerculturalcenter.org/Pages/Bacon/FBFaces.html
Endless Bounty: http://artdaily.com/news/67295/John-F--Simon-Jr--s-multimedia-works-inspired-by-geology-and-Kandinsky-on-view-at-the-Phillips-Collection

FEMINIST ART MOVEMENT

It's March and that means it is Women's History Month! This entire month I'll try to stick to talking about women in the art world. To start it off let's talk about the Feminist Art Movement, a movement that brought all genres of art into one strong force. A great book to look up would be WACK! Art and the Feminist Revolution because it has many many examples of artists who defined the Feminist Art Movement and pushed for equality.

In the 1970s, Art moved from Modernism to a movement that opened doors to many different types of artists with many different ideas of what art could be. One of the most interesting things about this movement is that if you were a woman artist and making art, you were in the feminist art movement no matter what. It didn't have to be controversial or make a statement about women in the art world it just needed to be art. Of course there were many pieces that were speaking their minds and they were in the forefront of the revolution. 

Some think that one of the inspirations for the Feminist Art Movement was Yoko Ono. Especially her piece "Cut Piece" where she invited anyone to come up and cut her clothes as she just sat there unemotional. In 1965 this was pretty huge in the art world, and this piece was considered one of the most shocking art performance pieces ever done. You can see parts of this performance here:

Inspired by Yoko Ono's performance piece, another performance artist, Marina Abramović did a piece titled "Rhythm 0: 1974". In this performance Marina sat there just as Yoko did unemotional and had a table with a rose, feather, honey, whip, scissors, scalpel, gun, and a single bullet. In the end, it was a test of how people react which started off more passive and ended very aggressive. At one point a person even aimed the gun at her. Brave as she was, Marina Abramović is someone who put her idea before her personal boundaries just to get the point across. 

In total the many artists of the Feminist Art Movement were trying to express sexual, material, social, and political views on women. Here's a list of just a few important feminist artists that were apart of the Feminist Movement or inspired by it: Jenny Saville, Helen Frankenthaler, Grace Hartigan, Bridget Riley, Mary Beth Edelson, Yvonne Rainer, Silvia Kolbowski, Cindy Sherman, Barbara Kruger, Kiki Smith, Chantal Akerman, Lynda Benglis, Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, Valie Export, Mary Heilman, Sanja Ivekovic, Ana Mendieta, Alice Neel, and Annette Messager and many many many more. 

+Stay tuned this month for more about women in art+

HOW TO VISIT AN ART MUSEUM

A lot of time artists go to museums for inspiration. Other times people may go just to practice sketching. Tourists seem to be running around trying to see everything and only really slow down for the "main stream" artists. Some slowly read every bit of information and stand in front of pieces for a long time pretending to examine them. But what is the best way to get the most out of your trip to a museum?

I've found that since most museums have so much hung at one time it's best to plan out your trip ahead of time. On almost every museum website you can find a map of the museum with the current galleries as well as special exhibits.

If you are going to be inspired by things you don't know then I suggest walking through the museum and stopping when you're intrigued. This way you aren't bumbling around an entire museum looking at every little piece. Don't skip any sections because you may find inspiration in something you never expected.

If you're going to practice sketching be aware of the layout of the museum so that you leave yourself enough room around you. Also it's important for this to know which artist you are going to copy ahead of time (unless you just want random inspiration sketches) so you know where to go to make the most out of your time. I find this helpful because you can plan out which artist you want to learn from (because techniques change quite a lot from artist to artist).

If you're a tourist, you've probably planned out a good portion of what you want to see or get out of the trip to the museum so make sure to note where all of the famous pieces are located throughout the museum. This is pretty simple because museums never really hide any "main stream" art and all museums employees will know where the pieces are. Just be prepared for crowds.

If you're there to learn, read up ahead of time. Know what it is you're going to see before you do so that when you see the piece you can really see it and get the most out of it because you can right away apply what you read instead of reading about it and trying to see it all at once.

Overall, make sure to bring a sketchbook to sketch and write things down. Also don't bring a huge backpack because it will probably have to be put in with coat check. Just be aware you are in a public place and you aren't the only one who is there to appreciate what is there. Everyone wants to get the most out of their trips to museums so be courteous (don't say things like "a 5 year old could do that") and soak in as much as you can.

BEING AN INTROVERT IN THE ART WORLD

There are two kinds of people, in general, introverts and extroverts. This is true about people within the art world as well. There are people who are silent sketchers and there are people who shove their idea down your throat. I always was led to believe that most artists were introverts but, most of my classmates are extroverts. 

Extroverts, I have learned, want people to know about their opinion. Whether it's just having a conversation or painting about it. A lot of artists are also narcissists. Yes there are artists who help charities and others, I'm just saying they have a high self esteem and ego. Which is great in the art world because of all of the critics. This is the opposite of what some people believe about artists because of the whole quiet meek artist stereotype. These artists will have no problem getting their name out there and promoting their work. They will probably get more shows because of being so out there and interesting. But what do the introverted artists do?

Technology has been a miracle worker for the introverted. Now with technology artists are able to submit their work electronically to shows and promote their art through many different websites to gain followers. So now that we're so used to only having to talk through typing how do artists deal when they have to actually talk at colleges or lectures or their own art opening?

Even though both introverted and extroverted artists have an ego, and need it, to promote their work and their passion, it can be hard to actually get what you want across to the audience. I've seen some art talks at an opening reception where the artist barely talks and clearly doesn't want to. But I've also seen some where the people are clearly ready to go and talk to anyone. A lot of people would say that the quieter artist isn't as passionate about what their work is about or even art in general but, I think you cannot combine those two thoughts. Yes, it is important to be passionate about your artwork but you can be passionate about your work in a one-on-one conversation instead of a group reception. The fact that there is a show going on about this particular artist means they are passionate and want to share their work. I think it is important to keep in mind that many artists portray their opinion and thoughts through their pieces anyway so have a conversation with their work.There is a lot of power behind whatever you have researched that no one else has found, so use that to teach others instead of thinking of it about as a moment where you and only you are in the spotlight, cause your art is there too (and it will always have your back).

I believe that many people will have an issue with this only because it is so important to make connections and show your passion for what you do, but I don't think it is necessary especially with today's technology. It's okay to not want to talk about your work to everyone that's why we make long labels next to our pieces and artist statements and PR statements. Overall, don't assume an introverted artist isn't passionate about their work and doesn't want to share it with the world. 

What do you guys think? If you're an introvert, how does it feel to you?

PHOTO LABS: WHY THEY ARE IMPORTANT

Recently across the United States, many high schools and colleges/universities have been shutting down their dark rooms, companies stopped selling film, and people just stopped learning about film photography or photo processes. A lot of people either don't know why this is happening. A lot of people don't care and don't think it is important. And for some reason a lot of people are against having photo labs running. 

In high school when the dark room was being closed down, I didn't care. I was a digital photo kid, not a film kid. I still am, but that doesn't mean that I don't support it and find that the results people get from film photography is stupid. It's gorgeous. I have taken a few classes about the historic photo processes: cyanotypes, van dyke browns, salt prints and work in the photo lab. I think that if you are going to call yourself a photographer, or I'll even go to say, if you are going to call yourself an artist you need to take a photography class. Any kind of photography, digital or film, you will learn so much about composition, tweaking a final image, and critiquing that will be amazingly helpful in whatever process you do.

What made me want to write this post was mainly because many people don't realize the amazing prints that can come out of these processes. There any so many techniques that are so much more amazing when done by hand than by digitally editing an image. For instance, this 35mm film print is a double exposure. It's not just laying two images over each other with 50% opacity in Adobe Photoshop.

Ryan Teed, Alley, 35mm Double Exposure & Sequentially Toned

Other historic processes like Cyanotypes, Van Dyke Browns, Salt Prints, and Gum Prints create beautiful hand made prints that are literally one-of-a-kind. These processes are not being taught as broadly anymore and are quite rare to find, therefore their worth goes up, but popularity goes down. Here are just some examples to make you in awe of the gorgeous types of photography people are missing out on:

Aisling Housel, Flowers 5, Cyanotype

Leyla, Van Dyke Brown

Ryan Teed, Mask 1, Gum Print

 Most of these processes include mixing the emulsion in a dark area, and painting it on, exposing it, and then developing your print. There are many ways to change the image during the process to create weird effects that are worth it in the end. It's all science so experimenting and testing things out is what is the most fun about it, just don't forget they're also chemicals so you have to be really careful!
Slaving over a perfect print for an hour versus clicking a few buttons? All depends on what it's worth to you. But the ending result is something amazing and valuable.

Photo Cites:
Film - Alley: http://rnteed.wix.com/teedphotography
Cyanotype - Flowers 5: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Aisling-Housel/207239936104721
Van Dyke Brown - Leyla: http://leylaphotography.com/#/van-dyke-brown/
Gum Print - Mask 1: http://rnteed.wix.com/teedphotography#!historic-processes/c14ak