"Masters of Fine Art Final Show
Bath School of Art and Design
September 30th to October 3rd 10 - 4pm
Final show for the graduates of Masters of Fine Art from Bath School of Art and Design. The exhibition includes painting, sound and video installation, photography and sculpture by artists from the UK, USA and Europe. Private view Wednesday September 29th 6 - 9pm, then open from September 30th to October 3rd 10 - 4, entry is free. For directions, information about the artists and a preview of their work visit www.bathspa-mfa2010.com"
Saturday, 7 August 2010
choosing titles for my work
One of the most difficult things I find, is to choose titles. It can change the entire viewing by wrongly naming, or it can immediately lead the viewer to the obvious. To engage an audience there has to be a mental interaction between what you see and what you read. A sense of active engagement can be created, but the difficulty lies in finding where the balance lies. My current work visually refer to repatriation scenes at Wootton Bassett. Linking words such as; war, soldiers, grief, pride, ceremony and documentation. It lead me to research WW1 poetry. I was struck by the force of the words, the purity of communication, the way the words strike at the very core of existence. It has helped me formulate a tangible link between the paintings and meaningful words. I will post both finished paintings and their titles later in September, when the work is up for my MFA assessment.
Wilfrid Owen
"Dulce et Decorum Est "
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.
Gas! GAS! Quick, boys! -- An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime . . .
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under I green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues, --
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.
'Back' by Wilfrid Gibson
They ask me where I've been,
And what I've done and seen.
But what can I reply
Who know it wasn't I,
But someone just like me,
Who went across the sea
And with my head and hands
Killed men in foreign lands...
Though I must bear the blame,
Because he bore my name."
Philip Larkin
"MCMXIV"
Those long uneven lines
Standing as patiently
As if they were stretched outside
The Oval or Villa Park,
The crowns of hats, the sun
On moustached archaic faces
Grinning as if it were all
An August Bank Holiday lark;
And the shut shops, the bleached
Established names on the sunblinds,
The farthings and sovereigns,
And dark-clothed children at play
Called after kings and queens,
The tin advertisements
For cocoa and twist, and the pubs
Wide open all day;
And the countryside not caring
The place-names all hazed over
With flowering grasses, and fields
Shadowing Domesday lines
Under wheats' restless silence;
The differently-dressed servants
With tiny rooms in huge houses,
The dust behind limousines;
Never such innocence,
Never before or since,
As changed itself to past
Without a word--the men
Leaving the gardens tidy,
The thousands of marriages
Lasting a little while longer:
Never such innocence again.
Wilfrid Owen
"Dulce et Decorum Est "
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.
Gas! GAS! Quick, boys! -- An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime . . .
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under I green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues, --
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.
'Back' by Wilfrid Gibson
They ask me where I've been,
And what I've done and seen.
But what can I reply
Who know it wasn't I,
But someone just like me,
Who went across the sea
And with my head and hands
Killed men in foreign lands...
Though I must bear the blame,
Because he bore my name."
Philip Larkin
"MCMXIV"
Those long uneven lines
Standing as patiently
As if they were stretched outside
The Oval or Villa Park,
The crowns of hats, the sun
On moustached archaic faces
Grinning as if it were all
An August Bank Holiday lark;
And the shut shops, the bleached
Established names on the sunblinds,
The farthings and sovereigns,
And dark-clothed children at play
Called after kings and queens,
The tin advertisements
For cocoa and twist, and the pubs
Wide open all day;
And the countryside not caring
The place-names all hazed over
With flowering grasses, and fields
Shadowing Domesday lines
Under wheats' restless silence;
The differently-dressed servants
With tiny rooms in huge houses,
The dust behind limousines;
Never such innocence,
Never before or since,
As changed itself to past
Without a word--the men
Leaving the gardens tidy,
The thousands of marriages
Lasting a little while longer:
Never such innocence again.
Tuesday, 3 August 2010
Monday, 26 July 2010
Something from my studio wall
Rembrandt's painting'
' Hendrikje bathing in a River'
1654 oil on panel. (National Gallery London)
The sensuality of this painting and the intimacy it creates is exquisite. The fine brush strokes contrasting with the use of his heavy loaded knife, here used to describe the shift she is holding up. It conceals as it exposes, as does the hand, which is a mere suggestion; a mark, yet a hand. I read somewhere about the light of the soul being like Rembrandt's light. I can imagine why, that tawny , golden light for which his work is known. Rembrandt managed to create such profound complexity of presence through the subtle use of shadow. Creating a real sense of depth and substance on the figure on whom it shines. I remember the very moment I fell in awe of Rembrandt's work, I was 7 years old visiting the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam with my Aunt Liesbet who took me there. The scale of the Nightwatch, its darkness and the people in it, created a spell over me that is still tangible. I have a few favourites but on my studio wall hangs Hendrickje bathing. Truly masterful.
Friday, 23 July 2010
Wednesday, 21 July 2010
Things that daily inspire me in the studio
a quote hanging up on my wall catches my eye a lot;
To See a World in a Grain of Sand
and Heaven in a Wild Flower
Hold Infinity in the Palm of your Hand
and Eternity in an Hour. William Blake
and the smell of turpentine and a newly primed canvas.
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