Posts tagged Prose

Eric Fischl’s Bad Boy: My Life on and Off the Canvas (2013)

Eric Fischl’s Bad Boy: My Life on and Off the Canvas (2013)

Alejandro Diaz, Naked Artist Inside, 2007

Alejandro Diaz, Naked Artist Inside, 2007

artnet.com

Edward Hopper, Interior (Model Reading), 1925

Edward Hopper, Interior (Model Reading), 1925

[via]

[via]

“for bluestockings, Redstockings, and no-stockings”—

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And now back to our regularly scheduled programming…

The living model, the naked body of a woman, is the privileged seat of feeling, but also of questioning… The model must mark you, awaken in you an emotion which you seek in turn to express.
Henri Matisse
Naturally there is eroticism. Without eroticism I would find painting impossible. The painting of the nude in particular. A nude is erotic even when indifferent, when glacial. What else would it be? The eroticism of my work resides in its evocation of youth and desire.
Paul Delvaux
welovepaintings: F. Luis Mora The Artist in His Studio, 1905Oil on canvas, 16 x 12Collection of Dr. Marvin and Mrs. Rhoda Kantor ___ Mora dedicated his career to imbue American painting with the techniques of the great Spanish masters. He often noted that his role as an artist was “the expression of beauty.” In 1910 he wrote, “Art is the whispering of the great voice of nature.” Despite his great success he suffered tragedies, too, and by the end of his life he had become virtually forgotten. Mattatuckmuseum.org

welovepaintings:

F. Luis Mora

The Artist in His Studio, 1905
Oil on canvas, 16 x 12
Collection of Dr. Marvin and Mrs. Rhoda Kantor

___

Mora dedicated his career to imbue American painting with the techniques of the great Spanish masters. He often noted that his role as an artist was “the expression of beauty.” In 1910 he wrote, “Art is the whispering of the great voice of nature.” Despite his great success he suffered tragedies, too, and by the end of his life he had become virtually forgotten.

Mattatuckmuseum.org

welovepaintings

She sat with great intensity, giving the whole of her mind to it, and was capable of remaining for an hour almost as motionless as if she were before a photographer’s lens. I could see she had been photographed often, but somehow the very habit that made her good for that purpose unfitted her for mine. At first I was extremely pleased with her lady-like air, and it was a satisfaction, on coming to follow her lines, to see how good they were and how far they could lead the pencil. But after a few times I began to find her too insurmountably stiff; do what I would with it my drawing looked like a photograph or a copy of a photograph. Her figure had no variety of expression—she herself had no sense of variety. You may say that this was my business, was only a question of placing her. I placed her in every conceivable position, but she managed to obliterate their differences. She was always a lady certainly, and into the bargain was always the same lady. She was the real thing, but always the same thing.
Henry James, “The Real Thing,” 1892
from William Hazlitt’s “On Sitting For One’s Picture,” 1823

from William Hazlitt’s “On Sitting For One’s Picture,” 1823

door hanger by Ginger Brooks Takahashi, 2002 originally included in the first issue of LTTR

door hanger by Ginger Brooks Takahashi, 2002

originally included in the first issue of LTTR

John Ferguson Weir, His Favorite Model, approx. 1880-1889 Until the end of the 19th century, when photographs of live models became their aid of choice, lay figures (jointed mannequins, often miniature) were a popular tool for artists painting the human form. As Daniel Burleigh Parkhurst wrote in The Painter in Oil (1903): No good figure-work has ever been done which was not founded on a knowledge of the nude. Whether the figure is draped or not, the nude is the basis of form. The best painters have always made their studies of pose and action in the nude, and then drawn the draperies over that. This insures the truth of action and structure true, which is almost sure to be lost when the drawing of the form is made through drapery or clothing. The underlying structure is as essential here as in portrait. It is the more imperative that the body be felt within the clothes from the fact that it cannot be seen. There must be no ambiguity, no doubt as to the anatomy underneath; for without this there can be no sense of actuality… The use of a lay figure will help you somewhat if you can get one which is true in proportion. It will not help you much in the finer modeling, but it will at least insure your structural lines being in the right place, and that is as much as you can hope for without the special study of the nude. A lay figure is expensive, costing about three hundred dollars in this country. You will hardly be apt to aspire to a full-sized one, as only professional painters can afford to pay so much for accessories. But small wooden ones are within the means of most people, and will be found useful for the purpose I have mentioned, and one should be obtained.

John Ferguson Weir, His Favorite Model, approx. 1880-1889

Until the end of the 19th century, when photographs of live models became their aid of choice, lay figures (jointed mannequins, often miniature) were a popular tool for artists painting the human form. As Daniel Burleigh Parkhurst wrote in The Painter in Oil (1903):

No good figure-work has ever been done which was not founded on a knowledge of the nude. Whether the figure is draped or not, the nude is the basis of form. The best painters have always made their studies of pose and action in the nude, and then drawn the draperies over that. This insures the truth of action and structure true, which is almost sure to be lost when the drawing of the form is made through drapery or clothing. The underlying structure is as essential here as in portrait. It is the more imperative that the body be felt within the clothes from the fact that it cannot be seen. There must be no ambiguity, no doubt as to the anatomy underneath; for without this there can be no sense of actuality…

The use of a lay figure will help you somewhat if you can get one which is true in proportion. It will not help you much in the finer modeling, but it will at least insure your structural lines being in the right place, and that is as much as you can hope for without the special study of the nude. A lay figure is expensive, costing about three hundred dollars in this country. You will hardly be apt to aspire to a full-sized one, as only professional painters can afford to pay so much for accessories. But small wooden ones are within the means of most people, and will be found useful for the purpose I have mentioned, and one should be obtained.

gurneyjourney.blogspot.com

A still from Inspiration (1915), the first non-pornographic American film to feature full-frontal female nudity. The film—about a sculptor in search of his ideal model—was a commercial success, and eventually rereleased three years later, under the title The Perfect Model. The sculptor’s model was played by Audrey Munson, who served as the model or inspiration for more than 15 statues in New York City alone. (Two of them—Memory and Mourning Victory, by Daniel Chester French—are on view in the Met’s American Wing.) In the 1920s, Munson wrote a series of articles for the New York Journal American, in which she described the lives of models—and tried to imagine their afterlives: What becomes of the artists’ models? I am wondering if many of my readers have not stood before a masterpiece of lovely sculpture or a remarkable painting of a young girl, her very abandonment of draperies accentuating rather than diminishing her modesty and purity, and asked themselves the question, ‘Where is she now, this model who was so beautiful?’ In 1931, Munson was committed to a mental institution, where she would spend the rest of her life. All copies of The Inspiration are believed to have been lost or destroyed.

A still from Inspiration (1915), the first non-pornographic American film to feature full-frontal female nudity. The film—about a sculptor in search of his ideal model—was a commercial success, and eventually rereleased three years later, under the title The Perfect Model.

The sculptor’s model was played by Audrey Munson, who served as the model or inspiration for more than 15 statues in New York City alone. (Two of them—Memory and Mourning Victory, by Daniel Chester French—are on view in the Met’s American Wing.) In the 1920s, Munson wrote a series of articles for the New York Journal American, in which she described the lives of models—and tried to imagine their afterlives:

What becomes of the artists’ models? I am wondering if many of my readers have not stood before a masterpiece of lovely sculpture or a remarkable painting of a young girl, her very abandonment of draperies accentuating rather than diminishing her modesty and purity, and asked themselves the question, ‘Where is she now, this model who was so beautiful?’

In 1931, Munson was committed to a mental institution, where she would spend the rest of her life. All copies of The Inspiration are believed to have been lost or destroyed.

“…I was able to undress and take the pose without hesitation. Although I was quite innocent at that time, he made me feel as if my body were no different than my face, as if I were the same as the statuette.” from the short story “Artists and Models,” included in Delta of Venus, one of Nin’s collections of erotic fiction [image via lightning-heart]

“…I was able to undress and take the pose without hesitation. Although I was quite innocent at that time, he made me feel as if my body were no different than my face, as if I were the same as the statuette.” from the short story “Artists and Models,” included in Delta of Venus, one of Nin’s collections of erotic fiction

[image via lightning-heart]

This is a film about the role of the spectator in the room.
Serge Daney in a 1982 Les Cahiers du Cinema review of Jackie Raynal’s Deux Fois. A still from the film appeared earlier today in honor of Black (Stockings) Monday!