Hulda Guzman - A Unique Self-portrait

For me, one of the highlights of the recent Triennial at the National Gallery of Victoria was the painting “Daily Ceremony, 2022” produced by Hulda Guzman, an artist of the Dominican Republic.  It’s one of the most inventive self portraits I’ve seen in recent times and includes her pet rooster and prancing cats.  In the NGV magazine, she describes the work as an autobiographical narrative, depicting a ritualistic summoning of creative energy.   

The setting is a new studio she designed with her father in a very remote area in the Dominican Republic where her nearest neighbour is at least 2 kilometres away.  She claims to have been inspired by the themes and ideas of the surrealists, but she does not reference dreams and other states of consciousness in her work.  Instead, she is more interested in the “hidden parts of ourselves - all those energies that come into play, the things that are not perceivable to our senses, such as our fears and demons that we try to repress.”

Daily Ceremony 2022, Hulda Guzman, synthetic polymer paint and gouche on cedar & mahogany, 140.6 x 122 cm

The triangles of light, the prancing cats and the symmetry are intended to invoke the cheerfulness, buoyancy, high vibration and celebration of creative energy and the uplifting energies of nature and consciousness. 

Guzman tells us that the dance session becomes a meditative practice to seek peace and to channel the inspiring Taino spirit, which appears as an outline in the triangle of light.  This spirit is a central concept in art and ritual to the Caribbean peoples, and was thought to inhabit trees, stones and other aspects of the landscape.

She also explains the importance of being in the right headspace when producing her work.  “When I’m painting and experiencing positive vibrations, I believe these vibrations transfer into the painting and the viewer afterwards.”  The feedback she gets from viewers of her work correspond to how she feels when painting.  “It’s a beautiful thing, and it makes me relate to people that way.  I would never want to transfer any negative emotions, so I always make sure I’m in the right headspace when I paint.” 

When I think of the headspace I often find myself in when painting, it’s a wonder I can produce anything at all, let alone being able to mount exhibitions and sell my work.  But this article and Guzman’s work gives me cause for thought and to perhaps be more appreciative of the creative spirit that, I believe, lurks within all of us. 

Hulda Guzman’s paintings  often depict tropical settings and naturalistic motifs.  She has two sisters, one a sculptor and the other a filmmaker.  “Daily Ceremony 2022” has been purchased by the NGV. 

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The year 2024 is fast becoming the year of the female artist, judging by what I’ve seen so far.  At Geelong Gallery there is an enormous print exhibition staged by Dianne Fogwell.  It consists of 56 hand printed panels featuring linocuts, woodcuts, burn drawings and pigmented ink on paper. It runs until 28th July.

Dianne Fogwell at Geelong Gallery

At Niagara Gallery in Melbourne recently, there was the exhibition “Lifting The Veil” consisting of paintings by Julia Ciccarone, one of my favourite local artists. 

Julia Ciccarone, "We Are All Stories In The End" 2023, oil on linen, 122 x 183 cm

And recently at Australian Galleries in Collingwood there was an exhibition of paintings, drawings and ceramics by Mary Tonkin titled “Both Sides Now”.

Mary Tonkin, "Coprosma Madonna, Kalorama", 2021-22, oil on linen, 320 x 610 cm (Australian Galleries)

References;

NGV Magazine

Nan Goldin - Art And Addiction

It’s interesting the way some successful artists reflect upon their lives.  Internationally renowned artist Nan Goldin had long berated herself for years of addiction, especially to opiates. “Every morning I’d wake up in hell, waking up to self-condemnation.  And then I’m taking two hours to get up because it’s so awful.”  These comments were made during her session with celebrated physician and addiction therapist Dr Gabor Mate.

Buzz and Nan at the Afterhours, New York City, 1980

Reading of her sessions with Mate, you’d swear she’d never been a ‘creative dynamo’ who has produced a vast body of powerful and distinctive art, exhibiting internationally to great acclaim.  “I’ve missed years of my life, I don’t have many more years to go.  I’ve spent most of my life addicted to drugs and as a result, know nothing.  My knowledge is very limited, I didn’t look in the mirror and deal with myself.  So much has been lost.”  She went on to say that she feels worthless and defective.

Rise and Monty Kissing, New York City, 1980

She was born Nancy Goldin into a middle class Jewish family in Boston in 1953.  She is the youngest of four children and was particularly close to her sister, Barbara, who from an early age rebelled against middle class American life.  This, in a climate of silence and denial.  Barbara spent time in institutions before committing suicide at the age of 18, when Nan was 11.  Speaking of Barbara, Goldin argues that in the early sixties, women who were sexual and angry were considered dangerous and outside the range of acceptable behavior.  She described her sister as being born at the wrong time with no tribe, no other people like her.  It’s argued that the gritty realism of Goldin’s work, the desire to tell it as it is has its roots in these early childhood experiences.

Trixie on the Cot, New York City, 1979

Goldin decided at an early age she would record her life and experiences “that no one could rewrite or deny”.  One of her closest friends was the photographer David Wojnarowicz (see my blog dated 8 May, 2020), and like him, she used photography as an act of resistance.  She moved to New York in 1979 and began producing photographs of those in her immediate environment.  Her most celebrated body of work is “Ballad of Sexual Dependency”, a project which began in the early 1980’s.  

In her critique of an exhibition based around ‘Ballad’, held at MOMA in 2016, Tasya Kudryk argues that Goldin had an intense relationship with her subjects whom she described as her family.  “The artist’s work captures an essential element of humanity that is transcendent of all struggles: the need to connect.”  Goldin claims it’s impossible to capture the essence of a person in a single image, instead she aims to “capture the swirl of identities over time.”  Her images include relationships in transition, of couples drifting together and then apart.  She doesn’t shy away from depicting violence, such as her self portrait showing the aftermath of a battering she received from a boyfriend that almost blinded her.  The message seemed to be that while sex can be a cure for isolation, it can be a source of alienation.

Nan, One Month After Being Battered, 1984

Ballad of Sexual Dependency has been described as a deeply personal visual diary narrating the struggle for intimacy and understanding between her friends, family and lovers.  The setting is mainly the hard-drugs subculture of New York’s lower east side.  (Interestingly, some former inhabitants  lament the gentrification of the area that has taken place recently.)  Goldin wants her work not to be seen in the context of observer, but as participant.  “Ballad” is now regarded as a contemporary classic, raising awareness around issues such as homosexuality and AIDS.  “Goldin's open, frank style of narration and dense colour make the viewer go beyond the surface of the photograph to encounter a subterranean intensity “- Kudryk.  Yet permeating these images is a sense of loss.  "I used to think that I could never lose anyone if I photographed them enough. In fact, my pictures show me how much I’ve lost." - Goldin.

Nan and Dickie in the York Motel, New Jersey, 1980

Goldin acknowledges that her escape into substance use rescued her when she resorted to it at age 18, when going through a painful time in her life.  “Literally, addiction saved my life”, she told Mate.  Otherwise, she may have been driven to suicidal despair.  She wishes that the consequences weren’t so harsh - as other addicts do.  Mate argues that self-accusation is a relentless whip that spurs so many perfectionists to buckle down, do more, be better.  It needs to be seen for what it is - a callow voice that needs to be firmly, but quietly put in its place.

Nan and Brian in Bed, New York City, 1983

More recently, (in addition to dealing with her own addiction) Goldin has engaged in personal and collective activism against Purdue Pharma, manufacturers of the opioid OxyContin which has claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands of people.  Purdue marketed the product as being a less addictive opioid than other painkillers, whilst suppressing evidence to the contrary.  

Her particular targets in this campaign has been the Sackler family, who control Purdue, and her fame as an artist gave her a platform to raise the banner.  The Sacklers have promoted themselves as benevolent art philanthropists among other things, but Goldin was appalled at their callousness and inhumanity.  As a result of her campaigning, some of the world’s most prestigious galleries, including the Met in New York, no longer accept money from the Sacklers and have removed their logo from their buildings.

Tough Sharon

 When Mate asked her about her activism, Goldin responded “you need something bigger than yourself.”  In her case, it was the suffering of others, a situation she could rectify and which helps her to stay sober.  Mate believes that in standing up to a toxic culture, Goldin found herself. 

Hello, my name is Geoff. You may be interested to know that I’m a fulltime artist these days and regularly exhibit my work in Victoria, but particularly in Melbourne. You may wish to check out my work using the following link; https://geoffharrisonarts.com 

References; 

www.sleek-mag.com 

“The Myth of Normal”, Gabor Mate, 2022 

“The Lonely City”, Olivia Laing, 2016

The Sculpture of Jane Cavanough

In an interview she gave with Arts Health Network New South Wales, sculptor Jane Cavanough was asked “As an artist, how do you use art for your personal health and well-being?”  She gave a very telling response,  “Art is very low on the spectrum of cultural appreciation in Australia – very different for instance in Europe.  It is difficult to make your living being an artist and I sometimes think I should describe myself as a gambler rather than an artist, because now, with every project I apply for, the client mostly asks for a concept, which not only takes ages to think about, but also requires 3d illustration, for which I pay someone….and this is expensive – I’m not sure how many professions require the answer to the question before contracting them – and this really gets me down.

I knew that if I stayed being a landscape architect I would end up depressed and unsatisfied. The fact remains, I love what I do, and it never feels like work.”

Like many people, I’ve always had a love/hate relationship with public sculpture and I’m not sure if the blame should be leveled at the artists or those who commissioned these works, or both.  The “cheese stick” looming menacingly over Melbourne’s City Link comes to mind.  Many sculptors seem to be motivated by a desire to confront or challenge the public and they forget that many of us are confronted EVERY DAY with their creations.  But at its best, public sculpture can be memorable because it engages with the public.

Touchstones, Bankstown Arts Centre, Sydney, 2011.  These copper and glass pebbles refer to the lapidary workshops located in the arts complex.

This brings me to Jane Cavanough who is based in the Southern Highlands of New South Wales.  Her interest in sculpture dates back to the early 1990’s when she was working as a landscape architect in Sydney.  After studying at the Sydney College of the Arts, she instigated a couple of environmentally based sculpture events in Centennial Park and has continued to make site specific landscape based sculpture.

Endemic, Bungarribee NSW, Designed by Jane Cavanough and indigenous artist Enda Watson, a family group of corten steel kangaroos gather on the common at Bungarribee, developed by Urban Growth NSW.  Apparently, the locals dress up these sculptures every Christmas which gives Cavanough “a real buzz.”

Through her business Artlandish Art and Design, Cavanough works either solely or in collaboration with design teams for local and state governments, developers, statutory bodies and architecture firms to develop projects from concept through to completion.  The works are fabricated by artisans adept at working with glass, LED lighting, forged, stainless and mild steel, copper, bronze, brass, cast concrete, stone, timber, mist and water.

Boer War Memorial, Anzac Parade Canberra designed by Jane Cavanough and Group GSA, winner of a national design competition in 2012.

The aim is to create artworks that have a strong relationship to the site in urban, architectural and landscape settings. The relationship between people, sculpture and landscape lies at the heart of  Cavanough’s artwork. Rather than producing art that is willfully alienating or inaccessible to the public, she seeks to engage the environmental and cultural aspects of each site in her work.  She has won a number of scholarships and awards throughout her career.

You can read more of my blogs or check out my own art on www.geoffharrisonarts.com.

References;

Arts Health Network NSW

www.janecavanough.com.au

To Hell And Back With Tracey Emin

The bad girl of British art Tracey Emin was in the final stages of preparing her exhibition for the Royal Academy in 2020 alongside work of her hero Edvard Munch.  Then she was struck down with an aggressive form of cancer and had several organs removed.  She wasn’t expected to survive and just nine days after the opening, the exhibition was closed for six months due to Covid, an experience she found heartbreaking because it had meant so much to her.  The RA describes the exhibition as an exploration of grief, loss and longing. 

In laying down its policy on Covid restrictions, the British Government ranked galleries and museums alongside nightclubs – a strategy Emin found extraordinary and which she attributes to most politicians having never visited a gallery or museum.

A painter, drawer, sculptor, photographer who works in a variety of media, Tracey Emin became the best known and most controversial of the young British artists who emerged in the late 1990’s.  Her work is largely autobiographical and speaks broadly of the female experience.

Emin once claimed that she had been in love with Munch since she was 18.  Munch died in 1944.  His work which she chose for the exhibition is, she argues, more soulful and mournful than his better known work (such as The Scream) and about women and the emotions they go through, which made him a very unique artist in his time. 

In an interview to accompany the exhibition The Loneliness Of The Soul, it was suggested to her that Munch’s work portrays the tragedy of women whereas Emin’s work speaks of their resilience.  She responded by saying that she has experienced tragedy in her life which has featured in her work. One only has to think of works such as “My Bed” which she entered in the 1998 Turner Prize.  The bed is littered with condoms, cigarette butts, empty vodka bottles etc. and references disastrous sexual experiences and the aftermath.  She refers to the hostility and derision that her work received – one irate critic complained that anyone can submit a bed to an exhibition.  Emin’s response is a classic “well they didn’t, did they”.

My Bed, 1998

She believes that 30 years ago, Munch’s paintings weren’t taken seriously and that The Scream was regarded as a cartoon joke.  But now that there is a greater awareness of the issues many women have to face, there is a greater respect for his work.

Emin explained that what she went through with her cancer treatment was like surviving a plane crash, and she is so grateful to have survived and for every single moment. She now seems a happier and content person.

When I slept I longed ForYou

The issue of rape and sexual violence that appears so often in Emin’s work was raised during the interview.  She came up with an interesting expression.  When she was at school in the 1970’s  school girls would speak of being broken into last night, and they weren’t referring to burglary.  They were referring to their first (most likely unwanted) sexual encounter and this was taken for granted.  Emin claims to have been raped more than once back then and the real issue for her was the aftermath, which included wanting to sleep with just about every guy in her home town of Margate as a revenge and to empower herself sexually.  But she realised that this was diabolical for her self-esteem.

Tracey Emin at White Cube Gallery

After viewing her work, many girls and young women have written to Emin discussing their own disastrous sexual experiences which often resulted in abortions.  Now with the Me Too movement and with women being more open about discussing these issues, she believes that people are starting to pay attention.  But with her confronting work dating back decades Emin was, arguably, well ahead of the whole movement.

Now that she has recovered from her cancer, which included being bed ridden for 3 months, she is planning to open her own art school and residency in Margate where smoking and excessive noise will not be tolerated.  The new Tracey. 

References;

BBC Newsnight

The Royal Academy

ZCZ Films

Emma Minnie Boyd

As author Brenda Niall tells the story in her 2002 book “The Boyds”, Australia’s most famous artistic dynasty began with four men; Victoria’s first Chief Justice, a convict turned successful brewer, a military officer and a doctor/squatter. Initially, reading this book brought back memories of Tolstoy’s War and Peace in that the reader is confronted with an enormous family tree that runs to three pages.

The scale of that tree can be attributed to the simple fact that most of them bred like rabbits.  What is remarkable is the proliferation of artistic offspring produced by these various alliances; painters, potters, sculptors, writers and architects.

For this blog, I am focusing on the career of Emma Minnie Boyd (1858-1936) arguably the first significant artist of the dynasty.

Minnie Boyd; Interior With Figures - The Grange, 1875, watercolour

With the a’Beckett fortune behind her (William a’Beckett was Victoria’s first Chief Justice), Emma Minnie lived a privileged existence both in Victoria and the UK.  She spent six years at the Gallery School in Melbourne, as well as private lessons with none other than Louis Buvelot – the finest landscape painter of his generation.  Her early interior scenes are my favourites, they depict scenes at the Boyd’s Tudor style mansion “Glenfern” in East St Kilda (which still exists) and “The Grange” at Harkaway (which doesn’t).  They are small in scale but very intricate.

Minnie Boyd; Corner Of A Drawing Room, 1887, oil on canvas

Minnie and Arthur Merric Boyd, were contemporaries of the Heidelberg school artists; Tom Roberts, Arthur Streeton, Charles Conder etc. but being married, they remained on the fringes of that movement.  Life in the male dominated artists’ camps of the late 1880’s was not a proposition for a lady and besides, the others were all single.  She was fortunate to have a painter-husband who encouraged her in her career.

The Boyds moved to the UK in 1890 and their work was shown at the Royal Academy.  They lived in relative comfort, but the poverty of rural England began to disturb Minnie.  The industrial revolution had effectively destroyed cottage industries and Minnie was encouraged by a local vicar to take part in village life and charitable work.  Her painting “To The Workhouse” is a reflection of these times.  But they also toured Europe, largely on the proceeds of Emma a’Beckett – Minnie’s mother.  They moved back to Victoria in 1894.

Minnie Boyd; To The Workhouse, 1891, oil on canvas

Niall writes that their experiences in Europe didn’t change the Boyd’s greatly as artists, although being exposed to rural poverty awoke a social conscience in Minnie and she became deeply religious.  Back in Melbourne, Minnie and Arthur Merric attempted to live a more independent existence but were still heavily reliant on Emma’s “bounty”.

In 1902, the Boyd’s held a joint exhibition in the ballroom of Como House which was regarded as an enviable coup.  The exhibition, which was organised by wealthy patron Caroline Armytage was considered a commercial success.

Arthur Merric Boyd; Pastoral, 1899, watercolour

Yet it appears that their status as artists was hard to define.  Their perceived privileged background was an uneasy fit with the (romanticised) bohemian image of the serious artist.  And these artists may have envied their connections.  Yet among the wealthy upper class of Melbourne they were both insiders and outsiders.  There appeared to be a slight vein of eccentricity that ran through the Boyd Dynasty and certainly Minnie and Arthur Merric felt awkward about using friendships for money.  Yet the more they needed to sell their work the harder it became.  Eventually, Minnie began teaching.

Minnie Boyd; Harkaway, 1879, watercolour

Looking at Minnie’s early work, I’m left wondering why she didn’t become a more prominent artist, as she had been exhibiting her work from the age of fifteen.  Being a woman in a male dominated profession only provides part of the answer.  Once again, the family tree provides the other – she had five children and was a devoted mother.  Still, she was one of those rare artists who was able to combine an artistic career with raising a large family.  She was equally adept at watercolours and oils and was quite versatile in her output.

Just like her mother before her, Minnie became the centre of Boyd family life.  She gave religious sermons to her children, although it was not of the ‘fire and brimstone’ kind.  One of her sons (Martin) believes that the literal earnestness with which Minnie accepted her religion was the result of her need for some unalterable centre of stability.

After being frail for some years, Minnie died in 1936 at the age of 78.  She had been exhibiting landscapes at the Victorian Artist’s Society until seven years earlier.

References;

The Boyds, Brenda Niall, Melbourne University Press, 2002

Wikipedia

Kathe Kollwitz - Artist With A Social Conscience

In her 77th year, Kathe Kollwitz (1867 – 1945) stated in her diary that it was her deepest desire to no longer live.  She believed that she was old enough to have the right to complete rest.  One of her friends claimed that she had a dialogue with death for most of her life. 

Woman With A Dead Child, 1903, etching dry point

She was the fifth child of seven.  She was a shy and anxious child and the deaths of three of her siblings, one prior to Käthe's own birth, exposed her at an early age to the quiet, eternal suffering of parental grief. Her mother’s stoicism, her concealed "deep sorrow" and emotional strength in the face of such loss had a powerful effect on Kathe and she would later incorporate these childhood observations into her own aesthetic depictions of mourning. 

Unemployment, 1909 etching and aquatint

In 1891 she married Karl Kollwitz who was trained as a doctor with a social conscience, they moved into their home in a disadvantaged area of Berlin where they were to remain for the next 50 years. Kathe’s work has to be seen against the rapid industrialization that occurred in late 19th and early 20th century Germany and the toll it was taking on the working class.  In 50 years Berlin’s population had swelled from 400,000 to 2 million.  The city had trouble coping and for many poverty became a way of life in a city containing slum tenements, housing thousands of textile workers who had flooded into the city in search of work.

The quiet, hard working life they led was undoubtedly good for her art.  Early in her career she was influenced by the 1892 play The Weavers by Gerhart Hauptmann, which portrayed a group of Salesian weavers who staged an uprising in the 1840’s over concerns about the industrial revolution.

Kathe began a series of prints based on the weavers.  Shortly after, her etchings won a gold medal at an academy show, but Kaiser Wilhelm II vetoed the award, describing her work as “gutter art” and a sin against the German people.  State approved art featured images of German power, but her career was established.  Another influence was the peasant’s war of the early 16th century.  She claimed that all her work was the distillation of her life and she acknowledges that she is a socialist artist.  This was due to the influences of her brother, father and literature of the period, but the real motive for choosing as a subject for her art the life of the workers “was that such subjects gave me in a simple and unqualified way what I considered to be beautiful.”

The Volunteers, 1923 woodcut

She got involved with the difficulties and challenges of proletarian life due to the women who came to her husband for help, unsolved problems of prostitution and unemployment grieved her and she determined to “keep on” with her studies of the working class.

She lost her youngest son Peter in World War 1, “everywhere beneath the surface are tears and bleeding wounds and yet the war goes on and follows other laws”. In her youth she wanted to mount the barricades of revolution, but in the wake of WW1 she wrote “I am and sick and tired of all the hatred in the world, I long for a socialism that lets men live free from murdering, from lying, from destroying and disfiguring, from all the devil’s work that the world has seen enough of.”

The Mothers, 1923 woodcut

During the years 1912 to 1920, Kollwitz produced very little finished work, labouring under depression she made many etchings but none were completed.  Having “come to a clear sense of her own past” she began to investigate the possibilities of sculpture and finally gave etching up.

Then she wanted to explore the possibilities of line work so she switched to woodcuts.  “It’s like a photographic plate that lies in the developer, the picture gradually becomes recognisable and emerges more and more from the mist.  Simplicity in feeling but expressing the totality of grief”, the war was still impacting on her art.

Memorial For Karl Liebknecht, 1919 a co-founder of the Marxist anti war Spartacus League who was executed in 1919 - woodcut

“It is my duty to voice the sufferings of man.  I want my art to have a purpose beyond itself and to wield influence.  Strength is what I need, it’s the one thing I need that seems worthy of succeeding Peter.  Strength to take life as it is and unbroken by life and without complaining and much weeping to do one’s work powerfully.”

For 14 years Kollwitz was a member of the Berlin Academy of the Arts, but was forced to resign following Adolf Hitler’s election victory in 1933 - her left leaning politics saw to that.  She gave consideration to returning to an old plan of producing a series of prints that focussed on the theme of death.  “I thought that now that I am really old, I might be able to handle this theme that would allow me to plumb the depths.  But that is not the case, at the very time when death becomes visible behind everything it disrupts the imaginative process”.   Images of the protective mother began to appear in her work during World War 2 and her home was destroyed during the bombing of Berlin.

The Grieving Parents, 1932 - a memorial to her son Peter, granite

At the end of her life she was hopeful that “other comrades can carry the banner forward”.   She died just a few weeks prior to war’s end. 

Käthe Kollwitz - Portrait of the German artist of expressionism,  Arts Council of Great Britain production 1981.

Art Of Germany – BBCTV  2010

The Art Story

Francoise Gilot, SURVIVING pICASSO

I’m currently working my way through the book ‘Life With Picasso’ written by one of his many muses Francoise Gilot who was also an artist.  She had to work hard to develop her career beyond the baggage of her 10 year entanglement with HIM.  She is unique in that it was she who ended the relationship, much to Picasso’s annoyance so it seems.  He instructed her dealer, the famous Daniel-Henry Kahnwieler to dump her (which he did) and broke off contact with their 2 children.  She is still alive, now aged 99 and lives in New York.

The book was originally published in 1964 and republished in 2019 which tells you something – it’s a significant work.  In her introduction to the 2019 edition, Lisa Alther states that Picasso launched three unsuccessful lawsuits trying to prevent its publication, and 40 French artists and intellectuals, some of whom were former ‘friends’ of Gilot signed a manifesto demanding the book be banned.  It’s likely the objections revolved around gender issues, a woman succeeding in a man’s world although Gilot believes they were simply ingratiating themselves to Picasso.  Some of those signatories later admitted that they hadn’t read the book.

Gilot 'Fire Spirit', oil on canvas, 2011

Gilot was only in her early 20’s when she met Picasso in 1943 – he was about 40 years her senior.  Against the wishes of her parents (in particular her violent father) Gilot gave up her law studies to pursue a career in art.  She was banished from the family home and lived with her grandmother, who supported her whilst the relationship with Picasso evolved in secret. 

It is suggested by many observers of the time that Gilot’s influence on Picasso was greater than the other way around.  In an interview with The Guardian in 2016, it was put to Gilot that being involved with an artist of such magnitude threatened to overwhelm her own style and development.  She responded “No, in art subjectivity is everything; I accepted what [he] did but that did not mean I wanted to do the same.”

In August 2019 an exhibition of her monotypes was held at the MacGryder Gallery in New Orleans.  Over the years she has experimented with many mediums, styles and techniques displaying a confident use of colour and texture. 

Gilot, 'Polarities' monotype, 2009

Commenting on Gilot’s exhibition at the MacGryder, Jess Civello said “Using lithographic inks, solvents and equipment, but painting directly onto plexiglass rather than stone or metal plates, Gilot was free to improvise, adding layers of translucent texture with pass after pass of inking and wiping clean the plate. Collaging different exotic textured papers onto the base sheet further enhanced her finished vision, resulting in unique paintings on paper with various symbolic themes that have an organic sense of movement to them.”

The book provides us with a vivid portrayal of both Gilot and Picasso.  She describes how Picasso would manipulate the market for his work – playing one dealer off against another.  He would invite 2 competing dealers to his studio, make them wait an hour before inviting one of them into his ‘inner sanctum’ whilst the other sweated it out.  Oh, to have that much power as an artist!!

Gilot, 'My Grandmother Anne Renoult', oil on canvas, 1943

Gilot also gives a vivid account of how Picasso would manipulate people, including how he enticed her to leave her grandmother and live with him.  He argued that every positive action can have a negative consequence “the genius of Einstein lead to Hiroshima”, he said.  Emotional blackmail was also part of his armoury.

So how did Gilot survive Picasso?  By being strong-willed, talented and financially independent thanks to the support of her grandmother.

References;

The New York Times

The Guardian

“Life With Picasso”, Francoise Gilot & Carlton Lake, New York Review Books, 1964 (republished 2019)

Suzanne Valadon - Feisty, Determined & Talented

“I had great masters.  I took the best of them, of their teachings, of their examples.  I found myself, I made myself and I said what I had to say.” Suzanne Valadon

The illegitimate daughter of a drunken laundress, artist Suzanne Valadon (1865 – 1938) overcame her poor background to forge a career in a man’s world.  Contrasts are drawn with Valadon’s contemporaries Berthe Morisot and Mary Cassatt who both came from wealthy families and were thus thought to be restricted in their subjects and outlook.  Raised on the streets, Valadon had seen it all and this gave her the confidence to be independent and paint challenging subjects.  It’s worth noting that both Morisot and Cassatt eventually bought paintings by Valadon.

When she was in her teens, Valadon worked as a bare-back rider in the circus.  But after injuring her back in a fall, she became a model for artists – supposedly one of the few professions available at the time to young, beautiful women from poor backgrounds.  During her modelling career, Valadon cleverly cultivated contacts, gleaning techniques and ideas.  She made up stories about her background – raising or lowering her age depending on the circumstances.  She became the lover of many notable artists such as Renoir who painted possibly the best known image of her.

Renoir Dance At Bougival 1883. The male figure is Renoir’s brother.

Henry Toulouse-Lautrec met Valadon when she lived just next door to him in Paris and she became his mistress and muse for about two years.  One of the most moving of all depictions of Valadon is “A Grenelle” painted by Toulouse-Lautrec and based on a song of the same title sung by the sad balladeer Aristide Bruant.

Toulouse-Lautrec ‘A Grenelle

Unlike most of Valadon’s artist contacts, Toulouse-Lautrec took her artistic ambitions seriously.  It was he who convinced Valadon to change her name from Marie-Clementine to Suzanne, claiming no one would take her seriously if she was named after a fruit.  

In 1896, she got involved with well-to-do lawyer Paul Mousis and with financial security behind her, she was able to focus full time on her art.  Mousis purchased a house for her, her mother and son (thought to be Renoir’s, but he denied this).  The marriage didn’t last and her son, the artist Maurice Utrillo was having problems of his own.  Yet through all this and beyond, her career flourished.

Without any formal training Valadon developed a technique of her own with bold heavy strokes and a very direct style, laced with emotion.  Her nudes were considered very sincere and intense.

Valadon Reclining Nude 1928 Oil On Canvas

Valadon met the artist Andre Utter through Maurice and she became transfixed by him.  She was still living with Paul at the time.

Valadon Adam and Eve 1909 Oil on canvas

The figures (believed to be Valadon and Utter) are almost life size and this is the first painting by a woman depicting a nude male and female – so it created quite a stir.  The leaves covering Utter’s genitals were a later addition to enable the exhibition of this work at the 1920 salon.  The painting is audacious as there is no idealization here, instead there is a raw fleshiness in the presentation of the bodies already entwined as Eve (Valadon) picks the forbidden fruit.  It’s thought that Valadon was referencing her relationship with Utter – an older woman with a much younger man.

Valadon  The Joy of Life  1911 Oil on canvas

This is a familiar subject painted by Cezanne, Matisse and Gauguin among others but for one major feature – the presence of the male nude modelled by Utter again.  In previous paintings of this genre, the female figures are presented as languidly displaying themselves with no suggestion of where this might lead.  But with Valadon, there is again a demystifying of the scene and a clear pointer to desire and sexual gratification.

Art historian Gill Perry writes of the female figures being strangely separated from each other, from the male viewer and from nature that surrounds them….there is no evoking of the harmony between women and nature as suggested by Matisse or Gauguin.  She puts this down to Valadon’s “robust and sharply outlined” style.  Not surprisingly, Valadon’s “marriage” to Mousis ended. 

Such was the growth in her reputation that in 1923 the Bernheim-Jeune Gallery signed an unprecedented contract with Valadon worth 1m francs per year just to have her on a retainer.

References: 

Through The Eyes Of An Artist; Suzanne Valadon – Youtube

Toulouse-Lautrec, The Full Story – ZCZ Films 2006

Suzanne Valadon – The Art Story 2019