Yesterday in the artist's studio

Some pictures from yesterday when I ventured into the artist's studio again......

This is very much a work in progress, a constantly evolving record of a space in a state of flux. It has no natural beginning nor end and I'm not sure yet what I'm going to do with the images. I'll probably make them into a book at some point in the future but I also think it would be a nice idea to show them together with some of the paintings that were created in the space. A possible future husband/wife collaboration?

All paintings copyright Mike Newton

Tools of the Trade

Another peek into the artist's studio - this time looking at the various tools of the trade: brushes and palette knives, paints and palettes, canvases and paper, books and magazines, plus a surprising number of feathers! Not sure if they're just for decoration or whether they actually get used. The brushes come in a wide range of sizes and shapes and each will have its own defined specialist use.

Having looked at quite a number of  pictures of artists' studios, they seem to fall into two camps - the super-tidy and the messy. This one is a very tidy one and reflects the owner's character. Each item has its place, brushes are meticulously cleaned after use, processes and experiments are all noted down. A feeling of order and calm pervades the space, even in the midst of the creative process.....

Backs to the wall

Another peek inside the artist's studio.....

The works in today's post are all back views. Whether heads or figures, nude or clothed, the back view of a person hints at mystery, reverie and detachment. The viewer is unable to gauge the expression or can only partially do so if the face is in profile. The subject is usually portrayed as lost in thought, absorbed in some inner meditation, unaware of the viewer. We, the viewer, have to put our imaginations to work to fill in the gaps.

In painting, the Rückenfigur is the term used to describe a figure in the landscape, seen from behind, contemplating the view. The viewer is encouraged to place himself in the position of the Rückenfigur, so that he may experience the same sense of awe in the face of nature as felt by the figure in the painting. Associated with notions of the the sublime in nature, German romantic painters such as Caspar David Friedrich used this device to emphasise the spiritual and mystical aspects of the contemplation of nature.

The figures in the paintings featured below are not depicted in any communion with nature. In fact, we do not know what they are looking at. Nevertheless, their back views may lead us to suppose that their minds are on higher things, their thoughts turned in on themselves and the viewer is inspired to share their experience....

All paintings copyright Mike Newton
More of Mike's Rückenfigur work can be seen here and here

The Artist's Studio

"What would we not give to peer over the shoulder of Giorgione or Vermeer  - or Francis Bacon? In an age that has lost its natural sense of the numinous, we half believe that we could be the witness of a form of magic. And it is not only the enactment of that magic that so compels us; the place in which it is performed may be charged with a presence that compounds the spell. To enter the studio of Giacometti was to walk, like Alice, through the Looking-Glass, into a realm that seemed to change the scale of your own body; to find your way across the floor of Kitaj’s studio that is strewn with open books like paving stones in a Japanese garden is to step into the silent discourse of centuries between artist and artist; and to be invited into Brancusi’s lair at 11 Impasse Ronsin was to cross the threshold into a space that was itself a work of art in which sculptures of polished brass, white plaster and rough-hewn wood had been disposed in groups under the calm white light from high windows – a temple of trophies through which you moved as in a trance. In each case a way of working had moulded from within its own aura." 

          From The Artist at Work by Colin St John Wilson

These photographs are from a project about the artist's studio on which I've been working intermittently over the last year. I am lucky enough to have access to an artist's studio right here at home, where my husband works and produces his paintings and drawings. It is a fascinating place and offers different photographic opportunities virtually ever time I cross the threshold. The constant state of flux creates interesting and unusual juxtapositions of images as new work replaces work in progress or a finished piece. At times portraits seem to communicate with one another, at times willfully turning away, sometimes caught in a shaft of light, at other times expressions hidden in the shadows.   

I usually do my photographing there when the space is empty as I don't like to intrude. The studio is usually regarded as a place of sanctuary, a personal space which is not be invaded. In addition, I make it a rule never to disturb anything - I tend to prefer photographing what I come across rather than staging my pictures - and for me the serendipity of finding a ready-made still life is one of the great pleasures of photography. 

The images in this selection are all to do with the gaze - the painter's gaze of course, but also the gazes exchanged between the subjects of the paintings and their gaze as they look out at the viewer, as well as the viewer's gaze at both the paintings and the photographs. Gaze upon gaze upon gaze.....

To be continued........

All paintings copyright Mike Newton

Barbara Hepworth

Whilst in St Ives I paid a visit to Barbara Hepworth's Sculpture Garden.  It was pouring with rain so not ideal conditions for photography. In any case, although I like her work, I'm not that interested in just reproducing her sculptures in two dimensions - you can look online for that! I was fascinated by her studio which has been preserved just as it was left on the day of her death - 20th May 1975. You can see the calendar reflected in the mirror.  There is something fascinating about seeing an artist's place of work - the tools, the props, the bits and pieces of work in progress or unfinished and discarded.  It is as though we are being allowed into the artist's very personal space, their inner sanctum, a place of creativity and innovation.  In this case, I like how the outside world, in the shape of the garden, melds with the interior to create an almost double exposure.

Wandering around the garden, I was struck by the forms and shapes of the natural world - trees, plants, snails, rocks.  Hepworth's work is full of organic curves and swirls and her work was inspired by the beauty of the Cornish landscape.  There was even a beautiful grey cat which guided me round like some smoky familiar!