Naomi's Drawing Venture

 Research Point - Artists Self Portraits  Tracy Emin - 'The last great adventure is you' Exhibit 2014 "The work is about rights of passage, of time and age, and the simple realisation we are always alone". - Emin.  'Good Red Love'  Gouache on canvas -2014 'You Never Said Goodbye' Embroidered Calico - 2014   'Strong Distance' Gouache  on canvas - 2013   Emin explores herself so deeply and expressively, seemingly without inhibition. Her lines are bold and confident and even though she draws the figure so confidently and without a face, I can feel her energy and presence.  Emin is known for her continuous exploration of herself, however these drawings alone show so much honesty and feeling. They are exciting drawings, they pull me in and offer so much of her as a person. Emin describes art as a cathartic act.  'The Memory of Tears' Acrylic on canvas - 2018   How do contemporary artists approach tone, medium, pose and story?   This...

 Research Point  Historic and contemporary artists whose work involves the underlying structure of the body   Historic examples:  Michelangelo 1475-1564:  Renaissance artists studied anatomy as an essential way of learning to draw the human form. These studies (1500-1510) eventually became so detailed through research that they surpassed any medical journal of the time and were used in universities to teach anatomy.  Michelangelo and Leonardo Da Vinci became renowned for their human dissection illustrated research that they became leaders in this field, the majority of artists working on on the surface of the skin. The opportunity to dissect a human body at this time was a rare and limited.  Leonardo Da Vinci  1452 - 1519: Leonardo Da Vinci is considered the most significant artist anatomist.  His first studies show the form of the human skull in 1489. Da Vinci used the technique used in architecture - Plan, section and elevation.  ...

 Research Point - Look at contemporary as well as historic artists who work on the face in different ways Graham Little (1972-)  Graham Little produces highly detailed drawings using coloured pencils and gouache.  Little works for months at a time on one piece using his medium to produce texture and detail, a figure and a scene in one emotive piece.  Inspired by fashion magazines, Little sources images, both past (to the 1970's) and present using Vogue and Harper's Bazaar.  Little's work is viewed through what feels like a soft focus lens placed on the viewers eye. His scenes feel full, romantic, inspired and almost cryptic in the sense that there are so many small elements carefully placed in the drawings such as the brush and mirror in ' Untitled (yellow mirror) 2014' above and the piece of fruit resting in the male figures hand 'Untitled (Man and Dog 2019).  'Untitled (Man and Dog) 2019' -  The detail of the woven jumper is so intricate, as if...

 Research Point: How the depiction of the male and female nude has changed over the centuries   John Berger 'Ways of Seeing...' BBC  John Berger explores the deeper meaning of the placement of a female nude in a painting.  He suggests that women dream of themselves being dreamt of and men dream of women.  He explores the emotions of a woman in terms of her appearance and her psychology surrounding her body. Women meet glances off men, a constant reminder of how they should look. The glance acts like a mirror to a woman. Behind every glance is a judgement and sometimes the glance they meet is their own reflection looking back at them. Those who are who are not "judged" as beautiful by the spectator, simply are not.  Berger believes that a woman is always accompanied, even when alone. She is never far away from the image of herself. She can't avoid thinking of herself and surveying herself. Her appearance is made to be the success of her life. She is a sight ...

 Research Point: The human figure Leonardo Da Vinci 1452-1519 Da Vinci studied the human anatomy to get better at drawing the human form.and by the end of his life, he claimed to have cut up more than 30 corpses in his pursuit of human anatomy research for his groundbreaking sketches.  Michelangelo 1475- 1564 Drawing would always be Michelangelo's first point of call when working on a study or a commission. Although such is the ability, observation and skill of each drawing - they are highly regarded as fine art in themselves.  Many of Michelangelo's drawings appear unfinished, yet I can see the time and accurate detail in the anatomy. It is most likely that Michelangelo reached a point in each drawing that he had found what he needed in his observation, that he was able to move on to his final pieces without completing his drawing studies overall.  The drawings of the naked figure are created articulately using chalk and pencil. Studying the human form in such scien...

Research point:  Landscape artists from different eras Claude Lorrain 1604/05-1682 Claude Lorrain, born Gellee in 1604/05 is one of the earliest know landscape artists.  Rome was his interest and inspiration and where he spent a large amount of his life. Lorrain would sketch the Roman countryside with fellow artist Nicolas Poussin. These sketches would the be developed into oil paintings.  Lorrain was influenced by Northern painters, Elsheimer and Domenichino .  Lorrain's earliest dated canvas is 1629 with 'The storm' from 1630. 'The storm is a drawing/painting of an unknown location. Pen and brown wash are used on blue paper to depict a seascape. Figures on the beach are pulling hard to bring the ship to shore in the foreground. A ship floats wildly amongst the waves of the sea in the middle ground and in the background, I see the cliffs. Is it a real scene or is it fictional? There is such energy in this piece, I can see the great effort ...

Contemporary artists who work with landscape and a range of viewpoints Tacita Dean has had landmark exhibitions in London including the National gallery, National Portrait Gallery and the Royal Academy.  'The Roaring Forties - Seven Board in See Days' 1997 is one of several chalkboard series that evoke black and white cinema, a series of storyboards. 'The Roaring Forties' is the name given to a zone in the Atlantic Ocean renowned for its gale force winds.  In the ghostly chalk boards I see struggle and weather, might and fight against the winds and the sea. A large ship battles against the elements and the sea rages around it. The sky is vast. There is such a lonely, eerie, isolating feel to the drawings.  Georges Seurat 'Landscape with Houses' 1881-1882 Seurat is highly thought of as one of the most important Post-Impressionist painters, however he did deviate from this journey, from the spontaneity and speed of impressionism to a more...