11.01.20 -Wassail Revel evening at local subscription rooms. I like the illustration on the ticket which I purchased and subsequently enjoyed an evening of song and dance with friends.
Art History Talks are being delivered at the Centre for Science & Art.
On 19th January the first talk is about the Augustus John (1878 – 1961). It is well attended however I manage to find a seat.
I learn that Augustus John was born in Haverfordwest. His father was a solicitor and he was brought up by Aunts and a nanny after the loss of his mother when he was 6 years old. He attended the Slade school of Art at 16. Unfortunately during leave from college in his youth he suffered a head injury when he dived off rocks and this led to a change in his behaviour (becoming more extrovert and possibly disinhibited). The talk detailed his complicated relationships and numerous offspring.
Augustus John was acclaimed in his lifetime – 460 works at the Royal Academy. and for a brief time was appointed as Professor of Art at Liverpool University.
In 1914 he was elected president of Royal Society of Portrait Painters. During the first World War he was War Artist to the Canadian forces.
In 1919 he was official artist of the Paris Peace conference where he completed a famous portrait of TE Lawrence.
It was a well delivered presentation. I appreciated the slides of the paintings of Augustus John’s family either in domestic scenes or out in the country and at the beach. I agreed with the presenter that this represented his best work as opposed to his painting of portraits of known writers/poets of the time. I am looking forward to the next Art History talk about his sister, Gwen John.
Gwendoline Mary John (1876 – 1939)
The 2nd Art History Talk is given on 16th February 2020. Again well attended with a good provision of tea & biscuits during a mid afternoon break.
Gwen John was born in Haverfordwest. Her mother suffered with chronic rheumatism, living until 1884. So with her brother (Augustus John) and other siblings, Gwen John was brought up by 2 Aunts and a nurse.
The family moved to Tenby (32 Victoria Street) where Gwen set up a studio in an attic room. Similarly to Augustus she went to study at the Slade School of Art. The Slade School was very progressive in offering equal opportunities for women in art training. The tutor was Henry Tonks.
In 1898 after finishing at the Slade, Gwen John went to Paris. She was supported for a while by an allowance from her father. She spent 4 months at the Carmen’s Academy 1898 – 99 where James McNeill Whistler taught.
1899 – 1903 post-Slade were Gwen John’s “disturbed years”. She shared a flat with artist Ambrose McEvoy who later married Mary Edwards in 1902.
There is a self-portrait of Gwen John from 1902 in the National Portrait Gallery, London.
A joint exhibition was held by Augustus John and Gwen John at the Carfax Gallery, London with 45 works by Augustus and just two by Gwen John. Augustus described these two works of his sister as “rare blossoms from the most delicate of trees”.
Gwen John considered the happiest years of her life to be 1904 – 1907 and during these years she became involved with Rodin.
In the presentation one of the slides included “A corner of the Artist’s room with window open” from March 1907. Her paintings and portrai
s could be described as calm and harmonious of subtle tone with use of a limited range of colour values. Composition of figures in a restful pose.
Gwen John spent most of her life in France remaining in Paris during the first World War when she took on translation work for British Officers who could not speak French. During this time she did not paint. In 1913 she converted to the Catholic Faith (possibly influenced by Rodin who was a Catholic). Some of the slides were of a series of works by Gwen John of the nuns (Dominican Sisters of Charity) at Meudon.
In the decade 1913 to 1925 Gwen John was her most productive continuing to develop her themes of harmony in tone.
In 1926 Gwen John held her one and only solo exhibition at New Chenil Galleries. The exhibition proved successful. She moved out of her flat to a larger property with a garden to accommodate her nine cats. There were enchanting slides of her paintings of her beloved cats.
From 1932 -1939 Gwen John gradually became reclusive and with some degree of self-neglect.
In a sense I found her paintings to be peaceful and restful through her gentle composition and thoughtful limitation of palette.
Auguste Rodin (1840-1917)
Third Art History Talk on 15th March 2020. Rodin is described as the “Father of Modern Sculpture”. He was born in Paris in 1840. He struggled with “everything apart from drawing” and as a consequence was sent to his Uncle’s boarding school. It was lightly commented at the talk that Rodin may have suffered from dyslexia?
From 1854 to 1857 he studied at the Paris School of Decorative Arts, training as a Craftsman. The afternoons he spent at the Louvre – his favorite place for the classical sculptures. He was rejected from by the Grande Ecole des Beaux Arts on three occasions. It may have been due to his craft background rather than “fine” art training.
So in 1857 saw the start of 20 years of hardship for Rodin in touting for work and a struggle for recognition.
He lost his sister (aged 25) to peritonitis . Rodin was three years younger than his sister and he took her loss to heart and decided to join a Catholic order. His spiritual mentor Father Pierre Eymard, encouraged Rodin to pursue his passion in life.
In 1864 at the age of 24 , Rodin fell for Rose Beuret (aged 20). Rose was a seamstress, hand-stitching clothing as it wasn’t until 15 years later that the sewing machine was invented. Rose supported Rodin as a studio assistant. Together they had one son Auguste Beuret (born 1866).
Rodin entered the studio of Albert Carrier-Belleuse, a successful mass producer of art objects.
In July 1870 the Franco-Prussian war broke out and Rodin moved to Belgium to work with Carrier from 1871 to 1873. Rodin was working on figures for decorative public buildings. However Carrier signed much of the work and eventually Rodin left and went to work for Antoine-Joseph Van Rosbourgh (1831 – 1902). This proved a better working relationship. Rodin spent 3 to 5 years learning the work, then in 1875 he down tooled and took a 2 month trip to Italy to study antique and renaissance sculptures. He saw Michelangelo’s work and so glimpsed his own future path.
In 1875 aged 35 Rodin finally had a sculpture accepted by the Salon ie. “Man with a Broken Nose” of marble. However controversy remained around his work and Rodin spent a year collecting evidence and photographs to try to convince critics that the sculpture “Age of Bronze” was not a life caste.
Eventually Edmund Turquet, Undersecretary of State for Fine Arts personally congratulated Rodin for his work.
During the talk, slides were shown, one depicted Rodin’s “St John the Baptist ” . This was an innovation in sculpture of a walking figure as prior to that figures tended to be portrayed in a standing pose with body weight on one leg and the other foot raised slightly off the ground.
Rodin became to take part in sculpture competitions. In 1879 he entered a competition for the New Town Hall.
In 1880 he started a commission by Edmund Turquet, for doors to a new Art museum. This state commission changed everything for Rodin. It became his obsession for the next 20 years and he created original, poetic, freely expressive work. The plan of the museum itself was scrapped however Rodin continued to work on 180 figures, producing some of his most famous works eg “The Thinker” (1888) and “The Three Shades” (1881- 1886) , “Crouching Woman” (1881) , “Adam and Eve” (1881), “Steps of Pantheon” (1906).
Perhaps one of the best known sculptures in the world “The Kiss” was completed by Rodin, although it was carved by Jean Turquan. Here the figures from Dante’s inferno lean to kiss as the book they are reading (about Guinevere & Lancelot) falls aside. Critics argued the figures should be in contemporary dress.
Here the talk took a break before a short presentation on Camille Claudel (1864 – 1943). Camille took lessons from Alfred Boucher from 1879 to 1881 at the Academie Colarossi. She became assistant to Rodin at the age of 20 in 1884 (Rodin aged 43). During the next 10 years during their working relationship they influenced and inspired one another depicting gesture and expression in the human form.
However from 1892 to 1898 there was a progressive breakdown in their relationship and their relationship ended after 14 years. Camille found herself in a difficult position with no state commission and no longer supported by her father as he died in 1913. At the age of 48 she was committed to a mental asylum where she spent the rest of her life and died aged 78 in 1943, despite Doctors expressing that she was mentally well and did not require confinement. She was buried in a communal grave at the asylum.
However in 1917 a museum was dedicated to the work of Camille Claudel.
Returning to Rodin . In 1889 (the year the Eiffel Tower was constructed) Rodin held a joint exhibition with Claude Monet.
Rodin moved to Paris in 1893 and at the age of 60 held his first solo show in the Pavillion de l’Alma he had built to house his works at the Paris Exposition Universelle in 1900 . Later he had the Pavillion de l’Alma rebuilt in the grounds of his villa and invited others to view his work there. Edward VII visited in 1908.
Linking in with previous talks we are reminded that at the age of 63 Rodin has a new assistant at this studios (Gwen John – aged 28).
In approximately 1910 Rodin sets up studios in the Hotel Biron and Rodin sold works in 1911 to the French government in an agreement that all tenants (apart from Rodin) should be asked to leave the hotel. In November 1914 at the start of the first world war Rodin gifted 18 sculptures to the Victoria and Albert museum. The Musee Rodin was founded in 1916. Due to his fame and requirements of convention Rodin married Rose Beuret who had always been in his life.
Their son Auguste Beuret 1866 – 1934 became a tour guide of the Villa des Brillants, Meudon (one location of the Musee Rodin, the other being at Hotel Biron).
Comment on the Art Talks
These Art Talks prove very informative and it is a privilege to have a glimpse into the lives of the artists and makes their works more real. I appreciate now the struggle and effort they applied in their lives to be creative. Their humanity and foibles adds to their greatness and means it is possible to relate to them.
Reading through the feedback for part one of this course I am advised to generally avoid Wikipedia, Pinterest and Instagram. This makes sense and certainly I could read about Augustus and Gwen John, and Rodin on Wikipedia however it would not have had the impact or understanding of how their lives inter-weaved and how their relationship to their work unfolded as it does through the Art Talks. Attending these lectures brought these Artists and their work to life.
At the presentations on Augustus and Gwen John their paintings could be well depicted on the slides and the sense of the colour of their work. It is more difficult to show 3D sculptures on 2D slides so Rodin’s work could not be fully apprehended in the same way. However I feel this is good in that it leaves me wanting to explore and I would like to visit Rodin’s sculptures at the V&A museum and also investigate Camille Claudel’s work further. Despite the tragedy of her later life she did invest at least 14 to 20 years in sculpture and I found her work most expressive and innovative.
Photoshop
I have enrolled on photoshop 5 week evening course as detailed above. This is a basic introductory course. I have often heard photoshop mentioned and want to know about it.
Wednesday 15 January – the photoshop trainees are being taught alongside trainee photographers. This adds an additional element to the teaching programme. As photoshop trainees we work on Apple computers and are introduced to how the application window looks, the tool box, palette and so forth. It is lovely world of picture and colour.
Wednesday 17th January – Photoshop training continues. This time there 3 oranges photographed and uploaded into our screens. We learn how to “lasso” around the oranges to select them and how to blur selected oranges out of focus. The interface of photoshop seems a little more familiar this time and we use some of the short cut keyboards. I am beginning to realise how much photoshop can do and come away with a new thinking of how pictures and photos in publishing are presented.
Wednesday 29th January – Third evening at photoshop. This is more of an exploratory evening working through handouts, learning how to inverse an image, move items and begin to think about layers.
Wednesday 6th February – We are provided with a “potato face” exercise ie layers of images of salad products and a baked potato from which to build the image of a face. This helps me to understand the concept of layers in photoshop. I am surprised at how far I have progressed in the last four weeks from having no idea about photoshop to now understanding its purpose and function and its huge capacity in picture making.
I feel I need to take responsibility for building on this knowledge and decided to look into the county library webpage and order a photoshop reference book.
Saturday 8th February – the local library is prompto! and I collect the photoshop reference book I requested. It is well stamped so must be a popular book. I start to read it for one hour and it helps consolidate my learning.
Wednesday 12th February – In this fifth session I continue experimenting with layers, resizing and colouring images. This evening is the completion of the photoshop five week course. It has been an excellent introduction to photoshop. I now understand the basics of the photoshop package.
Adelaide Art 