Pablo Picasso, The Maids of Honor（1957）













 

 

 

 

 

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Pablo Picasso's attitude towards the past was largely influenced by the anti-historical stance of Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, who believed that "the past is merely a service to the present" (Nietzsche & Collins, 2019). 

 

Picasso created a series of works with Portrait of Pope Innocent X，Diego Velázquez, a total of 58 canvases. Velázquez was the most prominent Spanish artist of his time, just as Picasso was in his time.

 

The Maids of Honour (Las Meninas, after Velázquez) 1957 was painted in his own pictorial language, in order to reproduce Velázquez's realistic approach with a reproduction that deconstructs Velázquez’s complex approach to perspective. He preserves the original author's intention by retaining the connection between spaces and between space and the observer in the figure's flanks and in the geometric lines. By deconstructing the space in the original painting and deforming the figures, combined with appropriate white space, he draws the viewer's attention to the painter himself. The maids of honour, the setting of the scene, and the overall feeling of space, respectively. Each of his reconstructions encouraged me to keep changing my perspective and attention. He simplifies the figures by changing the colours, the space and by using geometric shapes. All the elements in the whole picture are recreated by him. He goes from copying to cubism, geometrizes and abstracts the main character, and re-creates the sense of space in the picture by contrasting the colours of black, white and grey.

 

He absorbed and reinterpreted the "illusory language" that once existed in Diego Velázquez's works through compressed space and flat expression, and the "illusion" inside the picture was replaced by Picasso's "reality", which also makes the work a historical continuation, allowing the viewer to enter into a dialogue of different forms and intentions over 300 years of time and space, and at the same time allowing him to rewrite the narrative.

I find it worthwhile to learn from his way of distorting figures. Streamlining lines and space by changing the colours, using translucent and geometrical painting techniques.

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Francis Bacon，Study after Velazquez’s Portrait of Pope Innocent X（ 1953 ）

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In The Logic of Sensation, Deleuze suggests that painting must wrest the image from the "figurative". Bacon, however, suggests two factors that distinguish ancient painting's relationship to figuration and illustration from that of modern painting. On the one hand, the photograph has assumed such an illustrative and informative function that modern painting no longer needs to fulfil this function, which originally belonged to ancient painting. On the other hand, ancient painting was conditioned by "religious possibilities" that gave the image a figurative meaning, whereas modern painting is an atheistic game.(Deleuze, 2004)

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The distinctive feature of the Pope in Francis Bacon's "Pope" paintings（ e.g. Study after Velazquez’s Portrait of Pope Innocent X, Francis Bacon ）his wide-open mouth, as if he were screaming hysterically from a confined space, each one with different pains and disturbances, distortions and horrors, but all of them instantly recognisable as the unlucky Pope.

 

I think Francis Bacon's constant use of screaming or shouting as a method of expression in this series of works is his attempt to visualise shouting, to combine perceptible but invisible forces through the dynamics of shouting. Bacon implanted fear and anxiety into Diego Velázquez's image of the majestic Pope （Portrait of Pope Innocent X，Diego Velázquez，1650） who is supposed to be respected and venerated, but in Bacon's paintings he combines this with the danger of his existence, and the images are simple, visually striking, and suggestive. On the one hand, Bacon's paintings on the theme of "Pope" are borrowed and re-created from classic paintings and images of traditional art history, and on the other hand, they are fused with various classic images, messages and social backgrounds of the painter's own time such as：The wounds, suffering and the human experience of World War II and the

the heart gripped by death.. The paintings reflect a unique combination of tradition and contemporaneity, and also show the artist's own creative concepts as well as a kind of discernment when facing propositions related to the nature of mankind, exploring how to explain his own concepts in an artistic way.

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I analyse this painting Study after Velazquez’s Portrait of Pope Innocent X, Francis Bacon, what are my feelings, and how would I convert it if it were me. A single line is used to outline the dynamics of the figure, and by exaggerating the dynamics of the figure, the figure is cartoonised and generalised, and the figure is broken down and reconstructed with strong contrasting multi-coloured blocks and geometric shapes, contrasting with the solemn chair in the background. The background treatment is then flattened and contrasted through the splicing and juxtaposition of different elements of reality, or through flat painting techniques. The use of entangled linear strokes divides and treats the picture, thus creating a sense of oppression and bondage. Emphasis is placed on the proportional coordination of points, lines and surfaces in the composition of the picture, using spatial flatness and abstract composition.

 

In my opinion, the most important change in the extension of the methods and means of creation of contemporary painting is the change of the creative resources from "natural" to "pictorial" resources.

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The practice of Flora Yukhnovich

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"Part of my job is to bring the style of Rococo‘s inspiration back to its source so I can break that connection and reinvent the aesthetic." (Parafin, 2019) Flora Yukhnovich brings together works created in the 17th and early 18th centuries by artists such as Ambrosius Bosschaert, Adriaen Coorte, Clara Peeters and Rachel Ruysch. Overlapping and colliding with revellers and comedic figures from many different art historical works, she captures a sense of delight in the textures of paint, the opulence of silk and the movement of dance.

Through a process of literal and metaphorical collage, archetypal motifs of idealised and controlled beauty are combined with female characters. Her work is in a constant state of fluctuation between abstraction and figuration, exploring ideas of duality and multiplicity, transcending the traditions of painting while blending high art with pop culture, intellect and intuition. In her work, she focused on painting the female figure. She has made the sheer richness of the Rococo style and the application of paint through a plethora of loose marks and strokes a means of resisting the objectification of her protagonists.

The artist's recent work has turned darker, delving into the notion of the "monstrous female" by colliding two very different frames of puberty, reproduction and the female body. In her work, she focuses on painting the female figure. She has made the sheer richness of the Rococo style, and the application of paint through a plethora of loose marks and strokes, a means of resisting the objectification of her protagonists.(Wirth，2023)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Cecily brown's The Triumph of death （2019）

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I was inspired by cecily brown's The Triumph of death, what is this painting? How does she paint?

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Her way of transforming traditional classic figurative works into her own paintings is what attracted me to her, by drawing on traditional painting genres in her unique style, blurring the edges between representation and expressive dynamics of the figure.

 I found that she subjectively selects some of the figures and not others from the original fresco. She hides certain objects in the picture and deconstructs them - the original appearance of the objects takes on an abstract form that makes them difficult to recognize. Also, the proportions of some of the human bodies in her pictures seem to have a slight correlation with the figures in the original works, but they are noticeably different. She exaggerates the dynamics of the figures by means of exaggeration and distortion, presenting a chaotic sense of movement in the picture. I think it is worthwhile for me to refer to her way of expressing the main character in the picture by means of abstract expression painting.

 

She takes elements from her original works （such as：blurred graphic, debonair effects, fantastically coloured compositional tone ）and deals with the background through layers of transparent colours and strokes that are both general and subtle, highlighting the image of the subject matter by contrasting and setting off different colours of brushstrokes ; She goes back and forth through intermittent strokes and rhythms, and each stroke in the picture seems to be endowed with a different degree of power. At the same time, she uses the brightness of the subject matter and the highly saturated, complementary colours of the background to draw out the gap. 

 

In Cecily Brown's interview with Laerke Rydal Jorgensen and Anders Kold Painting as Marriage between Brain and Body (Wetzler, 2019), she mentions that the reason for titling some of her works "after Bosch" or "after Hogarth" and so on is that she is attempting to internalise and fully understand a work by reproducing it.

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Gustav Klimt

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Before MA, I was inspired by Klimt's late works, so I appropriated and paraphrased his works Hope (1903) ，Mada Primavesi (1912), Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer II (1912) ，Water Sepents（1904）, all of whom are mid-career works by Klimt, a period in which. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the western society underwent a drastic change, Klimt was affected by the environment and the impact of the new trend of thinking. In 1897 Klimt and others set up the Vienna Secession, Klimt became the president of the school, and the concept of his painting and art style also changed. The Secessionists rejected traditional ideas and forms of expression, and advocated exploring the "functionality" of combining art and craftsmanship. At the same time, during this period, Klimt was subjected to a social debate and attacks from the traditional school of painting, after which Klimt began to concentrate on his inner dialogue, which marked Klimt's departure from the constraints of traditional painting and his move towards a new expression of art in his mind. During this period, his works were full of dynamic human movement, eliminating the dullness of flat decoration.

 

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I feel a sense of sadness and mystery in this painting, Portrait of Hermine Gallia, Gustav Klimt (1904), which I think is different from other paintings of Klimt's period, in that he uses small brushstrokes often found in classic paintings (reminding me of the landscape brushstrokes of Impressionist painters), and he is very careful with the background, capturing light and shadow in layers, giving the background a sense of mystery. He reduces the subject of the woman to an exquisitely decorated flat form, and through the use of light and heavy brushstrokes and variations of reality and lightness, the image is filled with a sense of mystery and sensation of mistiness, with precise brushstrokes to express the details. At the same time, Klimt also handles the dynamics of the woman's figure and the shape of her skirt, allowing the sleeves to reflect the structure of the arm with curved twists and turns, exaggerating and distorting the hemline of the skirt to make it more ethereal, and at the same time reducing the size of the woman's head to contrast with the splendour of the skirt's hem, which aids in the portrayal of the figure's vividness and the sense of the picture's mood and atmosphere. His treatment of the lower right corner of the picture is very special, and we can see that he combines impressionistic painting techniques with decoration and abstraction. Unlike his other portraits of the same period, we can see that he combined symbolism with decorative forms. Him. I think this work is different from other murals and portraits of the same period. In the frescoes as well as the other portraits, I feel that he, due to his the influence of Chinese folk elements of Chinese Folk Art, he focuses more on flat and decorative motifs and the use of rich colours, as well as spatial forms in his paintings.

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Last year, before I started MA, I had also translated this painting, the difference is that at that time, since I only saw this work from the internet, due to the problem of the clarity and colour difference of the picture, at that time, I was more concerned about the sense of composition of the picture and the direct translation of the figure. A year later, when I saw this work in National gallery, I found that the colours of the original work were more subtle, and the saturation level was very different from that shown on the internet. By observing the detailed strokes in the picture from a close distance, I found that last year, when I translated the work, I might have been too planar in focusing on combining decorativeness and abstraction. I may have neglected to convey the sense of atmosphere and the emotion that Klimt conveys in his paintings. So I re-translated and re-processed the painting, and I asked myself to improve the durability and readability of the painting, which came from an observation I made about some contemporary art paintings.

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While I mentioned earlier why I chose this work to create, this paragraph aims to illustrate how I use abstract painting in conjunction with traditional painting directions to translate. Influenced by the painting characteristics of Bacon's works, I use vivid and powerful strokes, twisting and distorting techniques, vigorously exaggerating the figure, combined with the characteristics of Cecily Brown's paintings, I geometrically divide the body of the figure, through the superimposition of black and white strokes of different weights and thicknesses, and the superimposition of different shapes of planarised colours to shape the body of the figure, coupled with the fluidity of the lines. The body of the figure is shaped by the movement of the fluid lines. Contrasts and contrasts are created through heavy, serious colours and light, cheerful geometric colours. The sense of space is emphasised by the texture of different areas and thicknesses in the picture.

 

The purpose of this article is to analyse the ways in which classical works are appropriated in paintings and how they inspire my work. In my opinion, the most important change in the extension of the methods and means of creation in contemporary painting is the shift from "natural" to "pictorial" resources. 

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In my works, I hope to create a sense of sublimity through the proportions of the figures, distorting and deforming the original dynamic images, combining conflicting colours in the figures, and focusing on the colours of the brushstrokes, as well as the colours of the brushstrokes. 

By twisting and distorting the dynamic image of the original, combined with the conflicting colour blocks in the figure, I focus on the colour of the brush strokes in the picture, as well as the accuracy of the form, thickness and strength of the brush strokes. The flowing lines of the figures contrast with the static background.

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Brown, C. et al. (2022) The Triumph of Death. London: Ridinghouse

Deleuze, G. (2004) The logic of Sensation. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. 

Feinberg, J. (2011) Art since 1940: Strategies of being. PEARSON EDUCATION. 

Frederick.N, (1984) The Use and Abuse of History, New York:New American Library,Meridian Classic,p232.

Nietzsche, F.W. and Collins, A. (2019) The use and abuse of history. Mineola, NY: Dover Publications, Inc. 

Parafin, (2019) Past Exhibitions — 2019 Flora Yukhnovich Sweet Spot. Available at: https://www.parafin.co.uk/exhibitions/2019/exhibitions-2019-flora-yukhnovich (Accessed: 2024). 

Wetzler, R. (2019) ‘Now I can steal from myself as much as from other artists’ – an interview with Cecily Brown.

Wirth, H. (2023) Welcoming Flora Yukhnovich to Hauser & Wirth, Hauser & Wirth.

 

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