Part Four The figure and the face

Fig. 1. Silverwood, Sarah Taylor.

 Snappy Clothes (2014)

Ink on drafting paper and magazine pages.

What I do love about this course is that it is drawing me back into the art world. While teaching Art History to high school students full-time, I had the time and motivation to research artists on a daily basis. Having been back in a regular elementary classroom situation these past three years has hampered the time I have available for research. However, I am finding that progressively my free time involves a pursuit of the study of artists. Just yesterday I was reading about the making of Loving Vincent, Zaha Hadid's Most Iconic Buildings (a photograph tribute to the passing of architect Zaha Hadid), and about a photographer whose photographs of abandoned European buildings appeal to my intrigue with decaying surfaces. Really interesting reading!

While trying to gear myself up for another few hours of drawing, I read the interview In conversation: Sarah Taylor Silverwood featured in WeAreOCA, 7 March, 2016. I then went on to study some more of her works on New Art WM. What I find appealing about her work is that by superimposing two images - a found image from a historical magazine photograph portraying a young woman of the popular culture, superimposed by an ink drawing on draft paper of an elderly woman - she creates a dynamic narrative. As explained by New Art WM, "...carefully constructed drawings, historical references and material from contemporary popular culture mutate into one another." (New Art WM, 2016) As a result, you want to know if the underlying beauty was the old lady in her youth. You are also encouraged to question how she got to look so haggard, disengaged and seemingly hopeless. Her technique puts a whole new level of meaning to what could otherwise be viewed as a simple contour line study of an elderly woman (fig. 1.).

This afternoon, I looked at the suggested reading list and tried to access the video of William Kentridge that is listed in the course. Unfortunately, it was no longere available, But I did find a video interview of his, How to make sense of the world. He said the following:

 "You can see the world as a process of unfolding...We don't have complete information...a walking collage of thoughts and ideas and thinking...somewhere in between is an openness to recognize something as it happens...You have to allow yourself the openness to see what's arriving by chance, through fortune, at the edges." - (How to make sense of the world, 2014) 

Too often I set out with set ideas of what I want to achieve, and how I am going to go about it, not allowing the freedom of happenstance to open the parameters of the final product. This interview was very intriguing and expanded my ideas, as I had only seen William Kentridge's work as static drawings, not as the combination of miming, performance and animation that many of them are. I like the fact that he compares our lives to a "walking collage". This is so true in that what I see as being the reality of a situation and you see are usually two totally different fragments of the same reality. Neither is wholly true, and neither is completely wrong. They are slivers of the reality, a collage of the experience. I guess what I get from this discussion is that I should not be so hard pressed to create a realistic rendition of a figure, or scene, but rather to allow it to be my interpretation and "collage". I need to free myself up to incorporate other fragments of my experience of the figure, or scene, to influence my choice of media, style of interpretation, etc.

Fig. 2. Wooll, Hannah. Uh-huh, 2013.

Another artist who intrigues me is Hannah Wooll. Her enigmatically haunting works are hard to interpret (fig.2.). Her self-analysis helps to explain some of her intent to me:

“My work has always been concerned with imagery that is slightly off kilter, exaggerated or fabricated, subverted from magazine pages, my own photographs, and old master paintings.” (Axisweb, 2016)

“I regard my works as being a still from a story or film, caught up in a moment, the image paused; sometimes melodramatic, sometimes fragments of quiet and uneasy tension.” (Wooll, 2015)
The suspicious expressions and closed form of the poses of many of her female figures, leaves you wondering what it is that disturbs, or frightens them. You end up trying to piece together meaning from the gestures, lighting and facial expressions. There is also a hint that the young women have a shared knowledge about the viewer, one that causes them to treat them with reserve, fragility and distance.

From these different artists, I get a sense that what makes a memorable and engaging figural artwork is one which requires you to make connections. One that requires you to puzzle the connections, stance, or expression, allowing your own impressions to add to the "collage" presented to you.


Illustrations

Figure 1. Silverwood, Sarah Taylor. Snappy Clothes (2014) Ink on drafting paper and magazine pages. New Art WM [Online] Available at: newartwm.org/artist [Accessed 19 March 2016]. The New Art Gallery in Walsall.

Figure 2. Wooll, Hannah. Uh-huh (2013). [Oil on board] 40 x 30 cm [Online] Available at: http://www.hannahwooll.co.uk/recent-works-2013-2016.html [Accessed 3 April 2016].

Works Cited

Axisweb, 2016. Hannah Wooll. [Online]
Available at: http://www.axisweb.org/p/hannahwooll/workset/212573-i-dont-care-pretty-baby/
[Accessed 3 April 2016].How to make sense of the world. 2014. [Film] USA: Louisiana Chanel.

Joanne, 2016. In conversation: Sarah Taylor Silverwood. [Online]
Available at: http://weareoca.com/fine-art/in-conversation-sarah-taylor-silverwood/
[Accessed 19 March 2016].

New Art WM, 2016. Sarah Taylor Silverwood. [Online]
Available at: newartwm.org/artist[Accessed 19 March 2016].

Wooll, H., 2015. Artist's Statement. [Online]
Available at: http://www.hannahwooll.co.uk/artists-statement.html [Accessed 3 April 2016].