Painting

luka

Well-known member
what is behind regos reputation is that she paints 'themes' and critics understand themes. themes are popular these days.
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
next time you do a bit walk through an art gallery. i reckon youll find it revelatory.
I would love to do this but I reckon I'd be freaked out by all the sober people walking about.

I'm usually stoned when I go to a gallery but you can hide that pretty easily.
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
N01511_10.jpg
One of my faves, Tate Britain
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Great thread, this.

Although in part I think that because I'm a narcissist and it's gratifying for me to remember that I've had (or ripped off) thoughts that I've now completely forgotten I ever had.
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Hard to say

I think when you see it in person it creates this powerful sense of illusion, somehow - because of how realistically these near-life sized bodies are painted, the painting creates a vivid illusion of bodies floating upwards.

It's supposed to be an image of salvation, of the bodies of the dead rising on the day of judgement, but it's really a quite sinister, morbid image. I like that apocalyptic tone it has, the grim colours.

It's also a bit kitschy, as Leighton's stuff always is, the marbled/tanned muscularity of the man. I say it's painted "realistically" but of course it's not a realistic image, both in the sense that it's a mythical/magical scene and in that it's highly mannered.

BUt it's that collision of realism and fantasy that makes it so weirdly powerful, I think - as an image.

If its intended to have an emotional effect (and it probably is), a poignance or something, it completely fails in my eyes, because of that mannered, uncanny quality.

These are all groping explanations to explain a visceral response. Probably too there's something satisfying about the way he's positioned the figures in the foreground and background, a mathematically satisfying balance, within the circular (tondo?) frame, presumably derived - as is the anatomical depiction of the bodies - from Michelangelo and Raphael.
 

yyaldrin

in je ogen waait de wind
i don't like that kind of paintings but i feel like i can't really say why. it's just that every museum i go into i see the same depressing biblical paintings, with the naked breasts and the pale skin. the museums are full of them. they're all dusty and old looking. it makes me think of the interior of my grandma's house. maybe you need to get the symbology for it to appreciate it better?
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
It's worth remembering that I am a miserable, morbid sort of person and I like wallowing in it sometimes. I suspect this is one reason why I like Rego more than Luka.

I'm also somehow or other highly conservative in my view of art (ditto poetry, prose, music) and although I make an effort to enjoy abstract and even conceptual stuff I tend to instinctively prefer representational art with veiny hands, tangible silks and gnarled tree trunks in it and stuff. This is why I only REALLY liked Rego when she moved onto figurative pastels which resembled to my eyes the work of Degas and Freud. I thought all the abstract stuff at the start was sort of interesting but also sort of bollocks.

Should also emphasise that that painting is one of my favourites at that gallery, not of all time.
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
I can sympathise with your view of things yyyaldrin cos I had exactly the same view until relatively recently. Thought galleries were boring. Couldn't relate to any of it.

Not sure what changed. Either I grew more open minded or more pretentious.
 

yyaldrin

in je ogen waait de wind
yeh my criticism is infantile to be honest. i wouldn't be surprised if i do start to appreciate it when i get older but i also believe in the scenario that with every new generation the interest in this kind of art will decline.
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Not sure about that. I consider sticking to your instinctive taste a good thing in many ways, and wish I had. Nowadays I'm confused as to what I actually like and don't like most of the time.
 

catalog

Well-known member
I want to go on an dissensus art trip as well. To that town where that weird guy lived, can't remember his name. War artist did weird shaped bodies and had strange marriage. would be nice.
 
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