The Rainbow

I am presently re-reading what I consider to be one of the most beautiful books in the English language: The Rainbow by D. H. Lawrence.

But regardless of what I consider to be the book's beauty and innocence; two months after its publication in 1915, copies were seized and suppressed under the 1857 Obscene Publications Act. Prosecutor Herbert Muskett declared that “although there might not be an obscene word to be found in the book, it was in fact a mass of obscenity of thought, idea, and action”.

Lawrence wasn't present at the trial; he wasn't even told it was taking place. He later heard about it through newspaper reports. Over one thousand copies of The Rainbow were burned by court order outside the Royal Exchange.

I quote from Herbert Reads essay The Problem with Pornography. 

"...The effect on Lawrence was disastrous...He felt as if the very springs of creation had been blocked by ignorant but powerful forces...How could he go on writing with this threat of suppression continually before him...Such an inhibition cannot be tolerated by any creative artist." 

But as followers of the serialization of my book Notes on the Nude will gather, nothing has changed!

My original Penguin copy of The Rainbow got lost and I replaced it with a recent re-print (Lawrence's copyright is now in the public domain). But the publishers of the re-print are taking no chances on being blocked by the censors. Hence the cautious and irrelevant front cover illustration.

I could do with a bath

In this week's serialization of my book Notes on the Nude I makes reference to how I take measurements for a sculpture and in particular chalk marks, both on the modelling stand and on the model.

The most reliable measurements of the figure are taken bone to bone. But when flesh comes between, as in the case of Dave, my rotund model for the lock-keeper pictured below, I resort to chalk marks to remind me of my datum. At the end of a week's modelling Dave asked me if I'd be needing the chalks marks on his torso for the following week. His question had me puzzled until I realized that he hadn't washed the chalk marks off from one session to the next. As he said, "I could do with a bath!". 

Alice, who modeled for one of my early sculptures in the series Daughters of the Caribbean Sun misunderstood when I told her to stay still I'm going to chalk you. She thought I had said choke and ran from the studio naked!

Jessica, who modeled for my bathing figure was so slim and her skin so transparent that chalk marks were unnecessary. I could see every bone in her body. 

When chalking the line that delineates Verlena's spine she suddenly yelled "STOP"...you're tickling!

These are the precious memories of incidents and intimacies that are shared between model and artist while working together to capture the sensuous beauty of the human form. 

In the image below you have chalk marks accenting the model's spine, her position on the modelling stand and the scores of measurements that are necessary to convincingly portray the figure.

When they were young

Following on from my last post that featured my daughter Trina, here are two early sculptures of my daughter Tania at age five and my son Tristan at eight months.

Tania is about to make me a grandfather in a few week's time and Tristan has just completed high school. 

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Staying still like a statue

My daughter Trina modelled for this portrait bust twenty years ago. While I worked with Trina in the studio, her sister Tania had to help her mother do the housework. None too pleased at having to do all the work, Tania remarked, "It's all right for you". To which Trina responded, "So you think its easy staying still all day like a statue!"

Today's installment of my book Notes on the Nude has a section headed "Modelling isn't Easy". It begins: I am forever searching for a model that is not a model and a pose that is not a pose...

The note is timely as this week I will be working with two new models. While I feel certain that they will enjoy and value the experience (I have never had a model who has not) they will nevertheless find that to be ones natural self for the first time on the modelling stand isn't easy.

If you scroll down the side bar to "Extracts from the UK diary pages" you will find more about Trina's portrait. And below is a recent picture of Trina.

As difficult as it may be

Today's painting is one that I made a couple of years ago of Shani breast feeding her baby. If you go to pages 10 and 11 of my book Notes on the Nude you'll find Shani featured in the role of ballet. But whoever the model and whatever the subject - and as difficult as it may be - like Rodin, I can do no other than work from the live model.

I can only work from a model. The sight of human forms feeds and comforts me. Auguste Rodin.

This is why I am all too often disappointed with the current crop of artists whose subject matter is the nude figure. One artist that I have followed and admired for years - his drawings are in the vein of Egon Schiele - I now suspect works from photographic images. His bold outlines of hands, feet and facial features are too regular and accurate to be otherwise. In contrast, Egon Schiele's drawings speak of his struggle of getting the living and breathing model down on paper, mistakes and all.

My painting of Shani breast feeding her baby was one such struggle. At the time I considered the painting a failure. But I now realise that within my perceived failure, mother and baby are alive and well! 

If only...

If today's sketch seems far removed from the normal run of my posts, let me explain...

When for a period in my life I relocated to my native West Riding of Yorkshire in the mid 1990's my first sculptural commission was for pair of bronze heraldic deer for the gateposts of a Grade 1 listed building. My preliminary sketches were made from life in a deer park, and therein lies the link with my work with the female nude: not by way of photographs but by way of life. 

If only I could have remained content to work from animals rather than humans, how much easier it would have been to find my models - and naked at that, just as God intended. 

Whether it be a shy deer or one of my Daughters of the Caribbean Sun, neither stays still for more than a fleeting few seconds. A photograph can record the instance but not the life. Both demand getting it down on paper at a single stroke, as referred to in this week's serialization of my book Notes on the Nude.