They will adorn you like ancient Jezebel

The opening pictures show Sudanese fashion model Adit Priscilla, before after her claim to fame. In the before picture she could well have modelled for the paintings and sculptures in my series Daughters of the Caribbean Sun. True enough, it would have been the Sedan sun. But no matter, all my models are of African decent. 

To those who keep asking: I have not given up on my Bare Minimum fashion label. It is just that my creative energy is presently taken up with other projects. The unknown young lady in the picture below temps me back. She leaves the world's fashion designers and catwalk models standing.

The devil is in the detail

I've been harping on about the allurement of detail by it's absence since my 2013 post of the same title . There is nothing more dreary than the contrived finish that most people are looking for in a painting.

In my book Notes on the Nude I mention experiments that I am making in projecting details from my paintings onto a screen the size of a house wall. The result is a dramatically new visual experience that has elements of the abstract. In its original form, the detail that illustrates today's post is no larger than a matchbox. The breasts that gave life, have life.

As Dylan Thomas once said in reference to a good poem having the captivation of a motion picture, By God it moves. And so By God, it does.

I am my own most ruthless critic

When it comes to viewing the paintings of aspiring artists you're expected to say either say something nice or say nothing at all. Criticism, especially here in the Caribbean, is perceived as a negative.  

Fortunately, I serve as my own most ruthless critic. And regardless of the shock I may occasionally give you, I also serve as my own most ruthless censor. 

For this post I've avoided the erotic and kept my subject on safe ground; that being the tops of palm trees. The detail shown in the opening image is all that a watercolour should be, and in the closing image all that it should not. The first is confident, the second confused.

In Homage to Egon Schiele and John Running

John Running's photograph of the model Nettie Harris in homage to Egon Schiele.

Close on the heels of my last post, I follow with this haunting photograph by John Running (1939-2018) in homage to Egon Schiele (1890-1918). Nettie Harris, also deserves credit for her remarkable modeling.

I quote from John Running's commentary on his photograph.

Here is one of the most lovely images of Nettie Harris, which says a lot, since dozens of the best photographers have shot her, and she's helped create probably hundreds of photos that will someday be seen as the masterpieces of this time.

It is, of course, the nature of Art History. So much of it is hindsight. Like seeing the work of Egon Schiele. He was a protégé of Gustav Klimt. His work, often self-portraits and women, noted for their twisted bodies. Some say he was a fore-runner of 20th Century Expressionism. Schiele began to explore not only the human form, but also human sexuality. At the time, many found the explicitness of his works disturbing.

Today, the sexuality of the work isn't shocking. Rather, we can see that he was just a pioneer of erotic art. 

It is exactly a century since Egon made his now classic erotic work. This portrait of Nettie, holding a book of his work, is a fitting tribute, that I am sure would thrill Egon. 

At a first glance I would have attributed John Running's photograph to the masterly work of Jan Saudek. My post Weird or not Weird featured Jan Saudek's work.

Incidentally, the painting I featured in my last post is from a collection I have titled Sensuous Suggestions. Alas, my collection is to too sensuous and suggestive for a fine art society that claims to represent the full spectrum of the beauty of the nude.

 

I leave you with one of Egon Schiele's drawings.

Unadorned, unabashed, unappreciated

We are forever demeaning natures natural beauty and then diminishing it still further by what is known as "beautification". When nature is unadorned and unabashed she is regrettably unappreciated. 

My watercolours attempt to record nature's subtleties without favour or shame. They suggest rather than define. I leave you to interpret them as you may.