The Easel

12th October 2021

Poussin and the Dance review, National Gallery: A youthful, light-hearted look at the French painter

Mark Hudson | The Independent | 8th October 2021

Poussin, the “father of French painting”, has a reputation for “emotionally remote”, even “stuffy” works. Well, that’s not the whole story. At age 30, Poussin went to Rome. Inspired by its ancient statues and sensual lifestyle, he suddenly started painting lighthearted – even bawdy – dance scenes. His later career returned to serious and sombre but, for a decade, Poussin painted “post-Renaissance rave art”. His “austerely beautiful” art was, for a time, not quite so inscrutable.

Jenny Saville’s Nudes Bring Renaissance Masters Down to Earth

Laura Rysman | The New York Times | 8th October 2021

The Renaissance was dominated by men. Florence has cleverly responded with a show that puts those works next to Jenny Saville’s acclaimed portraits of fleshy, imperfect female bodies. With their emphasis on emotion and vulnerability they differ radically from Renaissance ideals of womanhood. Still, at some level, all these artists are motivated by concepts of humanism. In different ways, they all put “the figure at the center of the history of art”.

Man Ray’s Slow Fade From the Limelight

Jeremy Lybarger | The New Republic | 7th October 2021

A new biography of Man Ray does little to bolster his fading reputation. Philadelphia born, he moved to Paris in 1921, drawn by its creative buzz. Aspirations to be a painter came to nothing but in photography his exploration of “technical epiphanies” made his name. These images never gelled into a signature style, suggestive of the “pinched radius of Ray’s genius”. Ray’s stylistic fingerprints can still be seen in fashion photography but elsewhere his cultural impact is “unnoticed”.

Gilbert & George, Full of Themselves Again

Michael Glover | Hyperallergic | 24th April 2021

Gilbert & George aim to provoke. In their coupledom, their opinions, their art, it has been a 50-year effort. Does it still ring true? The affirmative view highlights their message of inclusion, set against the harsher realities of urban London.  The linked piece, however, hints at a certain weariness. These “scalawags … are past masters of the titillating, half-meaningful, half-nonsensical, verbal provocation …What better place to enjoy all this spectacle than a well-appointed gallery in Mayfair?”

The Artist Paints Herself

Jennifer Higgie | Laphams Quarterly | 5th October 2021

From a recent book, three self-portraits by women artists active in the 17th century. Before her early death, Sirani’s self portraits showed her beauty – less self-flattery than a way to emphasise agency. Anguissola fearlessly showed herself in old age, a pushback against expectations that she portray idealized feminine youth. Carriera’s “brutally honest” image of herself in middle age is an “embodiment of the passing of the seasons, as if she were not only a woman but a landscape as well.”.

5th October 2021

French and Russian Art on a ‘War and Peace’ Scale

Jason Farago | The New York Times | 30th September 2021

Late Tsarist Russia spawned two great modern art collections. The Shchukin Collection was shown in Paris in 2016. Now the Morozov Collection is on show, also in Paris, the first time it has left Russia. No superlative seems too grand. Bonnard’s landscapes are a “showstopper”, the Gauguin’s are of “staggeringly high quality” and there are “incredible helpings of Cézanne, Monet and Matisse”. A “stupefying” exhibition, one that is “legitimately historic”. Images are here.

Jasper Johns

Blake Gopnik | 4Columns | 1st October 2021

In contrast to last week’s piece on Johns, this one focuses on the art. Starting out straight after abstract expressionism, Johns wanted to make art about real things. Are his celebrated flags ‘things’, or symbols of an idea? Do his ‘numbers’ pictures express a pure idea or are they objects borrowed from commercial art? This duality is the admirable aspect of Johns’ work. Less clear is whether, at some point, his art lost its cleverness and became a production of ‘things’.

Judith Joy Ross’s timeless and empathetic portraits

Rebecca Bengal | Aperture | 9th September 2021

Ross’s acclaimed portrait projects can be years long – members of Congress, people at Washington’s Vietnam memorial, Pennsylvania school pupils. They are mostly formal compositions, set in unremarkable locations. What makes them stand out is their emotional acuity, the ability to reveal a private self. Ross has that ability to connect with her subjects: “I know I’m being delusional. But I like to think I’m capturing the real thing.”

Spinning yarns with Sheila Hicks

Yasmine Seale | Apollo | 2nd October 2021

A studio visit with Hicks, the eminent textile artist. Her best known “fibre sculptures” are large, some being installations for building foyers that “emulate the splendour of the natural world.” Hicks also has a liking for small works, including “little exercises in disobedience” that result from working with unruly thread.  This is, says the writer, a world of craftmanship and “slow adventure”, where finished objects “demand to be touched”. More images are here.

Understanding ‘L’Arc de Triomphe, Wrapped’

Wilson Tarbox | Frieze | 28th September 2021

The Arc de Triomphe is now being unwrapped IRL, with little sign of a critical consensus. One French journalist tweeted “I am ashamed.” A writer happily admits the wrapping is both “nonsensical” and “transfixing, like seeing a frozen waterfall.” To another, it’s “joyous and lurid” and a reminder that “all things must come to an end”. Finally, a Paris resident – “I pass the Champs-Élysées most days. I never even notice the Arc de Triomphe. But now, I see it.”

The Quietly Rebellious Art of Iranian Women and What We Can Learn From Them

Susanna Schrobsdorff | Time | 20th September 2021

The organisers of this New York show have a point – Western images of Iran often focus on women in black chadors, living seemingly downtrodden lives. This, and other, misconceptions about Iran, apparently have added impetus to that country’s contemporary art. Tehran’s art scene is flourishing and women artists are prominent participants. They are philosophical about the restrictions they work under: “in Iran absolutely nothing is black and white”.

Noguchi

Dominic Lutyens | The Design Edit | 27th September 2021

Noguchi would have disliked being described as ‘designer and artist’. For him, his tables, lights and sculptures were not fashion items but a reflection of the human activity associated those objects. Well, at least one critic doesn’t see Noguchi’s modernist designs as art, either. They have “no punch … no emotional or psychic energy, just … harmless creations”. Responds another “just because something is simple, modest and popular does not mean it is not art.”

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