The Easel

16th May 2023

Mark Bradford has revived abstract art. His New York show is a knockout.

Sebastian Smee | The Washington Post

Bradford’s new show in New York prompts a kind of stock take. He is now famous, due to his abstract paintings. But are they paintings?  Using cheap materials, he “beats [them] into some form of beauty … by layering, sanding, gouging, scraping and tearing”. These are not so much paintings as vertical agglomerations and yet they “dramatically expand abstraction’s possibilities”. They allow him the freedom to “remain uncategorized … perhaps our era’s Jackson Pollock”.

Samuel Fosso wins the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize 2023

Diane Smyth | British Journal of Photography | 11th May 2023

Cameroon-born Fosso has long been regarded as a leading figure in African photography. Even before Cindy Sherman was creating her alternate identities, Fosso was making self-portraits while dressed up as someone he had seen in a magazine. His objective wasn’t political but rather to “tell stories” and, through that, question what is meant by identity. This rather workmanlike review is the best of a limited bunch, somewhat surprising for a prize (and recipient) of such prestige.

Portraits of Dogs: London’s Wallace Collection explores canine character and charm

Amber Louise Bryce | Euronews | 29th March 2023

You are either a dog person, or you aren’t. The above writer extols a London show of dog portraits, claiming “there’s a human story behind every painted pooch”. In particular,  dogs have long appeared in portraits to impute admirable qualities to their masters. Another critic, not a dog lover, is having none of this, arguing that the show is a “sickly cocktail”. The 19th century animal artist Landseer is “awful, [his paintings] trite, nauseous …bring your aesthetic pooper-scooper”.

Problem picture

Michael Prodger | The Critic | 15th April 2023

A London show resurrects the controversy over Balthus. His paintings of adolescent girls, with underwear showing, are disturbing. and reflect, as one critic puts it, Balthus’ “depressive, prurient weirdness”.  An alternate view, as explained by New York’s Met, is that Balthus saw adolescents as “a source of raw spirit” and was exploring their “unself-conscious natural eroticism”. Oddly, the linked piece seemingly suggests that continuing high auction prices for Balthus’ works settles the debate.

The Link Between Creativity and Mental Illness

Elaine Woo | Getty | 11th May 2023

As far back as Socrates there has been speculation that mental illness is associated with artistic creativity. Is it true?  The masterpieces van Gogh produced while living in a psychiatric hospital reflect “lucidity of the highest order”. Mental illness may have “embellished his creativity … but it doesn’t explain his brilliance as an artist”.  Whether a link exists or not, artists work “should be judged as art and not merely the results of art therapy”.

From Morandi to Balla, Magnelli and Severini: why did still-life painting flourish in early 20th-century Italy?

Staff | Christie’s | 12th May 2023

Still life painting is often associated with formalism because visual qualities predominate over narrative. The genre was especially popular in the Dutch renaissance. Perhaps sparked by Cezanne, it was again prominent in 20th century Italian art and Morandi was its undoubted star. Although prepared as an auction guide, this piece neatly summarises a seldom featured area of Italian art.

9th May 2023

Auerbach, grand master of paint, as hot-wired as a live grenade at 92

Geordie Greig | The Independent | 28th April 2023

Gushing admiration. Portraiture features prominently in Auerbach’s career, including his near obsession with painting just a handful of sitters. Only now, at 91 has the “Grand Old Master of British Art“ produced a series of self-portraits. These works are a “hard, uncompromising quest to take stock of human decline” with paint strokes that “almost disguise the likeness while exposing the interior of the mind. One of the most astonishing exhibitions of self-portraiture ever seen in London”.

‘Les Belles-Soeurs’: Ingres’s Portraits of the Noble Sisters-in-Law

Michelle Plastrik | The Epoch Times | 8th May 2023

An appreciation of Ingres’ portraiture. Harmony was an essential – “her exquisite [blue] satin ball gown … is an icy shade whose coolness is offset by the silky golden chair”. Subjects were shown in “anatomically unrealistic [poses] to create an impossible idealized beauty”. More perceptively, the late Tom Lubbock called these works “an extraordinary spectacle. The sitters are gift wrapped trophy wives … objects of worship and items of beauty … portraits in which, at every point, intimacy occurs”.

The Sheer Teeming Multiplicity and Variety of It All

Paul Strathern | Laphams Quarterly | 3rd May 2023

Bruegel placed in his life and times. In Antwerp, he encountered the work of Hieronymus Bosch whose vision of life included “everything from the carnival-esque to the grotesque”. Antwerp teemed with life but, due to political instability, had a troubled zeitgeist that perhaps explains an ominous Bosch-like tone in some Bruegel works. His renowned snowy landscapes “may be magnificent in their vision of bleakness but they do not depict a happy or easy way of life”.

Critics fear Benin Bronzes could be privatized by royal heir

Nikolas Fischer | DW | 8th May 2023

Not long after being restituted to Nigeria from Germany, a group of Benin bronzes have been given to their “rightful owner”, a descendant of the former royal family. One dismayed critic calls this outcome a “fiasco”. The response, of course, is that these were stolen goods and their owners can do with them as they please – as is the case with restituted artworks stolen by the Nazi’s. Whether the bronzes will be exhibited in the planned new museum of West African art is unknown.

Natural Light by Julian Bell review – the forgotten German artist who inspired Rembrandt and Rubens

John Banville | The Guardian | 2nd May 2023

No one person invented landscape painting, but Adam Elsheimer deserves an honourable mention. Contemporaries like Caravaggio thought human figures gave a painting its “substance and vigour”. Elsheimer, influenced by the rise of the natural sciences, prioritised landscape. He painted vegetation in realistic terms and portrayed subtle gradations of light. Not only did he highlight the world’s “immensity” but also posed an enduring question “what it [means] to be human and in nature”.

Artists Are Suing Artificial Intelligence Companies and the Lawsuit Could Upend Legal Precedents Around Art

Shanti Escalante-De Mattei | Art in America | 5th May 2023

An essay from just 2014 that explains the long accepted role of appropriation in art now seems almost quaint. AI presents new and subtle challenges, most recently copying an artist’s style and using that to create new work. Is this fair? Style cannot be legally protected and there is a presumption that online content can be copied. Complains one digital artist “You develop this [visual] language … and then AI doesn’t just replace you but also muddies what you are trying to do.”

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