Friday, May 25, 2012

Green/Yellow; Gestures on Brown Paper; Daniela Rossell (Ricas y Famosas)


Drawn from life, different days, different models.


Green/Yellow is black ink over Tombow marker with brush and water, on watercolor paper, about 5"x8".

Gestures on Brown Paper is drawn from one-minute poses.  Charcoal on cut open shopping bag


                                                  


SFMOMA, where I found some Lichtenstein imagery for my last post, has a fascinating feature:  Short video interviews with artists.


Check out  Daniela Rossell, on her book of photographs, Ricas y Famosas and on femininity, to get you started.  Gorgeous photos and interesting genesis for her project.

I now have a copy of  Ricas y Famosas.  The photos are gorgeous and the context of the work is much clearer.  The photos, taken together, are about wealth in Mexico; how the very very rich live.  Rossell is a member of this privileged group.  The photos started with close friends and family and grew from there.  The subjects decided how and where and with what they would be photographed.

18 comments:

  1. I save my brown paper bags to run through the paper shredder so Keating will have litter in his box. This is so much more impressive. = ; )

    I'm always glad to see your work, J. I like the understated control the ink brings to the color wash.

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  2. The drawings are great. Like especially the first.

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  3. Yes...the first is quite interesting...I like the color wash and the simplicity of the figure drawing...

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  4. You are so good with the figure. I love the strength of your charcoal stroke on the mundane surface of the brown shopping bag-- and your overlapping the figures. Keep that one. The top painting is a bit different for you. I'm still digesting.

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  5. The interview on feminism is interesting because I think people like Camille Paglia and Madonna would eat her for breakfast - and yet still I feel uncomfortable with this notion of "own it"

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  6. That PA always sounds so wise. I love her comments.

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  7. I'm impressed with the drawings, especially the difference of style, from one artist. The first feels like nonstop line, the second bold charcoal strokes. And your blog is such a resource as well.

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  8. Thanks, Paula. I was completely out of drawing paper, but I had a shopping bag. It was not the sturdy food kind, which I would have preferred, but one from a clothing place.

    Thanks, Anthony. When you have extra time, check out the SFMOMA website.

    Thanks, Chieftess. Your osprey photo is a wonderful photo and tribute.

    Thanks, Linda. I drew the top figure last winter, when I was struggling with mark making and color making, and only came back to it with color very recently.

    Liz, I love her photos of detail piled upon detail. From the samples in the interviews, I think they are gorgeous. And I like her gentle way of speaking and her vibe.

    Sharper, more articulate people than her have been demolished by Paglia. Don't know about Madonna, in this context.

    But it sounds like, from the interview snippets, Rossell's work and its subjects have been comprehensively attacked and mocked.

    Margaret, she does, and I do, too.

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  9. Ruth, thank you and thank you. I love your piece on Morrill hall. With age, comes layers of meaning and memory. Even though the new place will be safer, it is sad to lose the old place.

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  10. Ciao,
    your drawns and paints are always like many words that tell us about the life!
    Ciao, ciao, Floriana

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  11. I think I know two things about feminism and art. I'm sure there's more.

    The first is that if it's voyeuristic and the subject matter is willing then isn't feminist.

    The second, contingent upon the first, is that if the subject is making an honest statement about how she got where she is by her own efforts - financially, sexually, or otherwise - then she can say whatever she wants, make any statement, she's her own person. Otherwise, she's merely an object in the tableau and only making a statement about her placement in the world and not about herself. And I think it's up to us know the difference.

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  12. Ciao, Floriana, and thanks!

    Paula, good points.

    Part of what's interesting about the Rossell photos is that the subjects chose where and how to be photographed--and that the subjects were in their own homes, in their own environments, elaborate and fantastic as these spaces may seem to us.

    About models, Picasso's lover/model Francoise Gilot is still alive (90?) and still producing art herself. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/11/arts/design/picasso-and-francoise-gilot-at-gagosian.html?adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1338163293-O2SibHPrJ94HB53cd/qqMw

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  13. Wonderful color combinations with the greens and yellows, etc...

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  14. All your paintings from women are bringing a kind of their inside radiation!!
    I hope, that I make myself clear enough (!)...

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  15. Very clear and many thanks, Bitch!

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  16. I love your style: simple yet strong lines. I find hard to communicate a lot with few lines, but you do it beautifully!

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