RyckRudd

When faced with real, material objects, I haven't much patience for text. I haven’t blogged for half a year. But it’s been a busy year so far, and I do have lots of news to share over the week!



My open critique went wonderfully. I requested immediate feedback. Opinions, feelings, thoughts; all were welcomed and recorded. The support material, unfortunately, went largely unnoticed – drawings, research, theory, fiction, poetry – but that’s fine for now. We addressed the elements and near-resolve of each painting, and my mentors concluded the session. They encouraged more experimentation to further utilize the campus facilities. The following week I started afresh.



With a few weeks left of the semester, I worked much larger, with bigger brushes and more solvents. We built and wrapped a 170 cm x 190 cm stretcher frame. The weave was thin, the paint was thin; everything would be thin, washy, stained. Everything would, ideally, stretch me from the practical comforts while expanding on the subject. Most often in a painting, I crop the motif within an image 50 centimetres in diameter. And since my motif is most recognisably a naked child or group, I considered more seriously the life of their clothes. What happened to them and what implications could they carry, if painted so large?



Having reduced the subject matter to abandoned clothing, I decided a simpler object would emphasize the scale. The simpler the better; verging on absurdity. Recently I added a sock to a painting, beneath a boy’s foot, as if it were a deflated condom. The idea seemed strong enough to expand. So I made quick sketches until the image clicked for me. Key references were Guston and Baselitz, but only just now did I remember something heroic: Caravaggio’s Madonna and Child with St Anne. 

To a Freudian reader, distancing the biblical references from Caravaggio’s painting reveals something very regressive. The child and mother, stepping on a phallic symbol together – might be something to explore later. I’m very interested in this, but I should let time and process decide what impressions arise in my own work. I’ll later report back with my results.

I'm expecting to update the DAgallery with up to twenty new paintings and several new sculpture photographs, before the end of the year. In the meantime, the work can be viewed on my main website. In other news, I'm trying to bring a tighter relationship between my social networking accounts - DA housing the most enthusiastic people, Facebook having the most access, and Pinterest & Tumblr mainly for process imagery and brain feeds. 

All have their own perks, naturally, and I share different content across each. There are people here on DA who I appreciate, whom I'd love to have as company, across more than just the one location. I'd be most overjoyed if supporters here caught up with me elsewhere!

It's hugely difficult for a group, with its overly simplistic attitudes, to maintain the mysteries often essential in great art (with what we think of as "great art" embodying more of an abstract question than a book of answers keen to be shelved). What are the worthy groups you subscribe to? Naturally, one hopes for both generous exposure and a properly interested and maintained audience. And I'm running short on some quality groups.

Today, a lecturer insisted to me that 'Guernica' could never be made again - that the world has changed - a painting just doesn't carry that significance in today's world. It's a very tired, common testament, but it's true, sadly.

This lack of interest is sad because the human passion put into certain paintings is sometimes felt by us personally, if we only give them the time. We each have our favourites: Vincent van Gogh died distressed and alone over a century ago, and yet there he is in the paint itself, embodying it, a deeply passionate man, hoping to comfort us in a way he believed he could, from human to human. This phenomenon is not a spectacle made by today's top artists, who impress with shock tactics and tiresome installations in the concept-heavy exhibition race. Touching us emotionally and awakening the good in us isn't even their concern.

For an incredibly long time we have done it: painting can record directly the humanity of the maker, to be with us, to help us know that passionate people cared before us - about us. If only for the sake of empathy and feeling, painting as a practice is worth preserving because paintings themselves are worth preserving. The great masters are still about the living, if we want them to be.

If you even gave the time to read this, and still you agree, please do share it with others. Thank you.

hyperallergic.com/121121/no-ir…

Along with the article, I'll share some things with you:

I like the kitsch movement. I like the shamelessness of it. I like the intent, the ritual experience as practiced by Odd Nerdrum , and yet... I like practically none of the work, nor will I ever be part of its house. O. Nerdrum insists: "Follow the Greeks". I insist: follow whatever, whoever, wherever, whenever you like; history exists to be learnt from.

"Copying" used to carry less bad connotations. Noticeable derivatives solidify the concerns of the person. It is all a record. "This is who (or what) I was looking at." I get rather hard treatment for it, but I'll always look back on my "Francis Bacon period" with delight. To copy is a very wonderful thing.