old photos (again)

I have started drawing portraits from my old family photos and am finding it extremely interesting. I feel like the more I study the images the more I seem to generate an opinion on the people pictured. I am starting to imagine whole personalities and traits and the more I study the faces the more I feel like I know the people.
I have also made a book for the photographs to sit in because they were originally just mounted onto some grey paper which over time had deteriorated a lot. My dad wanted them to stay on the paper so they didn't get ruined trying to peel them off so I have kept them on this paper but have attached them into a hard backed book made from card. The photos are very delicate and already have quite a few tears and creases so I didn't want them to get even more tarnished in the process of studying and drawing them - especially not when I use a lot of paint and water! There were also some loose photographs that I have put into a photo album that I bought in a charity shop - everything involved in this project has a history and I want that to be apparent.

There is one person, a man, who appears in a lot of the images - I think this is my Grandma's father. I find it so interesting to see photographs from a short period of his life, which includes images from when he was in the Navy. I have drawn quite a few images of him and have also managed to get hold of two of his old smoking tins, one of which contains his shaving set. These possessions seem to bring everything together - the drawings, the photographs and the objects are, together, a collection representing a human life. There is a definite sense of history and time when all these things come together. The thing I find most fascinating about the tobacco tins and shaving set is the way the tins have aged, they are in surprisingly good condition yet every mark and dent is the result of human interference. There would have been a time when he carried the tin around with him everywhere and that is definitely apparent. The shaving set is also such a personal object that would have probably been a valuable possession - it would have been used every couple of days and been fairly expensive for the razor and brush. Everytime I look at the smoking tins I can't help but picture him shaving, or rolling a cigarette, going about his day-to-day life. I hope that my drawings give the audience a similar effect - wondering about the history of the person and automatically generating a story in your mind, and also to get a sense of time.

importance of good materials

In my crit a couple of weeks ago it really came to light that the materials I was using were not complimenting my work. The drawings that I do tend to be quite delicate and intricate so the slightest mark on the paper, a smudge or a crease will completely detract from my pen work and draw the audience's eye away. The other problem with not using decent paper is that it simply can't handle thick layers of paint or a lot of water so will start to deteriorate and curl - again detracting from the drawings.
I am using a much thicker and better type of cartridge paper for all my drawings from now on, and keeping the background paper as pristine as possible. I have also found a higher quality ink pen so draw with, with thought about the best nib shape to get the lines and strokes that I wanted. In a couple of my pieces I have also experimented with using artist's colours so create my ink washes rather than settling for acrylic and water. I have definitely found that the depth of colour and pure strength of the pigment is much better and the colours seem much more vivid and strong.


After thinking about all of this I decided that the best way of presenting my project would be to treat each drawing as it's own piece of art and to present each one properly to ensure that it didn't get caught up with all the other drawings. I have made sure that each of my drawings and photographs has its own page so that it can stand alone as a piece of art. I think that presenting it like this also shows that i am proud of each piece that I create. This also fitted well with my method of researching as I tend to normally acquire piles of photocopies and print outs that get tattered and lost throughout the course of the project so again I have tried to keep everything as organised and documented as possible.

how to paint

I found a tutorial website that shows you basic tips about how to paint elderly people. Even though this is designed for use on photoshop the basic principles can apply to painting in real life! I am treating this project as a chance to study the human face as much as possible, and gather research in preparation for my final major project. I think that some of the techniques shown in this tutorial are going to be very useful for when it comes to painting detailed images of the face. The most interesting part for me is the way that the wrinkles on the face look so realistic - as I am really only using pen and ink at the moment it is difficult to get the wrinkles to look effective. When painting it will be much easier to get the depth to each individual line - using the base colour to paint the wrinkle rather than using a harsh black line of a pen like I am doing now. There are also some really interesting points about ensuring that the wrinkles and lines are consistent with the contours of the face which again adds depth and a rounder finish to the painting.

More photos of old people

old persons home

I found this piece by Sun Yuan and Peng Yu at the Saatchi gallery and was really interested in their approach to the elderly figure. They have positioned them in electric wheelchairs which results in them all moving slowly around the gallery space in a completely random fashion, even crashing into walls and each other. Most of their work is concerned with 'death and the human condition' a similar theme to my work. I feel that their depiction of these people are quite contrived, I don't think that each figure has their own personality and in my opinion they look like they have been imagined by the artists rather than based on real people. I think that this makes the piece work well all together, with all the figures presented in the space as a group, however individually I don't feel that the sculptures have much personality. The quality of life is given to the figures by the physical movement of the pieces, not by the pieces themselves and this is definitely something I want to be able to convey through my drawings alone. I also feel that the pieces seem to be quite like caricatures - they are so wrinkled and decrepit that it makes them almost seem unreal. Also the uniforms that they are dressed in seem to represent more than the figures themselves.

The one aspect of this piece that I do like is the way that the figures seem to be asleep, or just completely exhausted. Their positioning and poses completely epitomise the elderly form.

face reading

Face reading
Illustrated guide to face reading

old photos

Having decided that I need to stop making my focus trying to find the perfect muse I thought I would focus more on the history of objects. I have decided that I want to look closer at my own history and relatives. Looking through old boxes at home I found a collection of photographs belonging to my grandma which essentially depict the past 100 years of my family on my dad's side. I have become increasingly interested in found objects with a history and old photographs definitely have the stories and history that I am looking for. There are so many aspects to these old images that intrigue me - the physical condition of the photos, the handwritten explanations of the images, the composition, the people, and the objects and places they've chosen to be photographed with/in front of. I also find it quite eerie that looking at the photos there is a definite sense that these people are no longer alive and are frozen in time in these images. There is also obviously a very personal connection to these images and certain pictures that I find strongly drawn to and can see myself in. I feel like whilst drawing from these images, studying their faces and body language, I conjur up a personality in my head and feel like I have met these people. It also comes back to what I wanted to achieve right at the beginning of this project - making sure that people are not forgotten and trying to making people interested and intrigued by their lives and history.
As well as using my own images I have also found a website of Vintage Images that people send in which have even more of an air of mystery about them as I have no idea who they are, where they're from, how old the image is or who this person is, which makes the drawings even more interesting as I am almost inventing a personality.

library of dust

Library of Dust is a really interesting series of photographs, by David Maisel, of found objects - namely old copper canisters used to hold the remains of cremated mentally ill patients. The most interesting part for me is the way that the human remains have altered the copper, various minerals such as calcium have different effects on the canister. This article about it is also very fascinating as the writer talks about the fact that when these images were on display the story behind them was not made clear and until it was the images didn't have the desired impact.

stephen irwin

Stephen Irwin is another artist that I admire. His work is similar to mine in the way that he only draws parts of the body and tries to represent a person's personality by just showing a fraction of their person. It poses the question of how much of a face or body you need for your brain to see a person. Especially in the image above your brain fills in the negative space and you almost see the whole image.

mark tucker

I've found another photographer whose work is perfect to draw from. He takes portraits of pepole with really characteristic faces and I find his images of elderly people really striking. I love the lighting aswell, and also the way that each portrait is completely different as if they are completely tailored to the person they are representing.

we're all gunna die

This is another photographic piece of ordinary people going about their every day life. It is a 100m long photograph by Simon Hoegsburg taken over twenty days as people crossed a brige in Berlin. The thing that interests me about this piece if the fact that most of the poeple who were being photographed didn't seem aware that their everyday movements were of interest to someone else, let alone being recorded.

Hogsburg said the photograph is about 'the uniqueness of ‘ordinary’ people' which is pretty much what I am trying to portray in my project.

Another piece of his which I really like is 'Faces of New York' which is a portrait photography series where he asks the subjects the same question, records their answers and then takes a photo of them. What I like the most about this series is the way he has presented them - he takes a full length photograph and then displays this next to a close up of the face from the same image. This method means that you absorb the person as you would in reality; you initially see a whole person and then you focus on the face and take in the features. I think this is so effective and is something I would definitely like to try. The questions he asked - What do you think about your face - and the answers received also add a depth to the pieces, giving you a little insight into these peoples' train of thought and personality.

russ mills

I find Mill's work very interesting - especially the passion and expression in his paintings. The pieces are a bit too abstract for me, however the actual faces in the pieces have such huge skill contrasted with the free paint splashing techniques. I am not sure whether the splatters and colours are based on the personality of the sitter but to me it seems like this is the personality of the actual artist and the face part may not even be a real person.

matt duffin

Matt Duffin's work really shows how symbolic everyday items can be. The way that he has painted the objects, the colours and the composition, create an eerie effect that otherwise wouldn't be achieved. The history and stories behind objects really intrigues me, like the flowers I am photographing decaying, the can also be hugely symbolic. I have been going around a couple of charity shops in the search of an object that I feel has a history to it, the sort of items that are discarded at carboot sales. Unfortunately, with the nature of charity shops nowadays, most of the items are of top quality and dont visibly show any signs of a previous owner - probably the point... I am most interested in old objects and also bizarre, distinctive pieces which convey the personality of the person who chose them in the first place.

yang shan-hen

I've put this Japanese artist, Yang Shan-Hen in purely because of his ink technique - I absolutely love it! I think there are alot of comparisons you could draw between my work and traditional japanese art because of the fluidity of the paint involved. I really want to take some inspiration from his work and maybe try experimenting more with inks and not just diluted paint, and also watercolours.

traditional techniques

While I was looking at more traditional portrait artists I came across Helene Knoop and whilst I admire her technical skills I find her work boring. I want people to be excited by my work and not just think about the skill involved, I almost want that to be the last thing on their mind. I want the paint to work with the image to create an interesting piece and not bore people with practicalities.

barbara sewing

kirkgate workshops

A few of the best photos that I took whilst at Kirkgate Studios & Workshops. It is a community centre for the over 50s specialising in arts and crafts, providing free classes and a space for people to be creative.

rembrandt

Although Rembrandt's style is a bit too traditional for me I think when doing a portrait project it is important to look at the masters and take aspects of their work to improve mine.

What I like most about his portraits kind of goes against what I was saying in the previous post! Because alot of his portraits are self-portraits there is an intense stare that pierces the viewer and makes you feel like he is gazing straight into your soul. This is probably due to the fact that self-portraits would have been painted looking into a mirror and couldn't be seen in any other way by the painter. I think that the emotions captured in his gaze are ones that can only be achieved by self-scrutiny especially in the image below. You can see a slight frown on his face that is probbly his 'painting face' due to pure concentration and judgement and scrutiny of his own work.

I also really like some of his portraits of other people who all seem to have very characteristic faces, I would love to be able to find sitters like that but it is proving more diffucult than I thought!


I also really like his etchings, and after a crit with Andrew and Sheila think that trying out doing some etching might be a good idea. I have done etching a lot in the past two years and I don't think it's a technique that suits me particularly well, however in my last printmaking elective I experimented more with drawing into my etchings after I had done the etching. I also used photoetching rather than hand drawn etching, and tried out printing onto images which both worked effectively.

the gaze

I thought I should research 'The Gaze' a bit more seeing as from looking at my work it seems to be key to many of my portraits. I think what intrigues me most about eyes and 'the gaze' is not the actual subject but what they are gazing at. Many of the images of people that I choose to paint from are not looking directly at the camera/artist. I find that a lot more personality comes through if the subject is captured in their natural environment, and most of the time that doesn't involve looking square on, straight ahead. If the sitter isn't looking directly at the viewer then it also provokes questions about their surroundings and what it is that has captured their attention. This is the aspect that I find the most interesting - what the sitter is interested in. Jacques Lacan used the phrase 'the gaze' first and sums up my feelings much more elequantly than I can, he is quoted as saying the gaze 'does not belong to the subject but, rather, to the object of the gaze.'

w h auden by unknown artist

I love this drawing. enough said.

casey orr

Whilst at the Kirkgate studios I was recommended to check out Casey Orr's work. She is a local photographer and University lecturer who lives in Leeds and often works closely with the community. One of her projects that has interested me the most was 'Hands' where she photographed people's hands including those of the workers at the textile mill and displayed them at Armley Mills.
I find it really interesting that as soon as you see a snapshot of a person, or a part of the body, you immediately start to judge and develop opinions and stories about the person being represented.

click to enlarge

gesso on black card
painted with a plastic spatular

abandoned (again)

This blog (Pixcetera) of photographs of abandoned buildings and locations speaks for itself really. Dawn Heumann is another artist who specialises in photographing old and dilapidated objects and scenes.

Photographs that you could stare at for ages, places you are dying to see for yourself, and decades of history captured in a split second.
These buildings have a certain similarity with elderly people, especially those who are alone, there is so much history and so many stories for them to tell but they are forgotten about. I want people to pay attention and listen.

andrew tift

Robert

Yet another BP Winner that really appeals to me. The piece above isn't the one that won but is the piece of Tift's that I love the most. His style is similar to mine, working in monochrome using pencil and shading to create extremely engaging images. I would love to create pieces like this I just need to find sitters with such amazing faces!

The piece below is the triptych that won in 2006 and the fact that it is presented in a series is what has intrigued me. I often present photographs in a series but have never really done it with portraits. I think it would be something to think about because I am trying to tell a story with my portraits, so why not present more than one snapshot in time?

caring together little london

I have found the perfect community centre, Caring Together, whose aim is to work with people aged between 55 and 101 to improve the quality of their lives on a day to day basis, providing activities and company for local elderly people. They also have a newsletter which I found extremely interesting - even the little things like an advert reminding the old people to check their smoke alarms.

charlotte harris

Untitled

Another amazing piece from the BP portrait award by Charlotte Harris, who was actually the same age as me when she won the award in 2003. I absolutely love this piece - again I think it is the gaze in the image, the fact that she is looking off the canvas and has such a perculiar expression on her face that it provokes a lot of questions. Again, she has used a very similar colour pallette to Elmsley, deep pastel colours but less grey. To me she also looks very sad, it makes me want to meet her and ask her about her life, I want to know how she came to be where she is now and where she has been. Her eyes are so well painted that I feel like she is deliberately not looking at me, the viewer. There is obviously a comfortable relationship between the artist and sitter, which is why it is not surprising that she is Harris's gran. I definitely can't just paint or draw a portrait without knowing the sitter, there needs to be a connection and feelings between the two people to obtain a portrait with depth and emotion. I also think that you can't paint a portrait without having a conversation with the person you are painting because then you are merely recreating what you see in front of you, rather than capturing the spirit of another human being using art.
I have also done a portrait of my gran, Maureen, and the reaction to it was extremely interesting, especially from close members of the family. There was definitely a sense of history in her face, you could see the similarities of her sons in her eyes.

Maureen

emsley

Michael Simpson


I go to the National Portrait Gallery to see the BP Portrait award every summer and thought it would be a good place to start looking at how contemporary artists paint portraits. I came across the artist Paul Emsley and absolutely loved this portrait - I love the detail, the lighting and the expression in the image. I feel like I could look at this man's face for hours wondering about his past and looking at each contour on his face.
The colour pallette used is also really interesting. I have mostly been working with black and white images as well as drawing and painting mostly in a greyscale. At the moment this is because I am just sketching out portraits at the moment, and it is mostly about the lines in the face, the shape and the tones rather than the colours. However, I do think that the use of the dull greys, blues and oranges are extremely effective, and the colours alone are haunting and ominous.
The image however is too photorealistic for me, it reminds me of work that I used to do a few years ago when I was primarily concerned with accuracy and often neglected the feelings and emotions in the brush work. I want to make sure that my portraits are full of expression and history so will probably have a much looser, expressive approach to my paintings. However, I haven't seen the painting in real life, and it is over a metre squared so the photorealism may be due to the fact that the image above has been condensed considerably. Scale is definitely something I will have to play around with, in the past the scale of my pieces has varied from enormous 5ft square paintings to tiny drawings in the centre of an A4 piece of paper.