Picasso - Blue Period

 

Self Portrait with Cloak - 1901

Pablo Picasso's Blue Period refers to a series of paintings in which the colour blue dominates, the blue period is an expression of personal melancholy. A significant influence on Picasso's blue period paintings was his visit to a woman's prison called St. Lazare in Paris, were nuns served as guards. In the painting 'The Visit', (below) the two figures were in fact a prisoner and a nun, the painting is an example of how Picasso used to mix daily reality with Christian iconography. The colour blue symbolizing Mary, the Mother of God, and the meeting or visitation, refers to the meeting between Mary and the mother of John the Baptist.
An ever returning theme in Picasso's blue period is the desolation of social outsiders, whether they be prisoners, beggars, circus people or poor or despairing people in general.

 The Visit - 1902 

The colour blue

Some people believe that colour is associated with emotions, the colour blue being associated with melancholy. In the Anglo-Saxon culture blue is still interpreted as such and so it was in France during the nineteenth century when the colour blue was particularly fashionable among artists and the general public. In Christian iconography blue represents the divine and in a rather more secular (non-religious) sense it stands for the super-natural as well as the erotic.

 Poor People on the Seashore - 1902 

 

  Prositutes in a Bar - 1902

The Blue Room - 1901

The Blind Man's Meal - 1901

Picasso's blue paintings have a darkness about them which is both visual and sensory, in that, as a viewer I feel like I am experiencing something of the environment which would have been so familar to Picasso at the time. I am seduced and intrigued to find out more about Picasso's life as the paintings have a sadness which is clearly not purely evoked by colour but also subject. Picasso's close friend Carlos Casamegas commited suicide in 1901 and this had a profound impact on his work, clearly the 'Blue period' was reflective of his subject and also his state of mind. Also his confrontation with social reality was a motivation and not an end in itself; it was important to Picasso to experiment and test new visual approaches.

Sometimes in my own work I find that the subject becomes less important, the painting becomes more about experimenting. Working out what I want my paintings to do is still something I am unsure about. I know what subjects I'm interested in and I like to make work based on my environment. Many artists have tried to affect change through their work however having a passion or fascination for my surroundings feeds my paintings but it is not essential for the viewer to know what the work is about.

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Blue Paintings

Blue 1

When I started making Blue 1 I used a photo, which showed detail of a building, rather than a broad view of the destruction of the riots. I think it is more interesting the less a viewer might know about the scene. If I was to crop the top of the buildings and the sky, the painting could work in a more abstract way. I may try taking a small part of the original image to make more paintings.

With regard to colour, Blue 1, initially had a ground colour of red/orange. I then painted with variations of blue, I could not control the urge to use a bit of yellow and green. I used a metal scraper to remove some of the layers of paint revealing some of the ground colour. There is a ghostly, desolate atmosphere to the painting and I'm sure colour has emphasized the sense of the destroyed, burnt out buildings.

Blue 2

I based this painting on 'Croydon's Burning 1' (below), which I made using colours similar to those in the original image, I wanted to see how different colours could affect image. Blue 2 is partly of the same image however I chose to use cold blue's for this painting, does it still feel like fire? Perhaps its because of  'Croydon's Burning' that 'Blue 2' still depicts a sense of fire and destruction for me, regardless of the colour. What does this do for my work? Well, what I do know is that it has clarified for me that I like the ambiguity in 'Blue2', the flames and burning buildings on the right hand side of the painting are undoubtedly visible to me, however a viewer might be totally oblivious to the fact that this is a painting based on fire and destruction. The viewer may not immediately notice the no entry signs or the fire hose across the bottom of 'Blue 2', and actually this is, for me, important that the audience has to think about the work. In contrast, the painting below, is a more obvious depiction which has no challenge for the audience.

 Croydon's Burning - 1

Blue 3

Blue 3 is work in progress, I decided to make a painting based on the feeling of 'Riots in Blue' not sure where this is going but its all part of my journey.

Albert Oehlen

The Snoring Fish, 2001, Albert Oehlen

240 x 380cm

Looking at the work of Albert Oehlen I am inspired by the different brush marks in his paintings. The Snoring Fish, is like two or three paintings overlayed and made into one, almost like a collage. The thin washes over previously painted areas contrast with solid areas of bolck colour and give the painting deepth, with other parts of the painting (for ex bottom left) the image feels like it is pushing its way forward towards the viewer. With regard to my own paintings I've been thinking about how much is too much.... is it indeed possible to put too much infomation in a painting? I think in Oehlen's paintings the variety of thickness in line and brush marks creates movement, it pulls you in different directions, I find myself struggling to find a space to concentrate on as my focus is constantly pulled towards different parts of the painting. 

Piece, 2003, Albert Oehlen

280 x 340cm

Colour is an area in my painting which feels slightly alien at the moment, I'm playing with different ways of using colour and trying to find out what colour is doing to my work. I've been making blue paintings as I found myself surrounded with fire, my space felt too hot and my eyes were tired of seeing bright red, yellow and orange! Oehlen's painting, Piece, is interesting in the way that the green seems to receed and the yellow feels pushed forward. The white areas allow the other colours space. I wonder if this is more to do with the composition, if the white was black would the painting still work? Does the painting work because there is space within the composition or is it due to the white space? Perhaps space as well as colour is what I should be thinking about.

'September' - Gerhard Richter

'September'

Richter's painting of 'September' is a relatively small painting, 52 x 72cm, Richter resisted enlarging his canvas to the scope of the event and instead found more meaning in a domestic size. 'September' is close to the size and shape of a flat-screen TV, matching the proportions of the vessel through which we learned the terrible news.

Richter said that, even with the scale right, when he originally tried to paint the burning towers, in 2005, he couldn’t stomach the results. Working in his classic photo-realist style, he found that the towers’ glowing flames felt garish and attractive. Richter took his failed painting, scraped off most of its surface detail, and smeared an abstract veil of grey on top of what was left. Richter applied the techniques of unpainting and since the subject is the erasure of a building, it’s the perfect metaphor.

Richter gives us a way to view the carnage: the image is so imprinted on our psyches that we recognise it in a painting that is close to obliterated. How can a painting contain the scale, scope and meaning of the moment? As a painter how can you do justice to a theme such as this? Richter's blurred and almost unseeable painting gives you a sense of the violence, catastrophe and enormity of the subject. It would seem impossible to condense such a subject into art, yet Richter has made a painting which feels somewhat haunting and true. 

Exhibition Part 2

My painting 'Croydon's Burning' in the show. 

Spending 2 days curating a show with loads of fine art students was a challenge and well worth the effort. Reflecting on the experience, it was exciting to be given the oportunity to work with other students to put together a show in the Triangle Space, which due to its shape is challenge enough. With many opinions, ideas and needs we worked hard as a team, to make sure we understood each others work and that we were all happy with how the show was developing. It was an interesting lesson which placed huge emphasis on how difficult a curators job is. With diplomacy, understanding and patience the show was a success.

Richter's Influence

Destruction - 3

I am trying to keep my work loose, I don't want to recreate a photograph, my work is more about interpreting an image. Destruction - 3 was initially a detailed painting of a burning house, even though it was supposed to be a painting about destruction, it somehow felt happy. I continued to layer paint until the surface became more textured. I then decided to obscure some of the image in a random way... allowing only part of the image to be seen. I'm interested in what happens when part of the image is covered, then scrape away or remove part of it.

Colour


 

Destruction - 1

Something strange is happening to colour.

I've been looking at paintings with bright vivid colours, Ashile Gorky's

paintings (below) have biomorphic forms and strong colours, they evoke a

mood and have a strong energetic presence. I'm trying to understand

colour in my paintings and have been working mainly with

colours which relate to fire, perhaps I'll try the opposite....Blues?

 

Paintings By Ashile Gorky

 Destruction - 2

Burning Bus