Bluebells was recently featured at CafePhilos when Paul’s comment reminded me about drawing this piece.





‘I’m very attracted to this work for its wonderful description of sunlight, which the artist has made almost tangible. It is also a beautifully balanced composition, and the only thing I can discern missing from the work is a nude or two romping towards us through the flowers. Of course, I firmly believe all art should have a romping nude or two somewhere in the composition, so my opinion on that might not be quite so rational as I could wish.’






The trunks and branches of trees have often seemed to have a vaguely human shape to me, with their boughs reaching skyward. The photo I worked this piece from had very strong resemblances to human forms in the two most prominent trees, emphasised by the strong light. I made definite efforts to soften this resemblance whilst I was drawing although I still recognise them as being there. It’s never occurred to me to wonder whether they are clothed though.





I’ve read or heard that the subconscious notices everything whether the conscious brain brings that into awareness or not – as that’s how subliminal advertising works, it seems an accurate statement. A technique to stimulate creativity known during the renaissance was recorded in two major records from the time.









Leonardo da Vinci
Young Woman (so-called pointing Lady)
c1516
The Royal Collection
© 2005, Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II













A WAY OF DEVELOPING AND AROUSING THE MIND TO VARIOUS INVENTIONS.




I cannot forbear to mention among these precepts a new device for study which, although it may seem but trivial and almost ludicrous, is nevertheless extremely useful in arousing the mind to various inventions. And this is, when you look at a wall spotted with stains, or with a mixture of stones, if you have to devise some scene, you may discover a resemblance to various landscapes, beautified with mountains, rivers, rocks, trees, plains, wide valleys and hills in varied arrangement; or again you may see battles and figures in action; or strange faces and costumes, and an endless variety of objects, which you could reduce to complete and well drawn forms. And these appear on such walls confusedly, like the sound of bells in whose jangle you may find any name or word you choose to imagine.






The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci
Volume 1


Trans by Jean Paul Richter 1888









Piero di Cosimo
Portrait of Simonetta Vespucci
c. 1480
Oil on panel
57 x 42 cm
Musée Condé, Chantilly, France




















‘… He would sometimes stop to contemplate a wall at which sick people had for ages been aiming their spittle, and there he descried battles between horsemen, and the most fantastic cities, and the most extensive landscapes ever seen: and he experienced the same with the clouds in the sky.’





referring to Piero Rosselli,
known as Piero di Cosimo
Vasari, 1568


‘The Penguin Book of Art Writing’ p446
ed Martin Gayford & Karen Wright
ISBN 0 140 25451 X

James Abbott McNeill Whistler,
The Artist's Studio
1865.
Dublin City Gallery The Hugh Lane. Inv. 6.
© Dublin City Gallery The Hugh Lane.

To Whistler, American


On the loan exhibit of his paintings at the Tate Gallery.
by Ezra Pound





You also, our first great,
Had tried all ways;
Tested and pried and worked in many fashions,
And this much gives me heart to play the game.




Here is a part that’s slight, and part gone wrong,
And much of little moment, and some few
Perfect as Dürer!




“In the Studio” and these two portraits,* if I had my choice I
And then these sketches in the mood of Greece?








WHISTLER, James McNeill
Brown and Gold
c.1895-1900
oil on canvas
95.8 x 51.5
© The Hunterian Museum and Art Gallery,
University of Glasgow 2009


You had your searches, your uncertainties,
And this is good to know—for us, I mean,
Who bear the brunt of our America
And try to wrench her impulse into art.




You were not always sure, not always set
To hiding night or tuning “symphonies”;
Had not one style from birth, but tried and pried
And stretched and tampered with the media.




You and Abe Lincoln from that mass of dolts
Show us there’s chance at least of winning through.





* “Brown and Gold—de Race.”
“Grenat et Or—Le Pettt Cardinal.”




Source: Poetry (October 1912).

















Selected Correspondence

of James McNeill Whistler






Audio Recordings

of Ezra Pound

“It is a portrait of Doge Andrea Gritti, and I believe it is a real Titian. It shows finish. It is a very perfect sample of the highest finish of ancient art.[17]








[17] … “I feel entitled to point out that the picture by Titian, produced in the case of Whistler v. Ruskin, is an early specimen of that master, and does not represent adequately the style and qualities which have obtained for him his great reputation—one obvious point of difference between this and his more mature work being the far greater amount of finish—I do not say completeness—exhibited in it … and as the picture was brought forward with a view to inform the jury as to the nature of the work of the greatest painter, and more especially as to the high finish introduced in it, it is evident that it was calculated to produce an erroneous impression on their minds, if indeed any one present at the inquiry can hold that those gentlemen were in any way fitted to understand the issues raised therein.—I am, Sir, your obedient servant,





A. MOORE.
“Nov. 28.”
Extract of a letter to the Editor of the Echo.

Titian (TIZIANO Vecellio)
Portrait of Doge Andrea Gritti
c. 1545 Oil on canvas,
133 x 103 cm
National Gallery of Art, Washington

I was once in the Norwich Castle Museum, purposefully striding along the galleries to their fine collection of watercolours and ignoring the paintings hanging left and right. In mid stride – I stopped – and took one pace backward, wondering what on earth had captured my notice? Looking around at the paintings, there was nothing here to interest me?

Painting a young maiden is similar to cavorting with great abandon. It is the finest refreshment.



Portrait of a Chambermaid

To my right was a rather plain 3/4 portrait in the the Dutch manner; an elderly man with a white beard, a red nose, dark and sombre clothing, hands resting in his lap with a white ruff I think. Not what would be described a handsome man though I think I recall a flash of spirit and a twinkle of laughter in his expression but those could easily be my imaginings.

Every child has the spirit of creation. The rubbish of life often exterminates the spirit through plague and a souls own wretchedness.





Nicolaas Rubens

It wasn’t the subject that had stopped me dead in my tracks, so many years on and the composition is very hazy in my memory. I stood and studied this painting for several minutes, even getting into conversation with one of the museum staff about it. The owner had recently died and the painting was expected to be sold – and they were expecting it to go elsewhere.



It was the sheer quality of the flesh painting – flesh that seemed almost to have blood running in the veins.

I’m just a simple man standing alone with my old brushes, asking God for inspiration.



Self Portrait

I was in Edinburgh some years later and excited about going to see a major Rubens they had on display at that time – how can anyone be excited about seeing a painting! Even though this enormous historical painting is a world famous masterpiece (and I’ve forgotten the title) it disappointed me because it lacked the same magic I’d seen in the humble portrait that had hung in Norwich Castle.

** More Peter Paul Rubens’ Quotes