Nudes

Painting nudes has become a prohibited artistic subject. The re-appropriation of the depiction of the female form has accused men of objectifying women by placing them under the male gaze.

As an artist I have to justify the investigation of the nude. Firstly, there are universal motifs in art, timeless forms, and the female body is one of the original art subjects. Painting a female form can be justified or explained by dealing in some generalities. The nude is sexual and when a man paints the body the intent and expression is fundamentally different from a woman’s treatment. A man’s representation is objectifying as it celebrates, remembers, hopes, and is an embodiment of desire. Women seem to generally approach the figure as a discovery of the self, of identity, and with younger artists a realization of their own sexual awareness.

The work here then is an expression of sex, a realization and affirmation of the fundamental experience of sharing a woman’s body. The work is also about drawing, about painting, and the figure is the surface whereby questions of texture, color, media, and substance can be explored. Working from the figure for me has varied over the years. From drawing Christey Brinkley from Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issues, back in grade 10, to images that re-create Edward Wesson’s photographs of Clara on a beach. These canvases are about the de-construction of the drawing. For many years I have drawn, with a brush, a thin rapid brown under-painting. These paintings have made this initial stage permanent and let the canvas stand on it’s own in that ephemeral and spontaneous form.

After working for two years as a printmaker I was interested in creating images that stood in stark contrast to prints and I longed for texture and color. Brilliant, bold color and excessive use of thick spontaneous brush strokes was a celebration of the freedom of painting in contrast to the black and white flatness of printmaking. However, that said I went back to the print form and tried to work back into printmaking some of the qualities unique to painting. By applying washes over the surface of the limestone and using color mono-printing some of the gestures of paint have been preserved.

Other variations of nude’s have included formal etching representations working from the model using traditional drawing techniques to Emile Nolde like small gestural plates combining aquatint, etching, open bite embossing, and dry-point. Interestingly, the more formal the representation have used conservative poses, and the more liberal the approach the greater provocation in the female’s gesture.

The figure offers a space for aesthetic exploration while offering the viewer an image that is evocative and relevant.

Yesterday I read a sexual passage in a tacky detective novel, “… and then they moved again “Oh,” she said, a low sound from her throat, her head back … he put his mouth on hers, kissing her as he gripped her below…” I fear in the end art fails sexuality. The discomfort reading about sexual encounters derived from the writers limited vocabulary to properly express the moment may only be duplicated visually. And then when guests come to our house, Linda my wife, will at times hide canvases. This reminds me that nudity is still viewed by many as the thin edge of the wedge leading to pornography. Who owns the right to depict the nude, who has the right to view it, why keep returning to it, or how to create a vocabulary to depict one, the subject continues to beguile me.

list of slides:

"karin in Yellow" 33x40" oil on canvas

"Jen: after Wesson #1" 40x60" oil on canvas

"Jen (as yellow torso)" 16x24" oil on canvas

"Jen: after Wesson #3: 24x36" lithograph

"untitled" 8x10" etching

"Karin" 8x10" etching

"Fast, Loose, and Lovely" 16x22" oil, plaster, varathane on canvas