Giorgione’s Sleeping Venus

Olympia

The everlasting allure of the nude in painting has inspired artists throughout the ages. Artists are influenced by other artists – perpetuating the same themes and compositions.

Sleeping Venus (Giorgione)

The painting of Olympia by Manet was inspired by Titian’s Venus of Urbino, which in turn refers to Giorgione’s Sleeping Venus. One of the most famous and typical of Giorgione’s works, Sleeping Venus, which is now in Dresden, was first recognized by Giovanni Morelli and is accepted as being the same painting seen by Marcantonio Michiel and later by Ridolfi (his 17th century biographer) in the Casa Marcello at Venice.

In Manet’s Olympia an authoritative hand covers the model’s total nudity, like in the Sleeping Venus, this emphasizes independence, sexual dominance and her status as an object of desire. Manet replaced the little dog (symbol of fidelity) in Titian’s painting with a black cat, which symbolized prostitution. People have suggested that she is looking in the direction of a door, as a client barges in unannounced. Read more…

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There is a link between Art and Business – the processes of realizing an artwork and a product are very similar.

The look

Gerhard Richter creating a ‘Squeegee Painting’

This is pure poetry

Gerhard Richter was born in Dresden, Saxony, and grew up in Reichenau, Lower Silesia, and in Waltersdorf (Zittauer Gebirge) in the Upper Lusatian countryside. He left school after tenth grade and apprenticed as an advertising and stage-set painter, before studying at the Dresden Academy of Fine Arts. In 1950 his application for a place at the Hochschule für Bildende Künste Dresden (Dresden University of Visual Arts) was rejected. He finally began his studies at the Dresden Academy of Fine Arts in 1951. His teachers were Karl von Appen, Ulrich Lohmar and Will Grohmann.

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Top 10 – Gerhard Richter

They say that wine matures with age and without doubt the later paintings of Gerhard Richter are his finest. His ability to travel through art history and create and respond to his own history is remarkable. To learn skills and then have the confidence to morph them into another methodology is a difficult thing to do. The paintings Cage (1) – (6) 2006 are without doubt in my top 10 list.

  • Confidence trick from the blog of Veronica Henry
    At the weekend, I went to the Gerhard Richter exhibition at Tate Modern. I was blown away, not only by the richness and variation of his work, but also his methodology: sometimes planned and ordered, sometimes random – sometimes both. It made me think long and hard about the way I write, and it occurred to me that the one quality all his work had, however it was generated, was confidence. Here is a man who knows what he is capable of and who is not afraid to experiment and take risks, but at the same time is very definite about what he has to say. Whatever image he ends up with, his voice is always loud and clear. It made me realise that confidence is the most important item in the writer’s toolbox. With confidence, you can write what you like and how you like, instead of slavishly following a formula. Confidence, of course, comes with experience, but the danger there is that one becomes complacent instead of pushing the boundaries. Something that Richter was clearly never afraid to do. And that is when genius emerges: when talent and confidence and craft combine with risk.
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Photograph self portrait 1974

This was taken with a 35mm Pentax SLR in 1974 and manipulated in the darkroom in Stourbridge College of Art and Design. This reminds me of the simple pleasures I had messing about with making images – it is a shame I have become cynical.

There are millions of ‘Art’ viewpoints; some take a position of extreme difficulty or resistance. This position questions everything and is unforgiving. The principal is that artists should look beyond the superficiality of life and expose the core. They should also look at the superficiality of Art and culture and rip and tear at the flesh of its own conception, rejecting Metaphor, Romanticism etc. etc. By implementing such self imposed draconian measures you may be left with a purity of ideas but that leaves little to create or live for.

QUALIFICATIONS:
Postgraduate Certificate from Wolverhampton University in Painting
BA(hons) degree from Exeter College of Art and Design in Printmaking

EDUCATION:
2004-2006 Bristol University
2002-2003 Wolverhampton University
1976–1979 Exeter College of Art & Design
1974-1976 Stourbridge College of Art & Design

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