A Visit to Museum Mesdag, Den Haag - Amsterdam

By Cyn Rene’ Whitfield

Early this December, I had the opportunity to visit the van Gogh Museum in Amersterdam (Museum Mesdag, Den Haag). It seemed only appropriate that the Netherlands pay homage to their most famous Dutch artist in a museum hosting the world’s largest collection of works by Vincent van Gogh. Over 200 paintings, including many very famous masterpieces like the famous “Sunflowers” (1889) from his Parisian period are displayed throughout four floors in chronological order show casing his development as an artist. All of the works displayed in this museum were produced in the 10 year period of his art “career”. In that time, van Gogh made well over 800 paintings, more than 1000 drawings as well as sketches and watercolors. Van Gogh was a master of renewal and experimentation and this collection provides a moving account of his artistic revolution.

In 1880, Vincent van Gogh decided to become an artist. He was 27 years old at the time and had already been employed in a variety of professions, as a lay preacher, a schoolmaster and like his brother, Theo, an art dealer, none of which had proved a great success. He was searching for a marketable niche which is documented in many letters to Theo and friends. Through his search he allowed influence and interpretation from other known artists like Georges Michel’s “Landscape with Windmills” and Jacob Maris “Mill” then expressed in van Gogh’s work “The Hill of Montmartre with Stone Quary” . The three pieces, the two inspirations and the van Gogh interpretation, hang side by side for comparison. It is a unique study which allows you to visibly observe the inspiration. Landscapes were van Gogh’s first attempt at carving an artistic niche. When that proved unsuccessful, in his mind, he moved to painting people in life. He wanted to represent the caretakers of the land; farmers, peasant subjects and the like. This also allowed him to incorporate his landscape techniques without abandonment. His inspiration came from his much admired famous French predecessor, Jean-Francois Millet. Van Gogh’s study of his subjects resulted in more than 40 portraits during the winter of 1884-1885, trying to capture characteristic features of the faces and heads of farmers and their wives. This series was the preparation for his first large figure piece, “The Potato Eaters” (April 1885). His hope was that his portrayal be perceived as realistic without glamorizing thus bringing him the creditability and integrity he had be striving for. Instead, it only yielded criticism.

According to Jones and Ferrill in their publication, “The Seven Layers of Integrity” (2006), being an innovator is a matter of how one portrays themselves. If you break the rules of the industry do it in a way that creates new opportunity for the industry as a whole. Break the rules in other ways and you create enemies instead of admirers. I believe this is why van Gough struggled. It wasn’t until he stopped imitating others and started breaking the rules of the artists perception did he become successful. Like many unrecognized talents in their day, success came after he took his own life at the age of 37. “Starry Night” (1889) has become one of the most well known images in modern culture. Ironically, given van Gogh evolution through duplication it is also one of the most replicated and sought after prints. To add to the irony, the oil on canvas was inspired looking out his sanatorium room window at night in Saint-Remy and does not even belong as a permanent piece in the Museum Mesdag, Den Haag. Since 1941, it has been part of the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City which gives the illusion that even in death, van Gogh has yet to be collectively embraced by the Dutch as an accomplished artist rather than an evolving one.

Sources:

Jones, George P. and Ferrill, June, (2006), The Seven Layers of Integrity, Authorhouse, IN

Vincent van Gogh Gallery retrieved December 9, 2010 from http://www.vangoghgallery.com/painting/

Allowing an Artists Integrity

By Cyn Rene’ Whitfield

There’s an unspoken art that drives us all. It is not in the clay we mold, or oils we mix, or chalk we dust to express ourselves. This art artists know is what drives inspiration and maintaining the integrity of the art. Some are more receptive to its gifts yet, others repel it with their very being. This inspiration is called the art of allowing.

Art is created by allowing a composition to be as it is and capturing its essence through representation. A photographer knows a candid shot is much more powerful than a staged one. Such as in life, if you allow others to live the life they choose you allow in more beauty and experiences than the ones you control. Allowing expands vision, choices and consequential experiences of those choices. Is posing a subject more ethical than a candid action shot?

Artists who invoke an emotion allow for interpretation. Modern Abstract Artists repel so much of the truth that it allows emotional responses to seek untapped places. In opera you needn’t understand the words to evoke the feeling of the message, yet the integrity of the intention is still present.
Vincent van Gogh and Edvard Much both were known to suffer from mental illness. Munch suffered from bi-polar disorder and van Gogh suffered from paranoia, epilepsy and absynth addiction. Yet, through the honesty of their work they were able to maintain integrity in their work. Why? Because, through their art, they provided an honest expression of allowing.

Sources:
Hillman, James (1999) The International Library of Psychology. Emotion: A Comprehensive Phenomenology of Theories and Their Meanings. Routledge Taylor and Francis Group, NY retrieved November 19, 2010 from http://books.google.com/books?id=C1ZgmmVIkPsC&pg=PA226&lpg=PA226&dq=artist+who+invoke+emotion&source=bl&ots=gldBBz3a56&sig=6UI3V9DF_6sinOLYZj14ijdRhCE&hl=en&ei=RAPnTNOZEcL7lwfQ9-D7Cw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=9&ved=0CDMQ6AEwCA

"life, like art, is merely an interpretation"
                                                             - Cyn Rene' Whitfield

Realism or Surrealism

by Cyn Rene' Whitfield

Oscar Wilde said “Life imitates art, more than art imitates life“. With that understanding it is not those artists from the Renaissance, or the Baroque, or the Neo-Classical eras that express the depiction of everyday life. The ability to represent life most accurately belongs to the Realists. I appreciate these artists as they depict life without embellishment or interpretation. What a better world we would have if we could climb into that canvas and live within the rules of the Realists.

Lately, I prefer to believe that Surrealism is dominating our lives. Surrealism, born out of the Dada movement, Surrealism features the element of surprise and exaggeration. It was intended to be a positive expression against rationalization. Life representative in our world today exists as lies, deception and skewed points of view which the Surrealists would have little trouble duplicating.

When André Breton started the Surrealism movement in 1924, he introduced a style rich with visual imagery from the subconscious mind to create art without the intention of logical comprehensibility. It is no wonder this movement was influenced by the psychoanalytical work of Freud and Jung, Ultimately Jung believed that by understanding how one's personal unconscious integrates with the collective unconscious, a person can achieve a state of individuation, or wholeness of self. Frued believed that we dream when we are tired of responding and receiving stimuli from an environment we wish to change. This withdrawal from reality causes us to stop any interest of conclusions of reality allowing us to escape in fabrications that allow us to cope.

Explore the works of Surrealist artist Man Ray in his 1938, oil on canvas entitled, "Pisces”. Understand Man Ray’s intention of the piece placing the woman lying alongside a fish to create contrasting of similar and different forms at the same time. Fantasy is enhanced using the painting technique known as grattage which involves scraping the paint off the canvas by trowel. How manageable our lives would be if we had the same opportunities to trowel away the hurt, the pain, the deception, the mistrust. To wipe the canvas clean.

Sources:

Surrealism, Retrieved October 20, 2010 from http://www.surrealism.org/

Jungs Approach to Dreams, Retrieved October 20, 2010 from http://library.thinkquest.org/C005545/english/dream/jung.htm

“Imagination is more important than knowledge”

                                         – Albert Einstein

A Visit to The Renwick Gallery Washington DC

by Cyn Rene' Whitfield

I was in Washington, DC for a business meeting and had a few hours free. Two blocks from my meeting with the General Services Administration (GSA), the largest property owner in the United States, stood one of their buildings, The Renwick Gallery. This branch of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, located near the White House, is dedicated to the richness and diversity of American craft and decorative arts from the 19th to the 21st centuries. The gallery takes its name from the building's architect, James Renwick Jr., who also designed the Smithsonian Castle on the National Mall.

The building was built in 1874, and was originally the home of the Corcoran Gallery to display the private collection of William Wilson Corcoran's art collection. The Corcoran collection expanded and was relocated to where it stands today, Corcoran Gallery of Art. The U.S. Court of Claims was housed in the building until the 1950’s when it too had outgrown the building. The U.S. Court proposed to raze the building but the intervention of the First Lady, Jacqueline Kennedy respected the Empire-style building and had it declared a National Historic Landmark. Mrs. Kennedy then solicited the aid of Secretary of the Smithsonian, S. Dillon Ripley, who requested that the gallery be turned over as a branch of the Smithsonian American Art Museum. The Renwick was subsequently dedicated in 1972, "for use as a gallery of art, crafts, and design." It was renamed the Renwick Gallery in honor of its architect, James Renwick Jr.

I entered through the beautiful glass etched doors of the Renwick Gallery where housed one of the finest collections of American craft in the United States. Its collections, exhibition program and publications highlight the best craft objects and decorative arts from the 19th century to the present. One-of-a-kind pieces created from clay, fiber, glass, metal, and wood from American Art's permanent collection of contemporary craft are displayed.

One of the featured pieces by Mary Van Cline, Cycles of Relationship of Time, 2000 showed the process of pate de verre. Pate de verre involves making a paste of glass that is applied to the surface of the mold, then fired. The big advantage to pate de verre is that it allows for precise placement of particular glass colors in the mold. Other ways of filling the mold often result in some shifting of glass from where it has been placed prior to firing. Pate de verre dates back to the ancient Egyptians, but it really came into its own about a century ago when it was revived by a group of French artists who gave this warm glass technique its current name. The modern equivalent builds on this traditional foundation. Generally the pate de verre process involves creating a paste from frit (small particles of glass). Frit of any size may be used, but most good glass pastes require smaller sizes (even powders) to be used. For this reason (and because the smaller the pieces of frit the more opaque the casting), pate de verre castings tend to be translucent (or even opaque). Once the mold is thoroughly dry and the frit has been secured, the next step is to make the glass paste. In some cases, where the mold has gently sloping sides, the glass can simply be mixed with distilled water to form the paste. Most molds, however, will require that glue be mixed with the glass to form the paste.

Sources:

Warm Glass http://www.warmglass.com/pate_de_verre.htm

“Staged Stories: Renwick Craft Invitational 2009 @ Renwick Gallery” http://dcist.com/2009/08/staged_stories_renwick_craft_invita.php

"The most important element in a picture cannot be defined."
                                                                           -  Renoir

3D Prints For the Artist: Real-Life Models — Quickly, Easily, Affordably

By Cyn Rene' Whitfield
Physical models directly from digital data created in hours instead of days makes 3D models extremely beneficial for reproduction.  3D prints can turn a conceptual idea into a reality and have been used for awards, prototypes, and art.  3D prints allow engineers, architects and artists to produce a range of concept models and functional test parts quickly and inexpensively. As a tool for creating models early in the design process, 3D Printing is a both a faster and more affordable alternative to hand modeling. Dimension printers cut days and weeks off the design cycle.  Dimension’s ability to produce quick, inexpensive models made of ABS plastic allows designers to efficiently model multiple concepts right from their desktop.  This process is also referred a “Fused Deposition Modeling” used for detailed models that are tough enough for functional testing and ABS plastic can be sanded, milled, even painted.

My experience in creating 3D prints was with in 2006, a company I worked for, 3DS2, Inc. was commissioned to create a 3D contoured print of an official emblem for the National Parks Service.  This piece was a series of is individually numbered awards to be presented exclusively to retirees from the Service.

The process involved five separate program applications for the original prototype. An original 2D image was provided by the National Parks Services scanned with a flatbed scanner and then converted into Autocad. The design from the model were then contoured. This process was performed by one of the CAD technicians in the office.  I loaded the file into 3D StudioMAX and extruded the lettering. I matched the CMYK values from the original image in Photoshop and assigned them to the computer working model .  Once the 3D print was created in 3D StudioMAX, individual text was added and the print was numbered to make it authentic.  The triangles that make up the model was then examined for water -tightness.  Water tightness is term used to make sure there are no holes in the model because it must be a contiguous surface without voids.Although the geometry of the piece is exact from print to print the art in the artistry finish makes the NPS Arrowhead one of a kind. Each print bears with it a certificate of authenticity to ensure its uniqueness.  This is an exciting new digital media for artists.

Impressions of an Abnormal Artist: Claude Monet

by: Cyn Rene’ Whitfield

Oscar-Claude Monet (1840 – 1871) was the second born child of two sons. When Oscar was about five (he was called Oscar until his early twenties) the family moved from urban Paris to a suburb coastal community on the coast of Normandy which provided must of the natural inspiration for his work later in life. Oscar admits he was an unruly student and his notebooks filled with sketches were his only salvation to sanity. He compared school to a prison that couldn’t contain him. His mother died when he was 16  and he left his controlling father to live with his father’s half sister, Marie-Jeanne Lecarde, a successful talented painter in her own right. While neither rich nor cosmopolitan Oscar’s new family entrenches goals and ambitions compliant with middle-class prosperity and social acceptance. Oscar embraces this thinking, but not at the expense of his budding artistic ambitions. For decades, Oscar will struggle with his challenge of attraction toward material and physical comforts and the desire to be an artist. He created a life-long habit of overspending, shopping sprees, and charitable donations well above his means. Later in life Monet was just one step ahead of his creditors. Monet’s neurotransmitters and spending-inducing epinephrine could be related to the death of mother, escaping a controlling father, the loss of his wife, and the chosen profession that monetarily did not fit in with the economic society imprint.

The disorder of compulsive spending is directly related to a feel better mentality and is similar to other addictive behaviors and has some of the same characteristics as alcoholism, gambling and overeating addictions. Compulsive spending can be a quick fix for depression, anxiety, and loneliness expressed to assure more love, bolster self-esteem, or heal the hurts, regrets, stress, and the problems of daily living. It generally makes these feelings worse because of the increased financial debt it creates. Monet’s Impressionist style was greeted with hostility and ridicule and was considered to be ugly and revolutionary because of its borderline abstractionism.  Monet believed that the starving artist avant-garde painters must take risks and push viewers to accept the new and shocking tried and true paintings that attract crowds and money. It was this set of conflicting goals that may have created the challenges that lead to his disorder.

In 1869, while working on The Magpie, Monet was feeling surly and unable to work.  In addition to his undermining confidence and rejection his anxiety about the family’s income became insurmountable. Even the birth of his new son in 1867 is not enough paternal sentiment to overpower the wielding, controlling father of his past (Monet’s father died in 1871 during Monet’s exile to London to avoid the Franco-Prussian War). The frustration of getting a real paying job was denounced and Monet continued to beg for money and art supplies while still living above his means with the help of mentor Pierre-Auguste Renoir.  Although his fame as an artist grows in between 1872 and 1878 (Monet sold 29 pieces to a single buyer) he was rejected as an artist by the prestigious Salon. His personal life begins to decline as his wife, Camille is bedridden and dies in 1879 from cancer of the womb. Monet continues to live beyond his means. By 1890, Monet has become a national treasure and settles into a home life that is the solid, middle-class consistency of his father’s dreams.  He buys a house in Giverny and remarries.  It is at this time that he creates his greatest works The WaterLillies.

What makes it all amazing is that Monet was able to link his emotional state into his paintings and make the psychological disorder of the cultural and social influences in his life work as expression through his art. What we see in Monet’ works is his struggle with societal norms expressed through the beauty and the many perspectives that surround it.  I have often found that I too will find solace in the shopping spree to overcome feelings of depression and anxiety.  What continues to work best is picking up a brush and letting the canvas speak to me. I found this C and R paper a very valuable look at the artist and the mindset. Like Van Gogh and Monet, it appears that the term suffering artist may just be the abnormality needed to excel creative greatness.

References:

Kosslyn, S. M., & Rosenberg, R. S. (2007). Fundamentals of Psychology in Context (3rd ed.). Boston: Pearson.

"Addiction". Magill's Medical Guide, 4th Rev. ed.. 01 Dec 2008.

"Stress Response". World Book Science Year. 01 Aug 2009.

Tuchman, Phyllis. "The Monet who wasn't". Lancet 9314(2002):1355.

Do You Have Money  Disorder (2010) Retrieved February 12, 2010 from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/mind-over-money/201001/

ArtMagick Exhibition Listings (1996)  Monet The Impressionist Eye Retrieved February 12, 2010 from http://www.artmagick.com/exhibitions/exhibition.aspx?id=1383&name=monet-impressionist-eye

Morris, Catherine (1999) The Essential Claude Monet NY Wonderland Press



"He who is fixed on a star does not change his mind."
                                                                                          -Leonardo DaVinci

My Impressionism on Monet: A Study in Light

by Cyn Rene' Whitfield
One day in the fall of 1890, while walking on the slopes above his house, Monet is attracted by a haystack that glows almost white, like a luminous spot, in the bright sun. But by the time he returns with materials and begins to paint, the effect has already changed. This was the beginning of a series by the French born painter, Claude Monet. The selective attention was to capture an ordinary subject matter, haystacks, so the viewer would focus on the non-subject matter of light, composition and technical mastery. In this paper I would like to examine how Monet, in his multiple studies, captured the range of electromagnetic radiation through oil on canvas in his many variations entitled “The Haystacks”.

Monet understood color hue, saturation and amplitude of light long before the field of psychophysics. In each painting, the color of the haystack is different because the light shining on the haystack is different. The color of the haystack is determined by the colors the haystack absorbs. The color we see is simply the colorized light that is not absorbed and that is reflected into our eyes. But Monet had no scientific explanation for what he saw to capture. His paintings were not about the haystacks, but rather an investigation of how the light during different times of the day, or different seasons of the year, changed the way those haystacks looked. Thus, Monet’s series of haystacks are painted under different light conditions at different times of the day. He would rise before dawn, paint the first canvas for half an hour, by which time the light would have changed. Then he would switch to the second canvas, and so on. The next day he would repeat the process.

Monet is considered to be one of the most representative Impressionists in history. Did he have a higher awareness of absolute threshold? Did he get his awareness from more sensitivity to stimulus and just-noticeable difference (JND)? Was the anatomy of his eyes superior to other artists or was he just gifted in observation? One could argue the validity of Monet possessing superior rods and cones in his eyes to create thirty different representations of light on haystacks but I personally think he is the original founder of the trichromatic theory of color vision. He just didn’t have the attention within him to do so.

References

Kosslyn, S. M., & Rosenberg, R. S. (2007). Fundamentals of Psychology in Context (3rd ed.). Boston: Pearson.

Morris, Catherine (1999) The Essential Claude Monet New York: Wonderland Press

Stuckey, Charles F. (1986) Monet A Retrospective New York: Parklane

Sproocati, Sandro (1992) Monet Milan: Arnoldo Mondadori Editore, S.p.A.

Livingstone, Margaret S. Vision and Art: The Biology of Seeing Monet’s Colors (2002) Retrieved December 16, 2009 from http://www.webexhibits.org/colorart/dh.html

The Whole Is Different than the Sum of It’s Parts Gestalt Theory in Art

by Cyn Rene' Whitfield

Gestalt psychology is the overall patterns of thoughts or experience of the human mind and behavior as a whole. It is a German word that roughly translates as "whole" or "form." In art, Gestalt is a general description for the visual perception and the psychology that make unity and variety possible in design and the relationship between the parts and the whole of a composition.

“The visual world is so complex that the mind has developed strategies for coping with the confusion. The mind tries to find the simplest solution to a problem. One of the ways it does this is to form groups of items that have certain characteristics in common,” according to 2D Design Notes.

Gestalt psychologists developed five laws that govern human perception and are considered by artists:

1. Law of Proximity -Elements that are closer together will be perceived as a coherent object. This is commonly seen in web design where the visual hierarchy of elements on the screen provides the grouping of related objects.

2. Law of Similarity - Elements that look similar will be perceived as part of the same form. We tend to group similar shapes together as a coherent object and then attach some kind of meaning to the result.

3. Law of Good Continuation - Humans tend to continue contours whenever the elements of the pattern establish an implied direction.

4. Law of Closure -Humans tend to enclose a space by completing a contour and ignoring gaps in the figure. Gestalt theory seeks completeness. With shapes that aren't closed, our mind will "fill in the gaps".

5. Law of Figure/Ground - A stimulus will be perceived as separate from it's ground. This effect is often seen in logo design where negative space is used to convey meaning.

In graphic design, as I studied it attaining my Electronic Imaging Degree from Metropolitan Community College, it is very important to know gestalt theory because it allows us to predict how viewers respond to design. It not only assures that our intention will be understood correctly by the audience, but it also helps us to create a dynamic design.

References

Kosslyn, S. M., & Rosenberg, R. S. (2007). Fundamentals of Psychology in Context (3rd ed.). Boston: Pearson.

2D Design Notes Art 104 Design and Composition Retrieved December 1, 2009 from http://daphne.palomar.edu/design/gestalt.html

Gestalt Design Laws Retrieved December 1, 2009 from http://www.squidoo.com/gestaltlaws