APPROPRIATING TITIAN'S 'SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE'

Ageless Gouache on paper 2003

 

In the early 2000s I painted a series of works on paper that dealt with love, marriage, divorce. 

If you are a regular reader, and thus aware of my more recent work - yes - there are no drones in this post! 

Part of the series included a series-within-a-series, where I appropriated Titian's early famous work Sacred and Profane Love ,1514 [below]. The painting is at the Borghese Gallery and Museum

Titian Sacred and Profane Love Oil on canvas 118 x 279 cm 1514

Sacred and Profane Love 

There has been much art historical discussion about the meaning of the Titian's painting. Questions like, which female figure represents sacred love, which represents profane love? There are questions over the title given to the painting too. Apparently the title Sacred and Profane Love may not have been recorded until the 17th century. However, there seems to be general consensus, due to various symbols in the painting, that love is a theme. For example, there is a cherub with wings, so it could be Cupid, and the clothed female figure holds a sprig of Myrtle, a symbol of marriage. This figure is also wearing what is considered bridal clothing for the period. And, the near-naked female figure is thought to be Venus, Goddess of  love, beauty, sex and fertility. I remember reading, somewhere, that the painting is a bridal portrait, but unusual for the times, because there is no husband included. Because the two women look very similar, they might represent multiple aspects of the bride - the sacred and profane, romance and lust, defiance and supplication? 

My Appropriations

In my appropriations Ageless and A Different Landscape I have replaced the distant small village, seen in Titian's painting, with modern cityscapes. In 2003, this was reference to me moving from the country to the city, when I got divorced. It could also demonstrate that themes of love traverse time. In Ageless, the dotted line is like a highway, a metaphor perhaps?

In Jigsaw and Love Puzzle the pastorale scene depicted by Titian is abstracted, with the figures merging into the landscape, becoming one with it. I have previously written about Love Puzzle in regard to landscape, and the image of the bride in the landscape. I have a whole other series dwelling on this theme too!

And, Cupid does not get a gig in any of my Titian-appropriated paintings! I am not sure why...

The face-less women elide the opportunity for portraiture to be considered. There is no gaze. And, in art historical terms this has implications - the history of the female gaze in art is oft discussed. Manet's appropriation of Titian's Venus of Urbino  [1534] to create Olympia [1863] provides just one example of where the significance of the female gaze is scrutinised - from allure to defiance. But in both cases who is the gaze and its inflection meant for. Many would say - men.

Jigsaw Gouache on paper 2003

In Monolithic Matriarchs the women are faceless, except for red circles. For me, in 2003, this indicated strength, a way to solidify the power of matriarchy. There are no gazes to be mistaken as seductive or defiant, no expressions that give away secrets. The six women repeat the figure of the bride in Titian's painting. The repetition reveals the powerfulness of her figure. The morphed shape of Venus is also repeated in the foreground. She forms the landscape on which the monolithic matriarchs are positioned. Love, lust, fertility and sex are not discarded in the matriarchy - they are private. 

So, what does it all mean - its up to you!

Cheers,

Kathryn

                                                Love Puzzle Gouache on paper 2003

                                             A Different Landscape Gouache on paper 2003

                                           Monolithic Matriarchs Gouache on paper 2003
 

HUMAN LANDSCAPE

Human Landscape Gouache on paper 66 x 30 cm 2015

Firstly: Please click HERE to read my latest newsletter - Christmas greetings and studio news. 

MORE TEXT AND CODE

This post follows on from my last one Text and Code where I wrote about my interest in using text, but also binary code. I am interested in the latter not only for the 'instructional' capacities of binary code, but also to tease out its aesthetic possibilities, in juxtaposition with other symbolic and representational elements...such as my much loved age-old transcultural/religious tree-of-life and landscape.

Human Landscape

So...in this post I have uploaded my latest work on paper Human Landscape  [above] where binary code instructs  Human and Landscape. The string of binary code takes on a horizon-like appearance, as does the word Landscape. I am playing with a number of things though. In this algorithmic contemporary world our lives are influenced by code on a daily, if not minute by minute, basis. Some would say that our lives are determined by it eg: travel, banking, email, social media, new media art, data collection and more. There's also an interest in how the body, embodiment, phenomenology and the human sensorium are possibly envisaged, manipulated, eroded, enhanced, transformed, alienated by the digital world. So, in my paintings I am keen to explore ways to expose code, possibly transform it, maybe enhance it or even erode its invisibility, by making it visible. This visibility is not provided by the digital but by the human hand...extracting code from normally 'clean' and precise looking presentations. There is a contrariness in my desire to paint code...it's fun.

Human Landscape is a triptych, like I Am Am I ? in my last post. And, because both paintings are made up of three separate parts, they can be arranged in different combinations. I am not precious about their arrangements, because new stories may emerge. But, the arrangement of Human Landscape as seen above, for me at least, tells a story about the connections the human body has with the land. When we die, whether buried or cremated, our body returns to the land, in some way or another. And, ultimately when the Earth is savaged by the death throes of the Sun, our remains, every human ever born along with our Earth, will be scattered across space, returning to star dust. Thus, I have painted a human figure as if it is the land, with its legs and arms extending into river-like or horizon-like trajectories. The tree-of-life is growing out of this 'embodiment' of land transforms the figure into a kind of root-like connective element too. For me the small tree creates perspective, not only visual, but also temporal. The bottom image, for me, is the future. 

Regular readers will identify that Human Landscape is also a cosmic landscape, and part of my quest to untether  ideas of landscape from Earth-bound horizons.

The painting below Coded Landscape is another 'landscape' where I have used binary code to create the impression of maybe mountains or possibly some kind of structure seen from above, maybe a track, a billabong or even....the remnants of landscape in space?

Coded Landscape Gouache on paper 15 x 21 cm 2015

I have previously painted landscapes with text. Here are a few:

This is a Landscape Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2001

In This is a Landscape I have written landscape over and over again, between the tree trunks. 

          Works on paper from Here Comes The Bride exhibition at Soapbox Gallery, Brisbane, 2003

  Text included painting middle row second from right. This painting is called Bride in the Landscape

The images above and below show a small selection of the around 70 works on paper I exhibited in my solo exhibition Here Comes The Bride held at Soapbox Gallery, Brisbane, 2003. The exhibition had a sub-theme of the bride in the landscape. I included text in a few of the paintings. I warn you , the text is a bit dark, but the paintings are essentially about the body being embraced, or possibly consumed, by the land. These paintings were inspired by my observations of country women...those women who often literally work the land, along side their farmer husbands/partners, but also the women who give so much of their spirit to rural communities. These women often sacrifice, not only material things, but companionship, culture, education. Yet, many try to encourage these things to occur in their communities. I've witnessed this first hand.....participated in it too.

        Works on paper from Here Comes The Bride exhibition at Soapbox Gallery, Brisbane, 2003
                                         Text included middle row middle and top left.

Below is another example of text...but also another kind of code ie: the $ sign. This painting is called Earth For Sale and is painted entirely with small $ signs, which are not discernible form a distance, however, they become evident when the painting is viewed up close. As I have previously written this is a deliberate ploy on my part, to provoke the necessity for close scrutiny as well as taking perspectives from further away. This dance back and forth is like a cosmological dance with perspective. 

Earth for Sale Oil on linen 120 x 160 cm 2008

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com  

BRIDE IN THE LANDSCAPE - ONLINE EXHIBITION

Living With Distance Diptych 120 x 160 cm

Over the last week I have been posting some older paintings on Instagram . I've also posted some to Facebook. These paintings are from my early 2000s bride-in-the-landscape series. And, something strange and pleasing has happened...people are responding to them in slightly different ways to responses I received 13 or so years ago. Did people like them years ago? Yes, but not quite in the same way.

BRIDE-IN-THE-LANDSCAPE
The painting above Living With Distance reminded me of some of the weather maps/images we Australians have recently been viewing with great interest. Cyclone Marcia hit the coast of Queensland, at Yeppoon, last week, causing great destruction. The accompanying heavy rains have caused flooding across the central and inland coast. Interestingly, when I uploaded this painting to Facebook and Instagram, I had one person comment that it looked like a weather image. This person is from California! I was thrilled that someone had picked up on what I also had seen in my own work.

When I painted Living With Distance I was thinking about the young brides who follow their rural-based husbands into the distance of geographical isolation. However, I was also 'playing' with the idea of distance within a relationship.

Assimilation Oil on linen 80 x 100 cm

 

Assimilation is also reminiscent of a weather map/image. The bride's form seems to becomes the indicator of water flow or cloud cover! When I painted this I was thinking about the country bride who becomes absorbed by the land. Her life depends on the ebbs and flows of the landscape...AND the weather. She also becomes part of a community where women are a force of spirit and involvement in everything from the arts, education, welfare, health and well being.

 

 

Flying Oil on linen 80 x 120 cm

 

 

 

Memory Oil on linen 80 x 100 cm

Previous posts The Moon and Memory

 

 

FLYING

The four paintings above all have a hovering or flying theme! The bride and her spirit watch from above, yet she is intrinsic to the patterns and rhythms of the land. In Flying the bride is like a cloud. Her shadow is cast across the landscape which she is a part of, but also separate from. Her presence has influence. It's as if she is a custodian or symbolic of Mother Nature looking after her Earth.

 

In Memory the bride and her young self as a child hover over a landscape that is cosmic in appearance. Maybe this is one of my early cosmic paintings...and I was not even aware of it until NOW! The phases of the moon symbolise the passing of time. The bride reflects upon the dreams she had as a child. Or, maybe the child is projecting into the future?

 

 

Life Oil on linen 80 x 200 cm

 

Life visualises the milestones of a girl's life. Birth, childhood, education, marriage, pregnancy and motherhood, death! This painting is a bit DARK methinks! I'll let you think upon that for a bit!

A DECADE ALONG
So, why are my bride-in-the-landscape paintings resonating with people in a slightly different way to ten or more years ago? There could be a number of reasons. A lot can happen in a decade. Here are some considerations, off the top of my head.

• With the deluge of imagery on the internet and social media available today, maybe we are generally more aware of patterns across such things as weather maps and bride-in-the-landscape paintings?!
• We currently have a heightened awareness of domestic violence, and whilst my paintings are not about domestic violence, the vulnerability of the bride symbol does affect people, even subliminally.
• We also have heightened discussion about same sex marriage. The idea of marriage is being re-negotiated, albeit slowly, on social, religious, political and economic fronts.
• I have daughters and I am aware that young women today are balancing many considerations against those that could be considered more traditional dreams, such as marriage and children. I am also aware that young men are taking part in these discussions. The latter is probably the thing that seems so different to when I got married, for instance!
• Due to the internet, non-stop news, social media etc there is more awareness of the status of women in other cultures. These include traditions of marriage. And, some of these shock us.
• And another possibility at a subliminal level. Maybe the vulnerability of Earth's sustainability seems more fragile when a bride's presence evokes purity and the call to Mother Nature?

The paintings above are only a selection of my bride series of work.

With International Women's Day next week, I will post some more of my bride paintings. Also, I have some exciting news about a painting and a UK publication! Shall keep you informed.



TESTIMONIES
My Mum's exhibition Testimonies is up! Here are the details.

My Mum, Elsie Brimblecombe, has been exhibiting her paintings for a few years now. She is inspired by the written word. Each of her exhibitions has been themed to a particular writer and book/poems.

This year's exhibition is a series of paintings inspired by the modern Greek poet Yannis Ritsos . The two paintings below will be in Elsie's exhibition.

 

Place: Upfront Club - 31 Maple St, Maleny, Queensland, Australia.

Dates: 20 February - 18 March 2015

Please check the Upfront Club for opening times - they open from 7.30 am 7 days - you can have breakfast, lunch, dinner, morning and afternoon tea there, but just check what days they open till late etc. They also have live gigs there, so you could combine seeing some art and listening to music!

 

Cheers,

Kathryn

www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

MOUNTAINS

More Mountains Oil on linen 55 x 80 cm 2002

 

I am suffering from an impasse. I have three canvases prepared for me to paint, but the flow is just not happening at the moment. Time to pause and reflect. It is all part of the process, the creative process. I have learnt to to step away, literally and emotionally, from my work when this happens, to make room for ideas to flow, and gel into inspiration.

The impasse has possibly happened because I was co-host to a big milestone party for one of my children. Yep...lot's of energy put into, what turned out to be, one of the best parties I have ever been to. I danced till 2.30am!

So, I decided to write this BLOG post featuring paintings where I have portrayed mountains. In my last post FAITH I wrote about mountains being a metaphor for overcoming adversity. The mountain is a metaphor for adversity, which upon ascent reveals new horizons and perspectives, giving fuel for optimism and hope.

Regular readers will know that I use landscape elements as visual metaphors for many things eg: horizons, mirages, trees, skies and so on. By using landscape elements, to reach out and touch hearts and minds, I hope that a connection between us and Earth, plus our universal environment, is deepened. Ascribing emotional elements to landscape may possibly make us think twice about how we sustain ourselves and the planet.

More Mountains and Metaphor are two paintings from ten years ago, just after I left the country to move to Brisbane. Yes, there is a personal element...a story of a journey...a massive change and overcoming fear and adversity. I literally left the interior, crossed the great Dividing Range and settled near the coast.

These two paintings were inspired by the many trips I used to make to and from Brisbane to Goondiwindi. This 4-5 hour drive took me, and my family, across the Great Dividing Range either at Cunningham's Gap or Toowoomba. Please check out this MAP where you can see the terrain. The driving directions given on the map are directing through Toowoomba, but you can also go through Warwick.

The mountains at Cunningham's Gap are amazing. Their light and shade, deep rich colour and their amazing silhouettes are astounding. Each time I see them I slow down, just to 'drink' in with my eyes, their beauty and majesty. More Mountains and Metaphor are both directly inspired by the mountains at Cunningham's Gap.

Metaphor Oil on linen 80 x 120 cm 2002

 

 

The painting below is called Life and as you can see, it tells the story of a woman's journey from birht to death. It is somewhat black in its demeanour. But, notice the mountains in the distance. They can be read many ways...as a block, a cause of shadow and darkness, an opportunity, new horizons, strength, potential. The road, as indicated by the marked lines does not end. It continues out of the paintings, maybe traversing the mountians and reaching the other side. As each generation is born new opportunities and different expectations forge a diversity of roads.

 

 

Life Oil on linen 80 x 200 cm 2005

 

Secrets Oil on linen 120 x 160 cm 2005

 

In Secrets the mountains are half hidden, by what seems to be a mirage-like aura. They shimmer in the distance, enticing with their glimpsed majesty. What secrets do they hold? What is over the other side, literally and metaphorically?

 Mountains Dancing Oil on linen 80 x 120 cm 2005

 

Mountains Dancing was recently shortlisted for an art award with a theme focused on the benefits of rain. Here is the Artist's Statement I wrote for my entry:

I grew up on the Darling Downs, on the flat treeless Pirrinuan Plain between Dalby and Jimbour. Looking west the flat horizon melted into shimmering mirages in Summer, and in Winter its flatness drew a sharp line between land and sky. Looking east the majestic Bunya Mountains cut a silhouette against often relentless blue skies. These same skies, when darkened with rain and storm clouds, seemed to embrace the mountains, bringing them closer.

The flat western horizon would often tantalise my parents with strips of rain falling on distant paddocks. We’d pray for the rain to come to us. One hot day, my two younger brothers and I decided to help by dancing a wild rain dance! It actually rained a few drops!

I also remember my father’s delight when gentle soaking rain arrived, swelling the rich black soil and easing his anxiety.

In Mountains Dancing I have incorporated memories of my childhood, plus those of living for eighteen years further west in Goondiwindi. Strips of rain, on distant horizons, always met with emotional responses, particularly during drought. In this painting, strips of rain fall from clouds which seem to dance across a fertile red sky. Water penetrates the land, forming and replenishing what could be rivers, puddles, underground aquifers.

The whole landscape dances with joy and fertility. The latter symbolised by the colour red. A dancing rhythm of movement suggests a natural flow of water on and in the landscape, bringing it to life, sustaining crops, livestock, flora and fauna…and livelihoods.

 

 

Living With Distance oil on linen 120 x 160 [Diptych] 2002

Living With Distance is another painting from ten years ago. Notice the mountains edging the curvature of the Earth. A bride floats above the landscape, her veil forming cloud-like illusions across a vast sky. As a young bride, like many who marry and live in the country, I literally lived with distance. Yet, distance is not only about the literal space between things. It can also be about emotional distance and spiritual separation from people and the planet. However, the bride in  Living With Distance seems to embrace the planet in a white light, a light of protection, as her dress and body mirror land formations and contours. The white lines marking the Earth, seem to call out to the bride. They are the spiritual remnants of pioneering women of the past, ancestors who forged the fabric of community.

 In Unison Oil on linen 92 x 207cm  2006 SOLD

 

In Unison is in a collection in Sth Korea. This is something I wrote previously:

 

'In Unison' speaks about the universal heartbeat of time and history. At a truly fundamental level we are reminded of life by the beating of our hearts and the rhythmic pace of our breath. No matter where we come from, what religion we have faith in, what type of political structure we espouse at a fundamental level we all share the same reminders of life. ..those elements of life that have a pattern and rhythm.

 

Elemental Oil on linen 52 x 90 cm 2009

Elemental  is an ambiguous landscape. The tree-of-life creates a formation mirroring a few landscape elements including a mountain. Red 'clouds' rain down onto the tree-of-life mountain.

Into the Symphony Oil on linen 120 x 160 cm 2008

 

I have written about Into The Symphony twice before. Please check HERE and HERE

Viscera Oil on linen 90 x 200 cm 2008 SOLD

 

From a previous Artist's Statement

 

This painting is about ‘seeing’ the interiority of vastness at the same time as witnessing the vastness enmass.  The macro and micro can be  experienced simultaneously, possibly giving clues to negotiating an increasingly globalised world lived locally. This painting also plays with perspective and distance.

I have called this painting ‘Viscera’ meaning that the internal life forces of the earth are revealed. Yet, ignoring the detail, the sum total is a large landscape. But, is the viewer sure of where they stand in view of this vast landscape? Is the viewer in front of a land and sky scene, or above a landscape of land and water, or inside the internal workings? The landscape seems to be born from a tree…the tree-of-life with its branches becoming visceral and vascular reminding us that our bodies hold these same truths and energies. This is where the image can devolve into something more universal than a particular landscape. I like the fact that a viewer standing at a distance will ‘see’ one  ‘landscape’ and then up close there is another landscape, yet it is the same landscape…a living one. Enticing the viewer to move back and forth from the painting replicates the moves I made when creating it. This dance with distance is an important component of my work.

 

Frisson with Distance Oil on linen 85 x 147cm 2009 SOLD

 

 

Frisson Oil on linen 84 x 147 cm 2010 SOLD

 

 

Hope In The Distance Oil on linen 80 x 120 cm 2010 SOLD

The three paintings above Frisson, Frisson With Distance and Hope In The Distance are all ambiguous landscapes featuring a mountain-like form, created with my much loved transcultural/religious tree-of-life symbol. They are also similar to Into The Symphony and Viscera.

In Frisson and Frisson With Distance the charged moment where horizons meet is the frisson of life, possibility and hope. The tingle, like the moment before a kiss, is inherent. The mountain meets the sky, connecting everything, fueling energy and suggesting potential.

Knowing Stillness Oil on linen 85 x 150 cm 2011 SOLD

 Galactic Horizons and Beyond Oil on linen 90 x 150 cm 2012

Knowing Stillness and Galactic Horizons and Beyond are very recent paintings, where the mountain has been untethered from more formal and traditional interpretations. The metaphoric quality pervades and the images take on multiple possibilities beyond Earth-bound perspectives.

The Mountain offers a view of where we have been and where we might go. It also clearly affords us the knowledge that there is more beyond sight, beyond the distances already travelled and those yet to be traversed. Having been in the valleys, where sight is impeded, the notion of close and far distances helps us negotiate perils, sanctuaries, unkonwns and hope.

Cheers,
Kathryn
www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

THE WORLD TURNED UPSIDE DOWN

The World Turned Upside Down Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm unframed 2003

HERE COMES THE BRIDE
In 2003 I held a solo exhibition called 'Here Comes The Bride' at Brisbane's Soapbox Gallery. The exhibition consisted of a number of oil paintings plus over 70 works on paper which were displayed montage style on the gallery walls. The over arching umbrella idea was to 'play' with and explore the image of the bride in the landscape which has been a recurring theme in art history.

Now...this is where it got personal, because I had literally been the young bride in the landscape ie: I married at the age of 21 and went to live in western Queensland with my husband in a small rural community [population around 5,000] called Goondiwindi. After University I had worked as a curatorial assistant at the National Gallery in Canberra...but there were no national galleries or even galleries [except a craft shop] in Goondiwindi! When I had the exhibition 'Here Comes The Bride' in 2003 I had been divorced for a couple of years and had been living in Brisbane, after spending 18 years living in Goondiwindi.

So...the exhibition was a little angsty. I did not see it at the time, but friends did!

The image above The World Turned Upside Down depicts the bride in the bottom left corner looking a little frantic as she tries to decipher why everything is upside down. Her world, which includes her dreams for the future, are all of sudden changed. This bride is situated in a rural or pastorale landscape, yet she seems absorbed by it... as if it is quick sand.

The exploration of the bride in the landscape theme brought a realisation that young women who marry and move to rural environments can be described as not being 'in' the landscape as some kind of observer or object, but rather they are absorbed or consumed by it. The landscape consumes them as they give their spirit, energy and vitality to their communities and families. When [and if] they leave, traces of their spirit are left. Also, the land and landscape never leaves them, because it burrows into their psyche like a umbilical river.

APPROPRIATION OF TITIAN'S SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE
But, I won't go on about this aspect of the exhibition, because there was another that I really enjoyed 'playing' with. ' I was inspired to recontextualise or appropriate Titian's famous painting Sacred and Profane Love. Here's a link to an image and some information http://www.galleriaborghese.it/borghese/en/eamor.htm This painting is imbedded in the art historical theme of the bride in the landscape as it is a painting to celebrate a wedding with the bride, accompanied by Venus and a distracted Cupid, set against a pastorale scene. However, it is an unusual wedding painting for the sixteenth century because the groom is absent. This and the look in the bride's eyes got me thinking!

Is the bride feeling like her world will be turned upside down? Is she thinking of her future or even a lost love? Is earthly love a dream...as perhaps the presence of Venus and Cupid's distraction suggests? Does the idyllic pastorale scene suggest some kind of quarantining of the young woman from worldy activities? These sort of questions are as pertinent now as they would have possibly been 500 years ago. In fact, love was pondered upon voraciously by poets, writers, artists. There is still a voracious appetite for romance today even though it is often hidden behind explicitly sexual song lyrics, graphic films or turned into Vampire love!

I painted a series of images which took components of Sacred and Profane Love and re-contextualised them to 'speak' with a contemporary voice, but one which clearly created a link back to the past. I used the figure of the bride in all, but one, of my paintings. Venus is evident in all, but I have left Cupid out, although he is always actually 'present' in absentia because he exists, albeit in a distracted state, in the earlier painting. I recreated the pastorale scene as either an all-consuming landscape or as a scene with skyscrapers hovering in the distance. The latter represents my dream ie: to live in the city, enjoy a more sophisticated cultural and intellectual life and resurrect my career.

The paintings from the series are all below.

Woman Child Dream Gouache on paper 30 x 42 xm unframed 2003

 

There are deliberately no commas in this painting's title. I wanted to convey that the woman and child are the same person and the dream that existed for the child still exists as a memory for the woman. In the painting the bride's self as a child seems to be transfixed by Venus. Like many little girls I used to dream of my wedding day and this little girl in this painting is me, but also every other woman who still carries the 'little girl' memories of herself inside her. We need to be compassionate towards ourselves! The city in the background replaces the small village in Sacred and Profane Love, yet the strip of rain in the far horizon looms with both hope and fear. Regular readers of my BLOG will recongise the strip of rain as a recurring motif in my work. 

With Contemporary Eyes Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm unframed 2003

 

In this painting I have chosen to depict only the bride and Venus. I am asking the viewer to see the painting with contemporary eyes to search for questions that have been asked for hundreds of years. These questions link us. The striped lines around the bride bring or transform her into the contemporary space, almost protecting her as Venus seems to be simultaneously disappearing and re-configuring?

Looking For The Answer Gouache on pape 30 x 42 cm 2003

 

So... in this image the bride and Venus seem to grow out of the landscape or are they being absorbed by it? How are we to know 'love', or is the only true love found in Heaven, as Venus maybe suggesting? In fact, the white background is suggestive of some kind of heavenly place! This painting represents some kind of transformation which I suspect happens as time collapses and the past and present collide. This is one of the powerful aspects of apropriation. Even though I have not faithfully copied Titian's painting [and why would I!?] there were visual, emotional, and art historical aspects imbedded in his painting that seemed to invite me to open up a conduit through time.

Ageless Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm unframed 2003

 

The search for, the experience and the understanding of love are ageless quests. Is 'quest' the right word? Maybe it isn't, but in this painting the broken lines represent the lines on the highways I drove out west...endless driving into the distance. The concept of a 'journey' is defintely an appropriate one when thinking of love.
 

A Different Landscape Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm 2003

This painting proposes a different landscape. The city has moved to the foreground of the image. A new life seems possible. The bride is absent, but is she? Maybe she is in the city with Venus watching over or beckoning her?

Jigsaw Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm unframed 2003

Love Puzzle Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm unframed 2003

The last two paintings play with the idea that love is a puzzle which is, in fact, maybe why we pursue it, even in our dreams! Nothing like a puzzle to engage us. Indeed as the bride's gaze in Sacred and Profane Love suggests, love was a puzzle 500 years ago too.

APPROPRIATION
In my last BLOG post I said I'd write something about appropriation. Well, I have done this by writing about my own work. For me appropriation is a conscious and deliberate activity that in the first instance is stimulated and then driven by intellectual catalysts which inform the artist's choices of materials, subject, positioning and even how the work is exhibited etc. Other issues such as aesthetic or creative ones are mediated by the intellectual activity of repositioning, recontextualising another artist's or creator's work or aspects of the work. It needs to be more than just simply clever or interesting.

Cheers,

Kathryn

JIGSAW

                                                 Love Puzzle Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm unframed 2003

                                                        Jigsaw Gouache on paper 30 x 42 cm unframed 2003

TWO PAINTINGS FROM 2003

Jigsaw and Love Puzzle are two works on paper from a larger series of work centred around the bride. These two paintings belong to a subset of about 5-6 paintings each appropriating Titian's famous painting Sacred and Profane Love which is a bridal portrait, but unusual for the time as the husband is not present. Venus, the God of Love, hovers with a distracted Cupid focused not on anyone else but on playing. The young bride gazes out of the painting but not at the viewer who wonders what lies behind her eyes. These three characters are placed against a beautiful pastorale scene. Venus's drapes indicate some kind of action yet the remainder of the painting is measured and contemplative. One wonders about love and its expression in the sixteenth century. And we also wonder about love and its expression in the 21st century!

I am really fond of this series of paintings, so I thought they deserved a posting.

This link will take you to an image of Titian's Sacred and Profane Love
http://www.galleriaborghese.it/borghese/en/eamor.htm


Cheers,
Kathryn
www.kathrynbrimblecombe-fox.com

RADIANCE

This painting is called Radiance. It is large painting 92 x 208 cm and I think it is startling. This is what I wanted to achieve and from the comments I have received I am more sure that I have acheived this.

The painting's format is similar to Thank Goodness ie: a layered work which plays with perspective. The viewer seems to see the painting from many angles...from above, below, in front and even behind. Questions are asked...Is there a tree or is it a layer of the earth? Is there a sky or is this another layer of the earth?

I wanted to give the impression that the earth is 'radiance'...that every part of it is glorious...that even the minutae, unseen by the human eye, are part of the radiant light which reassures us that we and the earth are alive.

I wanted to create a painting that gave the viewer hope and confidence to face the sombre news we read each day about our affects on the planet. This is not to ignore that these issues are real and important, but more to invigorate people and keep them from despondency. The problems seem too large for the mere mortal to have a positive affect, but each and everyone of us can have a positive influence on the survival of the planet whether it be by planting a tree, turning the lights off, praying, joining an action group or envisioning the planet as healthy, rich and fertile.