The images of Thomas Dodd: A photographic journey through art history

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art criticism, art history, art nouveau, Arthur Danto "Live Flesh", Brainstorm by Thomas Dodd, Claudia Moscovici, Daydream by Thomas Dodd, digital photography, Dogma by Thomas Dodd, Echo by Thomas Dodd, Gustav Klimt, Maxfield Parrish, photography, postromanticism, René Magritte, Romanticism and Postromanticism, Someday by Thomas Dodd, Spellbound by Thomas Dodd, Surrealism, The images of Thomas Dodd: A photographic journey through art history, Thomas Dodd, Thomas Dodd Photography, William-Adolphe Bouguereau, Woodshedding by Thomas Dodd

“Behind the Veil” by Thomas Dodd

The images of Thomas Dodd: A photographic journey through art history

by Claudia Moscovici

To explain the conceptual revolution that occurred in art at the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century, some art historians claim that photography eliminated the need for representational art, or the kind of art that tries to imitate “nature” by depicting faithfully what the eye can see. We can add in parentheses, as E. H. Gombrich observes in The Story of Art, that the notion of the representation of what the eye can see has changed throughout the history of art. Needless to say, it too is shaped by social assumptions. Nonetheless, the difference between a kind of art that aims at faithful visual imitation of the three-dimensional qualities of physical objects and one that doesn’t remains relatively easy to discern.

The invention of photography had a lot to do with the move away from visual representation. To say that photography eliminated the need for representational art, however, is an overstatement. Undoubtedly, the invention of the camera encouraged artists to experiment with other means of representation in the same way that the invention of machines displaced hand-made crafts. The camera probably did for painting what the industrial revolution did for artisanship. But that doesn’t mean that artisanship—or hand-made beautiful objects—are no longer valuable. For what the human imagination, sensibility, eye and hand can create will always be somewhat different from what can be made with the aid of machines. The texture, sense of color and vision that are captured by painters are not identical to those that photography can produce, even though photography can bring us closer to visual reality and even though photography is also artistic. The painterly photography of Thomas Dodd illustrates that rather than replacing painting, photography can transpose and “immortalize” it, so to speak, in a new medium. In fact, Thomas Dodd, an Atlanta-based photographer whose works are featured in galleries and magazines throughout the world, offers a journey through art history. His images allude to the paintings of some of the best-known artists in the world, including William-Adolphe Bouguereau, Gustav Klimt, the Pre-Raphaelites, Maxfield Parrish and René Magritte.

“Aphrodite” by William-Adolphe Bouguereau

William-Adolphe Bouguereau  (http://www.bouguereau.org/)

During the nineteenth-century, the painter William-Adolphe Bouguereau (1825-1905) came to epitomize the standards set by the French Academy for Salon art: a polished execution and idealized genre paintings that focused on mythological themes and usually represented women and girls of an other-worldly beauty and perfection.  During the second half of the century, however, the Impressionists, though originally ridiculed by critics, set new aesthetic standards for art. The changes they created became irreversible. The Impressionists’ greatest contribution to art was not so much to change the notion of painting as representing what the eye can see—or the standards of verisimilitude that had been dominant since the Renaissance—but to alter what the eye should see as well as where and how it should see it. Their violation of the rules of the Beaux-Arts system was not revolutionary—in the sense of transgressing its underlying premises or goals–but it was thorough, in the sense of changing almost all of the means of reaching those goals. The Impressionists considered that the best forum to observe and represent nature would be in the open air—which is why their works were called plein air paintings–where the play of light and shadows would be most natural, striking and intense, rather than under the dim and artificial lighting of the studio. Furthermore, the art students in the academies conveyed the three-dimensionality of forms by means of the subtle shading which was first perfected by the Renaissance masters. The Impressionists, on the other hand, evoked a sense of three-dimensionality by representing the dramatic contrasts of color that could be observed in vibrant sunlight. In seeking to capture visually the play of light and shadow—and its transformations—the Impressionists used rapid brushstrokes to produce paintings that looked rushed and unfinished as opposed to the well-rounded, glossy and polished forms and subtle shadings respected by the Beaux-Arts system. Similarly, rather than depicting a posed or characteristic angle of the objects painted, Manet and the Impressionists showed objects from uncharacteristic, and often, truncated perspectives. This truncation of subjects and objects, which is especially obvious in the paintings of Renoir and Degas, openly acknowledges the incompleteness of our field of vision and powers of representation.

 

The Little Sheperdess, by William-Adolphe Bouguereau

Sometimes photography preserves and honors our artistic heritage, despite the irreversible changes that occur in the history of art. This is certainly the case with the photography of Thomas Dodd, who devotes several of his images to experimenting with the rich artistic legacy of Bouguereau. “Spellbound” retains the same softness and fluidity of forms and represents a similarly idealized feminine beauty that we found in the nineteenth-century French master. The woman’s sweeping movement, in a veil-like dress that envelops not only her, but the entire image, creates an aura of mystery. The focus, however, lies in her gaze: bold, powerful yet undeniably feminine. As if to emphasize that she’s the center of this imaginary narrative, Dodd surrounds the female figure with soft clouds that dissipate, at the corners, in a painterly roughness that seems created by a palette knife in oils. This contemporary image, however, doesn’t reproduce Bouguereau’s works. It borrows from and pays homage to them, taking us on an evocative voyage through art history.

“Spellbound” by Thomas Dodd

While “Spellbound” only alludes to Bouguereau’s paintings,  “Maybe Someday” deliberately mimics their setting and figures. The woman in this image (below) has a very contemporary look. Yet she appears cast in a Bouguereau painting, as if she were an actress on a painted stage. Her sideway glance, her costume, her posture, the clouds that surround her: all these gestures and props appear staged by Bouguereau, over a century ago. But her slim face, her painted toenail, her tossled hairdo remain contemporary, reminding us that the past cannot be fully recreated or brought back in its original form. It can only be taught, respected and evoked.

Maybe Someday by Thomas Dodd  http://thomasdodd.com/

Maxfield Parrish

The American painter and illustrator Maxfield Parrish (1870-1966) was an iconoclast, though many see him as a traditionalist. He deliberately went against the modernist trends in art of his times to bring back Neoclassical standards. He is known for his luminous paintings, pastoral settings and idealized Neoclassical imagery. In the painting “Daybreak,” the girl’s calm repose has an angelic quality, as if she herself, not only her state, were in a liminal space, somewhere between reality and dream.

“Daybreak” by Maxfield Parrish

With digital photography and a masterful control of light, Thomas Dodd captures the spirit of Maxfield Parrish in the image “Daydream”(below). Like Parrish, he depicts a young woman, dressed in a white in a flowing dress, at sunrise (or sunset), when the light changes–and play of shadows–are most colorful, nuanced and intense.

“Daydream” by Thomas Dodd

Gustav Klimt

There are certain art movements that never go out of style: Art Nouveau can be counted among them. Highly stylized yet in harmony with nature; ornamental yet profoundly philosophical; sexually daring and controversial yet utterly refined, Art Nouveau continues to please the public. It’s therefore not all that surprising that one of Dodd’s biggest artistic inspirations is the Art Nouveau movement, particularly the works of Gustav Klimt. As we know, art Nouveau is an ornamental style of art, architecture and decoration, which peaked in popularity at the turn of the 20th century, sometime between 1890-1905. Seen as, quite literally, the “new art”, Art Nouveau employed ornamental, floral motifs and stylized, curvilinear forms that are coming back in style today. Although the Art Nouveau movement was greatly influenced by the Czech artist Alphonse Mucha, some of the its main motifs and decorative designs were also associated with even more popular artists, including Gustav Klimt, Antoni Gaudi and Louis Comfort Tiffany, each of whom adapted and reshaped the movement according to his unique artistic style.

“The Kiss” by Gustav Klimt

In his article “Live Flesh” (“The Nation,” January 23, 2006), the critic and philosopher Arthur Danto describes Klimt’s gilded, ornamental paintings as efforts to depict erotism to its limits, transcending, and perhaps immortalizing, the flesh: “Klimt, of course, depicted lovers clasped to each other in intense erotic embrace. There is nevertheless something operatic about Klimt’s lovers, as if they were figures in a myth. Like Tristan and Isolde they are caught up in the sweep of passion as the music swells around them. Sex is somehow meant to be transfigurative, a way of transcending the sweaty realities of the flesh depicted.”

“Echo” by Thomas Dodd

This is precisely what Thomas Dodd does in his image “Echo,” an homage to Klimt. Although the painting doesn’t have the usual art deco floral motifs, the background becomes a gilded decoration which envelops the delicate face of the young woman. With her lips half-open and her eyes closed, the young woman’s state seems to waver between dream and fantasy. The erotism in this image, like the one depicted by Klimt’s paintings, is powerful yet subtle. Dodd’s image suggests a beauty not only beyond the realm of the possible, but also already transcendental, as the human form blends into the golden background: fluid yet at the same time, somehow, dry and crisp like a gilded leaf pressed for ages between the pages of an old book.

“Dogma” By Thomas Dodd

René Magritte

When we look at the image “Dogma” (above), it becomes clear that Dodd finds inspiration in Surrealism as well: particularly in the works of the Belgian modernist artist René Magritte (1898–1967) . Surrealist art often combines the best of both worlds: a “realistic” representation of objects, which requires talent and technical skill, and a fantastic imagination that takes us past the threshold of the rational and the knowable, so we can explore the mysteries of the subconscious. Surrealism offers an escape from the real world yet also probes the depths of a perhaps truer and deeper reality: the reality of human desire; of our dreams and nightmares; of our hopes and fears; of our collective past and a visionary future we can barely imagine. Surrealism can also be playful: at least in the hands of an artist like Miró as well as in Magritte‘s linguistic imagination, whose paintings are filled with visual puns and paradoxes.

“Not to be Reproduced” by Rene Magritte

In “Dogma” the young woman, looking poised and professional, holds firmly with one hand a book. Yet her head dissipates, along with the memorized and predigested knowledge of the book, into thin air. The background around her, rather than sustaining life, appears caustic, as if an acid were spilled upon the image to destroy its contents. Knowledge can be fleeting and even harmful.

Brainstorm by Thomas Dodd

One of Dodd’s most interesting Surrealist images, “Brainstorm”, depicts a more complex process of creativity. Dodd explains that “Brainstorm,” also called “Woodshedding“, refers to a phenomenon called “woodshedding” in Jazz music, whereby a musician shuts himself in a woodshed to practice and improvise new songs until he or she creates is satisfied with the performance. This creative process plays a central role in all kinds of creativity, be it music, the plastic arts, creative writing, or photography. As Thomas Edison famously stated, “Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety nine percent perspiration”. For further information about Thomas Dodd’s painterly photography, please take a look at his website http://thomasdodd.com.

Claudia Moscovici, postromanticism.com 

Rodney Smith’s Eclectic Surrealism

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aesthetics, art, art blog, art criticism, Claudia Moscovici, contemporary art, contemporary photography, fine art, fineartebooks, fineartebooks.com, photographer Rodney Smith, postromantic art, postromanticism, postromanticism.com, Rodney Smith, Rodney Smith fineartebooks, Rodney Smith photography, Rodney Smith's Eclectic Surrealism, Romanticism and Postromanticism, Surrealism, Surrealist art, Surrealist photography

photo by Rodney Smith

When you look at Rodney Smith‘s photographs you may think of René Magritte, the Belgian Surrealist artist known for his visual puns and, generally speaking, thought-provoking, “conceptual” images. Surrealist art, in general, combines the best of both worlds: a “realistic” representation of objects, which requires talent and technical skill, and a fantastic imagination that takes us past the threshold of the rational and the knowable, so we can explore the mysteries of the subconscious.

photo by Rodney Smith

Surrealism offers an escape from the real world yet also probes the depths of a perhaps truer and deeper reality: the reality of human desire; of our dreams and nightmares; of our hopes and fears; of our collective past and a visionary future we can barely imagine. Surrealism can also be playful: at least in the hands of an artist like Miró as well as in Magritte‘s linguistic imagination, whose paintings are filled with visual puns and paradoxes.

photo by Rodney Smith

Rodney Smith’s education and professional route is somewhat unusual for an artist. He earned a Master of Divinity in Theology in 1973 from Yale University, where he also studied photography with Walker Evans and developed a love for this field. Far from being stuck in the Ivory Tower, however, his highly successful photography has been commissioned  by mainstream businesses such as American Express, I.B.M., Merril Lynch, the New York Stock Exchange and VISA (among many others).

photo by Rodney Smith

To call Rodney Smith’s Surrealism “eclectic,” as I do in the title of this introduction, may seem somewhat redundant. After all, Surrealist art is usually eclectic. Yet Rodney Smith adds so much Romantic flavor to many of his images–as well as playing with optical illusions, surprises and visual puns–that “eclectic” is the best term I found to describe his art.

photo by Rodney Smith

In fact, this is a term Rodney Smith uses to describe himself. Although art isn’t exactly autobiographical, I think that, in this case, there’s no better introduction to Rodney Smith’s quirky and eclectic Surrealist photography–which is filled with personality–than reading the witty and revealing description the artist provides about himself and his art on his website:

photo by Rodney Smith

http://www.rodneysmith.com/

Claudia Moscovici, postromanticism.com

http://www.amazon.com/Romanticism-Postromanticism-Claudia-Moscovici/dp/0739116754

 

Poetic and Spiritual: The Photography of Noell S. Oszvald

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aesthetic philosophy, aesthetics, art, art blog, art history, Claudia Moscovici, contemporary art, contemporary photography, existentialism, fine art, fineartebooks, fineartebooks.com, Hungarian artist Noell S. Oszvald, meditation, Noell S. Oszvald, Noell S. Oszvald photography, photography, Poetic and Spiritual: The Photography of Noell S. Oszvald, Romanticism and Postromanticism, Surrealism, Surrealist photography, the photography of Noell S. Oszvald

by Noell S. Oszvald

Poetry, meditation and spirituality are often linked. Since the Romantic movement, poetry has been about using an economy of words–condensing meaning only to the essential–to express our profound feelings. Similarly to meditation, this process requires looking within.  The photography of the Hungarian artist Noell S. Oszvald is poetic and spiritual: a visual meditation through images rather than a verbal one through thoughts and words.

by Noell S. Oszvald

It seems to be inspired by the the Buddhist practice of focused thought to achieve peace of mind and the cultivation of wisdom. There’s also a certain animism in it, as the human figure–usually a willowy and beautiful young woman with long dark hair–appears in total harmony with her environment. She often mirrors the positions of the objects or beings around her.

by Noell S. Oszvald

Like in poetry, form itself takes on the utmost importance. In one image we see the young woman from behind assuming exactly the same position as the cat sitting next to her. In another photo, she bends like the tree close to her, in an environment as minimalist and stark as the setting of Samuel Beckett’s plays. In fact, the human being mimics so well her surroundings that she, too, appears to be a prop in the theater of life.

by Noell S. Oszvald

Beckett once said, “All I know is what the words know, and dead things, and that makes a handsome little sum, with a beginning and a middle and an end, as in the well-built phrase and the long sonata of the dead.”

by Noell S. Oszvald

Existential in mood without being somber, Noell S. Oszvald’s photographs do not offer, however, a long sonata of the dead. They stage the perfect setting for a meditation about life, simplicity of forms, oneness between body and mind, and a sense of harmony with our surroundings that doesn’t place human beings on top, but rather as one with nature.

Claudia Moscovici, postromanticism.com

http://www.amazon.com/Romanticism-Postromanticism-Claudia-Moscovici/dp/0739116754

 

A Surrealist Futurism: The Art of Adam Martinakis

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A Surrealist Futurism: The Art of Adam Martinakis, Adam Martinakis, Adam Martinakis art, aesthetic philosophy, aesthetics, art, art blog, art criticism, Claudia Moscovici, contemporary art, contemporary photography, fine art, fineartebooks, fineartebooks.com, futurism, postromanticism.com, Romanticism and Postromanticism, Surrealism, Surrealist photography, the art of Adam Martinakis, The remains of a Memory by Adam Martinakis

by Adam Martinakis

The cosmopolitan artist Adam Martinakis was born in Poland, grew up in Greece and lives in England. His style combines a unique mixture of Surrealism and Futurism and his genre can be described as highly versatile. Adam creates sculptures, intallations, and 3D models (via digital photography).

by Adam Martinakis

Although many of his works would fit right in as the posters for science fiction movies, they are, quite literally, multidimensional, not only in form but also in content. These silent humanoid figures speak volumes about the complexity of romantic love; the angst of the human condition (reminsicent of Edvard Munch’s expressionism); the pieces of our personalities and external influences that compose each and every one of us socially and psychologically.

by Adam Martinakis

There’s a clear scientific bent to Martinakis’s images and installations, as many of the human figures are positioned within structures that look like the orbits of planets or the makeup of atoms, reminding us, as did the ancient philosophers, of our material place within the universe.

The remains of a memory by Adam Martinakis

The metaphysical dimension of Adam Martinakis’s artwork is very evident in the sculpture “The remains of a Memory,” which reveals both the physical closeness of the lovers and the ephemeral nature of their temporal bond. Like the lovers themselves, memory and existence are inseparably intertwined. As their memory of each other disintegrates, so do their bodies. Adam Martinakis combines art, philosophy and science to create works of art that make profound statements about the human condition.

Claudia Moscovici, postromanticism.com

http://www.amazon.com/Romanticism-Postromanticism-Claudia-Moscovici/dp/0739116754

Finding the Extraordinary in the Ordinary: The Imaginative Photography of Andrew Shushvalyuk and Iren Lesik

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aesthetic philosophy, Andrew Shushvalyuk, Andrew Shushvalyuk photography, androgyny, art criticism, Claudia Moscovici, contemporary art, contemporary photography, digital art, digital photography, fantasy, Finding the Extraordinary in the Ordinary: The Imaginative Photography of Andrew Shushvalyuk and Iren Lesik, fine art, fineartebooks, fineartebooks.com, Iren Lesik, postromantic art, Romanticism and Postromanticism, Surrealism, Surrealist photography, The Imaginative Photography of Andrew Shushvalyuk and Iren Lesik, the photography of Andrew Shushvalyuk and Iren Lesik

Somewhere on the boundary between fantasy, science fiction, and surrealism, you will find the imaginative photography of Andrew Shushvalyuk and Iren Lesik. Their images are narrative in style. Each of them tells us a story: but we have to use our imagination, to help co-create the plot. Crossing the line between reality and imagination, this fantastic photography helps us see the extraordinary in the ordinary.

Andrew Shushvalyuk and Iren Lesik’s images tend to play with the notion of gender. They often feature a young couple, juxtaposed or intermingled in images that seem right out of fairy tales or science fiction scenes. The maiden in distress; the meeting of two lovers from completely separate realms and ways of life; the desolate yet majestic tower: the motifs of fantasy and fairy tale  are seamlessly integrated with contemporary elements of our every-day lives to create a fresh and original digital photography.

Yet the emotions these images evoke are far from other-worldly. They’re relevant and touching precisely because they’re the normal emotions we all feel:  longing, love, grief, sadness, hope. Transposed unto a different realm–the objects of our dreams or visions–these photographs gain depth without losing their relevance. We can still relate to them–and apply them to our ordinary lives–even though we see them as part of a completely different world, the realm of fantasy.

On their website, http://anshulesik.com/, Andrew Shushvalyuk and Iren Lesik describe the manner in which they create: “We take pictures, travel, work with magazines, make up unusual designs. We’re constantly seeking and experimenting; always on the move… Art, of course, has to be relevant. We want to create such a deep meaning for each picture that it will not lose its relevance for many years…. In the ordinary, we find the extraordinary.”

Playing with gender stereotypes yet also androgynous, fantasy-based yet also real; theatrical yet not over-the-top; expressive yet open-ended to many interpretations; emotional yet understated; poetic yet mythical: to my mind, the imaginative photography of Andrew Shushvalyuk and Iren Lesik represents the best of contemporary digital photography. Those who have not seen it yet can take a look at the treasure of images on their website: http://anshulesik.com/

Claudia Moscovici, postromanticism.com

http://www.amazon.com/Romanticism-Postromanticism-Claudia-Moscovici/dp/0739116754

The Photography of Dan St. Andrei: Dreaming of a Perfect Imperfection

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aesthetic philosophy, aesthetics, Alin Galatescu, art blog, art criticism, art history, artistic photography, Claudia Moscovici, Dan Andrei, Dan Andrei photography, Dan Andrei's photography, Dan St. Andrei, Dan St. Andrei photographer, Dan St. Andrei photography, danandrei.com, fine art, fineartebooks, fineartebooks.com, history of art, Marcel Proust, modern art, photographer Dan Andrei, photography, postmodernism, postromanticism, postromanticism.com, Romanian photography, Romanticism and Postromanticism, sensual art, sensuality, Surrealism, Surrealist photography, The Photography of Dan Andrei, The Photography of Dan St. Andrei: Dreaming a Perfect Imperfection

Romanian-born photographer Dan St. Andrei adopts a philosophical approach to the art of photography. He states: “Life is eventually an eternal attempt to understand your purpose, to build up and mold, to grow and to define yourself … I would like to discover daily reasons to love myself.”  His images take on so many different styles and approaches: from the fetishism of his sensual fragments; to the poetic dynamism of his photographs of dancers; to the reflexive and dream-like quality of his dystopic utopia images, which he calls, in a deliberate pun,  Mytopia.

If his photo series have any common thread, it’s in depicting life, as Dan St. Andrei himself puts it, as “beautifully imperfect.” The beauty lies in the aesthetic impact, since Dan St. Andrei’s images are not only beautiful but also dreamy, even haunting. The imperfection is revealed in the human emotions and anxieties they reflect, holding a mirror to both what we reveal and what we hide within. As the artist puts it, through the art of photography, he searches “for  the meanings and hidden motivations that put our world into motion.”

It’s difficult to imagine a world without fantasy, without dream. This would be a world devoid of possibilities, without a future. Dan St. Andrei captures our dreams and hopes in motion, as they develop, both literally from the camera as well as figuratively in our minds. He states: “There are moments when we ask ourselves about our purpose in life, about its meaning and our motivations. There are moments when we ask questions about life, as it is or as we imagine it to be.” The gap between reality and dream is not unbridgeable. It’s often connected, in fact, by art and our imaginations: “There are moments when we allow our imaginations to roam free; in which we allow ourselves to dream.”

Dan St. Andrei captures the dreamer in each of  us, whether we’re artists or not. After all, it’s our dreams that make more bearable our imperfect reality; that help us change it for the better; that give us hope and a sense of drive and direction in life. Without these aesthetic dreams, we risk getting bogged down in the routines and responsibilities of daily life. The dreamer in us, the artist explains, “lives through these moments” when life’s “imperfection becomes beautiful.” This may be only our personal vision–a fantasy–or what, if we follow our dreams, we make happen in real life.

There is also a sense of nostalgia in Dan St. Andrei’s images, as he suggests bygone eras. He does this without melancholia however, even adding a ludic touch, as in the fashion series below, photographed by Dan St. Andrei and created with the help of the talented stylist, Alin Galatescu.

Andrei Octav Doicescu aptly stated:  “The present disintegrates, first in history, then in nostalgia.” Nostalgia is an acute, often painful, awareness  of an irretrievably  lost past that we still long for in the present. But Dan St. Andrei shows us the past doesn’t have to evoke sadness. The past can reappear in our present as a playful celebration of previous epochs, in our imaginations, in art and of course in history. 

Like a Proustian search for lost time in pictorial form–a search for lost love, for impossibly perfect social structures, for the (unattainable) fulfillment of our sensual and sexual desires–Dan St. Andrei’s photography captures the peregrinations of our search for meaning in a life deprived of certainties. You can view his portfolio on his website, http://danandrei.com/.

Claudia Moscovici, postromanticism.com

http://www.amazon.com/Romanticism-Postromanticism-Claudia-Moscovici/dp/0739116754

An Archaeology of Contemporary Life: The Art of Gianluca Capozzi

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An Archaeology of Contemporary Life: The Art of Gianluca Capozzi, art blog, art criticism, art reviews, Claudia Moscovici, contemporary art, contemporary painting, fine art, Gianluca Capozzi, hyper-realism, Italian art, painting, pop art, postmodern art, postromanticism.com, Surrealism

Born in Avellino, Italy, educated at the prestigious Academy of Fine Art in Florence, the contemporary artist Gianluca Capozzi shows an amazing versatility. Her paintings range from hyper-realism to a kind of minimalist Surrealism to Pop art. Gianluca Capozzi’s artwork offers an archaeology of contemporary life.

If anyone were to discover her works decades or even centuries later, they’d see our societies as they are: fragments of our every day lives, be it enjoying a day at the beach or walking on crowded city streets, on the way to work. But for the modern viewer, her artwork holds unexpected visual surprises that give us–quite literally–a fresh perspective on our daily activities: such as images that are off-center, where the focal point is the people dispersing into the city streets from an empty center or a young woman standing in the foreground with a fire blazing right behind her.

One of my favorites, called Pinup, featured below, captures perfectly the nearly inseparable fetishism–a longstanding cliché of the media machine–between women’s sexual allure and cars.

On the other hand, the painting entitled Office, below, is demurely realist and traditional. In a manner reminiscent of Degas’ voyeuristic framing, the viewer is invited to peek inside our mundane reality of “just another day at the office” as if we were mere external observers to our own everyday lives. This painting effectively defamiliarizes the familiar through its perspective rather than its style.

Finally, the painting entitled Sunday Afternoon, featured below, superposes a black and white image of a man working on his car with whimsical, colorful streaks of color. Both the car and the man have a retro look about them, but the splashes of color framed in white render them very fresh, ornamental and modern.

Gianluca Capozzi has the talent to render the familiar unfamiliar for the viewers of today while also making it more memorable for the viewers of tomorrow. You can see more of Gianluca Capozzi’s contemporary and versatile art on her blogspot, at the link below:

http://www.capozzigianluca.blogspot.com

Claudia Moscovici, postromanticism.com

The Artistic Legacy of Georges Yatridès

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aesthetic philosophy, aesthetics, art, art blog, art criticism, art history, Claudia Moscovici, contemporary art, fine art, fineartebooks, fineartebooks.com, Georges Yatridès, history of art, modern art, modernism, modernist art, postromantic movement, postromanticism, postromanticism.com, Romanticism and Postromanticism, Surrealism, The Artistic Legacy of Georges Yatridès

There is something other-worldly about the paintings of the French-American painter Georges Yatridès. Although the artist was influenced by Gaugin and the Fauve movement, Yatridès’ work stands apart, on its own. Painted during the height of modernism, it also seems very contemporary in feel, prefiguring  Japanese pop art influenced by comic books.

Luminous, colorful and evocative, these mythical, fantasmogoric paintings bring to mind classical heroism in a modern pictorial translation. They straddle the divide between pop culture and high art, fitting in perfectly with both.

There are several unique artists in the history of modern art that defy categorization–such as Mondigliani and Balthus–whose works are enjoying a contemporary revival. The time has come for a look back at the forward-looking artistic legacy of Georges Yatridès.

http://www.yatrides.com/anglais/index.htm 
http://www.yatrides-21st-century.com/ 

Claudia Moscovici, postromanticism.com

http://www.amazon.com/Romanticism-Postromanticism-Claudia-Moscovici/dp/0739116754

Literary Images: The Photography of Alex M. Bustillo

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aesthetic philosophy, aesthetics, Alex Bustillo, Alex Bustillo photography, Alex M. Bustillo, Alex M. Bustillo photography, art, art blog, art criticism, art history, Claudia Moscovici, collage, contemporary art, contemporary photography, erotic transgression, Erotism, fine art, fineartebooks, Georges Batailles, Histoire de l'oeil, history of art, L'Erotisme, Literary Images: The Photography of Alex M. Bustillo, Marquis de Sade, modern art, Pablo Picasso, photographer Alex M. Bustillo, photography Alex Bustillo, postmodern art, postmodernism, postromantic movement, postromanticism, postromanticism.com, Roland Barthes, Romanticism and Postromanticism, Story of the Eye, Surrealism, Surrealist photography, Susan Sontag, The Photography of Alex Bustillo, The Photography of Alex M. Bustillo, transgression

Alex M. Bustillo is an international artist par excellence. Born in Miami, Florida and of Cuban origin, he currently resides in France. Alex has lived throughout the world, however, including the United States, Puerto Rico, Latin America and Italy. It’s not only his diverse cultural backgrounds that shine through in his photographic collages, but also his keen interest in all aspects of culture: including philosophy, literature, music and film.

Pablo Picasso is credited with having invented the artistic collage, made up of sketches, painting and newspaper cutouts. Bustillo transforms this modernist tradition into a postmodern artform that includes overlapping materials as diverse as digital photography, plexiglas and aluminum foil that somehow work together to create a striking and unique artistic whole. Not limited to the visual arts, Bustillo has even collaborated with the American musician Garland Jeffreys to incorporate musical ideas in a visual context.

Bustillo doesn’t shy away from anthropology, philosophy or even erotic fiction. His collection  Story of the Eye (above) offers a visual interpretation of Georges Bataille‘s famous erotic and philosophical collection of vignettes by the same name, which was published in 1928. Bataille is best known for his anthropology of pleasure, Eroticism (1957), which studies human sexuality in terms of religious sacrifice and cultural taboos.

But it’s Bataille’s erotic tale that captured the imagination of artists, literary critics and film producers. Written in the tradition of libertine fiction made popular in eighteenth-century France by the Marquis de Sade, Story of the Eye describes the erotic passion between an adolescent male (the narrator) and Simone, his main partner. The couple have a menage-à-trois with Marcelle, a mentally ill teenage girl, engaging together in various exhibitionist acts (in front of Simone’s mother) and other taboo sexual behaviors.

Simone and the narrator are the original Bonnie and Clyde–or Natural Born Killers, more like it–manifesting their penchant for transgression through their increasingly violent sexual bond. When Marcelle breaks out of the mental institution, she becomes suicidal and hangs herself. The sociopathic lovers have sex next to her corpse, suggesting necrophilia, a recurrent theme in the book. This seedy story seems to be taken right out of pulp or pornographic fiction; however, it’s become a favorite allegory of taboo and transgression among French (and Francophile) intellectuals. Both the American feminist critic Susan Sontag and the French structuralist literary critic Roland Barthes wrote about it.

In Bustillo’s interpretation, Bataille’s tale of sexual liberty and libertinism takes a dystopic turn. His dramatic images are atavistic yet historical (in the photograph above you can see superposed images of an Egyptian bust, an American Indian chief and a Roman soldier); disembodied yet carnal (one slim leg appears, suggesting death rather than desire). Rather than glorifying transgression, they tell the story of what (and who) is sacrificed by the individual and society when the sadistic and perverse are  allowed free reign and gain power over others. At once elusive and allusive, the photography of Alex M. Bustillo provides a tantalizing peek  into the world of culture. You can view more of Alex’s portfolio on the link http://www.saatchionline.com/alexmbustillo.

 

Claudia Moscovici, postromanticism.com

Intoxication: Artistic Fame and the Magnetic Persona

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No matter what they may say, few artists create art  only for themselves. Just as few writers write only for themselves (unless they’re only writing in a journal, and even then, they may do it with an eye for posterity). Most artists aspire to share their art with others. Many want that elusive concept of “fame”. Artistic fame means being valued in their own lifetime as well as leaving a significant trace of their art for posterity. This, of course, implies canonization: making their name–and style(s)–common currency not only for their own times, but for future generations as well.

Immanuel Kant gave us three standards for great art that stands the test of time: 1) originality (the first of its kind in a certain style), 2) exemplarity (others will want to imitate that style) and 3) inimitability (the art is so unique that others won’t really be able to imitate it, just as there are many Impressionist painters but only one Monet or Renoir). If we examine, however, the manner in which art is consecrated in reality, we see at work the processes described by the sociologist of art Pierre Bourdieu. Art is what artists, critics, museum curators and collectors deem it to be. In my estimation, both philosophers are partly right: art is what those in “the field of cultural production,” to use Bourdieu’s term, say it is; however, what they perceive as “art” has a lot to do with Kant’s three criteria for aesthetic value.

Perhaps even more so, art has to do with the magnetic persona of the artist. To offer a notable example, Pablo Picasso not only reinvented his art in radically new style during each of his periods–ranging from the relative realism of his blue period to his Cubism, to his collage art–but also shaped public opinion, juggled and manipulated art dealers and defined international art.  He commanded attention to his art largely thanks to his greater-than-life persona. Similarly, Salvador Dali, though one of the founders of Surrealism and an artist of immense talent, generated publicity for his art via antics that weren’t completely random. For example, to underscore the lobster motif of his art, he gave a talk in New York with his foot in a bucket and a lobster on his head.

In our times, I believe that Damien Hirst is the artist who manages to draw the public most effectively, not only through his sometimes shockingly original and diverse art–the pickled sharks, dissected cows, diamond-studded skulls and collections of diamond-clustered butterflies–but also through the way he presents himself to the media: through his dramatic persona. Artistic magnetism goes beyond mere shock value or even publicity stunts. It’s perhaps best described by Friedrich Nietzsche when he urges every person to live his or her life as a work of art. Few artists–let alone people in general–succeed in doing that. Because, as Nietzsche also states, “For art to exist, for any sort of aesthetic activity to exist, a certain physiological precondition is indispensable: intoxication.” Artistic fame happens when both the artist and his art are able to intoxicate us.

Claudia Moscovici, postromanticism.com