Botticelli Reimagined

A very quick blog to say I was in London last weekend and fortunately got to see the Botticelli Reimagined exhibition at the Victoria & Albert Museum (5 March 2016-3 July 2016).

I cannot express how chuffed I was that Botticelli's Pallas and the centaur was on display and that, yes, very excitingly, it was tempera on canvas! Ha, and this work dates from 1482-1485! It did appear well protected with varnish. More information on the painting here.

Sandro Botticelli (circa 1482-85), Pallas and the centaur [Tempera on canvas]

Also, very pleasing was to discover an amazing artist, Evelyn De Morgan. Her work was so finely done and I felt with such understanding of the female form and mind. I don't usually like nude paintings, but De Morgan's Cadmus and Harmonia was wonderful. The way the snake, Cadmus, wrapped around Harmonia was incredible. Reluctantly, I had to drag myself away from the painting in order to let others see it. I also liked the way De Morgan painted flowers and birds in the paintings on display. I am quite desperate to get her book and in fact have just ordered it online (even though I probably really shouldn't spend the money!), but it is a limited edition and I don't want to miss out. Here is the link to the The De Morgan Foundation.

Evelyn De Morgan (1877), Cadmus and Harmonia, Oil on canvas 

Ovid’s Metamorphoses (Book IV, 563-603):

With lambent tongue he kissed her patient face,

Crept in her bosom as his dwelling place

Entwined her neck, and shared the loved embrace.

Other exhibitions I perused while in London were Sculpture in the Garden (Pangolin London 13 May 2016-9 July 2016). I particularly liked the Lynn Chadwick and Ann Christopher works. 

There was also a fabulous exhibition of Quentin Blake (I love his drawings!) and Shojo Manga: Japanese Girls' Comics in the House of Illustration. Really cheap ticket to see both as well.

Okay, well I must go work on my own silverpoint drawing and get to the ECA degree show this afternoon. 

Bugs and Rabbits

K Fisher (2016) You have been and will bee [Silverpoint, 20 x 20 cm]

Listening to Sufjan Stevens at the moment. It's taken me 2 and half hours to make my own gesso (first time!) and apply it to my canvas. I mixed refined linseed oil with it, a half oil ground, in the hope that it will provide a more flexible support for my egg tempera. I keep reading that you shouldn't use canvas for egg tempera as it is too brittle and inflexible, and therefore wood is the best support. As usual, I am stubborn and don't like taking no for an answer. The other alternative suggested was to use canvas on wood, which I have done before, but then speaking to a framer friend of mine, he said, if I keep adding wood to wood, it's just going to get heavier and the point is that a picture should be light. Sigh. Okay, well I should know in the next two weeks if I did the gesso wrong and it cracks. I'm also not sure that it might have little pinholes in it from bubbles in the gesso. 

I was speaking with my niece this morning and she's been drawing pictures of the characters in the Miraculous Tales of Ladybug and Cat Noir. She told me I could find it on youtube, so I watched an episode just now. It's kinda cool. I like the fact that the boy in it is the Cat superhero wearing a skin tight cat suit, instead of the usual catwoman. Here's a link Miraculous Tales of Ladybug and Cat Noir

And the rabbits, well that's the rabbit skin glue. Poor rabbit - why isn't there a vegetarian glue solution!

Two Traditions of Icon Painting

 K Fisher (2016) Mary - Western tradition
  (original fragment of icon by Segna di Bonaventura in the beginning of 14th century and kept in Honolulu Museum of Art)

Before I start to tell you about the Icon Painting course, I wanted to share that my web page on the Society of Scottish Artists is now up and running. You can find it at My SSA Web Page. I hope to update the images during the year as I finish new work. I am quite excited to have another online space.

Part of my plan for this year is to gain more knowledge and experience in the art of egg tempera painting, including different methods to protect and or varnish my work. I was very fortunate in January to attend an icon painting course in Melbourne Australia with Philip Davydov and Olga Shalamova, who are iconographers in Saint Petersburg. Their web page can be found here Sacred Murals Studio.

The course was 5 days long and even better than I had expected. I knew nothing about iconography when I started and felt I had a good grasp of what icons were about and the traditions behind them by the end of the week. I learnt that icons are a focus for prayer and meditation and that while the figures and scenes should be recognisable and painted with love and skill, they should also be abstract enough and not too flashy so as not to detract the focus from prayer. 

The course was logically set out and made more energetic and interesting by swapping between demonstration, painting and lectures in the exhibition space, where the current exhibition included icons painted by Philip and Olga. Both artists were great tutors, being very patient and encouraging and happy to answer the questions I had about their own work and practice.

K Fisher (2016) Looking at classical proportions of face

K Fisher (2016) Drawing in Ochre and Water

K Fisher (2016) Mixing flesh tone using mortar, pestle and egg yolk

K Fisher (2016) Painting tools and pigments

K Fisher (2016) Finalising drawing before green layer

K Fisher (2016) Mary - Eastern (Byzantine) Tradition  (original fragment of icon by anonymous iconographer of the Eastern Orthdox church in last two thirds of 13th century from Chilander Monastery (Mount Athos in Greece))
 

 K Fisher (2016) Mary - Western tradition
  (original fragment of icon by Segna di Bonaventura in the beginning of 14th century and kept in Honolulu Museum of Art)

Street Art - Fitzroy, Melbourne

Just over a week ago I attended a week long icon painting workshop in Fitzroy, Melbourne at the Australian Catholic University on Brunswick Street. I will post more about the course later (which was brilliant I might add!), but for now I wanted to share some of the fantastic street art I came across during one of my lunch time walks. Enjoy!

Silverpoint

I have finally arrived back in Perth, Australia for 2 months after much ado. It's a bit of an adjustment coming from pitch black in the mornings in Scotland to sunshine coming in the window at 4.30am. The weather was perfect the day I arrived - a breezy 27 degrees. Things are now warming up to what they usually are about this time of year. Hot! I've been having a nice time seeing family and watching Tudor Monastery Farm during the day and detective shows in the evening with my parents. I think I may be beginning to become annoying as I imitate Inspector Montalbano's Italian accent and gestures and use the same Mr Fartone joke again and again!

The past few months have been busy with other work so I have only been managing to get into the studio for a few hours each week. Below is my first experiment with silverpoint on a gesso wood panel. I tried shaving coloured pastels and then painting them on lightly. I had to rub most of it off as even a little colour was quite overwhelming. Little did I know I would also rub off half the silverpoint! I kept reading how silverpoint was very difficult to remove once on. So either I didn't apply the ground properly, which I have remedied for the next piece, or it is in fact possible to remove silverpoint and adjust as I go.

K Fisher (2015) Parable Silverpoint on Gesso panel [8" x 8"]

Straffe Artists Contest Edition 2015

Last week I finally finished my painting for the Straffe Artists Contest Edition 2015 (below). I am reasonably pleased with it, except I think there are a couple of things in it that aren't painted as well as I would have liked them to be, such as the text and the 3D of the bottles. These items I definitely need to work on going forward. I am quite happy with the wolf though, as I have struggled in the past to bring animals into a painting and make them look like a concrete part of the whole and I feel that I've finally succeeded with this. If you like my painting, please vote for me by 15 September at http://www.straffeartists.be/gallery.php

K Fisher (2015) De Halve Maan talks Wild [Egg tempera on canvas 1m x 1m]

I've also put a screen shot of the gallery screen so I can keep it for future reference.

A little done...a lot more to do

I am super grateful for all the amazing friends I have. A couple of weeks ago, one of my friend's got free tickets to the Charles Avery talk at Ingleby Gallery. 

Charles Avery - Ingleby Gallery Postcard (Exhibition 29 Jul - 30 October 2015)

Both of us love Avery's work and to have the opportunity to hear him talk about it was fantastic. Obviously a very intelligent and talented artist. To top it off, we then meandered to Waverley Train Station to see his public artwork. Here is an article about the work that my sister happened to send to me a few days ago http://www.edinburghnews.scotsman.com/what-s-on/alien-tree-for-waverley-during-edinburgh-art-festival-1-3843811

Ashamedly, I confess that I interpreted his 'alien tree' as a massive shower, due to the 'strange fruit' appearing like big rotating shower heads and what I took for streams of coloured water. My friend immediately understood it was an 'alien tree' and this week we got to talking whether the Tree of Gondor from Lord of the Rings or the tree in Avatar may have wound its way into the artist's subconscious. 

I also joyfully confess, that while it was a bit naughty of us, we went to another excellent exhibition in Trinity Apse which while it said 'no public access' there were lots of people milling around and free cake, so we thought it was okay to go in. Banana cake superb!

There is just less than 3 weeks to go until my Straffe Hendrik competition painting needs to be submitted. I have finally done the underpainting and am quite worried about painting the text and whether the branding is obvious enough. To be that precise and fine, is going to be a true challenge for me. I can't give you the design yet as that would be telling, but here is a little excerpt of a research photo...who/what could it be of..? 

K Fisher (2015) Straffe Hendrik Research Photo