Self-portraits

Last Saturday, May 20 2017, was National Drawing Day. I had been planning to do some plein air sketching in Knocksink Woods but there were a few downpours and I also had a birthday cake to make, so the kibosh was put on outdoor drawing. However, while doing my morning ablutions, I was enamoured by some of my curls and decided to do a quick self-portrait before brushing my hair. This is the result:

I have been thinking of doing a regular bout of self-portraits, but just haven't been motivated to start! For a brief period before my daughter was born (15 years ago!) I tried doing a daily self-portrait, but once I became pregnant, my drawing regimen lapsed. But at the beginning of that attempt I think I look a bit tentative about the project of self-portraits in a brand new sketchbook. This charcoal pencil sketch from August 9 2001 has holes speckled on the face because I later used the closed sketchbook as a semi-hard surface when I was piercing holes for bookbinding!

The pencil sketch on August 10 2001 also has numerous holes in it. It took me awhile to figure out what the things were in front of the mirror, then I remembered I was in a different house at the time, the mirror was above the fireplace and they were objects on the mantlepiece.

This pencil sketch is from August 13 2001, and again, because it is at the start of the sketchbook has holes in it. It must have been a warm day because my hair is tied back.

On August 14 2001 I was outside with a mini mirror on the window ledge, and obviously more interested in the fuschia.

On August 15 2001 I was interested in a continuous line, which stylised the drawing.

I remember this taupe t-shirt from Canada with the stylised deer, under one of my favourite items of clothing at the time - a denim shift dress. This pencil drawing is from August 16 2001.

A week later, August 20 2001, I was wearing my denim dress again. I loved my blue fish earrings, a gift from one of my Canadian friends. I lost one, but still have the other.

In this sketch from August 22 2001 I was trying to include a bit more of the room. The image behind me is a sketch of an oil painting of tulips that I had done in 1980. One of my earliest works that is still in existence!

This sketch is also from August 22. I know I was outside with the mini mirror because my glasses have gone dark.

This pencil sketch is from September 19 2001. I was starting not to feel well, but I didn't realise yet that I was pregnant.

By time I did this pencil sketch on October 27 2001, I had let all my family and friends know that I was having a baby. Later I was so grateful that my morning sickness only lasted for the first trimester -- one of my aunts had told me she had morning sickness for 9 months with each of her 5 children... I was never actually sick, but constant nausea all day prevented me from eating anything other than porridge and dried apricots. I remember it well.

On May 14 2002 (a week before my daughter was born) I commented on feeling Yoda-like while I tried to draw!

Lucian Freud Project at IMMA

I went to the Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA) recently to see the Lucian Freud work, which will be exhibited in the Garden Galleries for the next five years. While at the moment all the work is being exhibited as a large collection, I got the impression that over this period that the work may be exhibited in different curatorial permutations, so now was the time to see the work before there was any personal "agenda" attached to it! This etching is Self Portrait: Reflection, 1996. 

I have to admit that I was never particularly interested in Freud's (what seemed to me) hyper realistic painting before, but there is something compelling about seeing a collection of works together. And that I have long been interested in psychoanalysis. And that there is an unmistakable psychological element in his work that definitely is reflective of the work of his grandfather. So the name becomes part of the intrigue, and part of my reason for going to the exhibition. This etching is Bella in Her Pluto T Shirt, 1995.

The basement gallery was devoted to works on paper, mostly etchings. Given my relatively recent interest in printmaking, I was delighted to find the room full of work that was unfamiliar to me. This etching is Girl with Fuzzy Hair, 2004. I thought this print was especially interesting as I thought at first the white highlights in the hair were were created manually when wiping off the plate before going to the press. However, there was another print with similarities and the display included the metal etching plate; the highlighted areas were actually burnished on the plate itself! These burnished highlights in curly hair are a major feat of burnishing brilliance!

There were quite a lot of etching portraits in this exhibition, which had incredible detail and certainly did not speak of flattery; as I said above, something about psychology and the artist's name... This etching is The New Yorker, 2006.

Although most of the basement gallery exhibition displayed images of people, there were several landscapes, which also indicate Freud's meticulous translation of observation. This gorgeously detailed etching is Painter's Garden, 2003-2004.

Grey Box Archive

I was looking for some specific old paperwork last month, and I thought it was in a particular grey file box below the shelves in the stairwell. To my utter surprise the box did not contain the expected paperwork, but instead it was an archive of sketches and small works from the 1980s! 

In 1983 I was experimenting with encaustic and collage and this small piece on board was the starting point for a series of works on paper using cutouts of hands to explore gestures.

During the early 1980s I first started my practice of recording my dreams through both writing and image.

Though I don't remember the specifics of this or the above dream, I know they were dreams that I had while on holiday in Ireland in 1984.

In this sketch I was trying to simplify dream imagery of my home and a ladder that kept appearing in dreams. The home image was apt as my parents had sold the house in Toronto and returned to Ireland.

While on that holiday in Ireland I also did a fair few self-portraits in different styles and different media. This is pen and marker in my sketchbook.

The dressing table in the room where I was staying had a large mirror which accommodated my self-portraiture! This picture is limited watercolour and ink.

Black & White

The facebook page of the Museum of Modern Art informed me that it was Franz Kline's birthday a few days ago, and of course posted a picture of one of his paintings to celebrate. It reminded me of how much I like this painter's work. In general, I have a love for the painterliness of Abstract Expressionism and I think it leaks into my own work, figurative or abstract.

Here is another Franz Kline black and white painting. Is it completely abstract or is it a figure standing on a bridge? Actually, I was taught that "abstract" means "taken from" which is completely different from "non-objective" work that aspires more to music (such as the paintings of Wassily Kandinsky).

The elegy series of Robert Motherwell are another group of abstract paintings using mostly black and white to great effect.

In 1984 I was on holiday in Ireland, visiting my parents, so I was using the minimalist palette of black and white to created postcard size self-portraits. In fact I used old postcards acquired from the local shop of one of my aunts. These two pieces from the series were included in a retrospective show in Wicklow County Buildings in 2005, "Coming of Age: Work from the Past 25+ Years".

I had previously painted a few large pieces (3' x 4') of figures in relation to the canvas solely in black and white, but only the small self portraits have survived from this time period.

At the time, among my music choices was The Stranglers including this song from their album Black & White, "In the Shadows".

I revisited the minimal palette in the early naughties with "There She Goes" a large multi-panelled painting on card. The card panels were painted first with my signature magenta background, which is always allowed to peep through subsequent layers of paint. This piece too was exhibited in the Coming of Age exibition in 2005.

While I love bright colours in my paintings (browns never get a look in), there is also something about the possibilities of limitations which is fascinating. Last year I was completely taken with the Jean Charles Blais exhibition that I saw in Antibes, most expecially the black and white figure paintings.