Research Point 3 - Figures in interiors

19th Century

Berthe Morisot - In the Dining Room
Cultural restrictions of her gender at the time limited what subjects Morisot could paint, in the sense that it was regarded as taboo for a woman of her class to be seen alone in many public places.  So, the subjects she painted were mostly of domestic life, family and friends. This particular one is of her maid servant, neatly dressed, looking alert and ready to serve. However I think the artist had a way of bringing sparkle to an otherwise  mundane subject matter. And despite 'respectable' female artist's limitations, Morisot broke away from conventional realism with her lively painting style. As a member of the Impressionist movement she had her own distinctive style characterised by very loose brushwork
The shape of the picture frame echoes the vertical rectangles, which are the dominant shapes. The largest areas of darkest values are balanced between the upper and lower centre of the fugure's clothes. Dark horizontal lines on the window frames and the wall clock direct the viewer's attention to the central figure. Although there is a lot going on in the background, it looks well balanced. This busy scene has been successfully simplified, I think, because of using the same colours and sketchy brushwork as in the figure, so that it doesn't take over the figure as the focus of attention.. Only the areas of orange and flesh tones are picked out in the fruit and other isolated areas, dotted around randomly. In this way attention is drawn to the little dog at the heels of the figure (maid) by the flesh colour of its only visible ear.

The Dining Room, National Gallery of Art, Washington DC, 1875
No description available

"Berthe Morisot 003" by Berthe Morisot - The Yorck Project: 10.000 Meisterwerke der Malerei. DVD-ROM, 2002. ISBN 3936122202. Distributed by DIRECTMEDIA Publishing GmbH.. Licensed under Public domain via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Berthe_Morisot_003.jpg#mediaviewer/File:Berthe_Morisot_003.jpg

19th/20th Century

Walter Sickert

http://www.wikipaintings.org/en/edward-hopper/sunlights-in-cafeteria

20th Century

Richard Diebenkorn 
Diebenkorn alternated between figure and abstract painting. He didn't want to be associated with any particular art movement, though at different times was associated with Abstract expressionism (earlier work) and the Bay area figurative movement of 1950s and 60s. Heavily influenced by Matisse his depiction of figures in interiors contained plain areas of colour in geometric shapes,  roughly rectangular, quite vivid, one colour often painted over an underlayer of its complementary, parts of which are very often left visible.
 Woman in Mirror - the main spatial relationships in background are formed by rectangular shapes. The triangle occurs at least twice as a secondary shape, of which orange ones lead the eye to the sitter's head and its reflection in the mirror. No two shapes are exactly alike. Horizontal, vertical and diagonal lines combine to lead the eye to the focal point - the woman's reflection. Coffee is constructed in a similar way:
http://www.wikiart.org/en/richard-diebenkorn/coffee
On studying a number of Diebenkorn's figure paintings I was trying to work out how he applied the paint - they are all done in a similar fashion. I tried to emulate it myself in my own painting of a figure in an interior (practicing on some pieces of gessoed scrap paper) but without much success. Some of the surfaces in these paintings, while looking very textured, they don't look raised. I think the texture is created by the way the paint has been applied rather than the thickness of it. I think now, on looking again later on after a couple of weeks have gone by, that he quite possible used a scrubbing motion, scumbling the paint thinly to achieve the parts of the underlayers still visible. For instance the blue over the orange on the dress is greyed down a little as a result. The muted greys and browns at the top and bottom of the frame intensify the more saturated tones next to them. The intense violets, reds and oranges only fill small parts of the whole but have a big impact, especially the reds and oranges juxtaposed against their complementaries.  This also applies to the reds in the painting on the left. In total their is a good balance of shapes, intense and muted tones.
Link to Woman in Mirror - http://paperimages.tumblr.com/post/7810167224/fineartstef-richard-diebenkorn
This blogsite also contains a large selection of other, mostly large, images of the artist's work, showing the brushwork in great detail. Hopefully this will prove useful to me on future attempts.

21st   Century 

Bradley Wood uses thickly textured oil paint in painterly way. Looking closely at the buttery texture of his painted surfaces I get a sense of how much he must revel in the paint’s thick consistency and the process of  moving it around. His enjoyment of the process is almost tangible in the end result.

He paints scenes (either imagined or real?) inside the large houses situated in a neighbourhood of the ‘well to do’ on the  outskirts of New York city.

It is difficult to pick out any one scene which I like the most but these two are intriguing:
I can't find a title for this one or a link that works - frustrating not being able to locate it. I think it must have been removed from the site. That's a pity as I find this one particularly intriguing. Not to worry though, as there are plenty of other paintings equally deserving of close inspection. In this scene however, all I can offer is a description of my own impression of it:
I get an impression of large space from the sharply receding perspective of the borders between ceiling, wall and floor. It is a decadent looking room, in which a sparsely dressed man is standing at a window holding a pet dog or cat under one arm. The other arm is holding up a viewing instrument of some kind - I would guess he possibly spying on his neighbours. Though I can't see it in this painting, in others the artist occasionally uses distorted perspective and the paint is allowed to drip in places.
This more evident in Reclined 2007 -
http://bradleywoodnyc.com/75812/667080/gallery/unavailable-and-some-older-work
 in a darkened room a woman stands near the edge of the picture frame, with a cigarette in hand, looking out of what is suggested as a window, judging by the lace curtain next to her, flapping about in the breeze and the sunlight from the window illuminating her face. Her whole stance suggests someone deep in thought. behind her the room recedes to a wall with two more brightly lit windows. There are some flowers in a vase on the table in the middle of the room at the left of the painting, helping to break up the space and balance the figure on the other side. But I also see a large dark silhouetted shape on the left edge, quite sinister looking - a real air of mystery and suspense.  Throughout this collection of paintings, contours are wobbly giving them a look of fragility.To me, it all adds up to an impression of a surreal and unearthly world, about to melt like warm ice cream.
Detailed views of his many paintings are available on this link:
http://www.bradleywoodnyc.com/
More information also on these:
http://partsgallery.blogspot.ie/2011/10/bradley-wood-oct-12-nov-6.html
http://www.bradleywoodnyc.com/75812/667080/gallery/unavailable-and-some-older-work