Paper and Threads

This was an unusual week for Sketchcrawls with my NYC Artist friends.

April 13:  Pat, Benedicte, Melly, and I gallery-hopped in Chelsea - each picking out 1-2 galleries to peruse.  Gwen Diehn was supposed to join us, but she had a foot problem and rescheduled our day together after the weekend. 

We loved an Adolph Gottlieb monograph at Pace Gallery (but not the more recent paintings of bursts) and decided to get together to learn more about his pictographs and to play with and extend his techniques.  I loved the huge B & W Nick Brandt African animal photos at Hasted Kraeutler Gallery and stayed behind to sketch several of his elephants.  You can see 23 of the photos here.

April 16:  We took Gwen on her first walk on the Highline - and after lunch found a beautiful place to sit, talk, and sketch.  This is the first time we saw Gwen since the publication of her new book - The Complete Decorated Journal: a Compendium of Journaling Techniques - which is an expanded combination of her Decorated Page and Decorated Journal.  Pat, Benedicte, Melly, and I are 4 of the new Artist Profiles added to the book.  Here is a photo of me, Pat, Teri, Benedicte, and Gwen.

Pat, Gwen and I sketched the same roofline with a quintessential NYC water tower.

April 18:  Judy, Pat, Benedicte and I met for brunch and the tours of the Whitney collection.  My friend Gail was the docent for the 3rd Floor tour of the Biennial, but we also dropped into tours by other docents on floors 5 and 2.  While waiting for the tour to start, I sketched several Alexander Calder figures from his massive piece called The Circus which is currently on display on the 5th floor.  The link only shows a small portion of this piece.

I love having local friends with similar interests - both art on paper and textiles.  And as I've said before, I would never have met most of them without connecting through our blogs.

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Gertrude, Leo, Michael Stein and Michael's wife Sara were avid collectors of art in Paris during the early decades of the 20th C.   We saw the preview of a new exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art the day before we left for California, and I didn't have time to finish sketches that I did at the exhibit until now.

The Met website presents lots of information about the Steins, highlights of the 200+ works of art, and even a virtual reconstruction video of the rooms and the placement of art on their walls.

My first sketches were from Gallery 1. 

"On October 15, 1904, the second Salon d'Automne (an exhibition of contemporary art held each fall) opened with retrospectives devoted to five artists who were considered among the most relevant for the younger generation of painters: Cézanne, Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, Odilon Redon, Renoir, and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. The impact on Leo was dramatic. Two weeks later he and Gertrude emptied their bank accounts and spent all their spare money on modern art."

I always loved Toulouse-Lautrec's drawings and combined 3 women from the works presented in this gallery.

I wasn't very impressed with early Matisse landscapes in their collection, but saw a little of Matisse's later style in his painting of the Young Sailor I from 1906.

My final sketch was of a very early Picasso nude and head.  I always sketch at least one of his drawings when attending an exhibit or auction preview - so this was an easy decision.

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                                Left to Right:  Benedicte, Me, Teri, Pat

Benedicte, Teri, Pat, Judy and I went to the Museum of Modern Art yesterday to see the new Exquisite Corpses exhibit.  This was a surrealist game of the 1920s and 1930s - initially played by group construction of a sentence. 

The goal of the pictoral form of Exquisite Corpse is to form a picture rather than a sentence. The method for three players is as follows:

• the first player draws the head
• the second player draws the midsection
• the third player draws the legs and feet

Each player folds the paper after finishing the drawing, hiding it from the next player. Usually a the picture extends past the fold just a little bit so that the next player's drawing will join with the first player's.  With more than 3 players, more folded sections are made and the body is divided up differently.

There were only 2 classic examples of Exquisite Corpses in the MoMA exhibit - the rest of the drawings and paintings were deformed-dysmorphic figures by single artists. 

This one was created by Yves Tanguy, Joan Miro, Max Morise, and Man Ray in 1926-7.  If you look carefully, you can see where they folded the paper as they passed it on to the next player.

We were inspired and went to the MoMA Sculpture Garden, to play our own game of Exquisite Corpse - with 4 players (Teri declined and worked in her sketchbook instead). 

         Left to Right:  Me, Judy, Pat, Benedicte (See Judy and Pat's blog entry here and here)

This was the one I started in the first round - with 5 folds.  I did the head and passed it on.  When it went around the circle and returned to me, I sketched the feet.

Here are all 4 created in the second round:

Of course it took us awhile to work out the simple rules - with much laughter - and fun.  We then headed off to lunch and 3 drawing exhibits at the Morgan Library. I love having "art buddies." 

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I am very sad that the Print Studio ended today.  It was an amazing resource for artists/visitors and each of us felt that it was the perfect environment for artistic play.  The Reanimation Library provided the inspiration.  The images that were available in the 35+ shelves of books stimulated so many ideas and the copiers, scanners, and computers with Photoshop software permitted artists to experiment in many different ways. 

I made my eighth 8-page pamphlet book on Monday - this one entitled The Mystique of the Alphabet.  On Wednesday I decided that it was time to do some drawing - and made a book with figure illustrations for me to draw.  On Thursday I added collages to the altered book that I started in the workshop they had several weeks ago.  New friends were made and I shall miss them as we begin withdrawal and catch up on the rest of our life.

Here are the pages from my book entitled "Draw Me."

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I am leaving tomorrow for vacation and will miss the next to the last week of the Print Studio! 

The Museum of Modern Art in New York City has a 6 week Print Studio program to celebrate two new MoMA print exhibits.  There is a work space in the Education Building and the public in invited to come from 12-4PM, every day except Tuesday, to get inspired and create art.  There are 35 shelves of amazing books to use for inspiration - called the Reanimation Library because these illustrated books were orphaned and destined for destruction.  And there is a color copier, scanners, and computers with photoediting software.

I already posted collage pamphlets that I made in the first 2 sessions - and today wanted to post the covers of all 7 collage books that I made to date in 7 sessions.  Each book is 5 3/4 X 7" and has a total of 8 pages - 2 folios stitched together with a 3 hole pamphlet stitch.

Working in the Print Studio is very inspiring and I am able to work very spontaneously and freely using a technique which is relatively new to me - collage.  My idea for a theme develops quickly as I pull a few books and start to examine the illustrations.  I then quickly select more images which support the theme and/or add visual interest to the pages.   My time is spent tearing and gluing paper, stamping, and adding watercolor pencil highlights.   These books are not amazing, but I loved making them. 

Number 1 - Inheritance of Genetic Characteristics.  This clearly originated in my science/medicine background.

Number 2: Images and Colors of Venice.  This Spring is our 3rd visit to Venice.

Volume 3:  Faces

Volume 4:  London - a City I know well.  A page from this book was on the MoMA website yesterday!

Volume 5:  Figure Drawing - another one of my passions

Volume 6: Children

Volume 7:  Blood Cells 

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