Art and Eye

  There is so much detail that the eye could take in, yet there is so much empty space. This is foregrounded by Giorgione's precise rendering of multiple textures. The shine of the armour almost glistens as though the paint is still wet, and would have fitted with the chapel display beside a window, which also corresponds with the shadows of the figures. The dress of Saint Francis suggests weight and mass, especially as the arms of his clothing drape down to articulate his gestures. These realistic folds are repeated in the velvet, crimson draperies of the Virgin who sits atop the extreme vertical of her throne. Her weighted clothing has Northern European connotations akin to the works of van Eyck or Antonella da Messina. Texture extends to the drooping standard that Saint George wields, and also to the rendering of the naturalistic landscape behind the figures. The trees on the far right of the piece really could be bending in the breeze. Finally, there is architectural texture, m...

As the only major oil painting by Rossetti to feature a nude figure, the eye of the male, Victorian consumer would settle on the sumptuous body of Venus. Only the highly conservative critic Ruskin seemed particularly repelled by Rossetti's representation. Though appalled by the sexual tones of the piece, he was perhaps too puritanical to voice the precise subject of his complaint, instead focusing on the flowers; 'awful in their coarseness'. Victorian society in the mid nineteenth century was well acquainted with the ability of flowers to evoke sensual symbolism. Floriography, or the study of the Language of flowers was a common interest. Equally by 1865 the sexual system of plant classification was also common parlance, thus eroticising flowers in the eyes of many viewers. Rossetti has amplified these tendencies in the honeysuckles right in the foreground of the picture plane - according to David Bentley they are nothing if not representations of 'sexual organs'.  ...

  Upon the advent of perspective in Quattrocento Florence, the eye of Donatello fixed on the use of one point perspective, echoing many other artists of the time. In this extremely tender relief of the Virgin and Child, the artist is using Brunelleschian principles to render space effectively. The two figures are contained within a well proportioned, box-like space - instead of the complicated perspectival backgrounds artists were often rendering at this time (Ghiberti's bronze doors of the Florentine Baptistery for instance), here there is no distraction from the intimate family moment. Our eye, using the orthogonals of this box, is concentrated on the faces of the Virgin and Christ, and to their inseparable, unblinking connection.  Donatello pioneered the technique of riliveo schiacciato which is expertly shown in this piece. This was a flattened relief, a system of carving creating effects through minute variations of surface modelling and extremely shallow cutting. Forms s...

  In many ways this portrait seems conventional to the eye. The flattening, dark background, the three quarter length view, the wandering gaze of the sitter - all are common tropes in sixteenth century portraiture. Equally, the dress of the sitter is of the time, showing off his patrician status, his jewels but also his refined nature as his black jacket melts into the background. However, the mastery of Titian means that this piece quickly deviates from convention. Titian had already pioneered the use of the parapet in portraiture; Man with a Quilted Sleeve in London's National Gallery painted ten years prior to the piece above, is the prime example of a figure encroaching in on our space and twisting elegantly towards us. Here the unknown sitter leans on a similar device, allowing the painting to extend into our space so it is not such a flat design. The artist has used this device to also place his signature on the piece, and thus stamp his artistic authority.  The origins ...

Although the piece is dominated by nature, my eye picks out a human element. The viewer is positioned far away from the scene, separated from the hill by what could be a large snowdrift, part of the mountain, or even some sort of avalanche of white on the left side of the print. But the three stooped figures are still visible. Hiroshige's eye for detail - look at the snow covered backs of the figures for instance - emphasise their suffering and slow movement through the harsh elements. They have been battered by nature, literally stooping under its weight. The only break in the snow is made by these figures and their tiny footprints. The crunch of fatigued feet is almost audible to the viewer as the figures make slow progress up and down this landscape. Hiroshige's use of a blue coat for the figure heading down the slope serves to highlight the sprinkles of snow on their back. None of the figures are recognisable, their faces covered, allowing the viewer to further empathise wi...

  My eye is drawn to an overall sense of darkness. The monochrome palette made up of charcoal and pastel sucks the viewer in, plunging them into the canvas and echoing the title of the piece. This is foregrounded by Johns' stencilling of the word Diver on the bottom left hand corner of the piece, barely visible against the murky colours. The capitalisation of the word seems like a warning - do not be pulled under. Diver has been interpreted to be Johns paying homage to the suicide of Hart Crane, an American poet who jumped overboard a ship in the 1930s, his body never being recovered. With this interpretation in mind, both the dark colour palette and warning label below the anchor shape depicted are even more emotionally effective.  If Johns is referencing Crane's suicide, he takes the human element of the painting further. Johns said that he wanted to convey the idea of a 'swan dive' through this depiction. Despite an overall darkness, there are graceful movements to t...

  The eye-opening exhibition of woodcuts by artist Helen Frankenthaler at Dulwich Picture Gallery from 15 Sept 2021-18 April 2022 encouraged a closer look by the eye at this often neglected medium. Obvious images that come to mind from the word 'woodcut' might be associated with Albrecht Durer or the works of the German Expressionists. But Frankenthaler goes a stage further, giving her woodcuts a radical yet beautiful twist, as the title of the exhibition so aptly described. Right at the start of the exhibition, the eye is engulfed by Freefall.  Already the name of the piece resonates with an amateur studying woodcuts; the viewer plunges themselves into the abyss of this relatively underexplored medium, freefalling into the mind of the artist herself. The title also implies a freedom of expression. As a prominent second generation Abstract Expressionist and pioneer of the colour-field painting technique, Frankenthaler's better-known paintings tend to evoke a feeling rather ...