Artist Comparison

Holly Thoburn

 

Holly Thoburn was Born and raised in and around London. Holly is said to draw inspiration from “urban city life”. These influences are very noticeable and present in her abstracted paintings, and reflected in her edgy style and use of texture and colour. Her work references an “eclectic mix of street art, graffiti, and the natural decay of urban spaces”.

Information sourced from http://www.artshole.co.uk/hollythoburn.htm

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Holly Thoburn – Metropolis (2009)

 

This work is described as Acrylic and Mixed media on canvas. This piece is Holly Thoburn’s interpretation of street life in London.  The prime coat of this piece is white. Worked into this pure, titanium white is black. To achieve the blended, almost dirty look, thoburn works into the white at different levels of dryness. When working into the wetter surface, both paints tend to mix achieving a blended tone of grey. When working on to a drier surface the black simply layers over the white creating a solid colour.

The layout of this piece is fairly intricate. The abstract nature of the piece means it doesn’t necessarily depict a certain thing but is left to interpretation. However, I believe Thoburn as an artist had a very definite aim with this piece of work. The intricate layers throughout this piece, represent the layers of London. London as a certain has many different aspects, from the business orientated to the crime centred themes.

Colour is scarce in this piece but tone is used excessively. The black, in the top right of this piece creates darkness and I believe this is aimed towards the more negative side of the city. I believe the white scattered throughout the piece represent the more pure parts of the city. The merging of these colours could represent the city’s resilience and its ability to continue to live with all of these aspects merged and how these aspects are merged to create everyday life in London.

The contrast in the piece creates a chaotic feel. Implying chaos up on the city of London. This helps to create an image of London. If somebody were viewing this canvas without ever visiting the city a very negative image is being created for the city.

The use of text in the image is native to the genre of graffiti. This graffiti links the art to the streets of London. This text is almost covered by a very thin layer of paint. Creating an aged theme, in hand creating time within the piece. The acrylic paint is scratched into. This makes the image feel old and damaged emphasizing her aim of creating the “natural decay of urban surfaces”. The paint is also scratched into at different times and therefore different dryness levels. This changes the amount of paint that is removing. Removing this paint reveals layers underneath.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cy Twombly -

 

Cy Twombly was born Edwin Parker Twombly on April 25^th 1928 and died July 5, 2011. Twombly was an American artist well known for his calligraphic style paintings, on to solid simple backgrounds. Twombly’s work has been described to be ‘reminiscent of school blackboards’. Twombly was born in Lexington, Virginia. At the age 12, Twombly began to take private art lessons with Pierre Daura.

After high school Cy Twombly pursued higher education in the form of Darlington School in Georgia and then the School of the museum of fine arts, Boston. After these he attended Washington and lee University. On a tuition scholarship from 1950 to 1951, he studied at the Art Students league of New York. It was during this time he met Robert Rauschenberg, a pioneer of Pop Art, and was convinced to attend Black Mountain College near Ashville. At Black Mountain in 1951 and 1952 he studied with Franz Kline, Robert Motherwell and Ben Shahn, and met John Cage.

Twombly served in the U.S. army as a cryptologist. This has had a huge impact on his work as he translates things present in cryptography into his work. From 1955 to 1959, he worked in New York, where he became integrated in a group of artists including Robert Rauschenberg – with whom he had a relationship. This relationship helped to develop this unique style through influence and working closely together.

 

This is a painted piece by Cy Twombly named ‘Apollo & the Artist’. Twombly had a well-known interest in mythology. I believe the text in both the name and the piece, refer to the god Apollo. Apollo in greek mythology was one of the most complex of all gods, being recognized as the god of light and the sun, truth and prophecy, healing, plague, music, poetry, and more, all at the same time. I believe this piece is loosely based on Apollo. This theme of greek mythology is present in a fair amount of Twomblys work, For example ‘Leda & the swan’. This refers to the Greek heroine Leda, daughter of Thestius.

 

The layout of this work is very simple, with the base layers of the piece being two rectangles. These rectangles are geometrical. Geometrical shapes in visual things are the most prominent and our brain is attracted to them first. By using these rectangles to frame the details of the piece Twombly is creating appeal to the parts of his piece he desires. These appearing to be the text ‘Apollo’ and the image of what appears to be a plant.

On top of this simple layout Twombly has added some very scribbly, almost annotation like marks. The mark towards the bottom of the piece, on the lower rectangle is a scribble that resembles a laurel leaf. Laurel leafs were worn on the head of Apollo in Greek mythology. This use of the leaf shaped mark helps to found my theory of theme.

This could link to my theme of memories because of the huge impact that Greek mythology has had on history and the huge influence it continues to have in our day to day life. A simple example of the influence Greek mythology has had on my life is the use of the laurel leaf emblem employed by the Fred Perry, which I often wear and recognise. This brand is hugely embraced as the Mod brand. And the culture of Mods vs. Rockers in the 60’s is a sub-theme I am planning to explore throughout my sketchbook.

 

Robert Rauschenberg analysis

 

Robert Rauschenberg – Retroactive I (1963)

Robert Rauschenberg who was born Milton Ernest Rauschenberg was born October 22^nd 1925 in Port Arthur, Texas and died at the age of 82 on May 12^th 2008 in Captiva, Florida, United States of heart failure. Rauschenberg’s work is said to have ‘anticipated’ the pop art movement. Rauschenberg has received many notorious awards throughout his life, the main two being ‘The National Medal of Arts’ in 1993 and the ‘Leonardo da Vinci World award of Arts’ in 1995. Rauschenberg was a painter and sculptor well known for his works with mediums such as Photographs, Printmaking and Papermaking. These unorthodox methods were very present throughout ‘The combines’ (works by Rauschenberg) . Rauschenberg made a huge influence with his art style on the movements ‘Neo-Dada’ and ‘Abstract Expressionism’. A few of Rauschenberg’s influences came in the form of Marcel Duchamp, Kurt Schwitters, Joseph Cornell, John Cage and Jasper Johns. Rauschenberg then influenced very successful artists such as Lichtenstein and Warhol in the Pop art genre.  

This is a collage piece by Rauschenberg Named Retroactive I. This piece was created in 1963. Its creation began before President Kennedy’s assassination. Rauschenberg initially decided to scrap this piece but once news came through of the Presidents assassination Rauschenberg decided to rework the piece as a memorial and tribute to Kennedy’s death. Rauschenberg aspired to create art of the every day. Alongside the use of the recently deceased president there are a lot of things within this piece that relate to the current events of the time. One of the most obvious being the astronaut in the top left corner. With the race to the moon hot on everybody’s lips in the late 60’s this topic deserved insertion. Not to mention Kennedy’s aspirations to achieve this. Rauschenberg said “I was bombarded with TV sets and magazines, by the refuse, by the excess of the world… I thought that if I could paint or make an honest work, it should contain all of these elements, which were and are a reality.”

 

 

 

This piece is and Oil and silkscreen ink on canvas 213.4 x 152.4cm. The layout of this piece like many of Rauschenberg’s pieces is very simple and consists of almost separate sections. These sections are very quadrilateral in shape, although irregular. This irregularity combined with the size difference helps us to link the images together in order of importance. The rectangle including John.F.Kennedy is the largest in size and most central. This layout helps us distinguish him as the main element of the canvas. The second largest element is that of an astronaut in space. These both link to the current events of the time. The block containing Kennedy is in blue key and printed on to silk. There is then another box on the left, slightly below the vertical middle containing a selection of fruit.

 Shape is used to great effect within this piece. The anatomy of the piece is very simple and effective because the more intricate organic shapes such as the Kennedy gain prominence within the piece and are then highlighted by the geometrical rectangles. The piece of the work the eye of the viewer is attracted to first is the portrait of Kennedy because of the shape and also because of the vibrant blue, which contrasts with the duller images and highlights it. The central positioning emphasizes this with the use of the rule of thirds. This makes this work as a memorial piece incredibly effective.

 This could link to my theme of memories because of the amount the current events, starring in this piece have gone down in history. The theme of memories can be taken in several directions. In this instance it would be that of impersonal, historical memories. This could be a very interesting direction to take the theme in.