Frank Brangwyn

Frank Brangwyn

Wine

circa 1909

    This picture perfectly illustrates the joys of laziness. For some, with the help of alcohol, doing absolutely nothing brings about an amazing feeling of satisfaction - which is what this young worker is experiencing. In his mind he is the epitome of coolness. Consider his gestural swag; his grope around the shapely wine vessel; and the strategically-placed clump of grapes resting in his lap. This man is a modern Bacchus.

     Brangwyn's style elucidates well the theme of drunkenness: his lines and strokes of oil paint literally quiver and drool across the canvas. About to nod off into a solid sleep, the main figure sees everything doubled and swaying to the movement of his own instability. We, too (the viewers), sense this instability as we take in the claminess of his taut body and the rich summer-time haze, typical of late evenings and warm rains and breezes. Brangwyn's works never seem to be entirely dry, but always a bit wet as if just completed. His wine vessel in particular has a lucent quality that almost rivals the infamous jugs of Diego Velázquez.

     These men are rough. Their faces and forearms are burnt with laborious months under the heavy sun while their torsos, having been protected, retain a fresh, pink whiteness. With unkempt hair and sweat-stained clothes they form a picture of the everyday. They exude a completeness, a satisfaction, that is often overlooked in common jobs. 

Tiziano Vecellio

Tiziano Vecellio (Titian)

Ranuccio Farnese

circa 1542

     Not even a teenager, Ranuccio poses like an adult. His stare is important: his eyes, the slight flare of his nostrils and his pursed mouth give the impression that he is overwhelmed with the prospect of what he is posing for, and that it has stupefied him into a slight trance.

      Titian placed the strongest light directly on the boy’s upper half. It accentuates the gleam of his costly, possibly silk, red chemise as well as his fresh complexion. His blushed cheeks and large ears place him in the context of childhood - a stage that, judging by his strict posture and conventional clothing, he has been forced out of too early. The sharp contrast between the high finish of his clothing and the blackness of the background and of his large overcoat could be interpreted as a kind of vacuum: one that is sucking away the innocence and childish spirit from a twelve-year-old who had no choice but to submit to the contorted rules of the ecclesiastical world.

     It is sad to see someone young aged in such a rapid way. For the sake of religion Ranuccio must have been harvested like a seed from birth to assume the title of Cardinal, which happened not long after this portrait was commissioned. One wonders whether he experienced childhood at all.

Károly Ferenczy

Károly Ferenczy

Valér ágyban

circa 1888

     There is something vaguely familiar with this oil painting. The gentle colours and the unbalanced layout remind one of Jean-Édouard Vuillard’s Entrance to the Garden (circa 1903), or his Seamstress with Scraps (circa 1893). Both pictures involve a soft patterned wallpaper set into the background (to give the eye an area on which to rest without distraction), as well as a figure who appears bent over in concentration, not acknowledging the viewer. Ferenczy’s young boy, by contrast, actually faces the viewer but remains in his own world, perhaps in a land of fairy tales judging by the large picture book that dwarfs his small head. The delicate porcelain cow on his side table reflects the daylight on its shiny hide, and its white lustre acts as a small continuation of the whiteness surrounding Valér, like a puff of cloud. Set near the window a similar clump of white is found in Seamstress with Scraps, giving the scene a sense of the outdoors by allowing the sunlight to warm a large portion of the seamstress' interior workspace.

     Notice that the receding position of Valér’s bed guides the viewer’s eye into the back corridor, focusing on the second strong source of outdoor light. Entirely wooden, this interior is made soft by the warm colours of the well-worn carpet and by the plushness of the child’s sheets. Like a tram car, his bed seems to be creeping out the picture frame at a gathering speed, about to enter the land that only children know how to enjoy.

Édouard Manet

Édouard Manet

Le Fumeur

circa 1866

     The focus is on his hands. They are huge, almost too big to be realistic, but their realism is exact. Perhaps their large size and shadowed creases, or the way the fingers seem darkened with years of use, is unappealing to an ignorant eye. But the palpable quality with which Manet imbues the man's thick, leathery skin, and the way the skin seems to draw itself over the individual knuckles and nails as would an old stiff bed sheet over the shape of a lumpy mattress, give this nineteenth century smoker an ironic air: one that is ephemeral but also ever-lasting, and one that blurs any sense of ugliness.

   The man's eyes tell the viewer that he is aware of his existence. Though his plump, bushy beard defies his true age his singed whiskers nevertheless reveal his old habits. This man embodies the transience of his own old age, as well as the permanence of time - a permanence that never falters, even if births and deaths across the globe trickle in and out of its frame of view. The two trails of smoke do not dissipate into the picture's foreground, but deeper still into its background. That which hovers over the cigarette butt is heavy and slow-moving, while the other whisps along quickly with the steady stream of the man's exhaling. These remind one of the relations things have between themselves; that while one thing may move along quickly and indifferently, completely undistracted by its surroundings, another may move slowly and contemplatively. But at their core, as seen with Manet's two wisps of smoke, they could share the same origin. 

Léon Bakst

Léon Bakst

Supper

circa 1902

     This painting exudes more of a feast for the eyes than an actual meal. The paint strokes and colours put together form a visual dessert: from the bulbous, succulent fruit to the woman's elegant allure, everything appears sweet in tone and texture.

     But is all as sweet as it seems? Underneath the folds of the table cloth, whisped about like a soft mousse, seems to be caught a violent wind. Something powerful, possibly deep sentiment, created these folds. Layer upon layer, the structure of this painting resembles that of a many-tiered mille-feuille - not only in composition but in meaning, too. We think that we see a simple scene involving a woman seated at a table, but in noticing subtle details such as her fan or the fallen orange, it becomes necessary to delve beyond this superficial impression. We must question why she bears such confidence in her stature and stare? Why she is dressed entirely in black, but with suggestive curves and tendrils of hair falling against her white neck, leading our eye along the contours of her nearly-naked bosom? And above all, why she sits at an empty table - when that which is in the foreground appears fully set? Question after question we lose ourselves in faint possibilities, and the work inevitably becomes more complicated than it first appeared.

     This is the nature of art, however. If we study it for too long we may lose its original message. Art does not have to be understood in order to be interesting, and it does not have to follow an ideal in order to be beautiful. In this case, Bakst teases us through the woman's curious stare and surroundings, leaving us a bit baffled.

Jean-Édouard Vuillard

Jean-Édouard Vuillard

On the Sofa or The White Room

circa 1890-93

   Pattern dominates this interior space. Though the reclining dark-haired girl sleeps, the walls and cushions and floor-boards flicker with animation. From the left, a cool linear crimson saturates into dull whites and yellows along the sofa's fabric, and the light pink material covering the girl's legs forms the shape of a large wilted petal. The vertically-lined wallpaper behind simulates thin streaks of light, like rays of the sun that seem to pour down at the end of a hot day. Below is the wooden floor: its rectangular panes forming wide zig-zags across the ground like great matching puzzle pieces, some of which are slightly dusty nearer the stubby feet of the sofa. The natural grain and colour of the wood cast the appearance of a miniature railway station, one that is seen from above with all of its little trains parked in parallel slots aside one another.

    To the right of the picture stretches a surface of white wall. It shares similar vertical lines that wash down its side like sheets of heavy rain, but they are more subtle than those of the first. They alternate between bright white and light-blue and -purple strips, much of which appear to be bathed in a strong block of late-day sunlight. The dark brass handle of the door mirrors the dark shadow underneath the sofa, as well as the girl's hair, chemise and the artist's cornered signature. Notice that without the five panels above the door handle the contrasting halves of this scene would not be able to mingle; that without the subtle continuation of the reddish-brown wallpaper into the white surface the picture would seem un-balanced.