Response from individual artists for TheGreatNude Invitational has been huge! We’re now looking for “artist representatives” to manage several groups of artists. Curate a room at the event from our pool of applicants, handle sales at the event May 13-16, and provide art management in exchange for commissions paid directly by the artists to you. Contact us!
Friday, February 12, 2010 marked the opening for Chelsea Gallery, Rogue Space‘s show, Valentine’s Nude Workshop. The gallery featured a wide range of mediums with the figure as theme, with some artists from Barebrush.com. During the show, behind a private curtain, live drawing sessions were taking place. Inside the low-lit room were two models, striking a series a three different poses per session. In addition, TGN was able to judge the artists works from after the event.
TGN publisher Jeffrey Wiener talking with some Barebrush artists.
The following day TheGreatNude.tv publisher, Jeffrey Wiener gave a speech at the gallery on empowering artists through technology, digital marketing and social media. Make sure to check out the TGN site for more info on upcoming events, including our Great Nude Invitationals, and to see are our four favorite artist’s sketches posted online from the event.
http://www.thegreatnude.tv/rogue-space/
TGN publisher Jeffrey Wiener judging works from the contest.
TheGreatNude Invitational - May 13 - 16, The Roger Smith Hotel
Due to the great amount of interest in TheGreatNude Invitational, we have rescheduled the event at The Roger Smith Hotel for May 13 – 16, 2010 – allowing for the participation of some great artists and galleries, and making this event truly exciting for the Figurative Arts community. Check the site for new information and regular updates at www.thegreatnude.tv/invitational
Artists Odd Nerdrum, Richard T. Scott, Scott Goodwillie and Adam Miller have joined the exhibition, along with a number of galleries representing some of the world’s most well-known figurative artists, including Forum Gallery.
In addition, we are pleased to announce that Peter Trippi, editor of Fine Art Connoisseur Magazine and renowned art critic Donald Kuspit, have joined our Host Committee. Click to Read More>
Galleries, Curators, Artists Groups & Art Schools who wish to exhibit at the Invitational will be happy to know about several new developments. Early payment Discounts available. Click to Read More>
Sincerely,
Jeffery Wiener
Publisher, TheGreatNude.tv
Now showing at the Metropolitan Museum of Art until April 18, 2010 is the first ever show dedicated solely to Agnolo Bronzino, the Italian Mannerist
. With almost sixty drawings from the artist, , some never before seen, the exhibition helps to shed light on an artist whose name is familiar to many, but whose depictions of the form may still be unfamiliar to viewers.
The show is put together with the help of the Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe degli Uffizi and the Polo Museale Fiorentino, Florence and encompasses a refreshing take on the figure. Although the drawings are done largely from a scholastic standpoint, making excellent reference of the figures musculature and positioning, the works read as soft, delicate and emotional. Bronzino’s take on the figure is not only refreshing, but raises the question of how a figurative artist of his caliber escaped the public eye for so long.
Seated Nude Youth Playing Panpipes, red chalk, 1530-32
Seated Male Nude Youth, black chalk on gray-blue prepared paper, 1540-41
Throughout his career, Rembrandt took on a select group of students and taught them the techniques that he had spent his life perfecting. Because of the numerous works born in the academic environment that he created, many of the works are today disputed over whether the works came from Rembrandt or from one of the students, influenced by his style.
That is exactly what the show titled Rembrandt and his Pupils showing at the Getty Center until February 28th set out to show. Using a series of comparative techniques, the exhibit helps to explain the difference between a work of Rembrandt and of the fifteen pupils shown in the exhibit. Showing just over one hundred works on paper the collection highlights the brilliant simplicity in the work created between Rembrandt and his pupils.
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Seated Female Nude, Rembrandt, 1661
Here’s an appropriate use of the figure in advertising! The FX show Nip Tuck advertising campaigns have consistently used the figure in classic poses, but with one that captures the reality of one of the United State’s largest businesses; plastic surgery. The billion dollar industry operates under the promise of allowing men and women the opportunity to aesthetically reverse time. The shows advertisements give us glimpses into that mentality, showing it from a first person view, but critiquing the industry in the process. The images used in the show’s advertisements build around the social commentary of plastic surgery but stand as commercialized uses of the figure, as well as being reflective of timeless posing.
Caption holder
In one advertisement the figure dramatically contours her body accentuating the thinness of her waist. Her weight is supported primarily on the operating table as she balances herself on the thighs of her doctors. Another shows an angelic figure, fallen in the desert, her wings cut from her body, suggesting the once angels desire to sacrifice her gift of wings in exchange for proximity to achieving the ultimate standard in human beauty. The third image was taken by David LaChapelle, an artist once found in the pages of Vogue, now producing pieces that could be considered commercially inspired. In this photo we see a the surgeons reproducing Venus de Milo on a live human form. The live model wears swimwear with wavy blond hair and over-sized sunglasses, looking as if removed from a Florida beach. The superficial elements of the subject as an individual are hinted on, but not overtly emphasized.
An angel having just removed her wings through plastic surgery in an effort to achieve the human standard of beauty
Taken by David LaChapelle this photo shows a woman trying to emulate the Venus de Milo in an effort to achieve a greater degree of beauty.
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Other modern users of the nude form are harder to distinguish in terms of what their objectives are. One such advertiser is The United Colors of Benetton who frequently challenges our conceptions of race and social boundaries. More often than not Benetton seems to generate critiques that their advertising is more shock value but the idea that Benetton might be conveying a social commentary coded in metaphor above our comprehension levels remains. One of their ads features a Caucasian newborn ready to be nursed by am African American woman, her head out of view. Another features a wall of multiple portraits of men and women’s genitals; imagery that would be more likely to be seen in a gallery than with a commercial advertier. One thing is clear through viewing Benetton’s advertising; that there is a purpose for its symbolic value, even if that reason is strictly to generate sales.
When most people are asked to describe an artistic genius, Picasso is often cited as an example. In addition to his undeniable creative talents and the large body of excellent work produced in his lifetime, his whole career appears to have been a successful strategy of exploration and risk-taking at just the right moment in history.
Picasso moved through many periods during his career; some of them depending heavily on the use of the figure, and others where the human form is broken down into nearly unrecognizable shapes. The widely varying phases of Picasso, if positioned anonymously next to each other, could easily be seen as the works of completely different artists; not only aesthetically, but in tone and subject matter as well. His life’s work reflects the desire to understand the essence of humanity and to relay it back to us.
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Blue Nude. Oil on canvas, 1902
Les Demoiselles d'Avignon. Oil on canvas, 1907
Crouching Nude. Oil on canvas, 1954
Having been a contributor to the New York art world for over 130 years The Art Students League offers a rich history since its creation in 1875. Although the ASL is probably best known for producing celebrated artists in figurative drawing, it retains an informal environment where anyone of any skill level is welcome to attend. Its creation came out of necessity when a National academy instructor was unable to continue teaching due to lack of funds and joined The Art Students League. Within a decade of their opening the facility saw enrollments grow and boasted instructors such as William Merritt Chase and TGN favorite Kenyon Cox.
Over time the school amassed an impressive body of work and offered classes in many new styles of drawing. That’s exactly what their show, Drawing Lessons is all about. The show was initially held in October in New York but is now showing in Houston. Showing their collection of early academic drawings the collection includes the work of students of prominent ASL artists. Whether thoroughly versed in the figure, hoping to observe the techniques of early masters, or curious to figurative techniques used over the last one hundred years, the wide collection of artists and approaches to the figure proves to not only be an impressive collection, but shows the path that figurative art inside the Art Students League has taken.
Johnson, Academic drawing, undated, vine and compressed charcoal on Michallet paper, 24 ½ x 18 ½ in. Student of George B. Bridgman. PERMANENT COLLECTION, THE ART STUDENTS LEAGUE OF NEW YORK.
Walter Marshall Clute (1870-1915), Academic drawing, February 7, 1894, vine and compressed charcoal on Michallet paper, 24 ¼ x 18 ½ in. Student of H. Siddons Mowbray. PERMANENT COLLECTION, THE ART STUDENTS LEAGUE OF NEW YORK