Richard Pratt | ATLANTA
Posted: July 12, 2011 Filed under: Uncategorized Leave a comment »CURRENTLY ON VIEW:
Rake
Alan Avery Art Company | Atlanta
June 10 to August 6
Alan Avery Art Company’s summer show features new work from American master wood turner Anatoly Tsiris, and paintings by new gallery artist Richard Pratt. Tsiris’ large scale vessels are created with a unique process. Pratt’s new “Rake” series depicts pure, flat color in modern shapes and lines giving a new perspective of fallen leaves.
NOTES FROM AN OPENING [or two]
Posted: July 12, 2011 Filed under: PAINTING, Uncategorized Leave a comment »“You’ve taken a very traditional genre [landscape painting] and made something new out of it.”
Until I heard this remark in 2008, I had never once given thought to my paintings being landscapes. It’s pretty obvious, however, that paintings of trees and foliage are just that. The remark made me reflect on where I fit in, not necessarily in the world of art or even in art history, but where my images fit in the minds of viewers and collectors.
I have often described my work in terms of the HOW and the WHAT, the HOW of process and technique, and the WHAT of subject matter and the resultant image. It seems that some viewers respond more strongly to one than the other. At my recent opening at Alan Avery Art Company in Atlanta [on view through August 6, 2011], I was surprised that some viewers were fascinated by the way in which I had used Hogarth’s work in the process of painting “A Rake’s Progress.” They were intrigued by the story line hidden within these abstract paintings. Other viewers were more strongly affected by the color, pattern and facture of the paintings.
All of this ties in with what I refer to as the LIFE of a painting. The idea that my paintings disperse into the world and are enjoyed in ways that are independent of my original intentions and personal to a specific view sustains me as an artist and keeps me painting.
“I saw images of your paintings on the gallery website and thought that they were merely decorative, but in person there’s so much more to them.”
I’m grateful that one of the viewers at the Alan Avery opening told me this. It’s easy to forget that digital images are only approximations of artworks, and that in spite of the categorization of painting as two-dimensional art, they are actually three-dimensional objects. [I saw more than one viewer looking at one of my paintings from the side that night.] Paintings require physical presence to be fully appreciated.
Also, it seems to me that for most people the English word DECORATIVE can only have a pejorative meaning in an art gallery. Matisse, when speaking French instead of English, was apparently unashamed to say that his paintings were decoratif. Maybe he knew that it is only natural to drive away the blankness and boredom of an empty wall by painting something to hang on it, something interesting, surprising or decorative.
“I hope that this doesn’t offend you, but I’m thinking of buying this painting for in my kitchen.”
A very nice woman made this comment after enthusiastically viewing one of my paintings. By all means hang a painting where you will get the most out of it. There is nothing more flattering to an artist than the thought that one of his paintings will be nearby during important daily rituals like breakfast.
ART & COPYING ART
Posted: February 28, 2011 Filed under: PAINTING 1 Comment »
ABOVE:
Richard Pratt / GHENT ALTARPIECE AFTER VAN EYCK
51×110 inches [overall] / acrylic on canvas / 1986
I read an essay last week entitled “Why Move On from Illuminations That Haven’t yet Been Understood?” that made me think about some of the paintings I did in the 1980’s. The essay was written by David Levi Strauss and appears in his 2010 collection, From Head to Hand: Art and the Manual. Strauss talks at length about the artist Mike Bidlo who made numerous drawings after Duchamp’s readymade “Fountain.” I liked Strauss’s argument that Bidlo demonstrates “that originality can be as rampant and seemingly endless as the copy.”
The essay made me consider what I was up to in the eighties when I made a study of Renaissance paintings in books and museums, mining them for colors and compositions while at the same time leaving most of the Christian narrative and iconography far behind. It was a personal assertion of art over religion, a way to extract cultural elements that I admired away from a larger culture that I did not. My copies weren’t full copies. There was plenty of architecture, but no saints. By borrowing art forms from the past, I could both celebrate them and take ownership of them.
I painted the above painting, Ghent Altarpiece, After Van Eyck [overall dimensions: 51x110 inches, acrylic on canvas in four panels] in 1986. As Noah Charney pointed out last week in his blog The Secret History of Art on ArtInfo.com, the Ghent Altarpiece has been the most frequently stolen artwork is history, so what better choice for my thieving and rearranging?
Richard Pratt
POST ORIGINATED January 1, 2011
SMALL MUSEUMS
Posted: February 28, 2011 Filed under: ART TRAVEL Leave a comment »
Small museums often provide a quiet and uncrowded refuge where one can slow down, look and think. Here are three favorite examples.
THE NATIONAL MUSEUM of WOMEN in the ARTS
Located in Washington, DC, this museum is privately funded. Walking through its galleries I was repeatedly struck by the fact that every work of art on every wall was made by a woman. The comprehensive collection and the caliber of the work makes the historical dominance of male artists an absurdity.
MUSEO de ARTE de PUERTO RICO
I have visited this museum in San Juan twice. It is small in size, but broad in scope. Most of the artworks on view and the artists who created them were new to me on my first visit there. The museum is home to exhibits ranging from pre-colonial times to the present, and everything in the museum was created by Puerto Ricans. It was interesting to observe the historical parallels with North American and European art movements, especially during the twentieth century. Some of the political artworks are especially powerful. The museum building is impressive and is adjacent to a sculpture garden. The temporary exhibits on both of my visits were amazing.
THE KIRKLAND MUSEUM of FINE and DECORATIVE ART
The artist Vance Kirkland’s collection of 20th century furniture and objects forms the kernel from which this small museum has expanded since his death in 1981. The exhibits have an intimacy that you will not find at MOMA, and Kirkland’s art studio is touchingly preserved as part of the museum. The staff, including the director, are friendly and engaging.
Richard Pratt
POST ORIGINATED January 22, 2011
A RAKE’S PROGRESS Chapter 7: The Third Painting, Take 2
Posted: February 28, 2011 Filed under: PAINTING Leave a comment »
ABOVE:
Richard Pratt / A RAKE’S PROGRESS III: “The Orgy”
48×48 inches / acrylic on canvas / 2011
My third painting underwent several changes during the week following what turned out notto be its completion. The dark bands of color to the right and left of the painting ,as well as the dark green leaves in the center, seemed too much like under-painting to me, and that is exactly what they turned out to be, for I spent this week lightening everything with additional layers of paint.
By lightening the overall tone of the painting, I maintained its familial resemblance to the previous two canvases and established yet another rule for the protocol in this series of paintings.
The lighter colors suggest three skin tones not unsuited to an orgy, even if the participants are still just leaves.
On to the arrest… I hope this time for real.
Richard Pratt
POST ORIGINATED January 20, 2011
A RAKE’S PROGRESS Chapter 6: The Third Painting
Posted: February 28, 2011 Filed under: PAINTING Leave a comment »The third work in Hogarth’s narrative is entitled “The Orgy.” An orgy of leaves immediately leaps to mind and an image of the wind raking the leaves instead of our hapless gardener. The gardener has succeeded in clearing two dark lanes in the painting between which there is a brightly lit swath of leaves and blossoms reveling and exulting in the wind. Our no-longer priapic protagonist departs from the scene, slightly blue.
“The Levee” and “The Orgy” share a complexity and recognizability that isn’t present in the first painting. In order to make the protocol work, I have added another rule: The fourth and the seventh paintings in this series will contain the simpler leaf shape found in the first. On to “The Arrest” and more abstraction.
BELOW:
Richard Pratt / A RAKE’S PROGRESS III: “The Orgy” [unfinished state]
48×48 inches / acrylic on canvas / 2011
Richard Pratt
POST ORIGINATED January 11, 2011
READING: “A Life of Picasso” by John Richardson
Posted: February 28, 2011 Filed under: ART BOOKS Leave a comment »
I purchased the first volume of John Richardson’s A LIFE OF PICASSO in the early nineties when the American edition was first published. I partially read it and, for some reason, set it aside.
Last year I discovered a copy of THE SORCERER’S APPRENTICE: PICASSO, PROVENCE, AND DOUGLAS COOPER, also by Richardson, in one of my favorite bookstores, AVOL’S, in Madison, Wisconsin. The author’s writing style and friendship with Picasso made this memoir about Cooper, an early collector of Picasso’s works with whom Richardson shared a house in the south of France, an engaging book to read.
Late last year I decided to tackle the 3-Volume biography. I am now savoring the third volume and am eagerly looking forward to the publishing of the fourth, and final, volume by its now octogenarian author. These books are wonderful to read. Richardson organizes the information in chronological order within short, often topical chapters. Picasso constantly changes location, relationships and painting styles.
A LIFE OF PICASSO: Volumes 1 1881 – 1906 [1991] ISBN 0394531922
A LIFE OF PICASSO: Volumes 2 The Painter of Modern Life 1907 -1917 [1996] ISBN 0394559185
A LIFE OF PICASSO: Volumes 3 The Triumphant Years 1917 – 1932 [2007] ISBN 9780224031219
A RAKE’S PROGRESS Chapter 5: The Second Painting
Posted: February 28, 2011 Filed under: PAINTING Leave a comment »
Work on the second painting, “The Levee,” is nearly finished. To “levee” in this case means to arise. In the original, Tom has risen from bed and is surrounded, as a gentleman would be, by his various attendants and hangers-on.
I’ve used two distinct leaf shapes here, the smaller ones serving as the cast of characters, the other longer, seed-pod shaped ones suggesting sunlight as it enters the bed chamber. I also decided to paint the protagonist as a white leaf, suggesting desiccation and Hogarth’s ill-fated hero. I also went back and painted one of the leaves in the first painting white, and plan to mark the protagonist in a similar way in each of the following paintings.
There is a protocol for every series of paintings that I paint, and this white leaf has been added to the protocol. These rules help me to refine my ideas as I paint each painting, whereas painting more than one painting according to a protocol helps me expand and exhaust ideas that could never be expressed on just one canvas.
BELOW:
Richard Pratt / A RAKE’S PROGRESS II: “The Levee”
48×48 inches / acrylic on canvas / 2010
Richard Pratt
POST ORIGINATED December 5, 2010
DESIGN: RICHARD PRATT Studio Easel
Posted: February 28, 2011 Filed under: DESIGN Leave a comment »
I originally set up my EASEL WALL for display only. I had a conventional wooden easel that I used for painting, but since I was often making a single painting out of one or more stretched canvases, there was no way to look at them simultaneously on the conventional easel.
The easel wall is eight feet wide and is constructed out of three 32” wide hollow core doors that are held together at top and bottom by lengths of molding screwed into the doors. The whole thing can be taken apart easily and moved if necessary.
After I decided to use the wall for painting, I added a stronger ledge board to support the canvas panels, and later added a second ledge 18” above the original one so that I can raise and lower the painting while working on it. The ledges are waxed so that panels can easily slide from side to side. These horizontal boards also help to brace the easel and hold it together. The easel leans against the studio wall and is supported at the base by concrete blocks. The blocks may be overkill, but I didn’t want any slipping or wobbling while I work. There are also two adjustable lamps attached to the easel that augment the overhead lighting in the studio. The space behind the wall provides extra storage.
Like any good design solution, the function of my studio easel wall evolved over time and I will continue to make modifications to it as needed. Its size, sturdiness and affordability are exactly what I need to do my work. It’s a pleasure to know that I made it myself.
Richard Pratt
POST ORIGINATED November 21, 2010
A RAKE’S PROGRESS Chapter 4: The First Painting
Posted: February 28, 2011 Filed under: PAINTING Leave a comment »
My first painting in the series, “The Heir,” is complete. The leaf shape that I used was incredibly simple, symmetrical and stemless. While working on this first canvas I came to think of the individual leaves as characters in a scene: the crowd at a funeral, the blood ties to relatives, and the protagonist’s father “dropping out of the picture.”
In formal terms, the painting is completely abstract and exhibits the simple color contrast between a rich red and yellow-green.
The strength of my compelling interest in making paintings over the past thirty years has always rested along the boundary between the real and the abstract. Since this particular painting is so abstract, I will probably have to cross the boundary and travel in the opposite direction with the next one in the series.
BELOW:
Richard Pratt / A RAKE’S PROGRESS I: “The Heir”
48×48 inches / acrylic on canvas / 2010
Richard Pratt
POST ORIGINATED November 13, 2010
