Painting the Euganean Hills in Italy

About a year ago I travelled to the Euganean Hills near Padua to draw and paint a landscape that had been commissioned by the writer Myra Robinson. I knew Myra was thinking of leaving this beautiful and fascinating area and the painting was to be a reminder of the hills for her home in England. Myra has a discerning eye for sure and I wanted to do her hills justice.

Travelling to Italy to do a landscape painting has, luckily been an habitual pleasure for me over the years yet I arrived in a slight state of anxiety because with commissions there are always a few unknowns that go with the process of selection and creation.

The first of those is that usually the particular view to be painted has not yet been chosen. It’s been discussed but only generally as a location and so there’s a chance you might find a view that doesn’t quite hit target. With Myra these concerns soon fell away as we drove across the hills on a recce to see her chosen locations. I needn’t have worried. They were all visually magical.

As Myra describes in the latest edition of Italy Magazine “My painting would not be the landscape typically thought of as “Italian,”… In my area — glorious Petrarch country — volcanic hills with vineyards on south-facing slopes and chestnut trees facing north cluster around deep green valleys interspersed with small villages, each with its own bell tower. It’s an area of rare wild flowers and butterflies where time stands still..”

The weather as always plays its part in the drama. I need the action to be lit just so to be able to draw the chosen view a number of times without getting blown away, drenched or burnt. That has to happen at the right time of the day as the light changes quite quickly and the principal elements and tones adjust accordingly. The dramatic space between a foreground tree and the sheer drop behind it can change as quickly as a cloud floats by making it all look as flat as a pancake.

As part of the deal I hand-delivered the painting myself. It involved a long train journey with many opportunities for damage along the way. Even though it was well-wrapped it was still a fragile object and a stray prod from a foot on the Underground or a random poke from a man with a pole could wreak havoc. I imagined arriving at my destination with a torn piece of parcel paper and a wooden shard of broken frame. I visualised something similar to Laurel and Hardy in “The Piano”.

Thankfully the painting arrived completely intact and she loved it.

Read the story of the commission in ItalyMagazine

https://www.italymagazine.com/featured-story/what-its-commission-italian-landscape-painting-today

Auerbach at the Courtauld until 27 May 2024

‘The Charcoal Heads’ opened a few weeks ago at the Courtauld gallery in London. The exhibition is a small presentation of a series of large-scale drawings in charcoal by Frank Auerbach made during his early years as an artist in post-war London.

It’s absolutely worth visiting these works to experience them in the flesh, so to speak, in order to really see the intense level of enquiry and determination to get the image that he was happy with onto the paper. They’re full of corrections, gouges, tears and rubbings that reveal the scars and patches of their making. They are a moving encounter with the models who were so close to him and would continually sit for him during the period.

It’s tempting for me to try to read significance into these images based on what I know about Auerbach and the historical context that they were made in, just after the war in blitzed out London. They’re dark and heavy. They are intense studies. There’s no eye contact with the viewer in any drawing except for the self-portrait image used on the poster. The heads emerge out of the blackness and exist in their space, lost in thought. Or maybe not lost at all? I guess we’ll never know or maybe we don’t even need to know. Powerful stuff. Just great.

“Although we may be stimulated by works of art we make our pictures from living sensations. The aim of painting is this: To capture a raw experience for art.” Auerbach

A show spread over two rooms of 17 drawings and 6 paintings. Until 27 May.



Frank Auerbach Self-portraits in London until 14 July

‘I didn’t find actual formal components of my head all that interesting when I was younger, smoother and less frazzled. Now that I’ve got bags under my eyes, things are sagging and so on, there’s more material to work with.’ - Frank Auerbach

There’s a unique show of 20 self-portraits by Frank Auerbach currently on at Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert gallery in St.James’ London until 14 July.

If you like scratches, scribbles, dry brush marks, colour, erasing and layered gestural brushstrokes then this is for you. For me this is no disappointment and as ever seeing it in reality exceeds anything in a photograph.

Manifestations of life. “Sensations…congealed…cohered…out of the battle into being…”

#auerbach #frankauerbach #selfportraits #painting #vilarrubi #julianvilarrubi #inspiration

Soutine | Kossoff in Hastings

In the top rank of my all time favourite painters is Chaim Soutine who died in 1943, aged 50. Amazingly, Hastings Contemporary in East Sussex have curated a show of Soutine paintings paired up with work by Leon Kossoff on right now and running to September 2023.

I would never have predicted this could happen outside London but it has and it is colossal. If you are turned on by the possibilities of oil paint in portraiture and landscape painting then this is a must see.

This show has quite rightly been gathering some excellent reviews in the quality papers and journals. Waldemar Januszczak | The Sunday Times review | 30.04.23 wrote Soutine “was to painting what Lionel Messi is to football or Mohammed Ali was to boxing: a high speed perfectionist of remarkable dexterity.”

I remember the first time I saw a Soutine. It was a a visual punch 🤛 in the gut similar to the first time I saw a Frank Auerbach painting used as the artwork for the cover of Japan’s Oil on Canvas album (which someone had casually left lying around in the studios where I did an art foundation course in 1983).

The first Soutine I saw was in the Tate Gallery collection (as it was known then) on a visit in the early 80’s. It was Landscape at Céret, oil on canvas 56 x 84 cm 1920-21. The Tate have 3 great paintings by Soutine.

The tate.org.uk site writes…

‘Soutine’s handling of paint conveys an agitated, frenetic quality, suggesting a confrontation with the earthy forces of nature.’

‘Inspired by classic painting in the European tradition, exemplified by the works of Rembrandt, Chardin and Courbet, Soutine developed an individual style more concerned with shape, color, and texture than representation, which served as a bridge between more traditional approaches and the developing form of Abstract Expressionism.’

I went on to write my final year dissertation on Soutine at university for my fine art degree. As part of my research I went to the Musée de l’Orangerie in Paris to absorb their collection of his work and then visited and stayed in Céret itself on a soak up the vibe and follow in the footsteps mission.

I have never seen so many quality paintings by Soutine gathered in one place. This, I am sure will not happen again for a very long time. Feast your eyes and senses.

The show runs to 24 September 2023. Read the reviews 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻 ⭐️ ⭐️⭐️ (The Financial Times, The Sunday Times, Studio International) and see, probably a once in a lifetime outstanding show.

Soutine (1893-1943)

Leon Kossoff (1926-2019)

@_art_on_sea

#soutine #chaimsoutine #ceret #landscapepainting #dekooning #auerbach #rembrandt #goya #chardin #bacon #painting #landscapepainter #painter #inspiration @tate @museeorangerie #oiloncanvas #japan #courbet #gustavecourbet #leonkossoff #hastingscontemporary #soutinekossoff

Soutine

Groupe d’arbes. Oil on canvas 1922 Le petit pâtissier Oil on canvas C 1927

Leon Kossoff

Sally in an Armchair No.1 oil on board Christ Church, Spitalfields 1989

Pass the peas

Josh Lilley Gallery in central London has, until today been showing an exhibition devoted to Patrick Caulfield called ‘Pass the Peas’.

I am a long time fan of Caulfield’s work. I have always loved the seemingly simplistic detachment and matter of factness of his images, the compositions, colour choices, the editing of content and the meticulous process in the execution.

Pass the Peas “comprises works on paper, paintings and sketchbooks from his archive, together with a selection of significant paintings loaned from important collections within the UK. The presentation considers the shaping of an artist whose work so often played with reality and illusion, and for whom restraint, conceptually and formally, was fundamental to practice. As an artist with a renowned ability to reconcile society and solitude, this intimate reappraisal reflects on how Caulfield’s philosophy and approach guided his creative methodology and output; providing a deeper understanding of Caulfield’s subconscious, his energy, and his sense of humour as a painter of modernity.”

“The exhibition’s title, Pass the Peas, comes from a 1968 Western film The Stalking Moon where Gregory Peck’s character considers how the mundane can simultaneously be extraordinary, and how seemingly insignificant details function to punctuate our existence. In Caulfield’s work, we see tools or vessels to elicit a certain feeling – a vase, a wine glass, a room as a site of comfort or of containment. Whilst posing as simple, functional devices, they are much more than the sum of their parts – details which open up worlds of aspiration and inspiration. It is these details, motifs and symbols which are highlighted in the remarkable archival works.” Josh Lilley website

Patrick Caulfield 1936- 2005

Images below by Caulfield

Top: Home (design for Formica mural) ink on paper and collage 96.5 x 93 cm

Bottom: Untitled (pint of Guiness) 22.8 x 30 cm

L’arbe de Vence France

I was curious to see what might have become of Soutine’s L’arbe de Vence, an oil painting he made in 1929. It’s one of my favourite Soutine paintings. It was only when I saw it at the exhibition Soutine|Kossoff recently at Hastings Contemporary that I wondered how the actual tree was faring these days.

“According to legend, this ash tree was planted in 1538 on the orders of Francis I of France, to thank the citizens of Vence for hosting his delegation during negotiations for the Treaty of Nice with Charles V of Spain. A tourist attraction in Soutine's day as now, the venerable ash has … a strikingly individual character. As with his portraits of this period, he shows us an immediately recognizable likeness, the branches dark against vivid blue. Painterly experiment is mostly confined to the trunk of the tree, across which we see a play of blue, yellow and red, while the circular bench below is a lustrous Soutine green.” Notes from Hastings Contemporary wall panel at the exhibition Soutine|Kossoff. The painting comes from a private collection.

Looks like it’s doing very well. The bench has gone though.

Photo on left courtesy of ©️Google 2023

The path to the sea, Costa Brava, Spain

I’m working towards a show of paintings later this year (details to follow) and have been focusing on some of the material I gathered last summer on the Costa Brava in Spain. One particular view is of a path down to the rocks discovered by accident even though I’ve been near here many times before. I loved the light and the colours but also the way as you approach the distant obscured scene begins to reveal itself. The images are my on-site responses that will inform my studio-based paintings of this view.

Mixed media A3

Mixed media A2

Hampstead heath commission

Hampstead Heath and I go back to the late 80’s. I’d often go there for a blast of air after the clutter, noise and confinement of Camden Town, where I lived in those days. The Heath is great for views, for swims, walks or picnics. Lots of things happen there.

Over the years I’ve walked, drawn and painted Hampstead Heath many times. A favourite view is of the entrance to the Heath from South End Green. Standing across the road from the train station looking over to the avenue of trees invitingly sweeping you in is a view I love and I’ve worked with quite a few times. I once did an enormous blue winter version of the trees and that is now in a Swiss collection.

I have just completed and delivered a private commission of this very view that measures 34” x 48”.

If you are interested in discussing a commission of a particular place please contact me via the email link in the ‘Contact’ page of this site.

Bowie and Auerbach

We’ve been lucky this year for exhibitions of Frank Auerbach’s drawings, prints and paintings. There was an excellent show at Newlands House Gallery in Petworth ‘Frank Auerbach: Unseen’ that explored the evolution of his practice with a collection of over 65 works.

There are some crackers, including a new self-portrait painting from last year in the current exhibition at Gagosian in Mayfair ‘Friends and Relations’ running to 28 Jan 23.

Still on, just, is the superb show ‘The Sitters’ at Piano Nobile in Portland Road, Holland Park W11 until 16 December.

For a minute I had entertained the notion of not going to see this one. I’ve been looking at Auerbach for 40 years, travelling from the north to London to see exhibitions many times. Perhaps I felt I knew his work? Did I really need to see more? In addition to that Holland Park’s off my beaten track when I’m in London. However, I knew that was ridiculous and of course I went. I’d walk a long way just to see one Auerbach.

This exhibition, and I had it all completely to myself, reminded me, and I need reminding often that although painting can be a pain to produce, it is difficult, maybe not even enjoyable, certainly not relaxing, it reminded me that paint has the ability, sometimes of transcending it’s basic state of matter and can excite and engage on a profound level.

I hadn’t seen many of these works as they were from private collections so that added to the experience and this show includes several incredible self-portrait drawings.

One of the paintings in this show, illustrated below used to belong to David Bowie. In 1998 Bowie told the New York Times, "My God, yeah - I want to sound like that looks," in response to the work of Auerbach.

‘Somebody I like very much indeed is Frank Auerbach. I think there are some mornings that if we hit each other a certain way - myself and a portrait by Auerbach - the work can magnify the kind of depression I'm going through. It will give spiritual weight to my angst. Some mornings I'll look at it and go, "Oh, God, yeah! I know!" But that same painting, on a different day, can produce in me an incredible feeling of the triumph of trying to express myself as an artist. I can look at it and say, "My God, yeah! I want to sound like that looks." I find his kind of bas-relief way of painting extraordinary. Sometimes I'm not really sure if I'm dealing with sculpture or painting. Plus, I've always been a huge David Bomberg fan. I love that particular school…’ (David Bowie, Interview with Michael Kimmelman, The New York Times, 14th June 1998).

I love the idea of Bowie, enjoying his first coffee of the day, standing bleary-eyed in his dressing gown, on whatever floor of his high-rise apartment in Manhattan, looking at and contemplating his Auerbach. Those oozy blobs of colour, the squiggles and deep crevices of paint almost about to slide off the surface are the triumphant result of so many things. The image appears suddenly as a beautiful chaos that makes sense, every element playing its part in support of the whole.

Frank Auerbach Head of Gerda Boehm

oil on board 44.5 by 37cm. 1965.

Detail of Head of Gerda Boehm

LuCian Freud centenary

There’s probably never been a better time to really get to grips with Lucian Freud’s work in the flesh than now. In London there are currently a number of shows dedicated to his work, or facets of it, brought together from both museums and private collections to celebrate the centenary of his birth, thus enabling you to complete your own accurate survey of his oeuvre. Many of these exhibitions are in commercial galleries and so are free to visit.

For me he’s fascinating for his meticulous approach, in all its many ways, to making work. For example, how is a painting put together? Get up really close to one of the paintings and actually see the brushwork and how it’s been organised. Quite astonishing. 👀 This level of detail is missed through reproduction.

Above: My pen drawing of Freud’s “Double Portrait,” (1985-86, oil on canvas) and “Pregnant Girl” 1960-61.

Links to shows currently showing Lucian Freud work: @nationalgallery @freudmuseum @gardenmuseum @gagosian @ordovas @hazlitthollandhibbert

Hauser & Wirth Menorca

Last week I found myself near Mahon on the Balearic Island of Menorca. Hauser and Wirth Menorca is a stunning gallery and education centre with a cantina in the natural setting of Illa del Rei, an island in Mahon harbour.

H&W run a ferry out and back from the island. You need to book online. The current exhibition is Rashid Johnson ‘Sodade’ running to 13 Nov.

This is a must do visit. Really! Apart from the exhibition you can have a ramble about the island and intermingle with the outdoor sculpture trail featuring work by Chillida, Bourgeois and Miró. When it gets a bit tiring and hot there’s the cantina to take the edge off. Perfect, no?

Sussex square linocut series

I’m in the process of making a new series of prints based on the architecture of Brighton. I’ve been a little bit lax with this particular cut of Sussex Square. I cut the lino in 1998 and I’ve only just recently started to print from it properly. Each print is hand printed so they’re all in different colour formats yet using the same piece of lino. There will be a max of 25 prints in the run and they are printed to order, numbered, signed and mounted.