The "retina-burn" factor

[Marcus Lim]

Hi, this is an interesting thread that, pulled out something i kept at the back of my head for a long time.
For me, a couple of artworks came into my mind immediately when i read this thread:
(1)Frederick Hart's Ex Nihilo sculpture which now sits on the doorway of National Cathedral in Washington DC (i think)

(2)Nikolai Fechin's portraits

These works are amazing! Wow...even till today, i'm still thrilled by them!

[Steven Sweeney]

In Robert Genn's most recent newsletter, he includes the observation:

The obvious is enchanted by the hidden.

That taps into what I was getting at earlier, about depth, and different levels of a painting.

And it called to mind a self-portrait by Rose Freymuth-Frazier, which was just mentioned yesterday in another thread. I think this one has retina burn, and that it is enchanted by the hidden.

There might be an impulse to think, yeah, but the intense red background was a gimmick to

[Linda Brandon]

Steven, it's the beautiful woman thing at work again. You're sucked in, you can't help it. Why do you think they're everywhere you look? They're magnetic; beauty is magnetic.

[Rob Sullivan]

David, that's a solid choice. Gabrielle Cot haunts my dreams - so that obviously got its hooks into me.

When that big Sargent show came to Boston MFA a number of yers ago, just about everything there left me either a drooling gawper or a gibbering idiot. I had to see the whole thing about three times during its tenure there, just so I could digest it all. Talk about retina burn! My opthomalogist has never forgiven me.

This may seem to some an odd choice, but in that whole incredible show, Elsie Palmer really got to me. Her countenance was (as shown in photos of her) already compelling, but the composition and limited palette brings it all together in the most subtle, but gripping way.

[Steven Sweeney]

Originally Posted by Linda Brandon

Steven, it's the beautiful woman thing at work again. ... Why do you think they're everywhere you look?

Luck o' the Irish, I guess.

[Anna Wakitsch]

For a while my favorite portrait has been Vermeer's Girl with a Red Hat. Recently, however, Rembrandt's 1628 self-portrait has moved up to number one.

Garth has already posted the Vermeer, but I'm posting them both side by side because it's funny how similar the poses are.

[Steven Sweeney]

I don't mean to be presumptuous -- though why not? The pay is the same -- but I think Alexandra was probably hoping for some very specific articulation of "why" the many images posted are appealing to their proponents.

There must be some drawing skill, some color treatment, some composition, subjects (beautiful women or crusty old men), something other than their mere appearance in a curated museum or exhibition catalog or accountant-vetted publication that causes the chosen images to stop you in your tracks and whisper "Yes" or "Oh . . . my."

What?

[Michele Rushworth]

For some of the perennial favorite portraits I think it often comes down to just a few main characteristics:

-- Beauty of the subject
-- Compelling gaze, (looking at the viewer)
-- Strong simple value massing in the composition
-- and possibly a dash of saturated color

The portraits that would be named by many of us as our favorites (Gabrielle Cot, Rembrandt as a young man, Vermeer's Girl with a Pearl Earring and his Girl with a Red Hat, Velazquez' Juan de Pareja, etc.) seem to have these characteristics.

Beyond perhaps a dozen paintings I can think of that would crop up on many people's Top Ten list, though, there are thousands of paintings that might "knock the socks off" only a few people. Whenever I go to a museum with another person I'm amazed by the difference in what kind of work we each think of as having "wall presence" or "retina burn".

A particular painting may have my friend riveted to the spot for ten minutes but when I look at it my reaction is just, "......hmmmm......" No response, or worse, a negative feeling.

I just don't know if there are really that many paintings that appeal to virtually everyone. We all have such different tastes and outlooks and I think we like different things as a result.

[Lacey Lewis]

Now, please don't get the idea that I am trying to compare my work to the amazing works posted and mentioned in this thread! But this conversation did bring to mind something from my recent experiences showing my work.

Every time I am where my work is hanging, or someone calls to say they like my work, etc., they mention my Judith painting. Every time. It is not my best painting at all, but it must have that retina burn factor... the value contrasts, the red dress, the stance, and the partially hidden eyes.

[Steven Sweeney]

The late Chet Atkins says on a video of his that I watched this morning that "tension and release" was what music was all about for him.

This may not translate, if music theory isn't familiar. It was a reference to the interplay of resolved and unresolved chords or structure. Perhaps the easiest way to convey the idea is through the do-re-mi scale. If we go up the scale and stop "too soon" -- say, do re mi fa so la ti -- something in our western ear wants the resolution offered by the final "do." But in turn, that resolution is satisfying precisely because of what came before it -- in Chet Atkins' word, the tension. Some chord structures provide tension -- the suspended, the augmented, the seventh -- and our ear awaits the complementary resolution, perhaps a major triad. But all of one or the other is either cacophony or a sedative.

I think the best paintings and drawings have tension and release within them. Not all hard edges but not all soft, either. There is a statement, followed by some relief from it, then a restatement. "All middle values" is all "resolution," and is as visually exciting as three-chord country is to the ear. (Please don't write, cowboys, I'm one of you.) A collage of values in an extended range but without design is all "tension," or chaos. Intensity of hue without relief (resolution) is the kind of shouting that prevents anyone from being heard. Intensity married to subtlety, the yin and yang of it, perhaps, is what completes the image.

The key is tension and release. When a painting or drawing has both, the odds favor "retina burn."