Black Cat Bone vs. Blake Gopnik

Julie Deane · 01-21-2007, 12:17 PM

The Black Cat Bone vs. the Blake Gopnik view of portraiture

Here

Michele Rushworth · 01-21-2007, 02:42 PM

Quote:

Can a portrait fulfill the duty of pleasing the client and also be art?

Depends on the client and on who's definition of art we're going by.

Richard Bingham · 01-22-2007, 01:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Julie Deane

Can a portrait fulfill the duty of pleasing the client and also be art?

No.

I'm slitting my wrists right now, mostly on account of Michele's relativist reply. Farewell, cruel world!

( . . . uhh joke?)

Claudemir Bonfim · 01-22-2007, 06:48 PM

Thanks for sharing Julie.

Sharon Knettell · 01-23-2007, 11:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Julie Deane

As Sharon Knettell put it in another post on this forum:
"I want this site to become a resource for those with a penchant to create transformative art that cannot be denied. We cannot do that if we are complacent and dismiss the criticisms, however distasteful of someone like Blake Gopnik."

Can a portrait fulfill the duty of pleasing the client and also be art?

Jeez, am I pompous or WHAT!

Boy that is a hard one. Sargent gave it up at 50 and had to be coaxed to do any portraiture after that.

I love portraiture, I know many think I disdain it. What I hate is the feeling of being a bug under a clients thumb, when the rent is due. Give me a lady in a ballgown any day and I am in heaven.

You start out with great visions of the great thing you are about to do, then WHAM! The client comes in with his portrait already painted in his head and just wants to pay you to execute it. OR, they don't like anything you have to offer and point to another's painting for inspiration.

Here is an example of what I think is art that was hated by the client.

Richard Bingham · 01-23-2007, 04:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sharon Knettell

Jeez, am I pompous or WHAT!

No. From your posts, I'd say you're passionate, sincere, and hold high standards.

Sharon, do you have the "back story" on this portrait that tells us the sitter was unhappy with it? (many of Sargent's do). If not, why did you say that?

Consider that by the time JSS "quit" doing "mug shots" he had pursued a career as a portraitist for over 25 years, so prolific a story circulates about a diplomat who considered it a safe conversational gambit to ask people he met for the first time, "So, how do you like your Sargent portrait?"

I'm not sure it's true in all cases, but as I look around, there's a definite "burnout" factor in people who work a demanding profession for a quarter century. If they can't re-invent it or quit, they can get annoyingly cranky!

Sharon Knettell · 01-23-2007, 05:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Richard Bingham

I'm not sure it's true in all cases, but as I look around, there's a definite "burnout" factor in people who work a demanding profession for a quarter century. If they can't re-invent it or quit, they can get annoyingly cranky!

I know I am.

The information about this portrait came from the book , "John Singer Sargent", edited by Elaine Kilmurray and Richard Ormond-Princeton University Press.

It was a quote from a conversation-"We were told that she did not like it"