Wednesday 10 March 2010

Inspiration from the skylines of Leicester

As I trekked home clutching my bag of various Sainsbury’s basics, I couldn’t help but notice the storm ravaged sky. Great pillars of torn clouds danced in the rays of the setting sun, casting a golden hue against a purple sky.

I couldn’t help but think of Constable and Turner and how the stormy sky resembled their work so much.

The textures of the clouds were so fluid and oil-paint like that it was uncanny to Constables technique. His ability to capture the British weather has always been a fascination of mine ever since my Mum and I worked on a 4,000 piece jigsaw of the Haywain. ( yes jigsaws are a guilty pleasure of mine)

However the gold and purple of that evenings sunset much resembled the colour palette of Turner.
Now Tuner is a tricky one for me and I can honestly say I am not a fan.

I have seen well over 50 of his paintings in the flesh (or canvas ;p), standing only millimetres away from his brushstrokes and I still can’t see the fascination of him.
To me his paintings look like they were left in the rain and whatever masterpiece lay underneath has washed away, there’s no depth or detail that keeps me intrigued.

I must say that I am rather patriotic and passionate about our country but I fail to acknowledge Turner as one of our most celebrated artists.

Maybe I need to know more about the context of his work, which in all fairness I am off to do right now, but if my attitude towards him changes, then you shall no doubt hear from me again.

2 comments:

Michael Powell said...

oh I saw that Turneresque sky as well! Like a really cliched painting, but in real life.

Awesome, forgot to take a picture tho :(

KwazySheep said...

Same :(