At Life Drawing today I discussed the Now You See Us Tate show with the fellow artist I ran into on the way back from Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize exhibition.

“We should build a time machine and get the men who kept those women down!” she said.

Before going to this exhibition I listened to various podcasts – Art podcast are wealth of information, I should listen to more of them & I advise you to do the same. Obviously Tate exhibitions receive the attention of serious critics offering professional insight rather than just personal musing / madness & I guess if you are reading this then you well read & more informed than me . . .

Artemisia Gentileschi’s work and life are exceptionally well documented.

I spend a lot of time looking at the ‘nuts and bolts’ of how a work is constructed.

I found the sparsity paint on her pallet particularly interesting – more of a observation on my own painting practice.

The Rich man’s wealth is his strong city..’ (Proverbs, x 15) by Emily Osborn (1828-1925). It could be argued, in correctly, this painting is about turning up with a painting to a drawing salon.

I spent a long time trying to figure out the shadows in School is Out, I’m still not sure they are ‘correct’.

It seems impossible to escape large munitions at the moment. I have seen Shop for Machining 15-inch Shells: Singer Manufacturing Company, Clydebank, Glasgow, 1918 by Anna Airy at the Imperial War Museum a couple of times but the video footage of endless Israeli onslaught make the painting all the more powerful.

I love the work of Gwen John who I may or may not be related to. (I am related to people who think they are related to her on DNA testing sites and her self-portrait looks rather similar to my sister). I also love she (may or may not) have written a letter describing how the ‘nuns will be angry’ over how long a commission was taking.

Sickert seems transparent in “tea with Sickert’ many argue he was.

So, you might well ask, what is the point of this blog post – it seems I’m drawn to the strong use of red hues in some of the paintings.

I don’t know if it’s deliberate construct of the exhibition but it’s quite difficult finding details of many of the works on line, so I can confirm Women’s contribution to Art has & is massively overlooked. . .

 

https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-britain/women-artists-in-britain-1520-1920