Von Zügel's Animal Paintings from Life

Heinrich von Zügel (1850-1941) made oil studies of cattle from life, rather than painting from dead animals, as Rungius and Stubbs typically did.

This required the assistance of young farm hands who could hold the cattle more or less in position. Frank Calderon, in his book Animal Drawing and Anatomy, talks about how he set up live cattle for his student painters:

"I generally selected a shady spot and had the cattle fastened to a crate that was full of hay or fresh cut green food. Sometimes I had a small box placed on the ground in front of the crate in which were a few pieces of oil cake as a tidbit to start upon. This I found always resulted in the animals hurrying up to their places and quietly submitting to be tied up."

Von Zügel said in his autobiography: "To simply paint an animal was always easy for me. But placing it into an atmosphere of air and light, and depicting its appearance in the moment where it is most beautiful, isn't always possible to achieve, because it's not always easy to focus on the form along with these other qualities. To capture both form and color was always my highest ambition."  

Heinrich von Zügel also made more informal drawings in his sketchbook, often with the goal of capturing a momentary pose or expression.

Because his memory was well stocked with knowledge and observation, he was able to compose imaginative action scenes that would be impossible to stage or pose, such as this boar hunt.

Book: Animal Drawing and Anatomy by Frank Calderon
Wikipedia: Heinrich von Zügel in German and in English
Free 1909 article: Studio Magazine on von Zügel
Bio of  Von Zügel in English
Previously on GJ: Rosa Bonheur ram studies
Thanks, Christoph Heuer and Christian Schlierkamp

Painting Animals from Life 
(Instructional video by James G.)

Digital download from:
Sellfy
Gumroad 

Cubebrush 

DVD

Direct from manufacturer Kunaki

DVD at Amazon

Faber Castell Pitt pen set

Landseer's Dog Studies

Edwin Landseer (English, 1802-1873) was an animal specialist who frequently drew and painted from life. He drew all the time: in books, on letters, even on checks.

He was the son of an artist and a child prodigy, mentored by a variety of artists and exhibiting in the Royal Academy before he was 20.

His knowledge of anatomy was profound as a result of his studies of ecorché specimens. He had an ongoing arrangement with his local zoo to dissect their animals after they died.

An early biography tells this anecdote:

"At a Court Ball at which the King of Portugal and Landseer were present, his Majesty expressed a wish to be introduced to the illustrious painter.
'Oh! Mr. Landseer,' said the King in a foreigner's English, 'I am delighted to make your acquaintance. I am so fond of beasts.'"

One time he was a guest at the Redleaf estate. His host, a faithful churchgoer, expected all his guests to accompany him on Sunday. Landseer declined to accompany the host and other guests to church, choosing to paint instead....

"...Looking out the window, he straightaway saw a spaniel catch a rabbit, and he proceeded to paint the scene from memory. When the family returned from church, they saw the finished painting, accompanied by a note: "Painted by E. Landseer in two hours and a half. Redleaf, August 1831."

Despite his success and his prodigious ability, Landseer was prone to depression and drinking. 

The Old Shepherd's Chief Mourner by Edwin Landseer

In his last years, he was vexed by failing eyesight, forced to rely on inadequate glasses right when PreRaphaelitism was all the rage. A fall from a horse evidently led to brain injury. After his death, houses and shops lowered their blinds, his bronze lions at Trafalgar Square were draped with wreaths, and he was buried in Saint Paul's.

 ----

Previously on GJ: 

Sir Edwin's Feats of Skill

Eternal Life for a Dead Bloodhound

Wikipedia: Edwin Landseer

Books: 

Sir Edwin Landseer by Richard Ormond

Free book on Archive.org: Sir Edwin Landseer by James A. Manson, 1902

"Painting Animals from Life" digital download

Gumroad

Sellfy 

Cubebrush 

DVD

Direct from manufacturer Kunaki

DVD at Amazon (Releases Aug. 10)

Anders Zorn in Algiers

In 1887, Anders Zorn painted a man and a boy on a balcony in Algiers.

The painting is a sensitive study in warm and cool colors. You can see from the "bead line" over the head below how he returned with a big wash of blue over the main figure to deepen the color of the sky.

Bonhams auction house tells how the painting came to be:

"In the New Year 1887, Anders Zorn and his wife Emma (née Lamm), travelled from Sweden to North Africa to spend the winter in Algiers. There were strong European influences in Algiers at this time, even a small circle of Swedes including the physician and author Axel Munthe. Zorn met up with his fellow artist Robert Thegerström and together they rented a 'Moorish' house with a roof terrace and inner courtyard in the old town, the Casbah, where they could paint figure studies using hired models. Zorn writes, '[We] rented for ourselves an Arabian house far up, where we could paint, and took on a servant, an Arab, who got models for us, which was otherwise quite difficult work.'


"The main reason for the trip to Algiers was that Zorn had a commission from the Swedish King Oscar II to paint something from the Golden Horn. The subject that he chose was 'the Arab women who came to a priest down in the harbour to be blessed. Then they usually went down some stairs to the water and removed the veil from their faces as long as they knew no-one was looking. I chose to paint this scene and made studies in the harbour with Algiers in the background and then painted the figures on our roof.'

"In a letter from Algiers, dated 17th March 1887, Emma Zorn writes to her mother, 'Today Anders finished the large picture. It is lovely and in my opinion one of the best things he has done.' The watercolour From Algiers Harbour is nowadays to be seen at the museum, Prince Eugen's Waldemarsudde in Stockholm.

"In the present watercolour Zorn's interest in the strong and characteristic North African light is combined with his interest in exotic models and the use of traditional dress. A man and boy are sitting and standing in intense sunlight on what might be the roof terrace of the house rented by Zorn, looking out over the sea. The dark face of the man creates a strong contrast to his white dress. The colour scale keeps to light blue, grey and white, just as it does in many other of Zorn's pictures from Algiers. The scene invites an interpretation of Orientalism; however Zorn has also presented an everyday picture of life in the North African city.
----
Book: Anders Zorn: Sweden's Master Painter 

The Committee on Moral Books

Jehan-Georges Vibert, "The Committee on Moral Books"

Brush and Pencil magazine from 1902 said of Vibert: 

"There is a certain element of irreverence in the art-loving public of France, and the piquancy, even audacity, of the artist’s treatment of the clergy was relished....With an intimate knowledge of human nature Vibert combines a surprising acquaintance with historical detail, and his pictures, therefore, radiant with light and brilliant with color, are as faithful to historic verity as it is possible to make them. In this regard he has been likened aptly to Meissonier, who in his costume pieces studied to make them absolute transcripts of the times from which his incidents were taken."

----

Book: Cavaliers and Cardinals: Nineteenth-Century French Anecdotal Paintings
Free Google eBook: "The Science of Painting" by Vibert
There's a Vibert painting of Gulliver in my book Imaginative Realism.
Previous post about Vibert's Cardinals

Exhibition: Women Artists in Paris

Yesterday we visited the exhibition "Women Artists in Paris, 1850-1900" at the Clark Art Institute. The exhibit presents 70 paintings by women who studied at the 19th-century French academies.

Cecilia Beaux (1855-1942), Ernesta (Child with Nurse)
The Metropolitan Museum of Art,

The show includes some standout works by Cecilia Beaux. William Merritt Chase reportedly remarked of her: "Miss Beaux is not only the greatest living woman-painter, but the best woman-painter that has ever lived." (Source: The Independent, 1899) 

Rosa Bonheur (1822-1899), Plowing at Nivernais, Ringling Museum of Art 

Rosa Bonheur is represented by a single large work showing oxen plowing. Although the entire scene is painted with incredible fidelity, and it was widely praised in its time, we wondered about how the oxen were attached to the plow. Oddly enough, we couldn't see any yokes on them. Oxen require a formidable wooden beam and individual bows around their necks in order for the oxen to transfer their energy to the plow.

Elizabeth Nourse (1859-1938) A Mother, 
Cincinnati Art Museum 

Elizabeth Nourse was already so well trained before she arrived at the Académie Julian that her teacher said she didn't need any further instruction. Her first entry to the Salon "A Mother," was hung "on the line," an achievement for any first-time artist.

Emma Löwstädt-Chadwick (1855-1932) Beach Parasol,
Brittany (Portrait of Amanda Sidwall)

The Scandinavians are well represented. Swedish painter Emma Löwstädt-Chadwick portrayed her friend Amanda Sidwall during one of their painting excursions to the Brittany coast. 

Hanna (Hirsch) Pauli (1864-1940)
The Artist Venny Soldan-Brofeldt, 1886–87
Gothenburg Museum of Art, Sweden

Some of the paintings celebrated female friendships and alliances. Hanna Pauli painted her friend Venny Soldan-Brofeldt in the studio they shared in Paris. The curators say:

"Pauli builds this vignette of creativity from items strewn about the studio, including paint-splattered drop cloths, a sketch of a female nude, and tools for clay working, placing Soldan-Brofeldt at the center of it all, with mouth open and legs outstretched, fingering a lump of clay. The subject’s unselfconscious manner—an intentional provocation on Pauli’s part, considering the era’s rigid rules concerning proper conduct—and the directness of the sitter’s gaze make a powerful statement on the validity of the woman artist."

Mina Carlson-Bredberg (1857–1943) Self Portrait

Marriage represented a death knell to some women's careers. Mina Carlson-Bredberg had to give up her career after she was married and told her young nieces that they were lucky they were single.

A minor gripe: it was difficult to read the object labels because most of them were vague, wordy, and written in small sans-serif white type on a dark background, requiring a lot of fumbling with reading glasses and navigating back and forth. I believe a label should be clearly readable from a normal viewing distance for the painting, and it should be short and to the point, focused on enhancing the experience of the artwork itself, not discussing wider sociological issues. That's best left for the catalog.

I would also have liked to see fewer Mary Cassatts and more Rosa Bonheurs. Also, the curators overlooked other worthy women artists who lived and worked in Paris, such as Ellen Day Hale, Anna Bilińska-Bohdanowicz, Jeanna Bauck, Bertha Wegmann and Juana Romani, but you can't do it all in one exhibition, and let's hope this show opens the doors to more exhibitions featuring women artists.
----
Women Artists in Paris, 1850-1900 is at the Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Massachusetts through September 3. You can get the catalog on Amazon.

Incidentally, there's a museum called National Museum of Women in the Arts in Denmark

Previously on GurneyJourney:
Thesleff's Echo (cover image of the catalog)
Studying Art in Paris, 1902
The Ups and Downs of Anna Bilińska-Bohdanowicz

Juana Romani, Artist and Model
Advice for Anna Ancher

Evolution of a Picture, Part 4 of 4: Refining the Idea

This is Part 4 of a 1901 article called Evolution of a Picture: A Chapter on Studies by academy-trained Edgar Spier Cameron. Yesterday's installment discussed maquettes and animals. Today we follow the journey to the finished painting.

Aimé Morot, Jewish Captives in Babylon, sketch and finish

Studies of Hands by Adolphe Menzel

Part 4: Refining the Idea
"It may be said that an artist never finds a model which corresponds exactly to his ideal, and he is obliged to make changes of form and expression in making his studies. Certain characteristics may be accentuated and others suppressed, while others which the model may not possess are supplied from memory, imagination, or from other models.

"The ways of using studies when they are made are as various as the ways of making them. If a study is in the form of a drawing it may be copied directly in the picture, or it may be transferred either in its actual size by tracing or pouncing, or on a larger scale by "squaring up." In squaring up, lines are drawn over the drawing to form squares and corresponding squares of a different proportion are drawn on the canvas where the picture is to be made.

"All of these processes admit of a certain amount of refinement, correction, or simplification of the original study, and anything which gives an artist an opportunity to prolong his preparations and shorten the time of the actual painting of a picture is of great benefit, as the result will be more spontaneous, fresher, and more vigorous than if it is puttered over and shows traces of experiment.

"The artist's studies are the ammunition with which he loads up for a final effective coup, which makes a hit or a miss, as his aim has been true or not. That such studies are requisite for good work is the universal verdict of all who have essayed to teach the art of painting.

Study by Friedrich August von Kaulbach, 1878

Planning or Improvisation?
"'It is undoubtedly a splendid and desirable accomplishment to be able to design instantaneously any given subject,' says Sir Joshua Reynolds in his Twelfth Discourse. 'It is an excellence that I believe every artist would wish to possess; but unluckily, the manner in which this dexterity is acquired habituates the mind to be contented with first thoughts, without choice or selection. The judgment, after it has been long passive, by degrees loses its power of becoming active when exertion is necessary. Whoever, therefore, has this talent must in some measure und what he had the habit of doing, or a least give a new turn to his mind.'

"Great works which are to live and stand the criticism of posterity are not performed at a heat. A proportionable time is required for deliberation and circumspection.

Oil-painted studies by J.C. Leyendecker

"However extraordinary it may appear, it is certainly true that the inventions of the pittori improvisatori, as they may be called, have notwithstanding the common boast of their authors that all is spun from their own brain—very rarely anything that has in the least the air of originality. Their compositions are generally commonplace and uninteresting, without character or expression; like those flowery speeches that we sometimes hear, which impress no new ideas upon the mind.'

Alphonse-Marie-Adolphe de Neuville Defense of the Gate

"It is said of a celebrated French painter, that a visitor called upon him one day and found him busily engaged making studies for a new work—studies in posture, in facial expression, in drapery, in suggested action. A considerable length of time elapsed, and the visitor again called upon the painter and found him still engaged in the work of making studies for the same composition. The painstaking, plodding methods of the painter provoked some exclamation of surprise from the caller. 'There is no occasion for wonderment,' returned the artist in justification of his multitude of studies. 'This is the main part of painting.'

"Illustrations such as those accompanying this article present no element of novelty to the practiced artist. There are who have essayed creative work who have not well-filled sketches of similar character and equal interest. To those, however, unfamiliar with the methods of the studio they give an insight more convincing than words could furnish into the way in which artists have produced the disjecta membra, so to speak, of their finished compositions. It would be interesting in the case of some noted picture to reproduce the finished work together with all the studies that entered into its composition."

----
Editor's note: The author is muralist and critic Edgar Spier Cameron (1862-1944) from Chicago. He studied at the Art Students League in New York and the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris. His teachers were Dewing, Inness, Cabanel, Lefebvre, Boulanger, Laurens, and Benjamin-Constant.

Sources and More Info:
Evolution of a Picture: A Chapter on Studies by Edgar Cameron in Brush and Pencil Magazine
Vol. 8, No. 3 (June, 1901), pp. 121-133

The Academic Method Series:

Evolution of the Picture, Part 1: Compositional Studies.

Evolution of the Picture, Part 2: Studies and Drapery
Evolution of the Picture, Part 3: Maquettes and Animals
Morot's motion device

Books:
You can find more about these methods in my book Imaginative Realism.
Ernest Meissonier exhibition catalog.
Frederic Leighton Abrams book.

Evolution of a Picture, Part 3 of 4: Maquettes and Animals

Ernest Meissonier, study for Friedland

This is Part 3 of a 1901 article called Evolution of a Picture: A Chapter on Studies by academy-trained Edgar Spier Cameron. Yesterday's installment discussed studies, facial expression, and drapery. Today we look at maquettes and animals.

Maquette by Meissonier

Part 3: Maquettes and Manikins
"Meissonier was so scrupulous in his drawing that he sometimes modeled his horses and sometimes his figures in wax from which to make his drawings.

"In a subject in which there are numerous figures, animals, or objects of similar size, the element of correct perspective is of great importance, and the grouping together of maquettes, or small models in wax or clay, makes it possible to avoid those errors which creep into the work of some of the greatest artists.

Lord Frederic Leighton in his studio

"Sir Frederic Leighton frequently made use of the plan, and it is said that Detaille, in composing his battle scenes, arranges whole companies of pewter soldiers on a table on which the inequalities of the surface of the ground have been represented in various ways.

"Maquettes and manikins are of great service in composing decorative subjects when it is desired to show figures in unusual positions requiring violent foreshortening, as in flying, or in a perspective system such as is sometimes used in ceiling decoration, with a vanishing point in the air.

Aimé Morot with the skin of a lion

Animals in Motion
"When animals are introduced into a picture many studies of them are necessary because of the great difficulty in securing a suitable pose or action, owing to their almost constant movement.

"In making studies of animal motion, many painters resort to the use of instantaneous photographs with the result that they frequently show movement too rapid to be observed by the human eye. In their efforts to avoid such solecism, artists have resorted to various devices to study the motions of the animals they paint.

Aimé Morot

"Aimé Morot, who has painted some of the most spirited cavalry charges ever reproduced on canvas, was attached to the General Staff of the French army, and had all the horses and men he desired at his disposition. His favorite mode of study was to have horses ridden past him, and at a certain point he would give one quick glance at his models, close his eyes, and open them only when he had diverted his gaze to the white surface of the paper held in his lap on which he quickly jotted down the impression received. (See previous post: Morot's motion device)

Horse study by Jean-Louis Ernest Meissonier

"Meissonier had a track built, along which he had himself propelled as horses were ridden along a parallel course. Another excellent way for an artist to gain an appreciation of a horse's movement is to see and feel it at the same time by riding the animal along a wall in sunlight and observing its shadow."

Editor's note: The author is muralist and critic Edgar Spier Cameron (1862-1944) from Chicago. He studied at the Art Students League in New York and the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris. His teachers were Dewing, Inness, Cabanel, Lefebvre, Boulanger, Laurens, and Benjamin-Constant.

Previously:

Evolution of the Picture, Part 1: Compositional Studies.

Evolution of the Picture, Part 2: Studies and Drapery
Morot's motion device

Books:
You can find more about these methods in my book Imaginative Realism.
Ernest Meissonier exhibition catalog.
Frederic Leighton Abrams book.

Sources and More Info:
Evolution of a Picture: A Chapter on Studies by Edgar Cameron in Brush and Pencil Magazine
Vol. 8, No. 3 (June, 1901), pp. 121-133

Evolution of a Picture, Part 2: Studies, Faces, and Drapery

William Bouguereau in his studio. Note preliminary studies displayed at left.

This is Part 2 of 4 of an article from 1901 called Evolution of a Picture: A Chapter on Studies by academy-trained Edgar Spier Cameron.

Yesterday's installment discussed how major paintings begin with compositional sketches drawn from the imagination. Today we look at studies, facial expression, and drapery.

Studies by Jean-Paul Laurens

Studies of Costumed Figures by Fritz Roeber

Commencing the Picture: Studies or Études
"From this point in the production of the picture there are various ways by which the artist may arrive at the completion of his work. He may either arrange his models in relation to the accessories as nearly as possible like his composition and paint directly from them, or he may "square up" or in some other manner transfer the lines of his composition to his canvas and proceed by painting portions of his picture directly from nature or from studies.

Study squared for enlargement by Eugene Carman

"Making important changes in a picture after it is commenced is not productive of so good results as a rapid execution preceded by mature preparation.

Study squared for transfer by Frank Brangwyn

"It is for this reason that most artists who paint figure subjects make careful drawings of the various figures of their compositions, and many fragmentary studies of heads, hands, or other portions in which the expression of a pose or movement may play an important part of the picture.

Mr. Byam Shaw criticising a student's work

"Studies of drapery, of accessories, of architecture or landscape which may constitute the setting for the figures, are other important elements in the preparation of a picture.

Portrait Studies by Friedrich von Amerling

Facial Expressions
"Facial expression also requires much study. There are models who have sufficient of an actor's ability to enter into the spirit of an artist's conception and give him a pose or an expression which may be literally copied, but they are rare; and in order to secure exactly what he desires in this respect the artist often becomes his own model with the aid of a mirror.

Studies of facial expression by M. Hayman

"The studies of facial expression shown here are parts of a series thus made by a young artist of Paris, who possessed considerable histrionic ability. They were published by him as a guide to artists and students.

Frank Brangwyn Study squared for Enlargement

"It has been frequently remarked that the technical qualities of the painting of some students is superior to that of many artists who are accounted as great masters, yet their pictures are valueless except as examples of technique. The reason of this is that they have not learned to use their knowledge, and what is learned in an art schools is but a small part of what an artist has to learn. Some masters, of whom Puvis de Chevannes is a striking example, have learned so well how to express their ideas that they dispense with technical elegance in their painting. Of Puvis de Chavannes it is sometimes wrongly held by immature critics that he was an incapable draughtsman.

Drapery study by Frederic Leighton

Nudes First, Then Drapery
"Many artists, in order that the figures in their pictures may express more fully the sentiment of a pose, begin by making a careful drawing of the nude over which drapery or costume is afterward drawn from the draped or clothed model.

Jacques Louis David - The oath of the Jeu de Paume

"There is preserved in the Louvre a large unfinished picture by David, "Le Serment du jeu de Paume," in which all of the figures are carefully drawn in the nude and only the portrait heads are painted. It excites the risibility of most visitors to the gallery, but it is of interest to artists and students."

Drapery study by Degas

Drapery
"For the study of drapery they are also invaluable. An effect of flying movement may be given to drapery by laying it upon the floor and drawing it from above or by arranging it in suspension with strings, but a more effective model may be made of paper, which is sufficiently stiff to retain its folds long enough, without support, to permit it to be drawn. Its folds are sharper than those of cloth, but it has the advantage of more natural effects, and is possible to find in tissue paper colors approaching almost any shade desired a painting, or to tint or decorate it as one may wish with watercolor.

"Portrait painters frequently use large lay figure upon which they place the costumes of their sitters, rarely for the purpose of making studies, but to serve as a substitute for the sitter in painting directly on the portrait. Other artists make use of the lay figure to make studies of elaborate costumes or uniforms.
-----
Yesterday: Evolution of the Picture, Part 1: Compositional Studies.
Tomorrow: Mannikins and Animals in Motion

Sources and More Info

Evolution of a Picture: A Chapter on Studies by Edgar Cameron in Brush and Pencil Magazine
Vol. 8, No. 3 (Jun., 1901), pp. 121-133

The author is muralist and critic Edgar Spier Cameron (1862-1944) from Chicago. He studied at the Art Students League in New York and the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris. His teachers were Dewing, Inness, Cabanel, Lefebvre, Boulanger, Laurens, and Benjamin-Constant.

You can find more about these methods in my book Imaginative Realism.