The real meaning of the word Artist... (Top 10 Artists)

Name: Miss Gretta

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Product:	Top 10 Artists
Date:	18/07/07 (216 review reads)
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Advantages: food for thought, food for the soul, not actually recommended as food though.

Disadvantages: 10 is never enough.

Ok, so I understand that the most common interpretation of this category is ists as in musicians, but this is actually a list of my top 10 artists, as in painters... just for something different.

Amedeo Modigliani.
Amedeo Clemente Modigliani, July 1884 - January 1920, was an Italian artist, practicing both painting and sculpture, who worked for the most part in France. Modigliani died tragically young in Paris of tubercular meningitis at the age of 35. The artist was never appreciated by the public or the majority of critics during his life, and indeed poverty and over-work were contributing factors in his death. What do I love about his work? The intense expressions, and often mask-like faces (indeed one of Modigliani's influences was primitive sculpture, in particular, African masks), the simplification of form, which highlights the elegant perfection of his use of line, and the rich colours that compliment his often Spartan compositions. In particular Modigliani's nudes are utterly breath-taking.

Gustav Klimt
An Austrian painter at the forefront of the Vienna Secession, Klimt (July 1862 - February 1918) was initially trained as an architectural decorator - his father was a successful goldsmith. Indeed the remnants of his decorative training and the knowledge he would no doubt have gained during childhood from watching his father work is clearly visible in his major works, many of which feature intricate designs applied in gold leaf to the painting surface. Perhaps Klimt's most famous work is 'The Kiss' of an embrace between lovers kneeling on a bed of flowers surrounded by something of a golden halo. What is there to love about his work? The effortless transition between realism and decorative art, where women's faces often float amongst a riot of pattern and colour; the strong themes and striking imagery used to capture such meta-ideas as music and death; the detail and hidden elements of these intricate works, which means that you can sit watching a piece for hours and continue to see new things.

Frida Kahlo
Magdalena Carmen Frida Kahlo (July 1907 - July 1954) was a Mexican painter and political activist. She was married to famous Mexican muralist and cubist Diego Rivera, a union which was no doubt artistically stimulating, if not exactly harmonious. Kahlo's work did much to promote the indigenous culture of her country, combining realism with traditional and modern symbolism. Her most famous works are the frequent self-portraits she painted expressing physical and emotional pain. For me, this is the key to loving her work - that the depth of feeling is so clearly visible on the canvas. The realistic and yet confronting style, which does nothing to try to enhance the beauty of the subject, seems to strip away any intervening layers between the viewer and the subject/painter. Particularly for those of us who grew up with European art traditions, this work seems incredibly fresh and raw - even after 50 years.

Edvard Munch
Munch (December 1863 - January 1944) was an artist with a very troubled soul, and a past weighed down by the illness and death of family and friends. He grew up in Norway and, after his mother died when he was only 5 years old, he was raised by his strictly religious father. Munch and his siblings were often ill and one of his sister's was diagnosed with a mental illness during childhood, Munch later said that "Sickness, insanity and death were the angels that surrounded my cradle and they have followed me throughout my life". In his art, Munch found expression for the fear, memories, and jealousies that permeated his life - his most famous picture 'The Scream' was a forerunner of the Expressionist movement, which sought to bring the emotional experience to the fore. The beginning of my appreciation for Munch was when I saw a large exhibition of his paintings, drawings, and prints all together at a solo exhibition. It was seeing his work in context that helped me to realise the connections, themes, and motifs that run through all he does. I admit, his emotional range often seems limited to the negative, but the intensity of emotion that he captures is remarkable.

Vincent Van Gogh
Van Gogh (March 1853 - July 1890), perhaps, needs no introduction. One of the most famous and celebrated painters in history he was a Dutch artist and a part of the Post-Impressionist school. He was, however, little appreciated during his lifetime and indeed did not begin painting seriously until 1880, when he was almost 30 years old. He produced more than 2000 works during the last decade of his short career, the most famous of which were achieved while he lived in Arles, France. Van Gogh suffered from several bouts of mental illness, during which he famously cut off part of his ear after a break in his friendship with fellow artist Paul Gaugin, and eventually led to his suicide. Given how famous he is now, I had of course seen many reproduced images of Van Gogh's work growing up, and indeed had studied some of his work during highschool etc. It was not until I first saw some of his work, so to speak, in the flesh, that I truly began to appreciate it. Van Gogh's paintings have an almost aggressive use of line and texture in the paint that creates another dimension in the work that is impossible to reproduce in texts. The energy and freshness in the paint is visible a century later, which I find to be an incredible feat and means he truly warrants the praise he now, posthumously, receives.

Brett Whitely
Whitely (April 1939 - June 1992) is one of the most successful of recent Australian artists and his work is held in the permanent collections of many important international galleries. He is particularly well-known for his self-portraits and paintings of the Sydney Harbour and Opera House. I find his work to be both beautiful and quirky. His compositions are often quite elaborate and the use of line is very lyrical - something that is especially evident in his ink drawings. If you haven't seen his work before, I suggest you have a look.

Henri Toulouse-Lautrec
Henri de Tousouse-Lautrec (November 1864 - September 1901) was a French artist, working in various mediums including painting, printmaking, and illustration. Born into an aristocratic French family, Toulouse-Lautrec preferred the debaucherous life of the Parisian cabaret scene. The oil paintings that he created, often rather loosely finished on cardboard or other impromptu surfaces, are all the more expressive and skilfull for their half-finished look. The many prints and poster designs that Toulouse-Lautrec made later in his career are both beautiful and fascinating as a glimpse into that time in Paris and the provocative, rather sexually liberated images presented of modern life.

Jackson Pollock
Paul Jackson Pollock (January 1912 - August 1956) was perhaps one of the most influential american painters of the 20th century, and one of the most forceful proponents of abstract expressionism. He was born in Wyoming but studied at the Los Angeles Manual Arts High School. He moved to New York in 1930 and studied there for some time before marrying in 1945 and moving to a house on Long Island, which Peggy Guggenheim loaned the money for (nice to have well-connected friends!). It was during the following period that Pollock developed the liquid paint dripping technique for which he is most famous. About his work Pollock said “When I am in my painting, I'm not aware of what I'm doing. It is only after a sort of 'get acquainted' period that I see what I have been about. I have no fear of making changes, destroying the image, etc., because the painting has a life of its own.” and I think that this statement encapsulates what is special about Pollock’s work - the sense of movement frozen through time, of a mysterious underlying narrative, and life. Pollock was known to have problems with alcoholism throughout his life, and died young following an alcohol-related car crash.

Pablo Picasso
Pablo Ruiz Picasso (October 1881 - April 1973) was one of the only painters in this list who lived a very full and long life. Indeed this is one of the things that makes his work fascinating - watching how his technique and foci changed over time. Picasso worked as a painter, sculptor, and occasional printmaker during his career. He is one of the most adored figures in 20th century art, rivalled perhaps only by Warhol, and enjoyed considerable success during his career - a fact which drove him to further push the bounadries of acceptable art in order to challenge the audience that unquestioningly applauded his work. Probably his most famous contribution to art is his founding, along with George Braques, the cubist movement. In my opinion however, this was not his best work, although his cubist paintings were superior to Braques’s. For me, the earlier Picasso works, from his Blue Period, are far more real, in that they seem to deal with human emotion and connect directly with the viewer, rather than the cubist works which intentionally withdraw from the viewer and are intended to provoke rather than inspire.

Salvador Dali
Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dali (phew, what a mouthful!), Marquis of Pubol (May 1904 - January 1989), is perhaps the most famous of the surrealist painters. He was born in Catalonia, Spain, and indeed spent most of his life in the Costa Brava region north of Barcelona. Whilst he was predominantly a painter, Dali also made ventures of various success into the realms of sculpture, photography, and arthouse film. While I must admit that I don’t have much time for his sculptures and such, the combination of incredible precision and skill, with an imagination and vision that defies words, in his paintings means that he scrapes into my list of top 10 artists. The voluptuous landscapes, those unforgettable melting clocks, and the improbable animals on spindle-thin legs make looking at a Dali painting like stepping into another world; one that seems to capture elements of your own way of looking at the world, that you hadn’t noticed before, but that now seem fundamental.

Please note, the above list represents pretty much how I feel this week and is constantly changing. It is in no particular order, although I would have to say that Klimt and Modigliani are always up there near the top. Hope this has been interesting.

Summary: 10 of my favourite artists (this week anyway)