Points of View

For centuries artists  like tourists have  visited prescribed locations to find inspiration, to document their journey,  and to insure a ready market for their artworks.  Artists like tourists tend to rely on standard viewpoints whether the subject is  Niagara Falls or the Coliseum.   Historically, guide books  presented prescribed routes for tourists and artists alike.  Artists saw earlier artist’s work  and considered it a challenge to try to outdo them using the same motif. When John Singer Sargent arrived in Venice in 1880 he brought  a new point of view  with him.  In the previous 18th century artists had painted  big vistas, big views across the Piazza San Marco or the entrance to the Grand Canal. These were the sort of images  that Canaletto, Guardi and Turner painted. Although, Turner also painted intimate interiors and stairways.  By the 1870’s a photographer, Naya, had discovered more personal intimate vignettes of Venice, its personal nooks and crannies. This new micro view of Venice would be adopted by Whistler and Sargent and,  became the new style for capturing the life of Venice.  Artists and collectors adopted it as the new fashionable point of view.  Like earlier artists, Whistler and Sargent often made small quick sketches before committing to larger watercolors or oils, especially the oils.  Both artists were encumbered with the notion that oils were more important and serious in the hierarchy of artist materials.  We still feel  that bias today.  Today, if you were to visit the Brooklyn Museum you would find a large show of Sargent’s travel oils and watercolors. You might notice that smaller were watercolors appeared as quick and spontaneous sketches while others were larger and more careful  and, the oils  were clearly more labored.  It’s difficult to generate the spontaneity of a small, quick watercolor or oil  sketch in a larger oil. Turner tried, Cezanne tried, Sargent tried and I too have repeatedly tried this.  In example 1 you see one of  Sargent’s small quick watercolor sketches of the church of the Gesuati along  the Guidecca shore. Example 2 shows Sargent slowing down to find more architectural accuracy in his larger watercolor of the same subject but,  from a different point of view.  In example 3 I have a small quick (8″x12″)  oil sketch of the interior of Grand Central  Station which you can contrast with my larger oil on steel (36×60) in example 4.  The point of view is the same but the palette, organization, and layered atmosphere have been further developed.

example 1. quick Sargent sketch.

example 2. the more studied Sargent.

example 3 my small quick oil sketch.

example 4. my  larger oil.

Points of view reveal differences in cultural and aesthetic values.  Canaletto generally paints large panoramic views of Venice.  This example (no. 5) shows an artist who still likes the big view but, found interest in a microcosm  of mystery within the painting.  Here Canaletto looks down the canal of the Mendicanti (rio dei Mendicanti).  The canal is not long,  only a couple hundred yards but, Canaletto makes it look large.  He is standing on a bridge with his back to the Northern Lagoon.  If he were to stop working and look to his right he could see where Sargent would  paint his Gesuati  Church watercolors a century later.  Francesco Guardi, a younger  contemporary of Canaletto’s,  painted the same canal but, from the opposite direction (example 6).  The bridge you see in Guardi’s painting is the one Canaletto stood upon while making his view.  Guardi  has also made the canal wider.  Taking an opposing  and lower point of view changed how Guardi  treated the scene.  In Canaletto’s painting observe  that I have  made two blue circles. One surrounds the backside of a church on the campo of St. John and St Paul and the other surrounds a bridge in the distance which services that campo.  John Singer Sargent will paint this same canal  but,  from the opposite direction of Canaletto.  In his watercolor we face the front of the church and have a closer view of the bridge.  Sargent’s point of view is from low on the water from within a gondola ( example 7).   In example 8 you see Guardi’s painting of  the same campo as Sargent. You can even make out  Sargent’s bridge on the far left.   Months before Sargent arrives Whistler would walk through this campo and over this bridge to the next canal where he makes pastels and an etching.

example 5. Canaletto.

example 6. Guardi.

example 7. Sargent.

example 8.  Guardi.

In between the century separating Guardi’s and Canaletto’s paintings from Whistler and Sargent is Richard Parkes Bonington.  He visits this same campo earlier in the 19th century and decides to look up to  paint the  monument in the square.  You can spot this same monument in Guardi’s painting.  Bonington’s  back is to the canal.  Here is a small sample of  artists all visiting the same location all looking to place their personal stamp on the experience by selecting a different point of view.

example 9. R.P.Bonington.

In my final set of examples I have a few of views of Times Square ( examples 9,10).  Like Canaletto and Guardi , I paint my subject from opposing points of view.  I also shift  the location of the vortex of light by changing my point of view.  Slight shifts in elevation or orientation create a different compositions.  These   and other works of mine  are  on view at Susan Powell Fine Art  at 679 Post Road in Madison, Connecticut    (tel. 230 318 0616). An exhibition of my work opens there on Friday at 6 PM   May 17. Like Guardi and Turner I did not let the facts of the topography interfere with my arrangement of the composition.  In example 11, I have a point of view not available to Canaletto or Sargent. I am riding high above Manhattan with a more modern point of view from airliner.

example 9. looking uptown, vortex left.

example 10. looking downtown, vortex right.

example 11. High over Manhattan.