#PaintingOfTheWeekNo6

DANSEUSE CAMBODGIENNE Auguste Rodin (1840 -1917)

I wanted this week to talk about a painting that I see at least once a day – as I have a copy in my bathroom at home.  It’s a surprising painting as normally we associate the artist Auguste Rodin with one media only – sculpture.

Born in 1840 in a poor part of Paris – the son of a clerk and his wife.  By his teens, Rodin had decided to become an artist and studied at a design school but he was hampered by his shortsightedness and was refused entry aged 17 to the prestigious École des Beaux-Arts; But he persisted and started to specialize in sculpture. It took time but by his mid-40s he had established himself as one of the preeminent sculptors in the country.  His works were to include The Age of Bronze, The Kiss, The Thinker, and The Burghers of Calais.  If you don’t know his work I thoroughly recommend visiting his museums in Paris or Philadelphia – both of which are wonderful – or simply see The Burgers of Calais at the Met in New York.  (Alternatively, have a look at our Tim Marlow meets Tony Bennett – where it is one of Tony’s choices to talk about).

But a painter?  No-one thinks of Rodin as a painter.  His own art collection had 6,000 works including paintings by Van Gogh, Monet and Renoir.   He loved paintings and loved to paint.  

In July 1906, Rodin, 66, went to see the Pré-Catelan in Paris, the show given by the troupe of Cambodian dancers, who came to accompany king Sisowath of Cambodia, during his official trip to France.  Rodin was bewitched by the beauty of the dancers and even followed them to Marseilles to be able to draw them again and again until they sailed away.

A few days later his comments were reported in the newspaper The Figaro: 

"These monotonous and slow dances, which follow the rhythm of a hectic music, have an extraordinary beauty, a perfect beauty ... [They] taught me movements that I had not met anywhere yet ..."

This particular painting I find absolutely gorgeous.   A gouache of ochre for the arms and head as well as a deep blue for the dress.  There is an absence of detail but that is not missed. The curve of the wrist, the slight tilt of the neck, even the rise of the knees carry with them a grace and control that is bewitching.  The energy and control are captured by a master artist.  This is what one sees time and time again with good and great artists – the ability to say so much with so little. It’s true of film-making too: often the skill is knowing what to leave out, knowing how to summarise in a few words or images what may be a complex tale.  To entertain, inform and move.  Rodin, painter as well as sculptor, was a master.

Test before you invest... The inconsistency of printing photos!

I am an old-fashioned chap at heart – I like my photos in albums.  I have yet to really enjoy the family huddled around a lap top looking at images of my kids growing up in quite the same way as we do when it’s albums we are gazing at. Maybe it’s just how I was brought up. The downside is that it’s a huge task and, despite my best and continuing efforts, I am currently 7 years behind.  It takes ages to ingest and log photos on all the many devices we as a family have – never mind going back through more than 20,000 photos we have on-line to make sure they too are properly labelled. Then one has to choose from the thousands that accumulate in any one year and make a representative selection. I recently did just that for 2012 and totalled up more than 200 that I needed printing. 

The big question then is ‘where’? I have tried on-line, department stores, supermarkets, chemists and photography shops and only their inconsistency is consistent!  The colour black can be anywhere from light grey to coal black. Colours are all over the place and white can be, well, anything. So I decided to do a test. I chose five locations in my hometown of Brighton and sent each the same five images to print. These were the photography chain Jessops, Boots, and photography shops Zoingimage, Colourstream and ClockTowerImages. The results were frankly pretty shocking.  It may be unfair to rank them but I will tell you the best one – and it rather surprised me:  Jessops.  I went in there to ask about their gear and they said they use a dry-printing method and that helps them keep standards high and regular.  I did ask their PR department for more information on exactly what equipment they use but no response has as yet been forthcoming.  

But the conclusion is: do a test in your local area and make sure you find out who prints best before cramming your photo albums with below-par reproductions of your fine photography skills!