Assignment 5 – Research

I have found research for this assignment particularly difficult as the subjects are modern buildings and not subjects for traditional landscape artists. The works I have found are largely modern and contemporary artists so I am simply looking at the work to investigate how other artists have approached these subjects.

Lloyds of London (The one with the outdoor plumbing!)

Lloyds of London Paintings by Ekaterina Lutokhina and Kris Mercer

https://www.saatchiart.com/paintings/lloyds-of-london/feature

Lutokina uses Marker pens and acrylic and the drawing is a pretty good representation of the building, having spent a wet and windy sheltering and sketching it myself. I feel that this approach, whilst lovely, would be better used when focusing on a drawing course.

Mercer uses Acrylic, stencil and Vector, a much more computer generated style of painting focusing on the darks to bring out the 3D form of the building. The paint is applied in brightly coloured overlapping planes to bring out the distinctive features of the building. I have to confess that this is very clever and very detailed in a simplistic way but I want to be much more subtle with my colours.

https://cathyreadart.com/product/lloyds-building-painting/

Cathy Read painted this in 2012. She used pencil on watercolour paper which she then masked; removing the fluid once the watercolour and acrylic ink painting was complete. It is an interesting technique and I really like the colours. Interestingly she has chosen the exact view that I am considering for my painting and I took a photograph in almost the exact same location.

I love this next oil painting by Anthony Borzillo Lloyd and is much closer to what I want to achieve.

https://www.pitturiamo.com/en/modern-painting/the-lloyds-building-lime-street-london-100x100cm-107463.html

There is an energy to the painting and the criss-crossed lines almost give the impression that we are looking at the building as a reflection in a window.

20 Fenchurch Street (Walkie-Talkie/Sky Garden)

The Walkie Talkie form Leadenhall Building by Sarah Adams is an acrylic painting of the building from an aerial perspective.

https://www.wychwoodart.com/shop/original-painting/the-walkie-talkie-from-the-leadenhall-building/

I do actually like the colour pallet and there is no doubt that this is undeniably recognisable as the building with The Shard behind despite the thickly applied brushstrokes but I have to confess I wish to produce something more detailed.

Walkie Talkie 2019 by Scott Listfield

https://www.creativeboom.com/inspiration/scott-listfields-paintings-of-a-lone-astronaut-split-between-two-divided-worlds-of-post-brexit-london/

I really enjoyed looking at all the paintings by Scott Listfield in this article. The concept is of a loan astronaut wandering around a London divided by Brexit. Iconic buildings or political or financial institutions are divided with a strong line from dilapidated or graffiti strewn buildings. The storytelling is thought provoking but for the purposes of this research it is the paintings themselves that I like. Listfield manages to capture a realistic image of the buildings but on closer inspection uses very little detail. He suggests the windows of the building with lines of paint and leaves large areas plain which leave your brain to fill in. I also like his colour pallet using similar hues in each part, keeping each section fairly monotone even though he uses some bright colours within the work.

The Millennium Bridge

Millennium Bridge London by David Drury is a very traditional watercolour painting.

http://www.drury-art.co.uk/woking-gallery/Millennium-Bridge-London.htm

Drury has really captured the shape of the bridge and the northern embankment with St Pauls in the background however I want to focus on a more close up view of the bridge concentration on the architecture itself.

This painting of the bridge by Anita Austwick is an interesting oil on canvas.

https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/millennium-bridge-london-213677

The colour suggests an evening sunset and the viewpoint is in the centre of the bridge looking towards St Paul’s. The eye is led towards the cathedral over the bridge. The supporting structure is shown at the outer edges of the painting but I want to make those parts a much stronger focus of my painting.

A similar view as the previous painting, I love this version by Claudia Hernandez.

https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Painting-Millennium-Bridge-London/52826/1269712/view

I particularly like the colour pallet that Hernandez has used for this oil painting. The subtle blues, greys and pinky beiges are very much what I want to try to accomplish in my work and I particularly like the attention to detail in the hand rail and supporting structure on the right hand side of the bridge.

This final painting I have found on the bridge is by Simon Fairless.

https://www.simonsgallery.com/popart/004sf3699millennium.php

This is an acrylic on canvas painting done in the style of pop art. Fairless has managed to capture the structure of the bridge in the form of a silhouette with a flash of orange and red that instantly manages to pull the bridge forward out of the black background. I would want much more detail in my painting but I do like the unusual composition.

The London Eye

I have found lots of paintings of the London eye, but they all paint the whole wheel as part of the London landscape, not the structure itself.

Jeremy Sanders painting uses heavy, impasto oil paint.

http://www.jeremysanders.co.uk/buy-prints/london-eye/

Looking at this work I suspected that he used a pallet knife but read that he actually uses varying sizes of credit cards as tools to paint with. His bright blues and warm russets of this painting evoke a warm sunny day and he has captured the idea of the wheel without being literal.

In contrast, this painting by Robert Wells on a slightly greyer day, more like the weather I experienced when I visited it.

http://www.bathartgallery.co.uk/showInventoryHQ.asp?iId=13056&title=The%20London%20Eye%20from%20Westminster%20Bridge&artist=Robert%20E%20WELLS

Wells uses softer, more muted tones with little flashes of red and light dabs of paint to suggest the image.

I finally found a close up of the pods painted by Julie Westmore, Sunset at the Eye.

https://www.jwestydesign.co.uk/collections/london-paintings

I was drawn to this image as the composition is almost exactly what I propose to do and having only visited the London Eye yesterday I can visualise exactly where she was standing. This is an acrylic painting using shades of yellow to depict the sunset and bring out the grey structure of the eye itself. My only hesitation with this painting (I am loath to call it criticism) is that the perspective of the pods and their shape seems a little off.

It has been interesting seeing how other artists tackle the challenge of these types of contemporary architecture. I decided to see how the old masters painted London and found this painting The Thames and the City by Canaletto (1746-7)

https://www.expedia.co.uk/explore/the-most-famous-paintings-of-london

The following photo taken yesterday whilst I was studying the chosen structures shows how much the London skyline has changed.

The photograph shows the City as it is now and is just to the right of St Paul’s Cathedral.