Contemporary and Historical Portraiture

Portraiture is the category in which an artist’s objective is to portray, realistically, one or more people in a painting, photograph or sculpture. This is not necessarily restricted to appearance as an artist can also show the mood and character of the sitter. They can also be used to portray qualities such as wealth, beauty or power. Portraits date back as far as ancient Egypt and remain one of the most popular categories to date.
I will be looking at both a contemporary and a historical portraiture artist to explore and compare their style, influence and how they have chosen to express their subjects.
The first artist is Natalie Holland (left), who describes herself as a realism and neoclassicism artist, is a Russian born contemporary painter who relocated to Norway in 1981 before settling in London some years ago. Working primarily using oil on canvas, her efforts go towards telling a story through figurative art focussing on the difference between the appearance of her subjects and their reality. Holland’s influences include western culture, society and the media. I have chosen to write about this particular artist because she shares my interest in philosophy and human interaction.
A quote from the artist states: Regarding my development as an artist, I subscribe to the thoughts of Picasso: "I am not developing as an artist at all, I just am." As an artist I focus on what I want to paint, with little responsibility beyond that. As long as one paints, one develops.

Natalie Holland’s painting ‘Sisters’ painted using oil on canvas tells two stories and I find this painting really inspirational as it reminds us that we are all individual and make our own choices. The painting shows two sisters who were brought up the same way ye...

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...lour in a painting which expresses anger. But after researching thee artists I feel that it makes for a much more interesting and in depth painting when you can experss which ever emotion you choose without the need to use a certain colour to make it more obvious what you are tryingto portrahy.

Works Cited

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vincent_van_Gogh http://arthistory.about.com/od/modernarthistory/a/Post-Impressionism-Art-History-101-Basics.htm https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/art-history/art-history-1848-1907-industrial-revolution-ii/post-impressionism/v/vincent-van-gogh--the-bedroom--1889 http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/artists/vincent-van-gogh http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/At_Eternity's_Gate http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natalie_Holland http://www.natalie-holland.com/
http://smarthistory.khanacademy.org/van-goghs-self-portrait-with-bandaged-ear.html