squares 1~5

squares 1~5

Tuesday, January 22, 2019

How modern was Cezanne syntactically?

There is no history in pure art.
When art-historical time is shown on horizontal ax, the quality of artwork appears on vertical ax.
The artistic quality which depends on the geometrical structure is measurable quantitatively.
I have shown in the blog [Cezanne's intuitive syntax and Modigliani's intentional syntax] that the syntactic structure in Cezanne can be explained using models.
Last time I made new model called circle-cross model.
This time I am going to check if the new model can be made for the same work:  [Six Bathers].

Cezanne [Bathers]

This is most finished work among Cezanne's whole works.
The contour without volume makes easy to see the design.
Cezanne [Six Bathers] lithograph arc model

This is mostly made of arcs.
I used only seven circles for the arcs.
I add the vertical and horizontal diameters to each circle for making a unit.
Cezanne [Six Bathers] circle-cross model A

To see better, I thicken the line segments which are lined.
Cezanne [six bathers] lithograph circle-cross model B

Many diameters of the units are lined, to my surprise.

(I quote from the previous blog.)
A picture usually started for drawing animal and human shapes.
The shapes always become simplified.
There are several steps in formalization of drawing.
The artists' awareness of shape develops like these:
  1) A string of line is made of a chain of curves each of which has different            curvature.
  2) A curve with a single curvature is an arc.
  3) The circles which are the extension of the arcs can be easily adjusted to have balance.
  4) The number of circles should be small to be harmonious.
  5) The crossing point( pivot) of the circles is important for harnesing.
  6) The pivots on a line makes unified look.
  7)  The unit of a circle and vertical-horizontal diameters makes easier to control the whole balance.

It is almost unbelievable that Cezanne invented such device.
But any design develops in the same way.
The process can be called embellishment of design.
The syntax is the device for embellishing a design.
Refining the design of a picture is making it ornamental.
This process can be seen in any style of artifact.
There is no difference between artist and artisan.
They use the same syntax.




No comments:

Post a Comment