Research Point - David, Ingres, Degas, Picasso, Giacometti, Hockney

Jacques Louis David (1748-1825)

Studies after Michaelangelo

David filled his sketchbooks after antique and baroque art but

rejected the rococo tradition. He described contours meticulously.

‘Marie Antoinette on Her Way to the Guillotine’ 16 Oct 1793, pen and ink.

‘Studies after Pietro da Cortona’
black chalk. This is from a fresco
 ‘The Assumption of the Virgin’. 

As an official artist of the French Revolution he sketched victims on their way to the guillotine. This is a very simple looking line sketch, almost a caricature, of Marie Antoinette on her way to the guillotine showing economical and deft use of lines. It encapsulates very well the broken yet dignified expression on her face.

Ingres

Ingres style was Neoclassicism (classical antiquity) and he was the last of the neoclassicist painters – a master of realism.

He was a pupil of David’s.

Ingres lines are very smooth and pure giving his figures a look of flowing elegance. He paid a lot of attention to detail. Infact the stress on line was an important part of his style – delicate but firm.

Portrait of Charles Francois Mallet. Front lighting used here (as in most of Ingres’ drawings) emphasizes the edges. In doing this he followed very much Raphael’s example. In places he has used minimal of broken line to show the saturation of light and bolder on the other side to show the form turned away.

Link to Ingres Miraculous Lines – describes in fascinating detail Ingres career, inspiration and techniques.

Edgar Degas

Woman drying herself after bathing, pastel

Degas was a great admirer of Ingres, whose masterful draughtsmanship was passed on through Degas’ tutor, who was a pupil of Ingres. Yet he also admired the turbulent style of Delacroix. He used a quite linear style in many of his drawings and often reasserted the outlines. The lines of the faces are usually quite controlled, yet the arms or legs for instance, are done in a quick sketchy looking way with numerous restatements. He often used scribbly lines for backgrounds but more controlled parallel hatching strokes for the forms and surface planes of his figures.

One of Degas main concerns was how to convey movement – drawing his subjects from unexpected and unusual angles. This link describes in detail his pre-occupation with movement, particularly in relation to dancers in the ballet.

Pablo Ruiz Picasso

La Sieste (Les Moissoneurs)

La Sieste (Les Moissoneurs), 1919, pencil

Here very fluid curving lines have been used, with little variation in weight, delicately reasserted here and there. This and the soft, voluptuous lines of the contours give form to the two figures.

In contrast Louis Freund’s drawing Pieta, 1960, oil on board,  the lines are wild and frenzied. The contours come and go and singular lines move from one end of the composition to the other in a vigorous exploration.

Louis Freund - Pieta

In Desuudo de espaldas, 1958 (right) Picasso has created a wonderfully expressive drawing with just a few lines.

                                     Alberto Giacometti

Many of Giacometti’s drawings are made up of a mass of often entangled lines, like lengths of wire. This was how he brought about the sitter’s likeness and presence. The turmoil in these  lines appears to give his figures a look of ghostly vulnerability.

David Hockney

Two Dogs – these are two contented looking daschund dogs, delicately rounded and plump. Hockney uses a balance of thin and thicker lines, suggesting just a slight amount of subtle shadow. This seems to anchor them very comfortably in the chair.

Celia Sleeping 1972 – just a minimal amount well placed lines here, which appear to capture the scene perfectly.

In ‘Portrait of Dwight’1979, pen and black ink, Hockney uses multiple short singular and v-shaped directional lines and marks to describe texture in the hair. Loose minimal slightly curving parallel lines describe the ribbing on the sleeve at lower left. There is just an 

Celia sleeping

indication of texture in the closer fibres on the front of the t-shirt
 where the marks are denser and more random.