Research Point Louise Bourgeois

An artist who worked in a quite expressive style is Louise Bourgeois (b.25 December 1911 – d.31 May 2010). She was a renowned French American artist, better known for her sculptures (particularly the spider structures) than for her drawings.


Maman, Guggenheim, Bilbao, Spain Retrospective-2003


On spiders

"I came from a family of repairers. The spider is a repairer. If you bash into the web of a spider, she doesn't get mad. She weaves and repairs it."

The artist's fascination with the figure of the spider – endlessly fertile mother and sinister predator – made itself felt in numerous works. This is Maman above (1999), an enormous sculpture that took up residence on the banks of the Thames in 2007

Most of her work was autobiographical - suggestive of the human figure and based on themes of betrayal, anxiety, and loneliness, said to have been influenced by childhood trauma.

The texture in some of the early abstract drawings of the1950s (although pre-dating the Maman spider sculpture) is to me reminiscent of the sinewy forms of the limbs.

Their surreal appearance is not surprising, considering the times in which the artist was beginning to hit her stride at the same time as the surrealist movement, just before World War II, though she didn’t develop the same shock tactic style.

Her lengthy immersion in African art is believed to have been an influence on these drawings, resulting in a collection of images that both symbolized and transcended autobiographical suggestions.

In many of the drawings, I find the linear quality and arrangement of marks quite mesmerizing in their directness and decisiveness, reminding me of spontaneous doodles; something from out of the unconscious.

untitled crayon on paper 1950

Untitled-Drawing-1950 ink on paper 11 x7 inches. A Year of Positive Thinking

Louise Bourgeois was also an important force during the rise of the American Abstract Expressionists in the late  1940's and early 1950's, as well as during the 1960's and 1970's feminist movement.

This quote serves to very clearly communicate to me the importance of sketching on the move:

“Drawings have a featherlike quality. Sometimes you think of something and it is so light, so slight, that you don’t have time to make a note in your diary. Everything is fleeting, but your drawing will serve as a reminder; otherwise it is forgotten.”

Louise Bourgeois, Drawings & Observations  Louise Bourgeois: The Insomnia Drawings  Whitney Museum of American Art June 14-Sept. 21, 2003 220 individual, red, blue and white drawings made during an eight-month period (Nov. 1994-June 1995) of sleep deprivation.

 

Insomnia 1994-95



View from the Bottom of the Well
- drawing from the 1950's

 

 Most of her work was autobiographical - suggestive of the human figure and based on themes of betrayal, anxitety and lonliness, said to have been influenced by childhood trauma. 

The texture in some of the early abstract drawings of the1950s (although pre-dating the Maman spider sculpture) is to me, reminiscent of the sinewy forms of the limbs. Their surreal appearance is not surprising, considering the times in which the artist was beginning to hit her stride - at the same time as the surrealist movement, just before World War II, though she didn’t develop the same shock tactic style. Her lengthy immersion in African art is believed to have been an influence on these drawings, resulting in a collection of images that both symbolized and transcended autobiographical suggestions.

In many of the drawings, I find the linear quality and arrangement of marks quite mesmerizing in their directness and decisiveness, reminding me of spontaneous doodles; something from out of the unconscious.

Louise Bourgeois was also an important force during the rise of the American abstract expressionists in the late 1940's and early 1950's, as well as during the 1960's and 1970's feminist movement.



Untitled - ink on paper 1950



Untitled crayon on paper 1950



This quote sends a strong yet poignant reminder across to me, of why it is so important to sketch on the move:

“Drawings have a featherlike quality. Sometimes you think of something and it is so light, so slight, that you don’t have time to make a note in your diary. Everything is fleeting, but your drawing will serve as a reminder; otherwise it is forgotten.”

Louise Bourgeois, Drawings & Observations