Self Portrait in Fur Coat (1500)
Albrecht Durer
Knob (1997) Gavin Turk
Damien Hirst and Maia Norman (1995)
Albrecht Durer's 'Self-Portrait in Fur Coat' (1500) shows a significant change in the way that the artist views and portrays himself.Research the paintings by Albrecht Durer, Gavin Turk and Damien Hirst in order to answer
the following questions;
- Identify aspects of Durer's self portrait that show a changing view of the artist's view of himself as an individual.
Durer’s self-portrait of himself shows that he thinks of himself as incredible like the almighty God or Jesus christ, he is shown to be like a christlike figure because of the way he is dressed in a dapper brown robe, with fur around the colour that he is grasping, the colours and the material including the fur look rich and superior to normal people of the 1500s therefore suggesting he is a wealthy man and highly looked up to. His hair and stance is also in reference to Christ because of how Jesus was portrayed in the Bible with long hair and always wore a robe. Because of the fact that he is comparing himself to Christ it shows that he thinks of himself as high and mighty. In this self-portrait he used himself to promote himself and his work, by showing his skills and enabling to make himself look like an icon before he was.
- Explain how the artist's social status increased during the Renaissance period. Briefly explain why this happened.
In the renaissance period Durer’s social status increased because in an arranged marriage he married a daughter of a wealthy machine and instrument maker. He later became famous and his social status increased due to being the only artist who continuously painted self-portraits to show his change in social status and appearance as time went by he was also one of the only artists of his time that made self-portraits a big park of his work.
- Comment on Gavin Turk's work in relation to individualism, status of the artist and egotism.
Like Durer, Gavin Turk self promoted himself because like other artist of his time and still today are eager to get out there and show the world what they have got to say. What is individualism? ‘A belief in the importance of the individual and the virtue of self-reliance and personal independence’.. ‘Individualism also stands in contrast to the Religious Right on matters such as gay marriage and the role of government in society.’ Gavin Turk continuously uses his own body image in large scale sculptures that are made to look like famous people that people should recognize like as seen in wax museums, such as the wax model he did of himself dressed in an Elvis Presley-like stance and outfit suggesting that he is as great or better than the incredibly famous man himself. Because he is an individualist he appears to be so hung up on himself, his appearance and views and values in his work because he always uses himself as his main subject, which shows how egotistic he is and shows he is rarely interested in anything other but himself.
- Comment on Damien Hirst's use of his work and the media for self promotion.
Damien Hirst is someone who really does not give a hoot about being ruthless in his ideas and only cares about things that interest him and things that he likes. He does art for himself and attention even though a lot of the time it is unwanted attention, such as being accused of copyright, visitors of his rotting cow and bull exhibition vomiting, comments on September 11 telling the world his personal opinions about the bombing “You've got to hand it to them on some level, because they've achieved something which nobody would have thought possible, especially to a country as big as America”. All these things has got people talking extremely bad to extremely good things about him and it is constant there is always something that Damien Hirst is doing to be talked about, it is what he lives off, he loves the fame, money and hate and respect people give him. Damien Hirst is Britons most famous and richest artist and he cannot even paint, he even has assistants to paint for him and has been called an amateur.. “Hirst, as a painter, is at about the level of a not-very-promising, first-year art student."- I disagree with this I just find his instalations etc have wowed people to the point where it cannot get any crazier or extreme that the paintings have been a bit of a let down because you can’t really get that feeling in his paintings of shock or surprise because they are flat and 2D I enjoy them because I feel in some respects it is like his 3D work been flattened out. However, on the other hand with his conceptual art and installation art has changed the likes of contemporary art and thinking today. I
- Find 2 images of work by artists or designers that reflects some of the ideas of individualism, self promotion or egotism that have been discussed on this blog. Upload images to your blog, title and date the work, identify the artist/designer and comment on the work in relation to the question.
Lee Alexander McQueen was a genius and everybody new it including himself. He was born in 1969 but died last year in February aged 40.. as some say ‘only the good die young.’ He is well-known for his exceptionally over the top runway shows for every collection and over the top garments. He brought the bridge between dressing normal to dressing however the hell you wanted. He mastered the art of costume design and tailoring in which all his wacky and weird ideas generated from.
Highland Rape collection 1995 Alexander McQueen
People are so terrified in the fashion world of being judged by the audience and the press and how it will effect their image etc.. however, with McQueen we have an artist, and artist who is not afraid to speak through clothes as if they were art his views on things such as in the collection their was much talk about it being a disgrace to rape and to women, however, in his respect he said he has such a great appreciation for women and this collection was all about how the “18th century Scotland had been over-romanticized.” He does what he wants and feels in his collections by exposing things that people do not necessarily feel comfortable viewing but he wants them to see beyond the boobs, bums etc. He was the pioneer on the ‘bumsters’ which are pants ‘cut off at the bone to reveal the cleft of the butox’ they are one of his most signature pieces. The point of making the bumsters was to extend the torso. He feels women have to be strong and powerful to wear his clothes, the clothes are an ‘armor’. ‘People have to have balls to talking to women wearing my clothes’- Lee McQueen 2009. By using ‘Loudmouth and shock tactics’ McQueen gets a reaction instead of an applause because that is the attention he wants because he was so carefree of what people thought about his designs because he had such a strong ego and wanted “people to see things that they hide in their heads; War, religion, sex: things we all think about but don’t bring to the forefront. But I do and I force them to watch it.” Because he had such a cocky ability he was able to promote himself in the way of speaking his mind to the press in clothes and in statements which made him so incredibly famous.
- How do you think artists and designers are viewed in Western society today?
Today designers and artist have the most freedom in the world because anything is basically art if you make it, back in the renaissance period artists were restricted and did not have the creative ideas and modern ways of today to explore things that maybe unacceptable in society. There are no limitations really for art today because time has moved on and it has been proved in a way that art is anything you can create or design or art is using your imaginative. I feel that artists and designers today, get recognized quickly (which most young artists want) by being as out-there and as eccentric as possible, which is not a bad thing at all but they get the most attention because of some of the vulgar, yet beautiful pieces of work that they create and can think of because there is a lot of criticism and effort to talk about them. Such as the likes of Damien Hirst’s work that is sometimes so unpleasant to look at it upsets the stomach. His and a lot of young artists stir the audience and the critics which makes them well-known.
British Fashion Designers by Hywel Davies page 22-29 Published by Laurence King Publishers
The Greatest Fashion Designers by Brenda Polon and Roger Tredre 2009 by Berg
Fashion Now- i.d selects the worlds 150 most important designers. By ED. Terry Jones and Avril Mair 2003 Taschen
