Maxmillian "Max" Barduleck (1846-1923) Academic Pencil Drawing: Seated Male Nude 1864

Yesterday the Max Barduleck (1864-1923) drawing arrived from Germany. When I took it out of its shipping container and looked at it for the first time I had to catch my breath. It is truly a beautiful work of art. The detail of the drawing is amazing, down to the shadows on the fingernails. The fact that the artist was only 18 years old when he completed the drawing is just astounding to me. I scanned it just as a teaser. It came in a shrink wrapped mat and when I get time I will take it out of the protective container and scan it in more detail. Enjoy
--------------------------------------------------


Caption: Seated Male Nude

Artist: Max Barduleck (1846-1923)

Material: Graphite pencil on Paper (35cm x 28cm)

Dated: Signed and dated 1864

Anonymous German Artist: Male Nude - Nude Boy - 1900 - 19th Century Drawing Technique in Progress

*

The two auction drawings from Koblenz, Germany arrived on Monday (above). The drawing of the male nude reaching out with closed fist on the left is somewhat mediocre and problematic but the drawing on the right (above and below), especially the larger drawing of the male nude on the left hand side of the paper, is a nice example of 19th century drawing techniques in progress. I have scanned the drawing life sized and reduced it by 50% so that you can see the detail of the original drawing. If you look closely you can see the light contour drawing of the overall figure and if you move from the feet up to the top of the model's head you can actually see the process the artist has used to complete the drawing. The artist has started the process by outlining the various planes of the body where lights, mid-tones, and darks will ultimately fall. This is a great example of graining, meaning the artist has created solid areas of shade with no separate strokes visible. As you travel up the body you can see how the artist has used hatching and cross-hatching to model the various soft planes and musculature of the body. Examining the drawing further, I do not believe the artist made it to the next step in drawing, stumping, where lights and darks are blended.
-------------------------------------------------

Caption: Male Nude

Artist: Unknown

Material: Pencil on paper

Dated February 2, 1900

Max Seliger (1865-1920): Semi-Nude Male - The Dying Soldier

*
This afternoon I bought this beautiful pencil sketch of a semi-nude male posed as a dying soldier by German Artist Max Seliger (1865-1920) on eBay Germany. It is very reminiscent of those drawings of wounded soldiers by the American Artist John Singer Sargent which were sketched by Sargent during the Great War. It is obviously a preparatory sketch for a larger work. The work is very moving and the classic training behind that accomplished hand is very obvious. Looking at this drawing one can see how the artist accomplished a stunning outcome of a fairly complicated modeled pose. The head and arms appear to be horizontal to the picture plane, the chest is twisted into that flat plane and the hips are twisted even further, causing fairly extreme foreshortening of the right leg and a somewhat by a lesser amount of foreshortening on that left leg. All that complicated twisting of the figure would have caused some problems for any drawing student but Seliger has brought if all off admirably.

Max Seliger attended the Royal School of Art in Berlin and later at the Institution of Decorative Arts in Berlin. He was a student of Max Friedrich Koch. From 1894, Seliger was an instructor at that same institution. In 1901 he became director of the Academy of Graphic Arts and Printing Arts in Leipzig. While there, he undertook the reorganization of the institute. In 1914 he founded the Leipzig Book Fair for Trade and Graphics. During his career, Seliger created murals and mosaics for many public buildings, including the Reichstag and Calvary Church in the suburb of Oranienburg in Berlin and for the entrance hall of the German Library in Leipzig.
-----------------------------------------------
*

Caption: The Dying Soldier

Artist: Max Seliger (1865-1920)

Medium: Pencil on Paper (35cm by 24cm)(13.75 in by 9.5 in)

Dated: 1899

---------------------------------------------------

Here are a few additional examples of Seliger's works:

---------------------------------------------------

French Drawings: XVI-XIX Centuries

Last night I found and bought a copy of the book: French Drawings - 16th to 19th Centuries by Gillian Kennedy and Ann Thackray of the Courtauld Institute of Art. The book is a paperback edition published by the University of London. It should be arriving sometime in the next two weeks and when I get my hands on it I will do a book review for you and post a few of the illustrations. The Courtauld Institute of Art houses one of the most significant collections of works on paper in Britain. It comprises approximately 6,000 drawings and watercolors and some 20,000 prints. The collection ranges from the late Middle Ages to the 20th century avant-garde. A small Museum in London that should be on any comprehensive tour.
--------------------------------------

Peter Trumm (Jean-Pierre Joseph Trumm)(1888-1966) Additional Works

Last Wednesday I introduced you to this Artist who studied at the Academies of Karlsruhe and Munich in context with the latin term horror vaqui. Today I found a few additional drawings by this artist and thought I would share them with you. These drawings are from the early to mid-20th century.
-------------------------------------

André Castaigne (1861-1929) : Troubadores - 1900

This morning I ran across this beautiful study by Andre Castaigne (1861-1929) listed on eBay France by Antiques de Laval. Obviously not a nude drawing but it does illustrate what all that classical 19th century Academic training could do for an artist of this caliber. Castaigne studied under Gerome and it shows in this beautiful figure study of children titled "Troubadores." Castaigne specialized in historical subject matter. His allegories, historical paintings (i.e. Alexander at the Temple in Memphis), biblical scenes, and portraits appeared regularily in the Paris Salon from 1885 to 1896.
___________________________

The View From My Pillow: A Personal Reflection

*
Alois Kasimir (1852-1930) Nude Boy Playing Flute

----------------------------------------------------

Each morning when the mutts decide it's time to get up, I turn my head and take in a simple tableau of drawings and bronzes set on an oak library table against the nearest wall. After having my heart restarted on three occasions last summer, having an electronic device embedded in my chest to restart it when it goes into overdrive again, I have started to really appreciate the very fact that I can open my eyes each morning and take in a small part of my collection of artworks. Each day waking up one more time becomes a reality that that particular day is indeed a celebration. That string holding the life force within each of our fragile bodies is so very delicate and fragile, and so taken for granted, a fact we sometimes overlook in our day to day rush. In this world that is in the process of going mad out of its mind we each must have some small event or place each day where we can take refuge for some kind of peace and self resolve. For me, it's in the beautiful creations of the various artists who produced the works around my home.

My mind is always spinning and thinking and the last couple of days I have been fascinated by the drawing of the young ephebe on the left (see the scanned image below and the photograph above), the Nude Boy playing the flute, by German artist Alois Kasimir (1852-1930). That drawing is actually a great example of the various drawing techniques prevalent in the 19th century academy. Drawing is technically observation, recognition, and translation. It is seeing what is out there on the human form and translating that into lights, darks, and mid-tones, all on a flat surface, in the process fooling the observers eye into believing your creation is reality. As I look at that drawing each morning I am amazed how the artist has managed, from the vantage point and distance of my pillow, to turn pencil marks on paper into three dimensional, fully modeled flesh. As I rise and get closer to the surface of that drawing, the lines that make up all that realistically modeled flesh (lights, darks, and mid-tones) start to become more obvious. The drawing becomes more about lines and less about moulded flesh. There is a point in distance from the surface of that drawing where the observers eye actually begins to complete the transition from line on paper into what appears to be real flesh and bone. I have taken that large drawing and scanned it life sized. I had to stitch the pieces together and because I did not want to damage the drawing further that in the shipping, some of the surface appears blurred so just ignore those areas and concentrate on the central figure itself. Take a look at the close up of the lines in that drawing and see if you can discern the various techniques the artist has used.

That drawing was started by means of a light contour drawing that the artist would go back into and refine in later stages of the drawing process. Three distinct methods of shading were used, often together in the same drawing: (1) hatching, which required the artist to apply distinct parallel strokes to model the form, and if necessary, a second set of strokes at the opposite angle on top, to produce cross-hatching; (2) graining, which means creating solid areas of shade with no separate stroke visible, the inflection of the actual grain of the surface of the paper showing through; and (3) stumping, which made use of a rolled-up piece of paper or leather to blend lights and darks. Graining and stumping were frequently taught as different forms of shading, to be distinguished from hatching. Contour, shading, and hatching, which comprised a three part vocabulary of representation. In effect, the model was viewed and transcribed in terms of separable pictorial elements, and each element carried as part of its meaning the academic context from which it was derived. Thus when viewed in context, hatching was learned from copying engravings and carried a reminder of two-dimensionality even as it was used to describe volume. Conversely, shading came into its own when copying from plaster casts; it continued to suggest smooth volume even when laid out in flat areas on the sheet of paper. The concept of half-tones in drawing was also learned from copying casts, which to the unpracticed eye simply look white under illumination and dark in shadow. If you look carefully you can see lost and found line in that drawing also. It has in reality become a symphony of line.

The aim of academic instruction that led to the creation of Kasimir's Nude Boy with Flute was to encourage students to see the not immediately apparent intermediate tones between light and dark, so as to create a more graduated effect of relief. A drawing like Kasimir's has made use of all these techniques to present the nude figure as if it were a kind of modeled sculptural relief when in truth it is nothing less than cleverly applied lines on a flat piece of paper.

---------------------------------------