Two paintings of footwear. One by by contemporary artist, Michael Taylor, the other by Vincent Van Gogh.
What is the difference between them?
$ 8,970,000, you might say as both were sold at auction a year ago and the Van Gogh realised $ 9,000,000. But then, Taylor hasn't initiated a major art movement and changed the course of painting to boot (forgive the pun).
So what is the difference?
I show both images to my students and the Taylor instantly appeals. Alongside it, the Van Gogh appears dour and colourless. The Taylor, on the other hand is beautifully rendered and there are lots of little details to beguile the eye. In his careful treatment of the girl's shoes, the fabric of the chair, the carnations on the armrests, he shows us just how well he can paint - and there it ends; a contrived, yet nevertheless superb demonstration of the artist's skill.
Van Gogh, on the other hand, in painting less seems to reveal more of himself. His shoes constitute not such much a still-life as yet another portrait of the artist who regarded portraiture as the chief genre for modern painters. We feel as if we can deduce the personality who discarded them; we sense the labouring that has been done in them and the landscapes they have traversed. The person here is inferred, painted as it were, from the bottom up. Like all great works, the painting hints at something beyond the mere depiction of the objects concerned.
I bring a few old pairs of shoes to the art class and everyone is instantly gripped. They are such sad things; empty shells. No props; I try to place them as if they've only just been discarded and it is strangely like having the ghost of the wearer in the room with us.
process cyan, magenta, yellow & black acrylic
neutral tint, sepia & burnt sienna watercolour
phthalo green, neutral tint & quinacridone violet watercolour
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