Calling All Vestals

When I visited museums I see lots of nude paintings and sculptures, so for me to worry about my attempt to include nudes in my painting is unfathomable.  Or is it.  Perhaps my heart is not pure.  My intentions not noble?  I suppose it is my cross to bear.

Anyways after I finished my attempt in painting my first Vestal, and deemed it not objectionable, I was a little more reassured to forge ahead with more.

My first pose has the model lying flat on her side facing me with her head pointing west.  I am picking a similar pose but with the head facing east and erect.  I believe this is a pleasing composition.  Sketching out the position and pose, I fill in the light values.  For this particular attempt, I am using flesh color acrylic to fill in as some of my highlights.  I think this is a interesting changeup.  

  

I am tempted to leave the painting as it is because I do like the looks of it.  I lost the argument with myself and subsequently finish up the second model along the same fashion as I did the first one, with wavy white lines for highlighted areas and wavy black lines to add to the foundation.  The wavy lines remind me of the veins in marble.  Perhaps I'm role playing a sculptor?

I notice my Xuan picked up a grease stain from my wool under-pad placed under the Xuan paper.  I consider this infarction as one of the banes of my life.  I am never disciplined enough to separate my working space from my eating space.  I am just a happy go lucky guy that often do things on a whim. So the logical solution for mitigating the grease stain is to paint something over that.

For my third nude, the "cover-the-stain-model", I think having the model lying on her side with her back facing me would be interesting.

That looks very pleasing indeed.  Again flesh color acrylic is used (along with empty clear spaces and ink) to define light values.  The same wavy line treatment is applied to finish up this sketch.

My fourth pose would have the model assume a sitting position, beginning to develop a dialogue with the rest of the model?  At least in theory anyways.

Close-up view of the wavy lines on the sketch

So now the painting looks like this

I must say I do enjoy the painting so far, and the painting process of course.  This is a new process for me and has invigorated me.  I found a new toy, a new game to occupy my time.

I am particularly fond of the composition so far.  

The two figures in the foreground are facing opposite ways, but their poses showcase the beautiful lines of the female body.  The fact that the two nudes have opposite light values is also an interesting contrast, and it just happened surreptitiously, I must admit.  I also like the last model facing inside and towards the group, albeit a little aloof, with an attitude.  As if she is basking in adulation from the model next to her.

Another grease stain.  Oh no!

Secret Asian Man

 "There's a man who leads a life of danger, to everyone he meets he stays a stranger.  With every move he makes another chance he takes, odds are he won't live to see tomorrow.   Secret agent man, secret agent man"

Those are the lyrics of Johnny Rivers' song "Secret Agent Man".

For someone who speaks English, those lyrics make sense, especially on paper.  However, once the lyrics are mixed with music tracks and whatnot, some of those words get obscured, especially for a non-native English speaker.

As I was growing up in Hong Kong listening to "pop" songs, I was more enamored with the melody and rhythm of a song, and lyrics often didn't mean much, not unless it was a slow love ballad.  Mostly because I didn't understand or couldn't figure out the words.

Thus for the longest time Johnny Rivers song became the "Secret Asian Man" for me.  All I could hear was the refrain "secret Asian man, secret Asian man".  Those were the only phrases I could sing along with to the transistor radio broadcast.  Frankly I didn't care why he was singing about a secret Asian man.

Fast forward 50 years I come across an old song that I loved "Whiter Shade Of Pale" by Procol Harum.  Now that my English proficiency is better than 50 years ago, I am now listening with a lot of curiosity and wanting answers; aside from the usual attraction of melody and chord changes.  First off I still don't see any connection of this song with Air on a G string.  I just don't understand how this work can be eponymous with Bach.  Then words like "miller" told his story, and 16 Vestal Virgins intrigued me.  What was Keith Reid trying to obfuscate?

Fortunately I have these avuncular search engines that never scoff at my ignorance.  I am being taken down the rabbit's hole.  At the end of the day, I am no closer to comprehending the meaning of the song, but at least I can understand the references.  I find myself being teased with the idea of painting the 16 Vestal Virgins.

For some reason my mental image of virgins are more in line with nude figures than what the Holy Book portrayed, but that's another topic.  So if I am to proceed with this "tease", how am I going to approach it. 

I am immediately faced with two challenges: I've not studied painting of a human body and how do I walk the fine line of nudity and obscenity.  I recall watching a presentation of some movie director and he alluded to the same dilemma when filming scenes with nudity.  His answer was in the lighting.  He went into great depth as to how he orchestrated the shadows and highlights and staged them on the human body in such a way that one would not hesitate to watch that movie with their parents.

I am going to try my best to eschew vulgarity.  I wonder if the inclusion of a sieve as a prop could validate my noble intent, since it is often associated with the magical power of the Vestals.

I had received some antique colored Xuan paper with golden flakes as a present, so I am going to use that as my inaugural paper for my Vestals painting.

I am hoping that the random golden flakes could either diffuse the painted images of nude bodies or add some semblance of art (yes, sarcasm ).

I sketch out a body on my Xuan paper and write in the dark areas with ink brush.

A brush with just water running alongside the dark brushstrokes draws out some of the ink and fills in the rest of the body.  Pretending that I am the director, I am placing the model in a backlit environment and a much weaker diffused high front lighting on the ventral aspects of the body.  In my mind the body shall don highlighted contour lines.

I am using opaque white to write on the contours of the body and also to hash wavy lines on the illuminated parts of the body.

I try to fine tune the hash marks a little, especially relative to the dark background.  I am trying to strike a balance between a representational form and a somewhat abstract rendering of that form.  I don't know, to make it more wholesome???  If this works, I shall continue to build on this painting.  

I know this is somewhat a departure from what I usually do, but the kid in me urges me to be a bit sophomoric.  For now I'll give myself a chance to ruminate on that possibility.