The Friday Evening Nudes

Frankly, I'm running out of steam to post The Friday Evening News on a regular basis. It was fun for awhile, but it appears in general that with 138 "followers" and several thousand visitors from several hundred countries, the comments have actually decreased.

I'm not a person who needs or even wants an adoring audience. In fact, I feel somewhat uncomfortable with the idea, even if I could pull it off! I'm rather private and I like it that way. I don't like to be the center of attention. At the same time, it's nice to get some validation for the work I put into this. It seems that  validation comes in the form of intrinsic rewards and the pleasure I get from the comments of a few friends in both the real and virtual worlds. The later being people who can see beyond the images and the few words I write and recognize that there is a person here worth getting to know. Once again, I thank the dozen or so regular and occasional blog friends who leave comments here. It means a lot to me and I don't want to disappoint you by discontinuing the Friday Evening News. As I said, though, it's gotten kind of old and I'm thinking of other new features that I can entertain you with!

As a last hurrah, I post for you this Friday, a nude of mammoth proportions. ;-) You may have seen her and felt disgust. Initially, I felt the same. But I kept wanting to go back to to see this painting because the artist's intent intrigued me. For me, it's the interest and curiosity in why that keeps my passion for art alive.

Benefits Supervisor Sleeping

Lucian Freud 

  b. 1922

When he paints, Freud talks, and he likes to go to a restaurant with the sitter after each session to carry on talking...read the rest of the article at Guardian.co.uk

And while I'm at it, why not post a few more Freud nudes? I love his work.

"At the outset there is always a mystery. We cannot know what a painter brought to painting or what drew him to it."    - From Lawrence Gowing, "Lucian Freud" read the book review here

My work is purely autobiographical.. It is about myself and my surroundings. I work from people that interest me and that I care about, in rooms that I know.  ~   Lucian Freud

I paint people not because of what they are like, not exactly in spite of what they are like, but how they happen to be.    ~ Lucian Freud

I remember Francis Bacon would say that he felt he was giving art what he thought it previously lacked. With me, it's what Yeats called the fascination with what's difficult. I'm only trying to do what I can't do.    ~ Lucian Freud 

Peace, Love and All Groovy Things,

Pagan Sphinx

ABC Wednesday

This week's letter is Kk

K is for Klimt's The Kiss

(1907-1908)

Gustave Klimt

(1862-1918)

"I have the gift of neither the spoken nor the written word, especially if I have to say something about myself or my work. Whoever wants to know something about me -as an artist, the only notable thing- ought to look carefully at my pictures and try and see in them what I am and what I want to do."

Gustav Klimt 

ABC Wednesday