History of Lines, #17: the Artist Painting the Negative, Camille Corot, 1874

JF Ptak Science Books   Post 1584   [Part of the History of Lines series]

An interesting appearance of lines in art that seemingly crosses several disciplines and chronological development is Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot's The Dreamer and the Large Trees (1874).  It is vivid artwork full of motion, expressing itself in an impressionistic sense that seems almost more abstract expressionist than mid-early Impressionist. (As an Impressionistic work it would be well into the second decade of the movement; if Abstract Expressionist, it is three decades early.)  It is a brusque, almost savage portrayal of a somber person in a deep wood, though the lines that is is composed of say anything but that. 

The print was made via the cliche verre process¹--Corot used a semi-photographic medium in which there was no camera, as it was the artist who drew the negative, who created the image from nature without a lens and without a camera body (thus eliminating lensless photography like pinhole), drawing directly on the medium (which in this case is glass, insinuated by the cliche) and then exposed/printed onto a photo-sensitive paper (the verre).  The artist is in a sense making a photograph directly of the image in their mind, recording it on the medium, and then printing it from there. 

Of course there are other important lines in the history of art: Vincent Van Gogh Starry Night (1889), Giacomo Balla, Street Light (1909), Umberto Boccioni States of Mind (1911), Michael Larionov's Rayonist Painting (1913),   Robert Delaunay Windows, (1912), Roberto Crippa (1921-1972), Jackson Pollock (1912-1956, particularly Number 1, 1948), and any numbers of works by Barnet Newman.  And of course the Cubists: Braque, Gris, Picasso, and the rest; the Constructivists like Malevich, and on and on into the sunset.  But the reason I've chosen Corot is because of the unexpected, wildish impressionist qualities that seem so far out of place, even with the movement. 

Notes:

1.  Cliche Verre was quite popular with French artists of this period, used by Theodore Rousseau, Charles Daubigny, Charles Jacques, Francois Millet and others.  The process itself appeared very early on in the history of photography, being described in Robert Hunt's technical manual on artistic photography as early as 1841, two years after photography's beginning.

The images:

Van Gogh

Balla

Larionov

Boccioni

Delaunay

Newman

Crippa

Comments

[Charles]

Thanks for that Corot. I use the cliche verre process myself, it's my primary work process.

I read that Corot had a photographic memory and could look at a landscape once and then draw it from memory so accurately, he could remember every leaf. Of course they say a lot of crazy things about artists.

[John F. Ptak]

Thanks for that story on Corot, Charles. Are you familiar with Stephen Wiltshire? A different sort of talent with a autistic-savant deep memory for cityscapes http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/19/artist-david-wiltshire-dr_n_903638.html There was a BBC (?) story on him where he was taken above a city in a helicopter, hovered for a bit, and then descended, where he went to a studio and started to immediately draw that city from memory. Very deeply impressive. ALSO: I would like to see examples of your work!

[Charles]

I've seen Wiltshire's work, that is a phenomenon all of its own. I personally don't think Corot was at that level of photographic memory, but it's the sort of legend that develops when you draw every leaf with such certitude. That cliche verre is just stunning, it has a whole different type of certitude, I didn't expect that from Corot.

Alas, I can't really show my own cliche verre work (btw, is that plural cliches verre or cliche verres?) because they are irreproducible in any other media. I use transparent metallic inks that have a strange reflective sheen, you can't really see the effect except firsthand. I can't scan them or photograph them. Well, I could scan them, but they would be lifeless. But in person.. I had one viewer tell me the prints shined so brightly, they gave her a migraine!

You know, the funny thing is, I didn't even know that my prints were cliche verre until I met up with my old art school photo professor, several decades after I studied with him. He said I should see his cliche verre, and I was surprised that it was the same technique I used. I swear I didn't learn it from him, I developed it (oops pun unintended) all on my own.

BTW, that was a hell of a collection of paintings, with my favorite Futurists, and I didn't think anyone had ever heard of Rayonism.