Art & The Female Breast

For centuries, the female body has been the alluring subject for many painters and photographers, from Pablo Picasso to Helmut Newton. The fullness, the roundness and the attraction of the female body are simply too beautiful not to appreciate in the art form. According to Susan Rubin Suleiman, author of The Female Body in Western Cultlure, “The female body has occupied a central place in the Western imagination, its images pervading poetry and story, mythology and religious doctrine, the visual arts, and scientific treatises. It has inspired both attraction and fear, been perceived as beautiful and unclean, alluring and dangerous, a source of pleasure and nurturing but also a source of evil and destruction.” 

For decades, I have recognized my feminine side with beauty products, hair color, stylish clothes, jewelry and perfumes. It wasn’t until I received a diagnosis of breast cancer two weeks ago, that I began to fully appreciate the beauty of the female body. I had been away on travel to attend my father’s wedding when I received the fateful phone call. Enjoying a coffee date with one of my sisters, my cell phone rang and the radiology technician read me the pathology report from my recent biopsy. With an impending breast surgery now scheduled for later this month, I've decided to engross myself in studying the art of the female breast.

Could I soak up all the beauty of mine own until then? One friend suggested plaster of paris. You know, make a plaster model of my breasts before the surgery so that I can remember how stunning they were before I went under the knife. I carefully considered this idea, but wondered where would I display “the breasts” in my house. Another friend hinted at doing a series of before and after photographs which could provide an artful documentary of my journey, but would I find beauty amongst all the scars? Finally, a third friend recommended a breast tattoo. I could design an artful bouquet of flowers that would bloom in abundance where there was once a nipple. Interesting. The pain of the tattoo needle would pale in comparison to the physical and emotional pain of losing breast tissue. What would Picasso or Miro or Dali suggest? Would they have considered painting a woman with no breasts?

Gale O’Brien lives in New Mexico surrounded by the love and support of her friends. If you have ideas or suggestions of how to celebrate the art of the female breast, then email her at gale2430@yahoo.com.

Photo credits: Dinh Hanh, vxartnews.com; unknown, drwlcarter.com; unknown, ebay.com.

Facing The Muse: A Portrait Exhibition

What a delight it was to step inside the New Mexico Art League building for the portrait and figure exhibition, Facing The Muse, sponsored by the Portrait Society of America in collaboration with the New Mexico Art League (NMAL). This exhibition was thoughtfully and beautifully displayed throughout the newly renovated NMAL building and was well received by a large crowd which spilled out into the garden with excited talk about the show.

After talking with Cynthia Rowland, the State Portrait Ambassador for New Mexico, I learned of the connection between the two organizations. The New Mexico Art League is one of the oldest such organizations in the country. It was begun by UNM art professors in 1929 to serve as a venue for showing their work and a forum in which to interact with the local art community. The League became a thriving part of Albuquerque which lasted well into the 70's but thereafter fell onto hard times. However, over the past several years a group of professional and aspiring artists and community leaders have worked diligently toward bringing the New Mexico Art League back to its former glory. The New Mexico Art League now offers excellent workshops and classes and has recently hosted several impressive exhibitions, "Facing the Muse" being its most recent.

The purpose of the Portrait Society of America is to foster and enhance the understanding of the practice, techniques and applications of traditional fine art portraiture and figurative works. These activities are instructional in nature. By working with the New Mexico Art League as a venue, the group has been able to offer this juried exhibition to the public. Internationally known figure artist Tony Ryder will be doing a demonstration at the New Mexico Art League on Thursday, October 18, from 5:30pm - 8:00pm. Mr. Ryder is known for his book, "The Artist's Complete Guide to Drawing the Figure" and now runs his own school in Santa Fe, New Mexico. 

About midway through the opening reception, Rowland announced exhibition awards in the following categories:

Best of Show, Mimi Jungbluth, “Midsummer’s Day Dream”

First Place, Professional, Robert Kuester, “Kelsey”

Second Place, Professional, Nancy Davis, “Sarah at the Window”

Third Place, Professional, Cynthia Rowland, “Self-portrait in One Color”

First Place, Aspiring, Doretta Bendalin, “Delaney and Madison”

Second Place, Aspiring, Barbara Endicott, “Luis”

Third Place, Aspiring, Rosalyn Roembke, “Eva”

Honorable Mention, Mary Jane Manford, “Everett Lawley III”

NM Art League Award, Marilyn Drake, “Effervescent”

Facing The Muse portrait exhibition will hang through October 26 at the New Mexico Art League, 3409 Juan Tabo Blvd. NE, Albuquerque, NM, (505) 293-5034, www.newmexicoartleague.org, Monday - Saturday, 10am-4pm.

Remembrances - Photography & Gravure by Karl Koenig

The passing of Karl Koenig in January 2012 left a huge gap in the world of photography. It was his imagery that he was most well known for: Striking shots of concentration camps, majestic trees, lonely grain elevators, remote places in New Mexico, and haunting French cemeteries. Last Friday evening, to a standing room only crowd, his beloved widow Frances Koenig led a special presentation: “Gumoil Photography Demystified” to discuss Karl’s career and his discovery of polychromatic gumoil photography.

Koenig explains the process of gumoil photography as follows, “Each gumoil image is hand-crafted after coating a sheet of 100% rag paper with sensitized liquid gum arabic and contact-exposing it to a transparent or translucent positive under intense ultraviolet radiation. The coated sheet is then developed in water, thoroughly dried, and later rubbed with a dark pigment such as lamp black oil paint. Excess pigment is wiped off and the paper is briefly dipped in a bleach bath to oxidize away (etch) some of the light-hardened residual gum arabic. This leaves the next tonal region of the picture open to a second pigment application. The sequence is repeated until the print is finished over the course of several days or weeks. It is the successive etchings and applications of oil colors which lead to the richness and dimensionality of the finished print. No two gumoil prints made from the same transparent positive can ever be truly identical; there are too many variables for exact replication.” 

After a career in academic psychology at Stanford and the University of New Mexico, followed by several years in private practice, Karl Koenig pursued different interests: art, photography, lithography, silkscreen and non-silver photography. In 1990, he created a new — but old-looking — ‘alternative process’ which he called polychromatic gumoil photography. Koenig published a book, Gumoil Photographic Printing, and several articles on the discovery. Soon he found himself giving university lectures, doing demonstrations, leading workshops and exhibiting work worldwide based on the process. Perhaps, his most important work was his series of photographs taken on multiple trips to Europe to document buildings and grounds of the ten remaining camps of Nazi Germany. Many of those images are included in Koenig’s definitive book on gumoil photography, Fragments: Architecture of the Holocaust, An Artist’s Journey Through The Camps.

Karl Koenig’s memorial exhibition will hang through the October 27 at New Grounds Print Workshop & Gallery, 3812 Central Avenue, SE, Suite 100 B, Albuquerque, NM 87108, (505) 268-8952, www.newgroundsprintshop.com.