ON REALISM – A LETTER TO HELEN

Why not draw realistically? After all, a basic tenant of realism is that it represents truth. A completely natural drawing is done without any outside artifice. Forms, textures, shadows, etc. are all rendered as closely as possible to what the eye sees.

Helen wrote to us to say that since she is concerned chiefly with realism, how does the concept of transparent drawing fit with her concerns? Another question that she raises is whether transparent drawing is abstract. This post is an attempt to answer these excellent questions.

Realist painters in the mid 1800s rejected the Romantic traditions of stylistic flourishes and overt emotionalism. These French painters, such as Gustave Courbet, favored illustrations of real people in real life settings.

Gustave Courbet, A Burial at Ornans, 1849-1850, oil on canvas, 314 x 663 cm.(123.6 x 261 inches), Musee d’Orsay, Paris.

It seems to make sense that if you want to develop the greatest truth in art, you will work to represent on your paper or canvas exactly what you see. This is a great and difficult goal for any artist.

Yet the production of art is not the goal of those who solve problems. Our goal is to develop the most appropriate graphic methods for the holistic design of enclosures, objects and containers. I submit that making analogue transparent drawings of these objects is the best way to design.

ABSTRACTION

Artistic abstraction, by most definitions, is a method by which information is reduced so as to get at the underlying concepts. Abstraction in art, typically in modern art, is not concerned with literal depiction.

Transparent drawing, on the other hand, is principally concerned with including all information. The ultimate transparent drawing would be one in which all information is shown. The word abstract, at least for the purposes of transparent drawing, is a bad word. A transparent drawing, like the one at the top of this page,  seeks truth by including all. So by this definition at least, transparent drawing is not abstract

If you are, like Helen, principally interested in making accurate and realistic depictions, then a transparent drawing as an end state most likely will not provide satisfaction. However, if you are developing a realistic drawing or painting, then a transparent drawing as part of your process might give you a greater understanding of the scene that you are representing.

HOW ABOUT A REALISTIC TRANSPARENT DRAWING?

Any discussion like this regarding the purposes, meanings, truth and process of the arts is naturally fraught with ambiguities. Part of this is due to the imprecise meanings of our words. Even in the discussion above, abstraction can have multiple meanings. Let’s not let abstraction lead us one way or another. Instead, let’s try to imagine what a Realistic Transparent Drawing might look like and see if that takes us anywhere. What do you think? Can a Realistic Transparent Drawing exist?