Boston Museum of Fine Arts

After our trip to Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts a couple of weekends ago, I can’t help but wish the museum wasn’t three hours south of here. I would love to go more regularly. I always get museum envy after visiting any city — it’s such a luxury to see so many masterworks under one roof.

As the piece begins, I stitch the image with silk thread

Adding definition and texture with stitch variation

Image complete, ready for dye

So I was interested to read on Hyperallergic last weekend that The Art Institute of Chicago has revamped their website and now provides free and unrestricted access to over 44,000 masterpieces from their digital archives. While it may not be quite as good as seeing the work in person, the sophistication of high-resolution images is a darn good substitute, furnishing those of us who live far afield with better access than ever before.

Folded and marked, ready for resist stitching

Resist stitching complete, threads drawn tightly for best results

Reading that article reminded me that several years ago The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York put 400,000 high-resolution images online. Looking further, I discovered The Yale University Art Gallery also offers free downloads of work within their collection, as does The National Gallery of Art and The British Museum. I’m sure many more institutions are jumping onboard as well.

Still wet from the dye process

Dyes and eyedroppers

Dyeing complete, ready to remove resist stitching

I know it’s not quite the same as sitting before the real thing, but it’s pretty remarkable that we can get so close to art virtually, don’t you think? What a gift it is that modern technology allows us to study masterpieces in collections far from home, in incredible detail, from the comfort of our studios.

Unpicking the stitches is a delicate process, especially when doing my best to keep my ripper away from the embroidered image.

The dyed piece unfolded. I may be in a bit of a pickle with this one as the dye took more readily to the embroidered area than it has in the two previous pieces I’ve made with this process. You can only barely see that there is an image hidden in the center. ©2018 Elizabeth Fram

By angling the piece in the light, you can at least see there is something there. Now the detailed work of bringing it out begins. This is going to be a challenge.

While looking into all of the above, I discovered Open Culture, which seems to be a gold mine of free cultural and educational media. You will want to add it to your bookmarks.

Time wears on and my weeks continue to be a balance between drawing and stitching. At the core of each is line — everything else seems to branch out from there. Although it’s surely more time-consuming to try to make room for both disciplines most days, I wouldn’t give up the exchange between them for anything.

In my life drawings, I can’t seem to move away from using .03 and .05 pencils (H, HB, & B). I would prefer richer darks, but don’t want to lose the immediacy and detail in each stroke to smudging or quickly blunting pencil tips, as commonly happens with a softer, darker lead. Using finer points allows me to build layer upon layer of marks that eventually carve out a form that tells a story through patience and time, for me and for the model. I don’t know our sitters, but I have the illusion of feeling I know them better at the end of each session.

When I look at the art of others, as I may have mentioned before, color can draw me from across a room, but it’s line that brings my nose inches from the piece and keeps me there for careful study.
After visiting the Boston MFA this past weekend, I am still thinking about the expertise of two very diverse artists who exploit line to its fullest and best effects.

Dandelions, Jean-François Millet, 1867-68, 16 x 19.75 inches, Pastel on tan wove paper, Boston Museum of Fine Arts

The first was a surprise. I think of Jean-François Millet as a painter, not as a pastel artist. But in the current exhibit French Pastels – Treasures from the Vault (on view through January 6, 2019), a dozen of Millet’s pastel works (along with selections from Cassatt, Degas, Manet, Monet, Pissarro, Redon and Renoir) allow one to experience the breadth of his fluency with line, conveying each scene to the effect of intimately enveloping a viewer. The rhythmic strokes give the illusion that you are peering over his shoulder while he works.

Dandelions, detail, Jean-François Millet, Boston Museum of Fine Arts

In another part of the museum and in a completely different way, EH Shepard’s illustrations in the exhibit Winnie the Pooh: Exploring a Classic (also up through January 6th) are pure delight. I was weaned on A.A. Milne’s books, so it was enchanting to see Shepard’s working drawings, including the written notations between him and Milne as their collaboration developed. Shepard’s ability to convey so much — mood, emotion, & personality — with such brevity, is breathtaking. If you too are a fan of the Hundred Acre Wood, try to get to Boston to catch this special show.

Tree for Wol’s (Owl’s) House from Winnie-the-Pooh, 1926, E.H. Shepard, Pencil on paper

Piglet and Pooh, E.H.Shepard

“Do you think it’s a Woozle?”, E.H.Shepard

“Bumpity Bump going up the stairs”, E.H. Shepard

Hundred Acre Wood, E.H.Shepard

And finally…
Looking for a light-hearted, uplifting, and inspirational art movie to cap off your week? Check out the film Faces Places by Agnès Varda and JR, available through Netflix — or try searching to see where else it may be streaming online. In it, a line of a different sort grabbed me. In response to an onlooker who asked Varda what was the point of the artwork she and JR were creating she quipped, “The point is the power of imagination”.
Perfect!

Endpapers for the House at Pooh Corner, 1928, E.H.Shepard

Elizabeth Fram

Eye of the Needle

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