This is my first post here. I am an artist working on a portrait of an Ancient Egyptian Painter . . .
I call it “Awan Royal Painter”. The painting is coming along well (life size) however I have some questions regarding the nature of the paint brushes used by the AE’s. I’ve some ideas gathered via “Google” (see my drawings)
but would appreciate any input some of you may wish to add here. Thanks in advance.
Posts: 14 | From: Waterloo Ontario | Registered: Jun 2008
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Is it intended as an accurate rendering of what an Egyptian painter may have looked like at some point in time? If so what point in time and from where? If you are going for accuracy then how did you model the figure, based on what sources?
As for the brushes, I am not that familiar with the various types of AE brushes, but it looks like you are on the right track.
Posts: 8897 | Registered: May 2005
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The purpose is to paint as accurately as I can, an example of the craftsmen behind the work many of us admire, and to do so in a Western (as in civilization) style of painting portraits. At present I am preceding with this project for my own interests . . . it has been worked on in and around commissioned pieces so for the present it sits to the side as I work on two landscapes destined for a gallery. It is possible that this painting may accompany an article regarding the AE craftsmen . . . we shall see.
The time period I am thinking about is New Kingdom, perhaps the 18th or 19th dynasty. I have in my library some 20 or more books (some of them rather large volumes) on Egypt. From these I have studied how the Egyptians represented themselves in sculpture and in paintings, from that I have sought to breath life into an example of an AE as they would have appeared in life rather than as the stylized canon they used.
I have been speculating in a vacuum as to the finish of a tool like the “paint brush” used by the AE’s. The crude examples I drew followed descriptions I had managed to find. However, being an artist and knowing how quality tools can make a huge difference in the outcome of a piece of art I wanted to toss around some ideas with a few others who might know more about this topic than I or who might find it interesting to discuss such a simple but important tool like the lowly paint brush, Egyptian paint brush that is.
If the interest is there I shall share images of the painting in progress, comments will be appreciated.
Posts: 14 | From: Waterloo Ontario | Registered: Jun 2008
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posted
In terms of accuracy it is hard to say exactly how any individual looked from AE, so some of it is subject to interperetation. The only thing I would say is that the portrait should look something similar to the images that such artists painted from the times. After all Egyptian art is the end result of their hard work. Sure, it isn't always accurate and has many stylistic conventions, but you can get some general ideas of how the AE saw themselves and transfer that to the portrait.
Those are the things I personally look at when comparing modern "western" style depictions of AE people. Many times though the modern portraits do not reflect the aesthetic of the ancients. I guess sometimes the "western" style makes them too "western".
In fact, to be specific, the image you made reminds me more of the images from the late period mummy masks, which are more "western", than images from the 18th dynasty. That is why I asked about time period and references.
posted
WOW, dude your icture is Awsome, Looks like a typical Kemmou in my Book...I to have made some Kemet Art.
I did one of Menes...and some other fantacy people in Kemet...Care to see them..?
Posts: 8805 | From: The fear of his majesty had entered their hearts, they were powerless | Registered: Nov 2007
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quote:Originally posted by Doug M: In terms of accuracy it is hard to say exactly how any individual looked from AE, so some of it is subject to interperetation. The only thing I would say is that the portrait should look something similar to the images that such artists painted from the times. After all Egyptian art is the end result of their hard work. Sure, it isn't always accurate and has many stylistic conventions, but you can get some general ideas of how the AE saw themselves and transfer that to the portrait.
Those are the things I personally look at when comparing modern "western" style depictions of AE people. Many times though the modern portraits do not reflect the aesthetic of the ancients. I guess sometimes the "western" style makes them too "western".
In fact, to be specific, the image you made reminds me more of the images from the late period mummy masks, which are more "western", than images from the 18th dynasty. That is why I asked about time period and references.
Yours
Greco Roman Mummy:
18th dynasty:
come on his picture looks great, As an Artist nothing is worse than being told your picture is "Off"...His pic looks like any normal Kemmou citizen. He looks like a native African not "western", although I do understand where you a coming from with the whole "Western style" but truthfully Western Style is interesting to show hoe the Egyptians looked.
Posts: 8805 | From: The fear of his majesty had entered their hearts, they were powerless | Registered: Nov 2007
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posted
He asked for comments and I gave them. If you don't agree that's fine. But I stand by my opinion.
I did not say that his art had no technical or artistic merit, all I said that in terms of historical accuracy and fact it looks more like portraits from the late period than a portrait from the 18th dynasty. Period. That is not KNOCKING his work, by no means.
Each period of Egyptian hard had its own somewhat unique characteristics, even though all Egyptian art follows a generalized canon of sorts. It is the cannon of AE art that makes it somewhat useless as far as accurate representations of individual persons is concerned, as many images are simply cut and paste repetitions done for sake of speed, even though accurate and more "western" style realistic artwork and sculpture was done. However in the tomb painting and temple decoration industry, speed was a very important factor that caused for shortcuts to be made.
Posts: 8897 | Registered: May 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Doug M: He asked for comments and I gave them. If you don't agree that's fine. But I stand by my opinion.
I did not say that his art had no technical or artistic merit, all I said that in terms of historical accuracy and fact it looks more like portraits from the late period than a portrait from the 18th dynasty. Period. That is not KNOCKING his work, by no means.
Each period of Egyptian hard had its own somewhat unique characteristics, even though all Egyptian art follows a generalized canon of sorts. It is the cannon of AE art that makes it somewhat useless as far as accurate representations of individual persons is concerned, as many images are simply cut and paste repetitions done for sake of speed, even though accurate and more "western" style realistic artwork and sculpture was done. However in the tomb painting and temple decoration industry, speed was a very important factor that caused for shortcuts to be made.
Cool, I think your opinion is valid and it is a good opinion.
Posts: 8805 | From: The fear of his majesty had entered their hearts, they were powerless | Registered: Nov 2007
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Yes I see what you mean; the sketch of course was a study with more emphasis on the overall stance of the subject. However it has not missed my notice that the Greco Roman view of an Egyptian is vary different from the stylized native one and of course as is the modern Western view. Nevertheless it is my desire to capture in this painting something more than a Western stylized image of an Ancient Egyptian. There is an essence here, a quality about how the native ancients not only saw themselves, but how they actually where. Is it possible for us to become aware of that essence? Of course I think it is. I can only hope it will not be entirely lost when it is removed from the native style and brought into what I would call (for a lack of a better word for it) a realistic style. Here is the start of the painted face, this is the rough lay in, but one can see (I hope) a glimmer of that essence I was talking about.
Yes I see what you mean; the sketch of course was a study with more emphasis on the overall stance of the subject. However it has not missed my notice that the Greco Roman view of an Egyptian is vary different from the stylized native one and of course as is the modern Western view. Nevertheless it is my desire to capture in this painting something more than a Western stylized image of an Ancient Egyptian. There is an essence here, a quality about how the native ancients not only saw themselves, but how they actually where. Is it possible for us to become aware of that essence? Of course I think it is. I can only hope it will not be entirely lost when it is removed from the native style and brought into what I would call (for a lack of a better word for it) a realistic style. Here is the start of the painted face, this is the rough lay in, but one can see (I hope) a glimmer of that essence I was talking about.
I think it looks good.
Posts: 8897 | Registered: May 2005
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posted
As a portrait artist I am interested in capturing a personality as well as a likeness, yet so much of AE art is devoid of the personality and likeness of the real humans who made up the body of that culture . . . and yet there are exceptions.
It is a personality that I wish to bring to the portrait I am working on, with an eye to that essence I was talking about, an AE essence like the ones seen in the images above.
Posts: 14 | From: Waterloo Ontario | Registered: Jun 2008
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posted
AE art, spanning thousands of years, has many variations. It takes a trained eye and awareness of the THOUSANDS of different images that have survived from AE to understand the subtle changes that occurred in AE art from one period to the next.
One can only go by those images that they have been exposed to as to what they feel is the authentic and most realistic "essence" of AE people.
Most modern artwork I see seems to reflect the limited scope of art that is available to a person who really has not taken the time to really expose themselves to the substantial amount of AE artwork that has survived to this day. But that is neither here nor there. It is what it is. Some people really get into AE art and others only have a casual interest. Everyone has their own perception and sees things differently. However, I do sometimes wish that modern painters who want to be "accurate" would take the time and do the research. That is the best way to get a good understanding of the AE essence and all its variations.
Good luck with your project.
Posts: 8897 | Registered: May 2005
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“Most modern artwork I see seems to reflect the limited scope of art that is available to a person who really has not taken the time to really expose themselves to the substantial amount of AE artwork that has survived to this day.”
. . . is an age old challenge that confronts every artist whether painting landscapes, portraits of people or recreating prehistoric scenes of animals or human cultures. Good references, strong powers of observation, intuition, and the talent and skills to pull it all together must be balanced in time, there is not enough of it to take in all the information out there, it is forever a matter of what to include and what to leave out and ones own sense of what matters to consider.
There is (and forever will be) ones own personal points of believability to consider when working on a painting. Even so the best of us may still not be able to match the imagination of another’s idea. I am content to let it lie there for in the end the hand that must move the brush is a solitary one, even though an artist may listen to the input of others (again I thank you for yours) one painting can not encompass everyone’s dream. However, hopefully we can come very close to it.
Posts: 14 | From: Waterloo Ontario | Registered: Jun 2008
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There is always guesswork involved when talking about ancient populations. And it is certainly not realistic to expect one image to typify the essence of all Egyptians over such a long period of history. Within the 18th dynasty you had a major revolution that occurred in Egyptian art, which had a major impact on the canon of AE art. Just another example of the many essences of AE art, people and culture. Two of the images you posted were from the 18th dynasty, while the rest were from the Old and Middle Kingdom.
Posts: 8897 | Registered: May 2005
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Some articles I found online mention that Ancient Egyptians used reed fibers to make their brushes.
Posts: 30135 | From: The owner of this website killed ES....... | Registered: Feb 2004
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Some articles I found online mention that Ancient Egyptians used reed fibers to make their brushes.
Tigerlili,
Thank you for your kind words and helpful links. I am almost ready to put the large canvas of “Awan Royal Painter” back up onto my easel (still working on a landscape for the Gallery) Looking forward to getting back at it, absolutely enjoy working on this piece. Must be the fact that Ancient Egypt has had me in its spell since I was a child.
Again, thank you, and I think I know how I will go about the paint brush question I had.
Posts: 14 | From: Waterloo Ontario | Registered: Jun 2008
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posted
Absolutely fantastic work Robert. Don't mind saying I'm envious. I particularly like the facial expression of the color version of your Egyptian painter. Serenity is perhaps the hardest emotion to convey, (mirth being the hardest, the reason why Mona Lisa is so widely respected) but you seem to make this trait come through strongly. I'm kind of an animation geek, so my stuff comes out more like this...
Now that I've seen what you've done I kind of feel like breaking out the oil paints and giving it another try.
On a side note, I'm kind of saddened to not have seen more works by people in these forums depicting their own versions of the AE. Not only to give an idea of how they're perceived by their present-day admirers, but because, to me at least, the visual arts is the highest form of celebration of a culture.
Again, great pice of art. Hope there's more to come. Works like yours are (or should be) mainly about recognizing who these amazing people were. Anything else is unimportant.
Posts: 248 | From: Way Down South | Registered: Sep 2007
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Thanks for the compliment and for the image you posted here of your work. I always enjoy seeing another artists interpretation of Ancient Egypt and her people. I will post the finished painting when it is done, but if you wish to see some other things I have done regarding an AE subject well here is something I did some years ago as I attempted to reconstruct how a vary famous Pharaoh may have looked in life . . . I think I would do it somewhat differently now but here it is.
posted
Here is another painting; this one of course is a fantasy. Never the less I attempted to show the enormous size of these fantastic Egyptian monuments.
posted
Thanks for the compliment in turn. A few points about the Ramses sketch. I know, I know, everyone's a critic, but I swear this isn't meant to be critical. Simply an observation.
Rameses, like all Africans, had a receding chin, pronouced prognathism and the back of his skull protrudes. Not to mention he had what Europeans insultingly referred to Africans as having a "sloping" forehead.
For a quick and dirty comparison of how African and Caucasian head shapes differ (in most cases, not all of course) I invite people to look at the poster for Demolition Man. Wesley Snipes and Stallone in profile.
Another point--prognathism. For caucasians the general shape of the profile is pretty much straight-down veritcal-- from forehead to mouth to chin. For Africans the profile is set to an angle, with the lips being the most prominent and the forehead being farthest back--and of course the chin recedes as well. You see this clearly in the wall engravings the Egyptians made of themselves. That's not to say they were trying to make any big point about it (at the time they were around their identity hadn't been politicized) but it was a physical trait of theirs and they were aware of it. Your fully-fleshed out depictions are well drawn, and since my skills are nowhere near so developed I hardly intend this to be a critique. Someone at my level can't afford that. It's just an observation.
Consider this profile of Ramses and Seti from the Ten Commandments. The real Rameses would have a hard time fitting in with those gentlemen.
On a side note: Notice the "Egyptian" servants with the Star Trek Romulan haid-dos? What a total joke! And the outfits, with sashes and capes. That style of dress owes more to Rome or Greece than Memphis or Thebes. But for the most part DeMille reigned in his costume designers and stayed pretty damned accurate. This is a responsible example of "artistic license."
But the hair-do's are not "artisitc license" it's outright making stuff up and it's ridiculous. However this is how the modern view of the Egpytians was formed--in a vacuum by people with an agenda. Sorry about that, I needed to vent.
The drawings are still good work, as is the painting. Hope to see more.
Posts: 248 | From: Way Down South | Registered: Sep 2007
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I think you called it exactly right, the Remises I drew looks Caucasian too European and that is precisely what I would change in it if I where to redo these drawings (which I may do some time later). It takes some thought and observation as well as a kind of stepping out of ones preconceived or racial mind set to be able to depict the AE’s accurately in a modern drawing or painting. I am of course of European descent (German) however I have no desire to conceive paintings of the Ancient Egyptians with a European bias . . . such depictions always look “wrong” (because they are wrong) not to mention thoroughly unreal, in other words they just don’t look as the AE’s depicted themselves in there paintings and in their sculptures. The aim in my painting is to have the uncanny feeling that you are actually staring into the face of a real Ancient Egyptian.
The DeMille’s costuming is of course a case in point – how wrong this all looks – however it is my view there was no agenda here other than to entertain a North American audience that actually did not know any better. Movies usually never conform to truth or historical accuracy, their chief aim is to entertain and make some money . . . not much else.
Posts: 14 | From: Waterloo Ontario | Registered: Jun 2008
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posted
When I went to art school (many, many moons ago) I was taught by a crusty, though endearing Scotch-Irishman with an accent so thick you could walk on it. He was the first person to emphasize the neccessity of understanding how to draw ethnic differences. He constantly drilled into us, "Understand the form underneath--the form underneath. When you do a drawing, remember you're drawing from the inside-out." I can still hear that anal-retentive bastard griping about how we "just weren't getting it" too. Well something he said must have stuck, because for me every drawing begins with the skeleton first.
BTW, it wasn't my intent to imply that your study of Ramses had any "bias." Please excuse me if the tenor of my reply seemed that way. Where the AE are concerned everyone has, to some extent or another been ill-informed--myself included. Anyway, I still hope to see more of your stuff when you finish.
Posts: 248 | From: Way Down South | Registered: Sep 2007
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quote:BTW, it wasn't my intent to imply that your study of Ramses had any "bias." Please excuse me if the tenor of my reply seemed that way. Where the AE are concerned everyone has, to some extent or another been ill-informed--myself included. Anyway, I still hope to see more of your stuff when you finish.
Not to worry, I took no offence. As far as I am concerned, that is indeed the biggest flaw in those drawings of Ramesses II. As a portrait artist I have painted men, women and children of varying races, it is important to look and to see what is actually staring back at you and not get caught up into adding things from ones imagination or preconceptions. I am not saying that the portrait artist dose not take certain liberties as in the removal of a mole or lightening a double chin. A little cosmetic adjustment may be in order or at the request of the sitter but in the end one dose not paint a black man to look like a white man. Essentially that is what I did when I drew Ramesses with a Caucasian look, the man was Egyptian and from what one can see by the work of there own hands they where definitely not German –chuckle-.
Posts: 14 | From: Waterloo Ontario | Registered: Jun 2008
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I am puzzled to know why the Queen Tiye bust is an exception? I have seen a number of busts of females of exactly the same hue. Or is it that the bust seems to portray her natural hair instead of the usual wig?
Posts: 5492 | Registered: Nov 2004
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quote:Another point--prognathism. For caucasians the general shape of the profile is pretty much straight-down veritcal-- from forehead to mouth to chin. For Africans the profile is set to an angle, with the lips being the most prominent and the forehead being farthest back--and of course the chin recedes as well. You see this clearly in the wall engravings the Egyptians made of themselves. That's not to say they were trying to make any big point about it (at the time they were around their identity hadn't been politicized) but it was a physical trait of theirs and they were aware of it. Your fully-fleshed out depictions are well drawn, and since my skills are nowhere near so developed I hardly intend this to be a critique. Someone at my level can't afford that. It's just an observation.
Sportbilly,
Re the AE profiles you are right but that may not be the case for large numbers of modern Africans--whose phenotype measurements vary quite a bit.
Consider examples of Africans whose photos are in the news quite regularly: Robert Mugabe, Desmond Tutu and Mwai Kibaki.
Mugabe, Tutu and Kibaki all have a 90° angle profile. Mugabe's chin is quite pronounced, while his lips are generically European. Note too that Tutu's chin is very pronounced--as in the Anglo-Saxon-Germanic mould.
Consider too Yar Adua(President of Nigeria) and Eduardo Dos Santos(President of Angola)--both with a 90° profile. In fact, one can say the same for all the African heads of state.
The profiles of Meles Zenawi(President of Ethiopia) and Paul Kagame(President of Rwanda) are also noteworthy. I mention these names only because their images can be easily googled for comparisons.
Posts: 5492 | Registered: Nov 2004
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quote: I am puzzled to know why the Queen Tiye bust is an exception? I have seen a number of busts of females of exactly the same hue. Or is it that the bust seems to portray her natural hair instead of the usual wig?
lamin,
It is more a matter of a sense that this actually resembles a particular living person rather than the usual stylized expressionless faces that were the norm for a lot of AE art. In those cases you know your looking at a motif or symbol of a person with no hint of a personality.
Posts: 14 | From: Waterloo Ontario | Registered: Jun 2008
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