El Jaleo Study
Last year, I went to a John Singer Sargent exhibit at the De Young Museum in San Francisco. One room was dedicated to his amazing piece, El Jaleo. While the original was not present, the exhibit displayed an extensive number of studies, drawings, and references he used in preparation for the masterpiece. There was an adjoining room that displayed various paintings he had done that were copies of pieces by other artists he admired.
I was fascinated by the collection not only because I admired his work, but it gave me insight into his process and the incredible amount of preparation he went through. Some of the initial studies are great works in their own right.
One of his copies was of a piece by Velazquez and it was in this moment that I understood the concept of a copy as a study. I've attempted to copy the look/feel of paintings I've admired, but I never set out to outright copy. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that staying within my own comfort zone did little to further my abilities. I felt I needed to copy a great work and what a better start than El Jaleo itself.
The original piece is huge. 11 foot wide by 7.5 foot tall, matching it's original scale was out of the question. With an abundance of canvases on hand, I decided to use one I already had and ultimately settled on a 12" x 9" panel. This size would provide two challenges: first, the proportions were different so I would have a taller image than the original and secondly, the much smaller size proved difficult to communicate detail in some areas of the orignal. I told myself from the beginning that the goal was not a duplicate but a piece that faithfully communicated the look/feel of El Jaleo.
The most important look/feel of El Jaleo in my mind is the representation of light and shadow. The dramatic shadows on the back wall; the dancer in the foreground bathed in bright light; the piece on the whole communicating motion.
While I never intended to create an exact copy, that intention got lost somewhere during the process and the whole piece stalled while I obsessed over the last few areas. I botched the first attempt at the dancer's face and then kept putting it off, psyching myself out on my ability or not to do it justice. As time dragged on, the self-doubt grew and I did anything I could to avoid finishing the piece.
Then it dawned on me, or specifically, I remembered my initial intent and more importantly that working on 1/10th the size of the original I would never be able to match the detail. Once I allowed myself that, I finished it in one session and a short one at that.
This is not a faithful copy of the original, but one I'm happy with nonethless. My palette is a little more blue grey on the back wall whereas the orginal is more green grey. I didn't stretch the composition to allow for my canvas' extra height, but rather just added headroom. All the elements are present although I treated each a little differently. I do feel like I've captured the dark/light. It is the same, but different.
No one will ever look at my painting and mistake it for the original, but it nonetheless was a great opportunity to stretch a bit more as an artist. It's yet another experience working in oils that makes me more enthusiastic with the medium.
While this will stay in my personal collection, it's something that will have an impact in a small way on future paintings and as such, I thought I would share with visitors to the site.