by John Gorman

Artwork Description

Frenhofer's model paints her lovers

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Frenhofer's model paints her lovers, 20x20cm, pencil on paper This composition of closely related groups, which is characteristic of the artist’s new style, shows Frenhofer’s model – totally absent again – busy painting her own lovers, in the studio of the old master, which they shamelessly took possession of to make it the site of their lovemaking and artistic endeavors. A form of revolt, of rebellion, in the face of the passive role of models that was assigned to them. On the left, the model-painter holds her brush in her right hand and seems to be contemplating it, her head tilted, her face with rather ungrateful features made of triangles (the contour of the face, the nose), while her eyes are reduced to two stretched but rudimentary features. His thick hair seems to be escaping from an undone bun, and to be only little cared for. His head is crisscrossed with abstract and scathing lines, his skull as if split in two. The triangle pattern also draws her small pointed breasts, but everything else on her body, except for the strong line at the top of her right shoulder, is circumscribed only by a very faint line, which sometimes breaks, as on her arm, while her hand is exquisitely drawn. Her posture is disturbing, the torso seen from the front and the buttocks in profile, as is the sketch of his leg. Her left arm is indistinguishable, although a firm, unfinished line may serve as a junction between this figure and those of her lovers. The latter form such a fused group that it is very difficult for the viewer to determine which member belongs to which woman. The one whose face can be seen, similar to that of a 19th century Parisian coquette, and whose head is crowned by a strange headdress with zigzagging hair cascading down her shoulders and upper back, is holding her lover tightly. This embrace is so madly grasped that the coquette appears dismembered, with her right shoulder and arm starting at the top of her head and, as if detached from her, her left arm truncated, one of her voluptuous breasts bursting out like a dented orange, a still life in the drawing, under her armpit… Her hand rests on the buttocks seen from behind her partner’s back, whose knee and right leg can also be seen, and a tiny fragment of head buried in the body of her lover and her folds and contortions. The coquette’s right leg is barely primed, the knee raised high to the left arm, while her left leg, from knee to foot, appears to be strangely bony but clearly defined. We have already touched on the subject and part of the iconography. But, if we link this reading of the image to what we know of Frenhofer’s life and latest work, a cubist work, although this term could not be used by Balzac at the time, perhaps we can try to go further in the interpretation. What if the old artist was not absent but dead? What if his models, having taken possession of his studio only in this 21st century, were trying to continue the research begun by the master, while indulging in the pleasures of the flesh? For it is a highly sexual work, of course, and this cannot be ignored. So we come to a re-reading of the 21st century (Delacroix, Ingres, Manet, Renoir, Cézanne, and Rodin…), and then of the most important avant-garde of the 20th century, Cubism, with the style and work so highly disturbing on the line of John Gorman, and to Picasso’s drawings above all. The memory of the remaining artist, as we know, is filled with ever-present memories of Michelangelo and the Trecento. Thus, with this study we end up with a total work of art, extremely complex, both in its style and in its iconography, and the very fact that it is a quickly brushed study shows how far John Gorman has reached in his art, and foreshadows the masterpieces to come, of which he gives us here a fantastic foretaste. Delphine Costedoat

Artwork Details

Medium: Drawing Other

Genre: Figurative