Karen Wowk

Wed, May 8th 2024 at 12:40 am - 2:00 am

Desert Island Pics - a few of her favourites

Guest speaker was Karen Wowk, local artist and fine art expert who studied at St Andrews University and taught for many years at St Leonards School. For her talk, entitled ‘Desert Island Pics’, Karen chose eight works of art chronologically across the centuries, giving fascinating insights into each. Her earliest choice was the Riace Warriors, full-size bronze statues recovered from the seabed off southern Italy and dating from around 450 BC, which illustrate Greek realist techniques and show their understanding of the human form. Leonardo's sketch The Virgin and Child with Saint Anne and Saint John the Baptist (his sketches cover over 2,500 pages), dating from around 1500, uses 'sfumato' technique to give a smokey or softened blending between colours. A self-portrait by Rembrandt has a characteristically dark background, using ‘impasto’ technique to add thick layers of paint. Vermeer’s famous Girl with a Pearl Earring dates from c1665 and uses ultramarine, a beautiful blue pigment made from lapis lazuli ground into powder. Turner, famous for his land- and sea-scapes, once said ‘I have no secret except hard work’; he is renowned for his perfection in colour tones. French Impressionist painter Berthe Morisot struggled to gain her deserved recognition (Manet said of her ‘It's is a pity she’s not a man’!). In the 20th century and still working today, Norman Ackroyd and Barbara Rae use colour and imagination to produce very different, hugely impressive landscapes. Karen’s Desert Island book: Gombrich’s ’The story of Art’; her luxury: an endless supply of arts materials! Ian Hamilton gave the vote of thanks.