An Ideal Place

With the turn of colours in the leaves and the freshness of autumn pushing summer into the shadows, there is a sense of renewal in the air. Over the last few months, Jaq has tapped into this refreshment that the change of seasons brings and been very proficient in her work. She has also made some important changes to her image.
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What makes art intriguing to me (and this is obviously different for everyone) is the story behind the work and the details of the artist's life. Take Tracey Emin, for example. I don't particularly like her art for what it is, but because she leads an interesting life and uses titles to expand the meaning of her work, I find her much more interesting than I would otherwise and even wrote one of my term papers on her a few years ago.
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With this in mind, we have taken the past few weeks to think about and change most of the titles of Jaq's paintings and pastels to reflect ideas or concepts and to be a bit more abstract and thought-provoking. Before, her titles pointed out what was obvious about a painting with names like “Blue Table” or “White Nude.” These particular paintings has now been retitled “Spirits Unseen” and “Sensations of Synesthesia,” respectively.
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An argument could be made that these kind of titles distract a viewer from the art itself but, in my opinion, they only add to its appeal.
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In this spirit of renewal, Jaq has also added 14 new ethereal, abstract landscapes to create a new series called An Ideal Place, and has added two new paintings to her collection “Searching for a Skyline,” previously titled “Solano”.
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The following are images of her most recent work, all oil on canvas. Please click over to http://www.jiqjaq.com/ to find an updated site and view the sizes for these paintings and the new titles for her older work. We're always interested to hear your thoughts.
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Secret Weapon

A Walk Down Park Avenue

Still, Close Enough 1

Still, Close Enough 2

Transition in Time

Lost in Translation 1

Lost in Translation 2

Lost in Translation 3

Perfect Moments Do Exist 1

Perfect Moments Do Exist 2

Perfect Moments Do Exist 3

Breathing Underwater

Chaos Theory

Blinking Against an Icy Wind

A Fragment of a Memory

Submerged

Happy Birthday, Jaq!

Yesterday, Jaq celebrated her birthday, but like any true lady, she will never reveal her age.

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She invited me over to her gorgeous home for a delicious glass of wine with a few of her closest (and well-dressed) friends and family. Conversation flowed mainly around art and culture.

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Jaq brought up an interesting discussion she had the other day about Mark Rothko's work now being categorised by critics as “landscape” rather than the former “abstract expressionism.” Personally, I still think abstract expressionism most accurately describes his work, but then its really just a label. One of Jaq's friends said she could see the critic's point as Rothko's work is rectilinear in nature.

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From there, we talked about metaphysics, operas, plays and the pizza in Verona, as well as the mutual chocolate obsession shared among a few of us.

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At one point, the conversation turned to classical music, namely Richard Wagner's Tristan und Isolde – Prelund Liebestod, which Jaq described as a musical orgasm. And from there, led to Schubert and the beauty in his music, especially right before his death at the young age of 31, six years after he was diagnosed with syphilis.

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Another of Jaq's guests pointed out that Schubert was not especially attractive to the ladies of his time. He was even called “The Little Mushroom” as he was shorter than 5'2 and apparently quite rotund.
This brought out the philosophical question of, “Do you think it's possible for true beauty to be the creative output of a person with a destructive personality?”

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And speaking of creative output, (though far from a destructive personality) Jaq led me upstairs to her studio at one point. She's currently working on three very large (taller than me) canvasses simultaneously. Each is in a different stage at the moment, layers of paint drying.

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They are ethereal, whispy, off-white, bits of blue. She said they reminded her of a tiny fragment of cells on a slide under a microscope, magnified about 300,000 times their size.

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By the way, the view from her studio is gorgeous and inspiring, in case you were wondering. She said the room was built for an artist before.

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In other news, I've entered Jaq's painting La Fille des Feuilles into the Saatchi Showdown. Because, well, why not? Voting begins April 2. Nothing will probably come of it, but as it's free, I thought we should give it a go. Stop by to vote if it's April 2 or later http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/showdown/index.php?showpic=13283. If it's before that, enter your own work!

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Look for a blog post by Jaq herself over the weekend.

~Posted by Steph~