{"id":8900,"date":"2014-11-26T17:08:20","date_gmt":"2014-11-26T16:08:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/?p=8900"},"modified":"2020-11-25T14:47:06","modified_gmt":"2020-11-25T13:47:06","slug":"oscar-kokoschkas-double-painting-under-analysis-at-the-royal-museums-of-fine-arts-of-belgium","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/2014\/11\/26\/oscar-kokoschkas-double-painting-under-analysis-at-the-royal-museums-of-fine-arts-of-belgium\/","title":{"rendered":"Scientific analysis of Oscar Kokoschka&#8217;s portrait of actor Ernst Reinhold reveal a mysterious under-painting"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\t\t<style type=\"text\/css\">\n\t\t\t#gallery-1 {\n\t\t\t\tmargin: auto;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t#gallery-1 .gallery-item {\n\t\t\t\tfloat: left;\n\t\t\t\tmargin-top: 10px;\n\t\t\t\ttext-align: center;\n\t\t\t\twidth: 33%;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t#gallery-1 img {\n\t\t\t\tborder: 2px solid #cfcfcf;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t#gallery-1 .gallery-caption {\n\t\t\t\tmargin-left: 0;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t\/* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes\/media.php *\/\n\t\t<\/style>\n\t\t<div id='gallery-1' class='gallery galleryid-8900 gallery-columns-3 gallery-size-thumbnail'><dl class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<dt class='gallery-icon portrait'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/2014\/11\/26\/oscar-kokoschkas-double-painting-under-analysis-at-the-royal-museums-of-fine-arts-of-belgium\/kokoschka_6152dig_h_web_large2x\/'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"119\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/CFA-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/kokoschka_6152dig_h_web_large@2x-382x480.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-8908\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/dt>\n\t\t\t\t<dd class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-8908'>\n\t\t\t\tOskar Kokoschka, Der Trancespieler. Oil on canvas, (ca. 1909). Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, inv. 6152. \u2014 \u00a9 RMFAB, Brussels, photo: J. Geleyns \/ Ro Scan.\n\t\t\t\t<\/dd><\/dl><dl class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<dt class='gallery-icon portrait'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/2014\/11\/26\/oscar-kokoschkas-double-painting-under-analysis-at-the-royal-museums-of-fine-arts-of-belgium\/up-side-down\/'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"113\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/CFA-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/up-side-down-360x480.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-8904\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/dt>\n\t\t\t\t<dd class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-8904'>\n\t\t\t\tOskar Kokoschka, Der Trancespieler, up side down.\n\t\t\t\t<\/dd><\/dl><dl class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<dt class='gallery-icon portrait'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/2014\/11\/26\/oscar-kokoschkas-double-painting-under-analysis-at-the-royal-museums-of-fine-arts-of-belgium\/infrared-scan\/'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"113\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/CFA-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/infrared-scan-360x480.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-8902\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/dt>\n\t\t\t\t<dd class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-8902'>\n\t\t\t\tAn infrared scan of A radiography of Der Trancespieler by Oskar Kokoschka.\n\t\t\t\t<\/dd><\/dl><br style=\"clear: both\" \/><dl class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<dt class='gallery-icon portrait'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/2014\/11\/26\/oscar-kokoschkas-double-painting-under-analysis-at-the-royal-museums-of-fine-arts-of-belgium\/radiography\/'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"113\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/CFA-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/radiography-360x480.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-8903\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/dt>\n\t\t\t\t<dd class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-8903'>\n\t\t\t\tA radiography of Der Trancespieler by Oskar Kokoschka.\n\t\t\t\t<\/dd><\/dl>\n\t\t\t<br style='clear: both' \/>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica, serif;\">These days, the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.fine-arts-museum.be\/en\/exhibitions\/kokoschka-gauguin-unravelled\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Royal Museums Of Fine Arts of Belgium<\/a> have dedicated a small section of their galleries to recent scientific techniques for the analysis of paintings, taking Kokoschka&#8217;s <\/span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica, serif;\"><i>Trance Player<\/i><\/span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica, serif;\"> and Gauguin&#8217;s <\/span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica, serif;\"><i>Portrait of Suzanne Bambridge<\/i><\/span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica, serif;\"> out of the permanent collection to be displayed as case studies.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica, serif;\">The latter, a portrait made by the French artist during one of his trips to Tahiti, is shown along with several reproductions coming from multi-spectral analysis in which a camera can capture the image at a higher spectral resolution. This technique, along with others, is currently used to discover the hidden layers of paint on the canvas and how these were originally laid out by the artist, allowing to see deep into the making of the artwork and help historians and restores in their research and practice.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica, serif;\">In the case of Kokoschka&#8217;s <\/span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica, serif;\"><i>Trance Player<\/i><\/span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica, serif;\"> (also called the <a href=\"http:\/\/books.google.fr\/books?id=kTsWBet4QrgC&amp;pg=PA143&amp;lpg=PA143&amp;dq=Ernst+Reinhold+actor+kokoschka&amp;source=bl&amp;ots=QCXnrtcEYH&amp;sig=m6i3463TjDRSOinON_lUR-5kEOs&amp;hl=en&amp;sa=X&amp;ei=Vvp1VJXlGYTxaN-PgLAC&amp;ved=0CC0Q6AEwAg#v=onepage&amp;q=Ernst%20Reinhold%20actor%20kokoschka&amp;f=false\">portrait of actor Ernst Reinhold<\/a>), the exhibition focuses on how this plethora of scientific examinations &#8211; the mentioned multi-spectral analysis, radiography and infrared scan &#8211; has managed to unveil a hidden painting which existed on the canvas before Kokoschka&#8217;s intervention, a painting that also consists of a portrait (though the one of a woman) and differs from Kokoschka&#8217;s for its opposite vertical orientation.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica, serif;\">As informed by the didactic panel in the show, the clear difference in both the style and the type of pigments has led to the conclusion that the older painting was not made by Kokoschka himself, who instead seems to have appropriated the pre-owned canvas, repaired a few holes in it and used it for his portrait the actor Ernst Reinhold. Other than what the museum reports, not much information can be found about the older painting as the artist doesn&#8217;t seem to have left any specific notes on the matter.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica, serif;\">Possibly because of the decay of the most recent layers of paint, it is curious to see how the face of the anonymous lady still appears up side down in the area of the man&#8217;s arm, as if Kokoschka &#8211; consciously or unconsciously &#8211; wanted to leave a visible trace of what he later covered with his work. <\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica, serif;\">Perhaps influenced by recent trends of collective authorship, we looked at the <\/span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica, serif;\"><i>Trance Player<\/i><\/span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica, serif;\"> as it consisted of a work made by two artists engaged in a collaborative dialogue, as the contribution of one was the continuation of the other, as the sound of this conversation had to wait until today to be heard &#8211; a moment when technological images of these parallel voices speaking to each other could be eventually seen.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; These days, the Royal Museums Of Fine Arts of Belgium have dedicated a small section of their galleries to recent scientific techniques for the analysis of paintings, taking Kokoschka&#8217;s [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8908,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2385],"tags":[1863,1689],"class_list":["post-8900","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latest-art-history","tag-oskar-kokoschka","tag-paul-gauguin"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8900","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8900"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8900\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8908"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8900"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8900"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8900"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}