Most of the men in Vettriano’s paintings look like characters who have walked straight out of the pages of an F.Scott Fitzgerald novel. Any one of them could be Jay Gatsby or Dick Diver, with their impeccable suits and sleek combed back haircuts.
Being a huge fan of Fitzgerald and his flawed heroes, it’s not surprising that Vettriano is a favourite artist of mine (not that I know too many. The other is Ed Gorey … so that should give you some insight into my range when it comes to artists!) I discovered Vettriano years back when the Sunday Times did a feature on him and not long after that Anthony bought me one of his books.
Vettriano is probably best known for The Singing Butler, a painting which sold for three quaters of a million pound back in 2004. I knew this painting as a print, long before I ever heard of Vettriano ( born Jack Hoggan bye the way, not quite as ‘arty’ is it !!!) While his beach and seaside paintings drum up a whole load of romaticism and nostalgia for the lost days when ladies and gents picnicked at the seaside, these aren’t my favourite at all!
His work has a far edgier side and when he is not painting the Vettriano beachscape, he is painting almost fetishly, voyeuristic glimpses into very private worlds, inhabited by broken and fragile people. The characters in his paintings are usually couples (sometimes threesomes!), portrayed either as very tactile and/or romantically connected (often with suggestions that they shouldn’t be as in Words of Wisdom) or distant but sharing the same space while separated by an emotional tension, as in A Very Married Woman, below.
"A Very Married Woman" … and a very mixed up man!
Let's go back to my place … "Words Of Wisdom"? I don't think so!
Vettriano takes you into the kind of worlds that other painters typically don’t bother with where adulterers and prostitutes, dancers and mistresses, all struggle through live, sharing that unspoken secret … that in private we know that life is what it is, when nobody else is watching there are no lies. I think this is what Vettriano does best. He exposes the fabrications and pretensions and presents what often lies behind the lie of the normal, happy life; adultery, desires, prostitution, desperation, fetishes. It’s all there in Vettriano’s work and that makes it all the more interesting.
He is a very contemporary and relevant artist despite the old time feel to his art. The balance works brilliantly and I admire him for taking on subjects just not considered ‘worthy’ enough by many other, artists, who often remain snobby about their subject matter!
Here is a couple of my other Vettriano favourites …
What's got her all bombed out … Oh it's "The Letter"
Looks like Mr Anonymous just stepped into the … "Parlour Of Temptation"
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Balloon Over St.Petersburg 5″ x 5″ Print
A Gentleman’s Regret – 5″ x 5″ Print
Bizarre Little Ramblings … And A Poem
Digital Art : My Photoshop Sketch of Kristen Scott Thomas
Bernard And Doris. A Review.