Originals and Variants
- Details
- Published on Friday, 03 July 2009 06:57
- Written by Bob Graham
What I want to do here is to illustrate one of the advantages of E-magazines. Follow the link and have a close look at a picture by Rembrandt.
www.mystudios.com/art/bar/rembrandt/rembrandt-artist-in-studio.html
That is a jaw dropping painting – an original. What is the artist trying to tell the viewer? How many interpretations can a viewer put on the painting? Go back and have another look and think about it. It’s completely incredible. How many meanings can be taken? How many ways can you interpret it? That’s the magic of Rembrandt – he paints a very simple scene and leaves it to the viewer to decide what to make of it. Astounding and astonishing don’t begin to describe it.
You might be asking what the connection is with troot catching and I refer you back to the word “original”. Do you still fish with spiders? These are some of the original flies. Just a short thread body and a couple of turns of hackle but they can still fool the wisest troot. That’s because the fly is tied in the same way Rembrandt painted – simple and suggestive. Have a look at the original Pheasant Tail Nymph – simple and suggestive. I’m not suggesting that troot have any human feelings but this is an example of how something thrown together with some scraps of easily obtainable materials can give the impression of any number of trooty food items.
Here are another couple of paintings on the same theme. Take your time and study them and reflect on the fact that not many magazines give you this opportunity to expand the breadth of your knowledge.
http://www.art-prints-on-demand.com/a/dou-gerard/a-painter-in-his-studio-p.html
http://www.sterlingtimes.org/morland17.htm
These are variants. Dou (who was a pupil of Rembrandt) and Morland use the same theme but, honestly, they’re not in the same league. Very simply they’re showing too much and adding un-necessary embellishments to the pictures. They have lost all of the simplicity of Rembrandt and the impact on the viewer has been lost.
Don’t you think we’re doing the same thing in troot catching terms? We take the originals and modify them. Add some flash, use different materials, put on some new embellishment, make the thing harder to tie. And does it catch any more troot and will it still work ten years from now? What (who) are we tying the flies to attract?
Who are you? Rembrandt or a second rate copyist?
Bob Graham is an occasionally lucky gentleman who claims he does not do very much these days other than try to catch trout five or six days a week. Bob is a regular at Hillend Reservoir and lives in Whitburn West Lothian.