Jenny Sages - Paths to Portraiture

Jenny Sages is an artist who mostly makes
paintings of abstract landscapes. In this portrait of Emily Kame Kngwarreye,
you can see that Jenny has shown Emily on country. 

Do you think it is hot or cold there?

Dry or wet?

What is it about the texture and colours that make you say that?

Jenny has a special way of painting Emily’s flesh.

Have you ever thought of painting flesh in such a large variety of colours?

Can you list all the colours?

Emily is also an artist.

Her paintings tell stories of Emily’s land and culture, her memories of when she was a child, what her mother cooked, and other parts of how she lived.

Sometimes faces, especially older people’s faces, show a life well lived. We know that Emily was in her 70’s when she took up painting.

Look at Emily's face and imagine what else she did during her life?

My relationship with the sitter is the most important thing; every face has its own need.
Jenny Sages

Jenny Sages likes to tell stories in her
paintings about people whom she is interested in. She does this by including things
in the portraits that help to tell us stories with images. This is Kate Grenville, she also likes to tell
stories and is a writer.

Kate Grenville wrote a book called 'The Secret River'.

Jenny has painted her in front of the Hawksbury River, where the story was set.

Listen to her reading an excerpt from the book 'The Secret River’.

Write down some of the descriptive words that Kate uses as you listen.

Having describing words and phrases helps us to visualise as we read the book.

As you listened to the story were you able to visualise the scene and the people?

Helen Garner, author, journalist and
feature writer, is one of Australia's best-known writers. This portrait of Helen Garner was created using a wax medium called encaustic. She combined colour pigment (which is a powder) with the encaustic and painted it onto the canvas with her fingers.

I used a wax medium and red pigment to lightly put down the essential elements sourced from over 37 drawings that I had undertaken some year and a half ago. Then, with my heart in my mouth, I dipped my fingers into the wax medium and then into the pigment. Using my fingers as a brush, I just hoped for the best. It only took a week to actually to make the finished portrait because it was either right or wrong, no fiddling around. Wrong meant scraping the whole thing off with a knife and starting again.
Jenny Sages

This is an encaustic portrait of Irina Baronova. 

What do you think she did in her life, her creative profession?

The portrait is subtitled, 'handing on the baton.'

This means giving knowledge to someone else so a person can continue on with improved skills.

Have a close look at how Jenny Sages has created Irina’s face.

Now have a close look at the ballet student’s skin.

What was Jenny Sages trying to say about Irina Baronova?

Why do you think Jenny Sages has only painted Irina Baronova’s face and not her dancing?

Can you think about something special that an older relative or friend shared with you?

This is an encaustic painting of Nancy Borlase and Laurie Short.

What relationship do you think they have with each other?

What do you see that makes you say that?

What else can you see in the picture?

Nancy was an artist and art critic.

What do think is the difference between being an artist and an art critic?

Laurie was an Australian Trade Union leader and part of the Australian Labor Party.

Compare the portraits of Emily Kame Kngwarreye to the portrait of Nancy Borlase and Laurie Short.

Can you see some similarities and differences between them? What are they?

This is a self-portrait called 'Each morning when I wake up I put on my mother’s face.'

It is different, not just because it is a self-portrait but because Jenny Sages did not do preliminary drawings as she had done with the previous portraits. She painted directly as she looked into a mirror.

What else has she included that also makes it different to the other portraits?

The words are not her own but they did represent a part of her life.

Why do you think she did that?

She felt uncomfortable about painting herself.

How can you tell this by looking at the way she is posed and where she is placed?