Photography's impact on the painted image after Manet : the emergent genre of painting from photographic references

When Gerhard Richter paints using photographic references, he considers that photography provides him with a “special kind of space” (Richter, 2009c, pp.30- 35). This space is generated through of relationships between the object represented and the pictorial space engaged. Richter (2009a, p.14) also suggests that every engagement the artist encounters is influenced by, “the age we live in”, and is strengthened by past and present knowledge. In recent times, there has been considerable interest in the greater understanding about painting from photographic references, whilst at the same time these two mediums are often treated as distinctive separate practices. What is made clear in such dialogue is that a new critical language is required to better understand how painters work with photographic references. The reason for needing this critical language is so that a more vigorous and accessible dialogue can be had about the workings of these painters to account for the various stages in the evolution of an artwork. This dialogue is not an aesthetic argument, nor is it a formal one; it is about the depth of engagement that happens when an artist is working across both genres of painting and photography. In light of this, this thesis proposes an articulation of critical language about how these artists work may be discussed and then better understood so that it might then provide a tool for other artists working in this context to unpack their own work. This new critical understanding provides a way to evaluate and identify individual artistic modes of practice as a form of artistic habitus - as new forms of critical contemporary painting practice. Whilst the development of these practices is shown to be highly personal, access to an inventory of methods for studio work based on an evaluation of artistic practice by other artists can be useful as ways to extend and deepen an artistic engagement, while stimulating dialogues about how painting, in itself, as an emerging and contemporary genre, is important and continues to be so. In this manner, a more in-depth understanding about the working of artistic habitus – if possible - through case study evaluations that explore the workings of methods and processes in selected artists’ work. With this approach the work of selected artists can provide a framework that other artists could adapt and use for their own purposes. By returning to, and studying, Modernist principles around art-making, this thesis identifies precedents that already exist for thinking through how such evaluations of practice through process might be carried out, and consequently, how a critical language could be articulated. To this end, this thesis firstly sets out that this working in painting using photographic references is a unique and different kind of space. Secondly, it identifies some of the precedents from Modernism and explores those, establishing a theoretical continuity that starts with Modernist experimentation with representational modes and meanings. Further to this, the thesis overviews photography and photographic theory to further establish a contemporary working context for the building of a critical language, and then proposes a model for understanding the way that painters of photographic references work