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(rumble)
(tear)
Crayons and paper.
The Rhenish Hessian draftsman Jörg Baltes uses it to create worlds.
It is a passion, that is, an ability to suffer.
Because I'm barely able to see a blank piece of paper
and don't want to get started somehow right away.
I don't know where that comes from.
All I know is that I have...
yes, somewhere...
a screw must be loose
because I have to draw something out of all that stuff.
Among his drawings there are caricatures ...
classic ...
funny and almost always something weird.
His "Handwerkskunst" project:
A drawing loosely based on a picture
by the Dutch baroque painter Jan Vermeer.
What does Jörg Baltes make weird out of it this time?
I'm trying to portray a depiction of the girl with a pearl earring
in a satirical way.
I think it's called with the pearl earring.
And yes, this is a beautiful depiction,
considered the Mona Lisa of the North.
And I want to change that a bit.
As I said, the pearl earring is very large and I would like
something to happen on the nose.
Of course, I also read a bit about Vermeer
and how he used his palette, and it's a painting
and that translates into a drawing.
that's a transfer service, and yes, we'll have to see.
I hope my colors and inspiration are enough
to get that across.
And this is my photo of an acquaintance,
and I'm going
to put her in... about the position...
like the girl.
I'll replace the face, the facial features
, the bigger part, like this hat and the dress,
of course the ear too, they'll stay,
but then she'll become the new model
and she'll get a nose ring.
Jörg Baltes uses his computer with a graphics program to create the template for his drawing
.
From that point of view, it's just a tool like a good pen
or a good printing device, something else.
I use it almost exclusively in a hybrid way, that I say
I build my template there and then want
to implement it on paper as I please
because it's just fun.
So, the ring is still missing here.
(Typing noises)
Vermeer's original is 18 by 16 inches.
Jörg Baltes wants to draw his imitation one and a half times as big.
This is rasterized and then enlarged.
The grid serves to enable me
to transfer this drawing from a small format
to a much larger format
in the same proportions and proportions
. The grid is just squares like a chess board.
(Printer noise)
I'm always seen as a bit of a serious person,
but I'm actually quite a funny fellow.
And I also worked for the "daily press" for a while
and drew cartoons.
There always had to be something
where the viewer could at least say "Haha" once.
And I've already kept that for myself,
the ... yes ... humorous, I'll say it now.
And the one with the nose ring was a through ball,
because right now this girl with the pearl earring
is being celebrated so much.
A pearl earring like that, that's enough, the girl is only famous for that,
I give her another one,
that's the caricature in the end.
(Rumble)
Paper with recorded grid and tracing paper on top.
Jörg Baltes will transfer the main lines to this.
From each small grid square of the printed template
to each corresponding large grid square.
A tool to be precise.
So, I'm looking for a start now.
And would say it could start there.
So, there we are at three.
This performance that we see does not necessarily correspond to
what is actually taking place on paper.
That is, the proportions that I see
are not identical to the ones I find there.
And these little boxes force me
to really draw what is there.
The difficulty here is
knowing how far does the nose go here?
How high can I make the nostril and so on.
Yes, but it's always a little adventure,
but a nice one.
Jörg Baltes draws in each large grid square
what he sees in the corresponding small one.
He thus avoids a too subjective reproduction.
(Character noises)
However, previous knowledge is part of it.
There's also a nice sentence that goes,
I tell my students from time to time,
that you only see what you know.
And up here, for example, I know
when this comes out in this form
that the fabric forms a bulge at that point.
Yes? And then there is a counterpart here as well.
And that's often so tricky with the wrinkles.
(Scraping drawing noises)
Jörg Baltes first draws on the tracing paper
over grid paper so as not to have any lines on his original
that he would have to erase later anyway.
Okay, then I can now rotate ...
and from the back ...
prepare the drawing so that it can be transferred.
Transferred to the paper on which he later draws the original.
So...
now I'll take a sanguine pencil that's a little bit like chalk
and trace it all over again.
This reversed sanguine drawing
will later function more or less like a stamp.
The sanguine corresponds to the color of the stamp.
I think drawing is actually the explanatory technique.
In principle, the plan among all things
that can be reproduced on paper.
I have always maintained that this is the case with painting.
And for a while it was good for me to observe
that some people think that
if they can put together beautiful colors
they could do without this construction.
And I never liked that and said, said for myself,
before I ever really started to paint,
I wanted to be very clear
with this plan underneath .
There's an awful lot of drawing paper out there.
I've now picked out two that I think
are suitable.
This is a bit coarser in structure.
Then I have more abrasion with the color.
And you can see this structure later in the picture.
The question is whether I want that.
And I'm more inclined to use this white here
because it keeps my color smooth.
Otherwise, the paper must also have a certain thickness,
because in that case I
will also prepare the background with gouache paint, i.e. liquid paint,
and then it is quite good if the paper is not too thin,
because otherwise it will become very wavy
and then I can no longer work on it.
So, I'm going to fix the paper a bit now.
Jörg Baltes will apply the sanguine color to the selected paper
in order to then begin with the actual drawing, the original.
So, and now I'm going to try to put these lines here...
using my fingernail on the sheet.
Let's see if that works, it looks pretty good.
I... fill in the missing parts, not everything came through,
in order to... have a clear border for the background,
because that's what's coming next.
It's a very dark blue.
And now I've got a few shades of blue
and a bit of black and I'm going to use them to create the background.
(rubbing)
Yes, I have to concentrate a lot.
If I make a mistake, I have to redo the transfer.
And also the stretching of the paper.
The gouache paint takes about 20 minutes to dry.
I'm going to try and color pencil the four color patches
we have on this girl
as best I can.
Since we have a range of chromatic color,
as for the bright yellow at the top, and the turban too.
We have the flesh tones, flesh tones.
Below we have an ocher with brown tones
and also probably with very dark red tones.
You have to explore and try it out.
This is the work I have ahead of me for the next few hours.
(rustling)
I'll start on the face
because it's the most alien element in the picture.
You know the girl with the pearl earring.
I installed that.
That's very exciting for me because it's more my own work.
That is what I have changed or will change in the picture
in the course of its creation.
These are now coordinated tones, i.e. flesh tones.
This is light flesh color.
It's now called salmon, used to be medium meat color,
they always change that a bit,
but they harmonize quite well together.
But then I still have a third color in my hand
or three or four colors.
This earthy green can be used later
to give the flesh color a slight brown tint,
which we can also see in the skin.
Actually, I'm still looking for a bit.
That's always very difficult.
The photo template isn't that great now,
I caused it myself, but ...
but it's also fun to search a bit,
and that's why I try to use these cross-hatchings
to remember the ups and downs in the Adjusting face
or groping, shall we say.
First as an autodidact, then with art studies.
Jörg Baltes from Sprendlingen has
made a name for himself as a draftsman. The way there was rocky.
As a teenager, he dropped out of school without a degree.
I grew up in Völklingen,
which is not necessarily a place with an affinity for art.
Nowadays they are, because they now have the World Heritage Site,
but when I grew up there,
this whole establishment was still literally smoking.
And I was fixated on this drawing very early on...
but neither my parents
nor my family
appreciated it, let alone the teachers.
And if you have dropped out of school,
it is of course rather difficult
to get a degree
. And there was, how should I put it,
a lot of complications for me, until it finally worked out.
And that's where you need really good advocates, lots and lots of people
to help you. And then I was lucky.
Otherwise I probably wouldn't do it that way.
I now take care of myself a bit, in terms of optics, for light.
And...
try this with this translucent yellow.
Which isn't that eye-catching yet,
but at least makes it a little...
the whole thing...
brighter.
I once compared it to a developer bath
when photos were still developed by hand in the darkroom.
This is how a three-dimensionality slowly emerges from the sheet of paper
and I hope to reproduce it well.
And that's the exciting thing about drawing,
that at least the way I do it, it takes a relatively long time ...
but then at some point it can look quite passable.
There is black.
(He laughs softly.)
But because it's underlined with this dark red,
it's different, of course.
At these points the picture looks out of itself or at the viewer.
And yes, I'm trying to make it as good as possible.
Well, what does it mean?
(He laughs softly.)
A very light blue for the vitreous body,
i.e. for the eyeball.
It also has a tint and it looks white,
but if you look closely, you can
do it in front of the mirror, it's not that easy white.
And now you can also...
structure this relatively large area of the eyeball
a bit
by adding a bit of red...
again the small blood vessels ... reproduces.
Here's a problem that I
don't see the suspension of this earring at all on the original.
And now improvise some kind of ear clip,
which afterwards almost disappears in the dark.
But right now I need him for this to be halfway believable.
The effect that was created here by this darkness,
to emphasize the earring,
of course also has a meaning for the rest of
what is coming down there, your cloak or the dress.
whatever it is
And I just have to create color fields
so that I can see how they all work together.
(laughs:) And you can't just stubbornly work in one place.
This is difficult.
These are now, so to speak, the toils of the level.
There are probably people who tend to start with that
and then save things like the face
until the end.
But I always think it's good
when the face is there and looks at you.
Then it's easier
to struggle through the valley of 1,000 lines.
(sighs:) It's really confusing down there,
man, man, man.
You can start with the dark pencil,
don't press it too hard
, and then go over it with a light one.
Then it mixes really well.
That's another color nuance
than when I make it yellow beforehand
and then go over it with the caput mortuum.
Caput mortuum, a violet-tinged red.
Jörg Baltes likes to use it for dark areas.
The exact color choice is artistic license.
I never wanted to be an artist.
I was always a little suspicious
when people had that attitude or pretended to be something like that.
I can do that, but then I only do it as a joke.
But there are people who stick with it
and make it their business model, so to speak.
And sometimes fill that with mundane things,
sometimes with great things.
But that was never my thing.
I wanted to be a draftsman and still want to do that today.
But I don't need to go beyond that to gain world fame.
The world didn't wait for me.
All of that will change
when the blue color is put on paper,
because the other tones react to it.
And yes, then A means that it might be quite nice,
but B can also mean that you have to rework a lot.
It's a small big moment.
But there is still no blue in it at all,
except for a little in the eyes.
And I'm curious to see what happens.
It's looking pretty good I think.
I'll let the blue area be like this for now
and I'll see how it
interacts with the one with the veil that's hanging down there, and then at the end I
might even have to do it a bit on the face down here,
so go over everything again completely.
Yes, I'm in the area between yellow and blue here.
And at the edges I sometimes go over the blue with the pen
and vice versa with the blue over the yellow,
so that the edges somehow, I would say, become friends.
(he chuckles)
And, yes.
You have, well, at least I never have just one thing in mind.
There are always different areas that I see.
Then everything has to fit together somehow.
Then I sometimes switch faster than I might have thought
and say, there's something else and there's something else.
And yes... That's what my teacher once said,
I could draw faster than I can think.
Maybe there's some truth in that, I don't know.
(Laughter)
Final strokes.
fine tuning. Jörg Baltes' drawing is about to be completed.
I could pull a few eyelashes in there.
I think I'll leave it like that for now.
It's okay.
I'm done.
First of all.
(He laughs.)
Yes, that turned out well.
Everything I wanted to show is now there.
To see how it is created and how it has grown.
How that works from a distance.
And you might want to get closer to see where is ...
how is the detail or the detail.
Yes, that's always a nice reward
after a job is done .
(Föhn noises)
After four days of work, Jörg Baltes completes his drawing.
Separate yourself from the work, that can work.
I think if I can make someone happy
with art ...
whether they want to buy it now or whether I give it to them as a gift, the
only important thing is that it
is not an object of speculation or anything else,
but that it serves pure pleasure.
That someone else sees that and says,
man, that's nice, I like that.
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SWR 2023