Curled Nude on a Stool
Euan Uglow's studies take life-painting and realism to a mathematically precise extreme. In their poses and solidarity his figures are like monumental classical sculptures, their outlines looking almost chiselled rather than painted. He poses his model to confirm exactly with the idea for a picture he has in mind, using chalk marks, plumb lines and scaffolding to ensure that the model's position and his viewpoint do not differ. Uglow leaves behind the measuring marks which were frequently employed by the Realist artists of the early 1950s, a tradition which he continues. This typical example if the artist's work is as much a comment on conventional approaches to the nude as a portrait of figure painting per se.
