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Lot Essay
‘When people ask me why I only paint black people … I always ask them why they only paint white people’ (Aitchison quoted in A. Williams, Craigie: The Art of Craigie Aitchison, Edinburgh, 1996, p. 68). For Aitchison, painting black models was not a statement, but an artistic choice. While he initially painted portraits to explore his painting technique, his later portraits began to focus on his sitters’ sense of identity and personality.
Portrait of Chris Ogidih is a bold demonstration of his application of colour and choice of sitter. The dominating bright pink background contrasts fantastically with the hat worn by Ogidih. Painting from life, Aitchison simply captures his model in an informal pose with a serene yet confident expression, gazing out of frame to the right of the canvas. Andrew Lambirth observes, ‘Individual features or limbs may not be painted with the greatest attention to detail or with anything like anatomical accuracy, but the whole works convincingly because of Aitchison’s instinctive and uncanny understanding of shape and how colours behave next to a dark skin. Hairstyles can give the key to a picture, as can the cut of a cap or sou’wester’ (A. Lambirth, exhibition catalogue, Craigie Aitchison: Out of the Ordinary, London, Royal Academy, October – November 2003, p. 17).
Portrait of Chris Ogidih is a bold demonstration of his application of colour and choice of sitter. The dominating bright pink background contrasts fantastically with the hat worn by Ogidih. Painting from life, Aitchison simply captures his model in an informal pose with a serene yet confident expression, gazing out of frame to the right of the canvas. Andrew Lambirth observes, ‘Individual features or limbs may not be painted with the greatest attention to detail or with anything like anatomical accuracy, but the whole works convincingly because of Aitchison’s instinctive and uncanny understanding of shape and how colours behave next to a dark skin. Hairstyles can give the key to a picture, as can the cut of a cap or sou’wester’ (A. Lambirth, exhibition catalogue, Craigie Aitchison: Out of the Ordinary, London, Royal Academy, October – November 2003, p. 17).