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What's in a name?
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Message
Posted
How do you decide on the title for a drawing/painting? Do you tend towards the romantic or the purely descriptive? Does it matter to you?
My subject matter is the landscape and my larger ‘finished’ works always start from sketchbook work made at a particular location. The names, then, come from and are usually descriptive of that location; e.g. A field of wheat at Marsh Farm or Hay Meadow at Auster Grange.
I have a bit of a block I confess, about what I call—at risk of possibly raising hackles here—airey-fairey romantic, poetic titles. Especially when they seem, as they sometimes do, to be saying ‘look how creatively intense I am; I can paint with words too’.
I’m aware that I’m likely to give far more time to a painting titled Summer Landscape than I am to one entitled Betwixt, Together, Apart or some such. At an exhibition I will not look at the title in the catalogue until I’ve studied the work for a while and if the title should be something like Undisturbed Serenity Agitated, I’m a little disappointed. It’s a slightly extreme reaction, I know.
Posted
I think its perfectly reasonable to name a landscape after a location or a portrait to reference the name of the person there-in. Sometimes something just occurs to you (which may or may not be obvious, clever, poetic or funny) and presumably sometimes nothing obvious jumps out. ...a rose by any other still smells as sweet.
Posted
I always think a title is merely a means of identifying a painting and nothing more - it is not part of a painting and nor should it distract or influence the viewers interpretation of it.
So stick to simple titles like place names, persons names, etc - none of the airy fairy pompous titles so beloved by the 'art elite'.
Posted
depends on what series I'm working on, some of my painting names are a bit dull, but I do love coming up with something kind of cliche/poetic/daft just for the fun of it, sometimes the name happens as I'm painting. My "Glamping" series painting names are all a bit silly - that's the point "V dubba dub dub" or "3 and a pik-a-nik" (I was watching my fave cartoon Yogi bear). I want to try and make the painting more memorable too - a good name is important!!