Dieter Maurer (Hrsg., 2014)
Since 1999, a research team at the Zurich University of the Arts (Switzerland) re-examines the very early qualities, structural formations and development tendencies that can be observed in the drawings and paintings of children in their first years of life. Thereby, one of the main topics addressed is the question whether or not – more precisely: to what extend – early pictures in ontogeny depend directly on the concrete context of picture production. In other words, whether or not early pictures in ontogeny are entirely coded.
When comparing extensive picture archives of contexts of Europe, India and Indonesia, evidence was provided that a substantial – and possibly structural – part of early picture qualities and their development are not directly related to the concrete context of the production of the drawings and paintings. This holds true for both so-called “abstract” as well as “figurative” aspects (Maurer et al., 2013). Such a finding is of importance, since up to now, the question is a matter of debate, as it will be explained in the first part of the present publication.
Since 2005, from all over the world, the artist Gilles Porte is documenting drawings of the human figure, created by children in their first years of life in terms of selfportraits. Having observed a cross-contextual structure of early pictures in ontogeny in our own investigation, when for the first time looking at the drawings Gilles Porte has brought back from his journey, we felt that these drawings carry a scientific value and can substantially contribute to clarify the relation between the early graphic qualities or drawings models and the concrete context of picture production.
Following this valuation, we investigated the thesis of cross-contextual graphic aspects related to the phenomenon of early human figure drawing on the basis of the drawings of Porte's archive. The present publication presents the corresponding results strongly confirming this thesis, and it gives access to the entire sample of pictures analyzed.
Englisch
eBook und Bildarchiv
2103 Abbildungen
Online: www.early-pictures.ch/porte2
Published as volume 13 of the Institute for Contemporary Art Research series