While preparing my post on Daniel E. Green I found an image of his incisive pastel portrait of Robert Beverly Hale (left).
Hale was probably the foremost teacher of figure drawing and artistic anatomy in America. He was Curator of the American Painting and Sculpture Department at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Instructor of Drawing and Lecturer on Anatomy at The Art Students League in New York, and Lecturer on Anatomy at The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia.
When I was a student at the Academy I had the privilege of attending Hale’s lectures on artistic anatomy. I was pretty young at the time and unaware of Hale’s status or reputation as a teacher. To me he was just “the anatomy lecture guy”. His lectures, however, left no doubt that you were getting the real goods from someone who knew his subject in extraordinary depth. I began to realize just how good he was when I started to pick up his books.
Hale was the author or co-author of some of the best books ever written on figure drawing and artistic anatomy: “Drawing Lessons from the Great Masters: 100 Great Drawings Analyzed, Figure Drawing Fundamentals Defined, Master Class in Figure Drawing, Artistic Anatomy (with Dr. Paul Richer), and “Anatomy Lessons from the Great Masters” (with Terence Coyle).
All of them are excellent. Anatomy Lessons from the Great Masters is my favorite book on artistic anatomy. Coyle took material from lectures by Hale, who really knew the work of the masters in addition to his knowledge of figure drawing and anatomy, included the corresponding images from Rembrandt, Rubens, Raphael, Michaelangelo, Pontormo, Leonardo, Prud’hon and others, and arranged them on opposing pages to illustrate important principles of artistic anatomy.
Hale’s quotes are accompanied by a diagram that Coyle has annotated so you know exactly what part of the master drawing Hale is referring to (image at left, below Daniel E. Green’s portrait of Hale). Wow, what a great way to learn artistic anatomy.
i love his work, and how he teaches complex drawing in such a simple manner..he’s books are amazing!
on a seperate note,
would you like to be the next 30day artist?
30dayartist.com
His anatomy lectures are available on VHS and DVD.
http://www.jo-an.com/art_video.htm
The image quality is a little sketchy in places (the source is old B&W video tape) but the lectures are well worth it.
I might also add that Edward Everett Hale, who wrote Man Without A Country, was his grandfather. There’s a great interview with him here:
http://www.aaa.si.edu/collections/oralhistories/transcripts/hale68.htm
Ming, belated thanks for the comment, I don’t think I could take on being a 30 artist, but maybe some readers will be interested.
Joseph, Thanks, both for the information about the videos of Hale teaching (frustratingly, a bit expensive for personal use, but what a great resource for schools!) and the tidbit that he is related to Edward Everett Hale and the link to the excellent interview!
The Hale videos are expensive for personal use, but they are often available at good college libraries across the country for free.
Southern Californians, for example, can watch them at Cal State Northridge for nothing more than the cost of $4 parking. You don’t have to be a student, but as a non-student you’ll have to remain on the premises and watch them on one of the many VHS machines available in the library.
Great thought, Joseph. Thanks.
Charley,
Do you consider Hale to be among the avant-garde?
I’m not sure I know what “avant-garde” really is. (I’m reminded of a quote: “Everything changes but the Avant-Garde.”)
I do know that Hale associated with many of the artistic and literary figures who were prominent in the middle of the last century, including many Abstract Expressionists who were considered “avant-garde” at the time. See the link to the interview provided by Joseph Francis in comment #3 above.
I once walked into a lecture Robert Beverly Hale was giving at the Acadamy in Philadelphia. He was drawing for everyone and I believe it was blown up somehow and projected large. It must have been because the room was packed, and my memory was how mezmorized I was with the confidence of his rendering and the knowledge that every line represented some anatomical structure. There was nothing unnecessary, everything essential. The room was electric. Large crowd, the only sound was of Mr. Hale.
I didn’t know it was Mr. Hale until the end of the lecture. When I realized it was the man who authored my favorite anatomy book,
I understood why I was so blown away.
Unforgetable!
Bev,
Thanks for your account. I wish I had been more aware of how remarkable Hale was when I had the opportunity to study with him, but then I can say that about several of my instructors at the Academy.
Thank you for actualy having some information on Robert Beverly Hale. I didn’t need to buy a book I just needed some info for a test, this is perfect.
Brittany, OR
Wow, what an amazing portrait. Hard to believe that’s a pastel
As the person who made the video tapes of Hale’s lectures I was always in awe of the man. He would casually draw on a tall blackboard with a piece of black chalk, on the end of a long stick, the most beautiful drawings you’ve ever seen.
At his apartment, I was surprised to see that he was an abstract painter. I saw his sketch book once. It was totally intimidating to this art student. He truly was a master draftsman.
The tapes came about because some members of the Board of Control at the time wanted to make a movie about Hale. As it turns out, the proponents of this endeavor were looking mainly to line their own pockets. I approached the director of the school (Steward Klonis) in private and told him to give me the money for a VTR and I would record his lectures for posterity. The tapes are a little shaky at first but later got better as I became more comfortable with the equipment. I thought it was important to at least have some record of this man’s talents.
One more thing. I once asked Mr. Hale how he went about purchasing the collection of American Art for the Metropolitan Museum. I was curious because the collection covers such a wide range of styles and artists. He told me that he went to the studios of “working” artists at the time and asked if they wanted to be in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. They each happily gave him a piece of work. He gathered all the paintings in a large room and leaned them against a wall. He then invited all the artists to pick the collection. He said the artists would walk around the room, while he took notes, and made comments about the selections. Hale claims the comments went a lot like this – “that’s good”, “that’s ugly”, “that’s shit”.
Tom,
Thanks for your comments, the insight into the creation of the videos and the wonderful story about the selection of pieces for the Met! I haven’t had an opportunity to see your tapes yet, but I’m really glad to know that Hale’s amazing lectures have been in some way preserved.
Hi Charley,
That makes two of us. I’ve never seen the tapes either except to review them. I would take them to Hales apartment the day after I made one. His wife would make dinner and invite me over. I would bring a bottle of Jack Daniels and after dinner I would set up the open reel VTR and a monitor and we would sit there and watch them. He commented once how well the camera work became as the series progressed. This was a relief to hear since after the third lecture I started smoking pot before each taping.
I noticed now the series is available on DVD for about $700. I don’t know who has the rights to them but they have to be making a big buck. It’s a shame since no art student I ever knew could afford that amount of money. I think the tapes were originally sold for about $300 in the Art Students League store. I had them transferred to video cassettes which were pretty expensive at the time.
Hale was a great man and I’m glad I was able to preserve a small part of his life.
Tom,
Would you be interested in reworking the RBH videos? They are wonderful, but with modern editing techniques it would be possible to improve the sound and the visibility of his drawings on the board (of course, you would have to be the copyright holder of the tapes to do this). Perhaps the reworked series could be made available at a more obtainable price by artists. It would be a work of love, but worth it! If so, post an email address.
L.
I have been sharing the information about this lecture series and commenting that fortunately someone recorded these. I had no idea I could every personally thank that person. I have had some of Hale’s books for a long time, but didn’t know until last year that the videos were available. I used St. Louis County Public Library interlibrary loan a number of times to borrrow them. The tapes came from Community Colleges, I believe.
I am so glad that I can thank you personally, Tom Hall. There is no other resource like this and the lectures are a gem and delightful. I was fortunate to be able to study anatomy at Syracuse University decades ago. They had an agreement with a medical center nearby to draw cadavres. It was awesome, in the full sense of the word and extremely instructive.
When I was copying a portrait of a young man from the school of Rembrandt in the St. Louis Art Museum, I would often have art students stop by to see what I was doing. I would always be sure to share the information about Hale’s books and lectures.
I have never seen Hale’s work, and was curious about it. I had no idea that he was an abstract painter. He doesn’t refer to his own work in the lectures much at all. I only remember him making a comment, half in jest perhaps, about painting white horses, that they were the only paintings that sold….
Kathy Yepez
I show Hale’s videos to my students. This is such a treat to read the comments from people who actually got to hear him speak. Thanks for the insight.
I paint, and have now gone back to life studies (my website is wwww.nefila.com). I have bought all of Robert Hale’s books I could find, but Unfortunately I find the tapes way too expensive, and there are no libraries in Italy, where I now live, that have them as far as I know, which is a shame since I would love to deepen my knowledge of artistic anatomy. I have followed some dissections but it was not aimed at artists as Hale’s lectures are. Sigh!
It was a pleasure to read about the Hale stories. I jut found about the videos, which led to me here. I wanted to mention that I stumbled across a website/company called Smartflix that rents instructional videos and has a great amount of art videos/Dvds. Very great and cheap way to learn from some of the greats. Glenn Vilppu is one person I was fortunate enough to study with when I lived in Los Angeles and they have a dozen of his lectures. He is the next closest thing to Hale. Who knows, if enough people ask them, maybe they will purchase the Hale videos to rent?
Thanks, Michael.
Unfortunately, I have to disrecommend SmartFlix. At first I thought it sounded like a great idea, and assumed from the steep rental price that they were making up for higher rental fees charged by the artists or producers.
I’ve since found out from several sources that they use a legal loophole to rent their videos out without any recompense to the artists or producers, and against their wishes.