Throughout my life I have worn glasses and contact lenses for acute short sightedness. I have often used my poor eyesight to my creative advantage e.g. when assembling a painting composition with blocked in areas of tone (see blog my To see or not to see).

Early in 2019 I noticed that the vision in my right eye was noticeably blurry and slightly yellow in appearance. A new prescription didn’t seem to help. A later examination diagnosed me with cataracts in the eye. Although the condition didn’t greatly affect my painting ability (my left eye was fine), an operation in early December 2019 restored clear vision - at least temporarily - until complications arose and I was soon back in hospital again just prior to Christmas to treat a detached retina. My convalescence period required me to lie down with my head angled in an odd position for several days. I was unable to paint but it gave me the idea to write my next blog about famous artists who had eye conditions.

It is well known that French Impressionist Claude Monet suffered from progressive cataracts later on in his life which greatly affected the quality of the paintings he produced. Japanese Bridge, painted before Monet’s eye operation, shows a highly painterly and almost abstracted composition in warm tones. One could easily assume that Monet was exploring a progressive creative direction in keeping with the avant garde art movements of the time such as the Fauves and the Nabis. In truth, this loose painterly style was the result of his impaired vision.

When Monet’s cataracts lens was removed, his subsequent paintings restored the clarity of his work from healthier times. He even destroyed many of his pre operation paintings after his sight had been restored. An interesting theory is that his new works took on bluer hues due to his ability to detect ultra violet (the human lens naturally screens out ultra violet rays).

Monet’s contemporary Edgar Degas also suffered from an eye condition, one that affected the central vision which dogged him throughout his life. Like Monet, Degas’ work also became looser and scratchier in appearance, and he turned to using pastels as a means to more work closely with the surface.

The retinal detachment surgery I had gave me some interesting visual affects, rather like seeing under water. Similar such effects have been illustrated by a retinal detachment patient who had the same procedure as me, describing what he could see during and after the operation. 

My two eyes now have completely different prescriptions but this can be corrected with a contact lens in the left eye. No doubt I will be using the lop sided prescriptions to my artistic advantage in future!