This Week’s Art: Sickert’s “The Camden Town Murder”
What I find fascinating about art is how much the idea of audience interpretation comes into play. Whether it’s a detailed illustration, or something abstract, there’s always a sense that good art brings the viewer into this new world, for better or for worse. In this case, in a much more overt way than the painting […]
For most of my life I have been a fan of truly intricate artwork. Not necessarily photo-realistic, which I can take or leave, but art pieces that have wonderfully tiny details throughout. Think the engraving work of Gustave Doré, the incredible works of Franklin Booth, or the fascinating details created by Bernie Wrightson in his adaptation of Frankenstein. […]
It may be clear to some of you who are familiar with my (more or less) past life as an illustrator and fine artist, but I have a bit of an odd streak. That’s what makes us all unique, and I wouldn’t try to be normal for all the money in the world. I think […]
This Week’s Art: Falero’s “Witches going to their Sabbath”
When I am talking about art, I often point to nudity and gore as being the “easy way out.” Much of the time they are both overdone, mostly for shock value when there is no real concept behind the art. Here’s some nudity! We’re awesome! There are times, though, where an artist has taken the […]
This Week’s Art: Cole’s “Course of Empire: Destruction”
Every morning, I wake up and look across the room at a Thomas Cole painting. Well, let’s face it, I’m not enormously rich so it is actually an old print. The print is of one of Cole’s five “Course of Empire” paintings, in this case “Consummation.” It’s been a personal favorite for a very long time, but […]
This Week’s Art: Rockwell’s “The Problem We All Live With”
“The Problem We All Live With” is one of Norman Rockwell’s most famous paintings, and has been discussed frequently by so many others that I encourage everyone to seek out those articles. That said, it being one of my favorite pieces, I hope I have something to add to the cacophony of voices in the […]
Sometimes, I see an image and I feel that I’ve been in that situation, that I’ve lived through something similar. It might be the artist’s technique, or the medium that was used, or maybe it’s just something in the way the character looks. This Schikaneder painting is one that has always given me pause, based on all three […]
This Week’s Art: Gentileschi’s “Judith and Her Maidservant with the Head of Holofernes
When it comes to painting any religious doctrine, particularly the Old Testament, there are literally thousands of paintings. It’s a popular, yet somewhat touchy, subject. There is a reserved reverence for many biblical paintings, and you often lose the sense that the stories within are based on mythology and the intimation of a higher purpose. […]
This Week’s Art: Henry Ossawa Tanner’s “The Banjo Lesson”
One of the challenges of memorable art is capturing an emotional moment between people. It can be something extreme like a moment of action, or something very subtle in the way a profile looks. Hitting the middle ground of softer actions and subtleties is difficult, it can lean one way or the other very quickly. […]
This Week’s Art: Goya’s darkly satirical painting “Witches Sabbath”
There’s a lot to unpack with Goya, especially for someone like me. I love traditional art, the kind you find in paintings that are hundreds of years old. I also love horror art, for those few fans I have left or those who have visited my art site it’s a fairly clear thing. So Goya speaks […]
This Week’s Art: Doré’s “La Famille du Saltimbanque: L’Enfant Blessé”
It is not a small painting, which is certainly part of it. Doré's La Famille du Saltimbanque: L'Enfant Blessé is over six feet tall, and seeing it made me literally stop in my tracks. Those are the moments I live for, the very reason why it is important to see art in a museum or gallery.
This Week’s Art: Levêque’s “La Parque (The Fates)”
Levêque was really hitting all manner of emotions with this piece.He painted the Roman versions of the fates, the Parcae. Rather, while I think he captured the essence of the Parcae, what he really captured here was existence itself. This is the spectacle of fate, on hand to show life and death in action.
This Week’s Art: Schoonover’s “Hopalong Takes Command”
I’ve always loved this piece by Frank Schoonover, though that can be said for many of the pieces I’ve seen by the artist. He was one of the classic illustrators, and being primarily an illustrator myself it’s easy to see why he’s always been one of my favorites. Hopalong Takes Command is an exceptional example of Schoonover’s […]
There’s probably something to be said about me when it comes to the reasons why I like “The Prisoner” by Yaroshenko. Maybe I’m a darker soul, a lonely one, or even just someone who contemplates life frequently, but this type of image really speaks to me. It’s not that this painting is particularly complex, either. […]
This Week’s Art: Processions in the art of John Singer Sargent
As I was looking at John Singer Sargent’s work, in anticipation of writing today’s article about his wonderful “Cashmere” painting below, I started looking at many of his other works. Now, that’s not at all unusual, I find myself leaping down the rabbit hole when it comes to art most of the time, and looking […]
When I talk about art, and believe me that’s pretty much every day of my life, I often touch on the things that I really love about particular pieces. Sometimes it’s composition, or texture, even just a color within the piece. Sometimes I get very technical with it, often it probably comes across more like, […]
I think it’s important as an artist to look at various kinds of art each day. Just as it is important for graphic designers, filmmakers, authors, and anyone with a creative side, seeing the works of others can help a creative person learn more about what they do. In that respect, I used to write […]
For a long while (for those who haven’t followed me for that long), I would do weekly art blogs about paintings that I was inspired by. Works by artists who are now among my favorites, like Caspar David Friedrich, Arnold Bocklin, Thomas Cole, and many others. You can see the original set gathered here. Between […]
Awhile back (and by “awhile back” I mean “over a year ago”) I wrote an art blog of Frederic Edwin Church’s beautiful painting called The Icebergs (check out the blog here… I”ll wait.) I won’t bore you with the specs again (I’ll be boring you with other ways now), but seeing it in person I […]
Continuing on my art posts of really happy, joyous images (reference: sarcasm), here is Vasily Perov’s Found Drowned (1867, Oil on canvas, 27″ x 42″). I’ve had a bookmark for it for awhile, and I think it’s an interesting piece. I think it’s one of those pieces that has a story behind it, but still […]
I’m all about cheery pics tonight, the other two I was thinking of were pretty dark too. Something in the air maybe? This is Jules Elie Delaunay’s Plague in Rome (1869, Oil on canvas, 52″ x 69″), also known as The Angel of Death. I might be wrong, but this isn’t the happiest of […]
Ok, so it’s been a little while since the last one of these art blogs. I’ll see if I can’t post a few more of them, and without the 4 months between them. Above is Ivan Aivazovsky and Ilya Repin’s Pushkin’s Farewell to the Sea (1887, Oil on canvas), one that caught my eye […]
Russ’s Art Blog: Vedder – The Questioner of the Sphinx
I've run across a number of Elihu Vedder's pieces before, and this one is one of my favorites. This is Vedder's, The Questioner of the Sphinx, a piece that for me is always inspiring.
This is Lord Frederick Leighton's "And the sea gave up the dead which were in it", a piece that caught my eye when I was looking for something else (which is often the case).
We’re back on a single piece of art this week (since I couldn’t decide on a different topic), this time it’s John Everett Millais’ The Blind Girl (Oil on canvas, 1854-1856, 32 1/2″ x 24 1/2″). It’s one of those pieces where the title really does impact what you see in the image, or at […]
This is Franz Von Stuck’s Sin (1893, Oil on canvas, 35″ x 21″), which may get my vote for having perhaps the most accurate title of an art piece I’ve seen. I like the color choices and palette here that Von Stuck used, or rather a lack thereof. He keeps the colors simple, […]
Ok, so my “little break” was more like a couple of weeks. Add “extreme coughing from the lungs” to “Post-Las Vegas” and there you go. But I’m back, and this one is an interesting one for me. It’s one of the first art pieces that I really took something from, especially in the extreme emotion. […]
Before I brand myself as either only liking realistic art or only posting neoclassic/romantic art, I thought I’d add a little different look. This is George Bellows’ Club Night (aka, Stag Night at Sharkey’s; 1907, Oil on canvas, 43 x 53 inches), a “looser” image than I’ve been posting so far. Ironically, Bellows also did […]
This is Thomas Cole’s Expulsion – Moon and Firelight (1828, Oil on canvas, 35 7/8 in x 47 7/8 in), one of those pieces that I find very inspiring. It’s a bit different than the images by Cole that I normally cite (like his Course of the Empire series, check out http://www.swarthmore.edu/Humanities/kjohnso1/colecourse.html), but it’s an […]
This is Frederic Remington’s Moonlight, Wolf, (1909; oil on canvas, 20 1/16 x 26 in), a bit of a different image from the typical Remington western art you’d see. Much of the effect had to do with Remington’s life. Many of his western works appeared before the Spanish-American War, and after he became an artist […]
This is Edward Poynter’s Faithful unto death (1865, Oil on canvas, 61″ x 29 3/4″), a piece of art that is not only is a strong image, but shows an accurate and interesting historical uniqueness. Many of Poynter’s works are historical, and this was one of his very first ones. The scene has been said […]
Here’s another week of art commentary, please let me know your thoughts on the art or other comments, and I will be posting this on my MySpace as well. This is Arnold Bocklin’s Self-portrait with Death Playing the Fiddle (oil on canvas, 1872). I like alot of Bocklin’s work, and I’m becoming a big fan […]
