8.31.2007
Judith Gutierrez - Mexican Artists
Gutierrez studied in the School of Fine Arts in Guayaquil, Ecuador, with her teacher Caesar Andrade Faini. A great part of her life was just spent living and painting at Mexico. Gutierrez and her husband left Ecuador, feeling like political banishes, due to the military government of the time.
Some of Gutierrez’s most significant works are: Dancer’s Memory of the Artist, Book for The Blind and The Christ of Santa Elena.
Gutierrez held many individual exhibitions and is represented in many galleries and museums at New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Pasadena, Washington, Great Britain, Osaka, Guayaquil, Quito, Mexico City, Munich, Havana, Guadalajara, Monterrey, Panama, and even at Sao Paulo.
8.28.2007
Incorporating Abstract Art into your Interior Decor
Interior decor is not just putting a picture on the wall; it’s also about capturing the essence of your mood and style.
Decorating the walls of your home with Abstract art adds touches of elegance and energizes your space. Whether you have a bare space on the wall, or a corner in desperate need of something special, abstract art will work.
Abstract art plays with light and color, shape and function. These paintings and sculptures will allow you to experiment with your modern look. Wassily Kandinsky, who many consider the father of Abstract art, used to paint his oil paintings as if he was writing a symphony: full of geometric shapes, passion and a marvelous flow of color.
Abstract art can add splashes of color and elegance to a room. It is a way to expose your visitors to something different.
Abstract art can also create different mood settings to your home, sophisticated pieces can revitalize your room and give it new meaning. “A white wall is simply a white wall… Add some abstract oil paintings and it becomes a showcase of style,”
If you are struggling to find a center piece for your space, abstract art pieces can provide the perfect focal point. Do not think that you have to situate your furnishings around the pieces. Instead, they add such drama and life that eyes will naturally flow to them. They become the center without effort.
Abstract art captures the elegance of contemporary design while also pushing into other boundaries. It can be playful, dramatic, sleek and exciting, all contained in one piece. Your home will never seem more complete, and more in style
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What is Expressionism?
Colors where important in Expressionism, but most importantly colors had to be non-realistic.
Henry Matisse who is one of the earliest expressionist painters, believed that "the invention of photography had released painting from the need to copy nature, leaving him free to present emotion as directly as possible and by the simplest means".
Even Van Gogh, the post-impressionist artist that had influenced Expressionism the most, tried to explain to his brother, Theo about the new way he uses color: "Instead of trying to reproduce exactly what I have before my eyes, I use color more arbitrarily, in order to express myself forcibly."
To learn more about Expressionism and artists that are considered Expressionist please checkout this great post by Breiana Cecil about the Modern Art Movement…
View more oil paintings on bigtimearts.com, all oil paintings framed in the lowest price, our aim is to let oil painting framed for home decorate is the same popular and universal as the clothes, hang on or place anywhere you can think, best gift to present.
Ten tips for buying art online
A huge selection of artists and artworks. A great way to sort through a great deal of variety. Technology assistant to help us visualize the art in our home and on our walls. All these and more make buying art online a very interesting proposition, but it does present some challenges. Here are 10 tips to help you optimize on your art shopping experience this holiday season.
Tip 1: Watch out for low qualityAnyone can make a website and put some pictures on it, and many do just that. This creates a challenge for the art connoisseurs looking through the heaps of online gallery clutter.
"There is a lot of junk out there," said David Sasson, founder of OverstockArt.com, which is an online gallery for handmade oil painting reproductions. "You can find great art and wall décor possibilities online. Unfortunately, the great majority of art-selling web sites is of low quality and offers an amateur approach far below industry standards."
The solution for sifting through all the junk is to look for sites that have customer reviews available, see what past customers are saying, look at how they rate the quality of the art and there general feelings about the shopping experience.
Tip 2: Offline presenceAnother way to ensure high standards and quality is to stick with sites that offer an offline contact, may it be a physical location or just a phone number where you can talk to an actual décor consultant or a curator. It is important to know the knowledge and expertise level of the people who take care of your art; it can line you up with what to expect to arrive at your door step.
"Most established galleries provide detailed information about themselves," Sasson added. "It is crucial that they have a physical address and a customer care phone number – I wouldn't buy if they didn't have one."
Tip 3: Return PolicyOnline galleries must have a lenient return policy, you must know that any decision you make in regards to the wall décor you buy is reversible and not final in any stretch of the imagination.
Tip 4: Decide on Budget and MediumThe internet offers a wide range of art subjects, styles, mediums all priced differently. So it's very important to decide on which styles and mediums you are interested in and what is your budget for your décor needs. Remember to include the cost of framing in your budget.
Tip 5: Research the art and the storeWhen you search through and find something that you like, look for as much background information as possible about the artist and the art itself. It just adds a lot to the buying experience and makes you look at the art in a different light.
In addition, make sure that the website you are dealing with is a legitimate business with secure purchasing and a solid privacy policy. Remember, that as an online buyer you are entitled to ask as many questions as possible, no question is off limits when shopping online.
Tip 7: Look for framing optionsOne of the great advantages of shopping online is the availability of tools to help you visualize the painting hanging in your home and customizing the artwork to your existing décor and style. Look for galleries offering customized framing. This enables you to pick the right frame for your home décor.
Tip 8: Take your timeIt is easy to get caught up in the moment when shopping online. You see something that you like and you immediately decide on buying. However, it is really important to take your time and go through all the details before deciding on your purchase. Look at the size of the art, what sort of medium, the framing options, the final price, your existing décor, site reviews, shipping and return policies. Look through all of that and only then make your purchase decisions. It will help you make the right choice.
Tip 9: Buy what you loveMany people shop by the name of the artist. My advice to you is to shop for what you love. If you think something is beautiful then it is more important then who painted it.
Tip 10: Be a part of the art communityEven though shopping for art online is a great substitute for shopping in brick-and-mortar galleries, it is still very important to take part in social events and gallery openings. Be a part of the local art scene and support art in your community.
Frida Kahlo - Mexican Artists
She married famous muralist Diego Rivera during 1929 and together they traveled in United States, staying in Detroit and New York City in the early 1930s. In the late 1930s Kahlo had show of her paintings in New York City and Paris and linked with some of the well-liked painters in the world. Kahlo and Rivera were both recognized for their extramarital affairs and in 1940 they divorced for a short time before remarrying. During the ’40s Kahlo gained global credit for her colorful and sometimes grisly paintings (as well as for her bold public persona), but she sustained to have health problems. She died in 1954 just after her 47th birthday.
Rafael Lozano-Hemmer - Mexican Artists
He created what might be the world’s biggest interactive installation, Vectorial Elevation; a work, which was installed in Mexico City during 1999, in Vitoria-Gasteiz during 2002, in Lyon in 2003 and in Dublin in April-May 2004.
He received several prizes, including an Ars Electronica Golden Nica in 2000.
Dr. Atl - Mexican Artists
Dr. Atl became very lively in Mexico when he returned. He led art exhibits sponsoring the luminous painters of his time, Francisco de la Torre, Diego Rivera, and Ponce de Leon.
Luis Nishizawa - Mexican Artists
Luis Nishizawa (born 1920 in San Mateo Ixtacalco, Mexico) is a famous Mexican painter of Japanese descent.
Nishizawa’s artistic studies started when he took admission in the Academy of San Carlos in 1942 and during 1951, the date of his first display in the Hall of Mexican Plastic Art; he has been an untiring producer and advocate of Mexican art. His traditional approach and his decrease and generalization of forms ally him with such immense landscape painters as Dr Atl, Gerardo Murillo. He also gave classes at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) during 1955. Nishizawa is known as one of Mexico’s biggest landscape artists of the 20th century. He currently works and teaches in Toluca, in a late eighteenth-century house, which he has converted to a studio and museum.
Juan O’Gorman - Mexican Artists
O’Gorman was born in Coyoacán, Mexican Federal District, a community within superior Mexico City, to an Irish father, Cecil Crawford O’Gorman (a painter himself) and a Mexican mother. In the 1920s he studied structural design at the Academy of San Carlos, the Art and Architecture school at National University, Mexico. He became a renowned architect, worked on the new Bank of Mexico building, and under the power of Le Corbusier introduced modern functionalist architecture to Mexico City.
His paintings often treated Mexican history, scenery, and legends. He painted the murals in the Independence Room in Mexico City’s Chapultepec Castle.
Jose Clemente Orozco - Mexican Artists
His other works comprise Prometheus (1930, at Pomona College, California), Zapata (1930), The Man of Fire (1939), and Christ Destroying His Cross (1943).
Diego Rivera - Mexican Artists
Diego is known as best by the public world for his 1933 mural, “Man at the Crossroads,” in the foyer of the RCA Building at Rockefeller Center. When his fan Nelson Rockefeller discovered, which is the mural incorporated a portrait of Lenin and other socialist imagery, he fired Rivera, and the incomplete work was finally destroyed by Rockefeller staff people. The film Cradle Will Rock contains a dramatization of the controversy.
Veronica Ruiz de Velasco - Mexican Artists
In 1985, Ruiz de Velasco held a display at the Gallery of the Loteria National of Mexico. In 1986 she had an individual display in the Gallery of the Benito Juarez International Airport at Mexico City. In 1987 she was the youngest artist to display at the Museo de Arte Moderno (national Museum of Modern Art) in Mexico. The exhibition was homage to Andrew Lloyd Weber and had amazing reference pieces such as Cats, Jesus Christ Superstar, Evita, Starlight Express, and as well the Phantom of the Opera. The Museo de Arte Moderno published their twenty five year celebration book and with Ruiz de Velasco as one of Mexico’s leading artists.
In 1989, Ruiz de Velasco painted a wall painting in the American British Cowdray Medical Center in Mexico D.F… This mural took approximately a year to complete. The investiture of the mural was a nationwide event in Mexico, exposed by the U.S. Ambassador in Mexico, Charles Pilliod. Prince Charles of Wales was as well present and congratulated Ruiz de Velasco on the donation of her time and effort.
In 1996, Ruiz de Velasco created a portrait for President Bill Clinton. President Bill Clinton and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton sent a letter of approval for this portrait
David Alfaro Siqueiros - Mexican Artists
His prominent projects include his shared mural at the Mexican Electricians’ Union (1939-40), From Porfiriato to the Revolution at the Museum of National History (1957-55), March of Humanity and the Polyforum Cultural Siqueiros at Avenida Insurgentes (1965-71), and his had a main role in obtaining mural commissions for artists on the University City campus of the National Autonomous University of Mexico during 1950s Mexico City.
Siqueiros was one of few famous Mexican muralists working at the time, including Diego Rivera, José Clement Orozco and Rufino Tamayo. His art honestly reflected the time period in which he actually grown as an artist. His art was intensely rooted in the Mexican Revolution, an aggressive and chaotic period in Mexican history in which different social and political factions fought for credit and power. The period during 1920s to the 1950s is recognized as the Mexican Renaissance, and Siqueiros was active in the effort to make an art that was at once Mexican and universal.
Siqueiros was awarded the Lenin Peace Prize for the year in 1966. His nephew is filmmaker David Siqueiros.
Rufino Tamayo - Mexican Artists
Rufino Tamayo (August 26, 1899 – June 24, 1991) was a famous Mexican painter. He was a Zapotec Native American and was born in the city of Oaxaca, Oaxaca.
In his paintings, Tamayo uttered what he actually believed was the traditional Mexico and did not follow the more politically based paintings, which many of his contemporaries such as José Clemente Orozco, Diego Rivera, Oswaldo Guayasamin and as well as David Alfaro Siqueiros did. Tamayo and one more artist, Lea Remba, were the first artists to make a new type of printed artwork called “mixografía”. This consisted of artwork printed on paper but with vigor and texture. One of their most well-known mixografías is free Dos Personajes Atacados por Perros (”Two Characters Attacked by Dogs”).
Tamayo also painted murals, some of which – counting Nacimiento de la nacionalidad (”Birth of the Nationality”), 1952 – are exhibited inside Mexico City’s Palacio de Bellas Artes opera house. His art has also been exposed in U.S. museums such as The Phillips Collection in Washington and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City.
Francisco Toledo - Mexican Artists
His social and artistic concerns about his home state led to his contribution in the organization of an significant art library at the IAGO, and his participation in the beginning of the Museo de Arte Contemporaneous de Oaxaca (MACO), the Patronato Pro-Defensa y Conservacion del Patrimonio Cultural de Oaxaca, a records for the blind, a photographic center, and the Eduardo Mata Music Library to name a little of his projects. Toledo’s exceptional originality has been spoken in pottery, sculpture, weaving, graphic arts, and paintings. He has had exhibitions in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Spain, Belgium, France, Japan, Sweden, the United States, plus other countries. Toledo is at the same time an outstanding artist and a supporter and guardian of the arts and the crafts and architectural inheritance of his state of Oaxaca.
Mauricio Toussaint - Mexican Artists
In 1995 Toussaint came to the United States, tempted by friends in the music business, which confident him to join them in Miami. He has had numerous exhibits in dissimilar Mexican cities over and above other countries like Spain, France, Korea and the United Sates.
Carlos Amorales - Mexican Artists
Amorales studied at Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam between 1992 and 1995 and at the Rijksakademie in 1996.
Known for his flat, bold forms, Amorales works in a wide mixture of media, including video animation, painting, drawing, sculpture, and performance. Images of his “liquid archive” - birds, spiders, trees, wolves, etc. - recur throught his work in blacks, reds, and grays. His previous works featured masked Mexican wrestlers performing in wrestling rings all over the world, including at the Tate Modern in London and the Pompidou Center in Paris. His most recent animation piece, Useless Wonder (2006) was shown at the Miami Basel art fair. Newly, Amorales has had solo exhibitions at the MALBA in Buenos Aires, the Milton Keynes Gallery in Milton Keynes, UK, Yvon Lambert Paris, and MUCA in Mexico City. The artist’s work is featured in many public and secretive collections, including the MoMA in New York, La Colección Jumex in Mexico City, the Cisneros Foundation Collection in New York, and the Margulies Collection in Miami.
John White - American artists
White, “Gentleman of London,” later became head of the newly-established Roanoke Colony. In 1587 he led a band of settlers sent out by Sir Walter Raleigh. White, as Governor, with thirteen others, was included under the name of “The Governor and Assistants of the Citie of Raleigh of Virginia”.
However, a record from May of 1606 that a Bridgit White was agreed estate administrator for her brother “John White” may refer to him. A Bridgett White was also the second wife of a Robert Wight (1578 - 1617) of Hareby, Lincolnshire, England whom he married on Nov 25, 1613 at Alford. As this Robert was also the son of an obscure John Wight and the father of an Elizabeth Wighte (1606-1671) who is rarely thought to have been the ex-wife of Nathaniel Eaton (1610 -1674), the first schoolmaster of Harvard College, Massachusetts; there is a possibility that Bridgit White, the sister of John White the Governor of Roanoke Colony, and Bridgett White, the second wife of the same above-mentioned Robert Wight, are directly related to each other
Miguel Covarrubias - mexican artist
Covarrubias also did some amazing illustrations for The Heritage Press including Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Green Mansions, and Pearl Buck’s All Men Are Brothers. These editions are very required after by collectors. He also worked as an illustrator for W.C. Handy’s publications.
Covarrubias is also well-known for his analysis of pre-Colombian art of Mesoamerica, mainly that of the Olmec culture. His analysis of iconography presented a strong case that the Olmec predated the Classic Era years before this was confirmed by archaeology.
8.27.2007
Patience Wright - American artist
Wright was born into a Quaker farm family and married Joseph Wright in 1748. For years, she had amused herself and her five kids by molding faces out of putty, bread dough, and wax. After her partner died in 1769, her leisure became a full-time occupation as she began earning a living from molding portraits in tinted wax.
In 1772, Wright traveled to England and opened a unbeaten wax museum. Wright became known as the “Promethean modeller,” for her New World equality and often coarse speech as well as her artwork. She was patronized by George III, and sculpted him and other members of British royalty and nobility, but fell from royal favor because of her open support for the colonial cause during the American Revolution. It is commonly believed that Wright provided her rebellious former compatriots with intelligence related to British war preparations. Wright’s sculpture of friend William Pitt still stands in Westminster Abbey.
John Singleton Copley - American artist
In 1774, Copley migrated to England to persist painting there. He moved on to Paris, Genoa and Rome before returning to London nine months later (1).
He began to specialize in historical narrative scenes which are sometimes dismissed by critics as lacking the vibrancy of his earlier portraits and joined the leading artistic institution, the Royal Academy of Art. Copley verified a genius, in both his American and British periods, for rendering face textures and capturing emotional immediacy. He died in London in 1815.
Gunther Gerszo - mexican artist
Born in Mexico City, Gerzso’s father, Oscar, was a watchmaker from Budapest, Hungary; his mother, Dore Wendland, a lead singer and a pianist from Berlin, Germany. His father died just six months after he was born. His mother then married another emigrant, the German owner of a well-liked jewelry store. He lost his business during the Mexican Revolution, and in 1922 the family moved to Europe.
In 1924 they returned to Mexico. After his mother divorced her second husband, during her subsequent financial uncertainty she decided to send Gunther, then 12, to live with her brother, Hans Wendland, an important art historian and dealer in Lugano, Switzerland. Wendland sold works by Rembrandt, Cézanne, and Titian, and Gerzso recalled paintings by Bonnard and Delacroix on the walls of his bedroom. Among the important visitors of the Wendland’s was Nando Tamberlani, an Italian stage set designer who became friends with Gerszo while living on the estate for a summer.
Oscar González Loyo - Mexican artist
He is the son of Oscar González Guerrero, legendary Mexican comic book master.
As a child he was influenced by the work of Mexican comic book artists that frequented his home like Héctor Macedo, as well as from Walt Disney, Osamu Tezuka, Bill Hanna, Joe Barbera, Chuck Jones, Friz Freleng and Robert McKimson.
At age 14 he became a professional artist for Las Aventuras de Capulina.
Over the years, he has worked in titles like Las Aventuras de Cepillín, Las Aventuras de Parchís, Katy la Oruga, El Monje Loco, The Flintstones, The New Speed Racer, Tiny Toons, Looney Tunes, The Simpsons Comics and Bart Simpson Comics.
From 1996-2000 he was the Animation Director for Sesame Street Latin america.
In the year 2000, he became the first Mexican to win an Eisner Award at Comic-Con International for his job on Simpson’s Comics.
Benjamin West - American artist
In 1763, West moved to England, where he was commissioned by King George III to generate portraits of members of the royal family. The king himself was twice painted by him. He painted his most famous and possibly most influential painting, The Death of General Wolfe, in 1770, exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1771. Although at first snubbed by Reynolds and others as over ambitious, the painting became one of the most frequently reproduced images of the period.
As painted by Gilbert Stuart, 1783-84In 1772, King George appointed him historical artist to the court at a yearly fee of £1,000. West became friends with the English portraitist Sir Joshua Reynolds and founded the Royal Academy of Arts with Reynolds in 1768. He was the second leader of the Royal Academy from 1792 to 1805. He was re-elected in 1806 and was president until his death in 1820. He was Surveyor of the King’s Pictures from 1791 until his death.
Rodolfo Morales - Mexican artist
Morales are best known for his brightly coloured surrealistic dream-like canvases and collages frequently featuring Mexican women in village settings.
He was famous for his restoration of historic buildings in Ocotlan, Mexico and together with Rufino Tamayo and Francisco Toledo, helped make Oaxaca in Southern Mexico a centre for contemporary art and sightseeing. Up until his death in 2001, both he and Toledo had been regarded as Mexico’s best living artists for over a decade.
Charles Willson Peale - American artist
Finding that he had a talent for painting, especially portraitures, Peale studied for a time under John Hesselius and John Singleton Copley; eventually friends raised enough money for him to travel to England to take instruction from Benjamin West.
He also had a huge interest in natural history, and organized the first U.S. scientific journey in 1801. These two major interests combined in his founding of what became the Philadelphia Museum, and was later renamed the Peale Museum. This museum was stocked with artwork supplied by Peale, as well as artifacts of natural history, such as a mastodon skeleton found on the first outing. After his death, the museum was sold to, and split up by, showmen P. T. Barnum and Moses Kimball.
Fernando Ortega - Mexican artist
Fernando grew up in a village near the banks of the Rio Grande. His family lived in Chimayo, New Mexico for eight generations; his music is influenced by those roots.From all this heritage, from his classical training at University of New Mexico, and varied life experiences, this turned into a unique sound that embraces country, classical, Celtic, Latin American, world music, modern folk and rustic hymnody.
James Peale - American artist
Peale was born in Chestertown, Maryland, the second child, after Charles, of Charles Peale (1709–1750) and Margaret Triggs (1709–1791). His father died when he was a child, and the family moved to Annapolis. In 1762 he began to supply apprenticeships there, first in a saddlery and later in a cabinetmaking store. After his brother Charles returned from London in 1769, where he had studied with Benjamin West, Peale served as his assistant and learned how to paint.
The total number of Peale’s landscape paintings remains indefinite, but he executed more than 200 watercolor miniatures on ivory, perhaps 100 still-life paintings, less than 70 oil portraits, and at least 8 history paintings.
Peale died in Philadelphia on May 24, 1831. Three of his six kids became talented painters: Anna Claypoole Peale (1798–1871), a miniaturist and still-life artist; Margaretta Peale (1795–1882), painter of trompe l’oeil subjects and tabletop fruit; and Sarah Miriam Peale (1800–1885), a portraitist and still-life painter
Gabriel Orozco – Mexican artist
Exploring the use of video, drawings, and installations in addition to his photographs and sculptures, Orozco allows the audience’s imagination to explore the imaginative associations between oft-ignored objects in today’s world. His work permits a rarely allowed interface between the artwork and the audience.
For instance, visitors at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, California could play a four person game of table tennis on Orozco’s Ping Pond Table (1998). The work’s center is a lily pond with four semi-circular ping pong table pieces set in a clover shape approximately it.
Ralph Earl – American artist
Ralph Earl was born in either Shrewsbury or Leicester, Massachusetts. By 1774, he was working in New Haven, Connecticut as a portrait painter. In the autumn of 1774, Earl returned to Leicester, Massachusetts to marry his cousin, Sarah Gates. A few months later, their daughter was born; though, Earl left them both with Sarah’s parents and returned to New Haven.
Like so many of the colonial craftsmen, Earl was self-taught, and for several years was an itinerant painter. In 1775, Earl visited Lexington and Concord, which were the sites of new battles in the American Revolution. Together with engraver Amos Doolittle, he painted four of his most well-known pictures, all battle scenes.
In London, he entered the studio of Benjamin West, and decorated the king and many notables. Earl continued painting portraits in the town of Norwich. He later married Ann Whiteside, an English woman, despite the fact that he had never ended his marriage ceremony with Sarah Gates. In 1785 or 1786, Earl returned to the United States with his new wife.
Manuel Rocha Iturbide - Mexican Artist
In 1988 he started using video work and in 1989 he realized his first sound sculpture at the mild stone exhibition “14 artists around Joseph Beuyce” in Mexico City along with significant Mexican artists from his generation such as Gabriel Orozco. In 1989 Rocha Iturbide travels to USA to the University Mills College in order to pursue an MFA in electronic music. There, he composes “Frost Clear”, a piece for enlarged refrigerator, double bass and electronic sounds that has been played by him through the years in different important festivals such as the “San Francisco electronic Music Festival” in 2006. In 1991, Rocha Iturbide travels to France where he studies and works as a researcher at IRCAM, and where he peruses his doctoral thesis on grainy synthesis and Quantum Mechanics in relation to sound from 1992 to 1999.
In these years, Manuel Rocha Iturbide worked with Curtis Roads and Barry Truax, two of the most important pioneers on granular synthesis computer music techniques. In 1999 the president of the jury of his doctoral thesis defense was Jean Claude Risset (The name of his thesis was “The granular synthesis techniques”). The influence of this research can be seen in different electroacustic works of this composer: “Transiciones de Fase” for brass quintet and electronic sounds (1994), Moin MOR for electronic sounds (1995), SL-9 for electronic sounds (1994), etc. At his return to Mexico after 7 years abroad, Manuel Rocha Iturbide devoted himself to sound art, being one of its pioneers and biggest promoters
Gilbert Stuart - American Artist
Following the example set by John Singleton Copley, Stuart departed for England in 1775. Unsuccessful at first in pursuit of his vocation, he then became a protégé of Benjamin West, with whom he studied for the after that six years. The relationship was a useful with Stuart exhibiting at the Royal Academy as early as 1777. By 1782 Stuart had met with success, mainly due to acclaim for “The Skater,” a portrait of William Grant. At one point the prices for his pictures were exceeded only by those of Joshua Reynolds and Thomas Gainsborough.
In spite of his many commissions, however, Stuart was habitually neglectful of finances and was in danger of being sent to debtors’ prison. In 1787 he fled to Ireland, where he painted and accumulated debt with equal vigor. In 1803 Stuart open a studio in Washington, D. C. By the end of his career he had taken the likenesses of over a thousand American political figures.
He was praised for the vitality and naturalness of his portraits, and his subjects found his company agreeable. “Speaking generally,” said John Adams, “no penance is like having one’s picture done. You must sit in a constrained and unnatural position, which is a trial to the temper. But I should like to sit to Stuart from the first of January to the last of December, for he lets me do just what I please, and keeps me continually amused by his conversation.” Stuart worked without the aid of sketches, beginning directly upon the canvas.
Gilbert Stuart - American Artist
Following the example set by John Singleton Copley, Stuart departed for England in 1775. Unsuccessful at first in pursuit of his vocation, he then became a protégé of Benjamin West, with whom he studied for the after that six years. The relationship was a useful with Stuart exhibiting at the Royal Academy as early as 1777. By 1782 Stuart had met with success, mainly due to acclaim for “The Skater,” a portrait of William Grant. At one point the prices for his pictures were exceeded only by those of Joshua Reynolds and Thomas Gainsborough.
In spite of his many commissions, however, Stuart was habitually neglectful of finances and was in danger of being sent to debtors’ prison. In 1787 he fled to Ireland, where he painted and accumulated debt with equal vigor. In 1803 Stuart open a studio in Washington, D. C. By the end of his career he had taken the likenesses of over a thousand American political figures.
He was praised for the vitality and naturalness of his portraits, and his subjects found his company agreeable. “Speaking generally,” said John Adams, “no penance is like having one’s picture done. You must sit in a constrained and unnatural position, which is a trial to the temper. But I should like to sit to Stuart from the first of January to the last of December, for he lets me do just what I please, and keeps me continually amused by his conversation.” Stuart worked without the aid of sketches, beginning directly upon the canvas.
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Remedios Varo - Mexican artist
Remedios Varo was born in December 16, 1908 - October 8, 1963 was a surrealist painter. She was born in Anglés Cataluña, Spain in 1908 and died from a heart-attack in Mexico City in 1963. During the Spanish Civil War she flees to Paris where she was mainly prejudiced by the surrealist movement. She met in Barcelona the French surrealist poet Benjamin Péret and became his wife. She was compulsory into banish from Paris during the Nazi profession of France and moved to Mexico City at the end of 1941. She at first considered Mexico a temporary haven, but would remain in Latin America for the rest of her life.
In Mexico she met inhabitant artists such as Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera. However, her strongest ties would be to other exiles and expatriates, and particularly her extraordinary friendship with the English painter Leonora Carrington. Her last major relationship would be with Walter Gruen, an Austrian who had endured concentration camps before escaping Europe. Gruen believed severely in Varo, and gave her the support that allowed her to fully concentrate on her painting.
After 1949 Varo developed into her mature and extraordinary style, which remains beautifully enigmatic and instantly recognizable. She often worked in oil on Masonite panels she ready herself. Although her colors have the blend resonance of the oil medium, her brushwork often concerned many fine strokes of paint laid closely together - a technique more reminiscent of egg tempera. She died at the height of her career.
Her work continues to achieve successful retrospectives at major sites in Mexico and the United States.
William Rush - American artist
He was qualified in the carving of ships’ heads in wood. This translates into sculptures that were deeply undercut and able to be seen from far away through the dramatic use of contrast and strong shadows. Rush blended American artisan tradition and neoclassical form.
Rush was one of the first to make outdoor public sculpture in the U.S. His Comedy and Tragedy was carved in 1808 for the New Theater on Chestnut Street in Philadelphia intended by Benjamin Latrobe. His Water Nymph and Bittern was created in 1809 for a Philadelphia waterworks that was also planned by Latrobe.
His statue of George Washington, imprinted in wood, is in Independence Hall in Philadelphia, Rush helped found the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, viewing his interest in art beyond the American craft tradition.
Mather Brown - American artist
Brown was the son of Gawen and Elizabeth (Byles) Brown, and descended from the Rev. amplify Mather on his mother’s side. He was trained by his aunt and around 1773 (age 12) became a pupil of Gilbert Stuart. He at home in London in 1781 to further his training in Benjamin West’s studio, enter the Royal Academy schools in 1782 with plans to be a miniature painter, and begin to exhibit a year later.
In 1784 he painted two religious paintings for the church of St Mary’s-in-the-Strand, which led Brown to found a company with the painter Daniel Orme for the commercialization of these and other works through display and the sale of engravings. Among these were large paintings of scenes from English history, as well as scenes from Shakespeare’s plays. However, despite their success he began to concentrate on portraiture. His first successes were with American sitters, among others his patron John Adams and family in 1784–85; this painting is now in the Boston Athenaeum. In 1785–86 he painted the first representation of Thomas Jefferson, who was visiting London. He also painted Sir William Pepperell.
His 1788 full-length portrait of Prince Frederick Augustus in the uniform of Colonel of the Cold stream Guards led to meeting as History and Portrait Painter to the Prince, later the Duke of York and Albany. Other paintings include the Prince of Wales, later George IV (about 1789), Queen Charlotte, and Cornwallis. A self-portrait now belongs to the American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, Massachusetts.
A falling off of support in the mid-1790s, and failure to be elected to the Royal Academy, led Brown to leave London in 1808 for Bath, Bristol, and Liverpool. He established in Manchester, returning to London almost two decades later, in 1824, where, even after West’s death, he continued to imitate his teacher’s style of painting. Unable to secure commissions, Brown eventually died in poverty in London on May 25, 1831.
John Brewster, Jr. - American artist
Family and early life
Little is known about Brewster’s childhood or adolescence. He was the third child born in Hampton, Connecticut, to Dr. John and Mary (Durkee) Brewster. His mother died while he was 17. His father remarried Ruth Avery of Brooklyn, Connecticut, and they went on to have four more children.John Brewster Sr., a doctor and descendant of William Brewster, the Pilgrim manager, was a member of the Connecticut General Assembly and also vigorous in the local church.
Work as a deaf artist
Brewster probably communicates with others using pantomime and a small amount of writing. For an display of Brewster’s work, the Florence Griswold Museum describe what being a deaf portraitist would have meant in the late 18th and early 19th centuries in the United States: It is astounding then that Brewster traveled great distances, sometimes in areas that were unfamiliar, negotiated prices, decided poses and artistic ideas with his sitters, as well as living in the middle of his sitters of weeks or months at a time.Being deaf also may have given Brewster some advantages in portrait painting, according to the museum exhibit web page: unable to hear and speak, Brewster listening carefully his energy and ability to imprison minute differences in facial expression. He also greatly emphasizes the gaze of his sitters, as eye contact was such a critical part of communication among the Deaf. Scientific studies have proven that since Deaf people rely on visual cues for announcement [they] can differentiate delicate differences in facial expressions much better than hearing people.
Washington Allston - American artist
Education and travel
Allston graduated from Harvard College in 1800, and then sails to Europe, where he exhausted the next three years studying art at the Royal Academy in London, England, of which the Anglo-American painter Benjamin West was then the president.
From 1803 to 1808 he visited the great museums of Paris and for a number of years those of Italy, where he met Coleridge, his lifelong friend. Samuel F. B. Morse was one of Allston’s art pupils and accompanies Allston to Europe in 1811. After wandering throughout Western Europe, Allston finally settled in London, where he won reputation and prizes for his pictures. He was the uncle of the artists George Whiting Flagg and Jared Bradley Flagg, both of whom intentional in painting under him.
Recognition
Flourmill’s Flight, 1819.Allston was from time to time called the “American Titian” because his style resembles the great Venetian Renaissance artists in their display of dramatic color contrast. His work greatly prejudiced the development of U.S. landscape painting. Also, the themes of many paintings were strained from literature, especially Biblical stories.
His artistic mastermind was much accepted by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and Ralph Waldo Emerson was strongly influenced by his paintings and poems, but so were both Sophia Peabody-who married Nathaniel Hawthorne-and Margaret Fuller. Allston also wrote a good deal of verse including The Sylphs of the Seasons (1813) and The Two Painters, a send-up. He also shaped a novel, Monaldi.In 1818 he returns to the United States and live in Cambridge, Massachusetts for 25 years, where he died on July 9, 1843, at age 64.
Impressionist paintings are suddenly back in vogue
Unlike past years, conservative taste dominated the new rich of Europe and Asia, some might call them trophy hunters. Instantly recognizable names such as Modigliani and Picasso took center stage and grabbed the most interest.
According to the New York Times, some experts say the auction results were good news for the art world. “The market is showing a return to reason,” said James Roundell, a London dealer. “After years of escalating prices for artists barely out of school, Impressionist paintings are suddenly back in vogue.”
The rejuvenated interest in the Impressionistic and Modern art comes after the big numbers paid for contemporary art in recent years. Now, the Old Masters works seem like bargains.
The works that grabbed most of the attention were a Modigliani 1919 portrait of the artist’s mistress and muse that sold for $30.1 million. An 1895 Degas pastel sold for $12.4 million. A flowery Renoir landscape from 1873 sold for $9.1 million. An 1881 Cézanne landscape was sold for $7.6 million. The top modern piece was a 1969 Picasso, “Seated Man With a Pipe and Cupid.” The hammer fell at $7.1 million.
Solomon Willard - American artist
Solomon Willard (June 2, 1783, Peter sham, Massachusetts – 1861) was a carver and designer in Massachusetts who is remembered primarily for designing and overseeing the Bunker Hill Monument, the first monumental obelisk erected in the United States. He designed it in 1825, and structure began in 1827. Willard exposed satisfactory granite quarries for the stone at Quincy, and the granite for the monument came from there.
Willard taught as a carpenter with his father, a farmer who did carpentry in the winters; he went to Boston in 1804, work during the day and reading books of architecture and drawing in the evenings. His handiness as a carver enhanced so rapidly that he was employed for carved architectural details for many important late Federal and Greek revival buildings in Boston, the Ionic and Corinthian capitals for the steeple of Park Street Church, built in 1810 and in the same year he carved the eagle for the pediment of the new Custom House. In 1818 he made a model of the capitol at Washington for Charles Bullfinch, than busy on the Massachusetts State House, and later did several works of this sort, among which were models of the Pantheon and the Parthenon for Edward Everett. From wood carving he twisted to stone carving, and in 1820 was engaged on the Ionic capitals and other stonework of the Episcopal St Paul's Church, the first illustration of Greek revival architecture in Boston. By 1821 Willard had become so victorious that he gave classes in architecture and drawing in his studio near St Paul's; there Horatio Greenough was a pupil. Willard added ship figureheads to his craft, from 1823.
In Framingham, Massachusetts, Willard's First Baptist Church of 1826 still stands, at the present the oldest building in the town. The Norfolk County law court in Dedham, Massachusetts is also his work. In the similar year he was also architect of Divinity Hall, Harvard Divinity School. Willard also designed the Greek Revival Framingham Village Hall. The Gothic Revival Mission Church of St. John the Evangelist on Bowdoin Street, Boston, dated to 1831, is also possibly his design.He is credited with designing some of the first hot-air central heating in an American building. In 1829 his recent pupil, the brilliant young architect Isaiah Rogers, considered the innovative Tremont House in Boston. This was the first American hotel to have indoor plumbing and it became the prototype of a modern, first-class American hotel.
In 1865 William W. Wheildon wrote a Memoir of Solomon Willard, Architect and Superintendent of the Bunker Hill Monument published by the Massachusetts: Monument Association, which is the primary source for his biographers.
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Thomas Sully - American artist
Thomas Sully (June 19, 1783 – November 5, 1872) was a well-known American (English-born) painter, frequently of portraits.
Life and career
Sully was born in Horn castle, Lincolnshire, England, to the actors Matthew and Sarah Sully. In March 1792 the Sullys and their nine children immigrated to Richmond, Virginia, where Thomas's uncle manages a theater. The boys attend school in New York City until 1794, when his mother died and he returns to Richmond. By July of that year the family was in Charleston, South Carolina. After a brief apprenticeship to an insurance broker who recognized his creative talent, at age 12 or thereabouts Sully begin painting and considered with his brother-in-law Jean Belzons (active 1794–1812), a French miniaturist, until they had a falling-out in 1799. He then returned to Richmond to learn "miniature & Device painting" from his elder brother Lawrence Sully (1769–1804). After Lawrence Sully's death, Thomas Sully married his sister-in-law, Lawrence's widow, Sarah Annis Sully and not only take on the raising of Lawrence's children but have a further nine children with Sarah himself. Among the children were Alfred Sully, Mary Chester Sully (Mrs John Neagle), Jane Cooper Sully Darley, Blanche, Rosalie Sully, and Thomas Wilcocks Sully.
Sully became a professional painter at age 18 in 1801. He studied face-painting under Gilbert Stuart in Boston for three weeks. After some time in Virginia with this brother, Sully inspired to New York, after which he moved to Philadelphia in 1806, where he resides for the remainder of his life. In 1809 he travels to London for nine months of learn under Benjamin West.
Sully's 1824 portraits of John Quincy Adams, who became President within the year, and then the Marquis de Lafayette appear to have brought him to the forefront of his day. His Adams portrait may be seen in the National Gallery of Art, Washington. Many famous Americans of the day had their portraits painted by him. In 1837-1838 he was in London to paint Queen Victoria at the demand of Philadelphia's St. George's Society. His daughter Blanche assisted him as the Queen's "stand-in", modeling the Queen's costume when she was not obtainable. One of Sully's portraits of Thomas Jefferson is own by the Jefferson Literary and Debating Society at the University of Virginia and hangs in that school's Rotunda. Another Jefferson portrait, this one head-to-toe, hangs at West Point.
Sully's own index indicate that he produced 2631 paintings from 1801, most of which are now in the United States. His style resembles that of Thomas Lawrence. Though best known as a portrait painter, Sully also made past pieces and landscapes. An example of the former is the 1819 Passage of the Delaware, now on show at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
Sully died in Philadelphia on November 5, 1872, where he had spent the greater part of his long and successful career. He is buried in the Laurel Hill burial ground. His book Hints to young painters was published after his death. Sully was a great-uncle of the New Orleans-based architect, also named Thomas Sully (1855-1939).
What is it about Coffee and Creativity?
More than Coffee was served”… that is the name of the new exhibition at the Gallery St. Etienne, celebrating “the role of the coffeehouse as both hangout and inspiration” for artists throughout history.
Either the coffee or the coffee house causes the artists of recent and of old to create and articulate great art. That correlation in itself is fascinating. Even the deranged Van Gogh, used Café Scenes as inspiration. The Earless café that he painted in his famous Café Terrace at Night painting is now a Mecca for South of France tourists.
Not so well known as a Café-patron, Gustav Klimt is a great example of a European artist that spent many hours on the café front, sipping on a latte and drawing loosely on his sketch pad “balanced between his knees.”
So, drink up a Cup of Joe and head down to the Gallery St. Etienne and celebrate the intriguing relationship between Art and caffeine.
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