Landscape Painters

Biography: Raoul Dufy

Known for his joyous contributions to the Fauve movement in art in the early 20th century, Raoul Dufy (1877-1953) actually began his painting career as an Impressionist. When a brilliant group of painters headed by Henri Matisse began breaking away and developing a new style, one painter who found his niche in the newly formed Fauve group was Raoul Dufy.

Life with the Fauves

Like the Impressionists, the Fauves rejected the idea of realism in their work. Where the Impressionists used pastel colors and light to tell their painterly stories, the Fauves (“wild beasts” according to one French art critic) used an expressionistic style that was more free, vibrant, and spontaneous.

The Fauves instead used color dramatically, in part to convey emotion: Matisse painted a green streak down a portrait of his wife’s face to separate light from shade, Derain painted a scene of Charing Cross Bridge in London that looked more like it belonged in the tropics, and Dufy embraced his subjects with a wild, reckless optimism that left critics shaking their heads in wonder.

Dufy’s Work

In “Regatta at Cowes” (1934) and “The English Promenade at Nice” (1946), a glorious blue dominates these water scenes. In “Regatta at Cowes,” the boats seem to swirl in a wild pattern across the canvas, hiding the true nature of the artist’s careful organization, making the activity seem effortless, nearly random.

Like Matisse, who also painted in the south of France, Dufy concentrated on brightly hued sea views and boldly patterned interiors. Whether it’s Dufy’s “The Workshop with the Bouquet” (1942) or “The Painter’s Studio” (1949), these environments capture a light-heartedness and energy that also led some critics to question Dufy’s seriousness about art.

What was at first hidden by Dufy’s use of pure colors and soft lines was his utter seriousness and clearly choreographed style, which presented in striking fashion the everyday vistas and still life that inspired him. What motivated Dufy was not only the pursuit of joy through his painting, but a conscious decision to be free and disinterested in making a “cultural statement,” often the signature of modern painting. What at first may appear incoherent, in truth is really a clarity of color and thought used to express the artist’s unbridled enthusiasm.

Professional Recognition

Eventually, even in his own time, Raoul Dufy came to be recognized as an important classic artist of the modern era, and he received many awards and honors. His most important recognition, however, came in the commission of 1936 when Dufy was selected to decorate the Palais de l’Electricite for the Parisian World’s Fair. At the time, his painting for the exhibition was more than 200 feet, the largest ever produced by an artist in Europe at the time.

Artistic Exploration

The short-lived Fauve movement resulted in a dissolution of the painting group, but for Dufy it merely expanded the areas of art to be explored. A thirst for experimentation led him to work in the mediums of book illustration, wood cuts, ceramics, and textile design, although he always returned to his first love, painting.

Despite suffering for years with debilitating arthritis, Dufy continued to paint until his death in 1953. Often referred to as the “Painter of Light,” Dufy will forever be known for his work in the Fauve style.

Where And Why – The Smart Buy Art

Since the days when cavemen began drawing on the walls – everyone has, at some point, displayed art in their home. In the beginning it was probably something we painted ourselves at kindergarten, aged four and a half, for mum to proudly display on the fridge in the kitchen, developing in our teens to the picture of the girl scratching her bare bottom on the tennis court or, in our later years, a genuine impressionist painting by an elephant called Tojo, purchased while on holiday in Thailand. At some point we have all fallen in love with an “image” and chosen to decorate our abode with that “must have” picture which momentarily amused or inspired us.

So, “art” for the home is nothing new. What is new is its’ abundance. Art is much more available now than it has ever been and the variety of things to choose from has never been more diverse. These days we can buy images of anything from architecture to erotica. We can buy it easier too. There is art on the internet, in furniture stores, high street galleries or even at the multiple outlet retailers who tempt us with their range of mass produced “two year tops – skip fodder”. We are literally spoilt for choice of things to buy.

But what should we buy and where should we buy it? Anyone can hang a picture on the wall, it’s easy. Buy something suitable, bang a nail in the wall, hang it up – job done! But that, dear reader, is as far from the truth as it is possible to get. In my opinion there are just three types of people who buy art. Those with genuine artistic appreciation and an eye for real talent, those who find it hard to make a distinction between creativity and an unmade bed and, probably worst of all – the decorists. What are “decorists” you may well ask – and so you should, for you might indeed be one of them.

Decorists are that happy band of picture hunters who never go shopping without their little bag of accoutrements. This essential selection of undeniable criteria can include many and diverse items. But those most commonly in place in their “art trappers bag” will be a swatch of curtain material, a piece of wallpaper, piping from the edge of a cushion, a lump of laminate flooring or the front of a draw from the new kitchen units. These people are to be helped and understood, for they are not responsible for their actions. They suffer from a condition you could call “refititis” which is usually caused or at least irritated by watching too many telly “experts” telling them that a piece of MDF painted the exact colour to match those items in their bag, is as good to hang up in your home as something genuinely artistic that employed real talent in its creation. Pretty though that may make your home, shallow is what it makes you.

There are only two rules to apply to the purchase of a picture for personal use in a private home.

1. Buy what you truly like to look at.

2. Spend what you can afford.

Such rules can, of course, be greatly extended but, simplistically, these are the two that really determine the purchase of most pictures sold today. What is more important is to understand what a picture is and what it does for you and your home. This is a topic that should provoke the whole picture industry to book a hall at the N.E.C. for a national debate, but here it is as I see it:

- The only place you should buy your pictures from is a specialist gallery – or the artist?

That’s generally sound advice. In both cases you can ask pertinent questions relating to the “art” and you should be able to expect a “sensible” answer. But watch out! Both can be biased and both are hungry to take your money off you. So, listen and take their advice with caution. Beware of the “independent” galleries that I call “Pubs”. These purport to be selling quality art that “you simply must be collecting right now”. What they are really doing is trying to shift their stock of sole supplier, industry dictated, over priced limited edition prints by artists who, once their day in the limelight is over, may be as worthless as that tennis player scratching her bare bottom. Essentially, there is nothing wrong with buying such pictures, the artistry is mostly excellent and very worthy of being featured in your home, so long as you are aware that what you are buying is often a “fashionable piece” and like your hair style in your wedding photos, may look bloody ridiculous in years to come. Whether you are told, with all genuine intention, that “this is a good investment”, choose not to believe it. The advice may well be right. But don’t take the risk. Stick to the two rules, if you like it and can afford it buy it.

- Pictures are much cheaper at the superstores.

Yes, they certainly can be – and for very good reason. Now, call me a snob if you like but for the same reasons I don’t go to Spain for my holidays to sit on a beach full of thousands of other overweight fat English people, I don’t buy pictures from a pallet in Ikea. I simply don’t want to make my personal space exactly the same as everyone else’s. If I had been born a Cow or a Sheep I’m sure I would have walked away from the rest of the Herd or Flock to stand on my own. But, same rules… if you like it, there’s no one on this planet to say you can’t have it. Just don’t invite me round for dinner.

- I only buy original Oil Paintings.

Very good, you are on the road to enlightenment and freedom of expression. However, you must be careful here too. There are original Oil Paintings and, wait for it, original Oil Paintings. You must be sure of what you are buying. Any oil painting is worth only what someone is prepared to pay for it. I tell my artists that a fair price to start from when pricing a work is double the amount it cost in materials and the sum amount of the hours it took to paint it, determined of course by the amount the artist expects to earn per hour. Any increment after that is essentially a grey area and inextricably linked to the quality and skills of the individual artist. Something you might choose to argue in your negotiations before you buy. This type of artwork is at least “honest” and “original” so our two rules apply again. The other type of Original Oil Painting is a very different story. I only need to say two words of warning, “Far East”. China, Taiwan, South Korea etc are all wonderful suppliers of “Original Oil Paintings”. They are very nice, painted by talented hands, but far from unique and even further from original. Many such paintings travel along a line of workers for each to add their individual bit, be it clouds, trees or rippling stream. The same rules apply – so long as you know “what” you are buying.

To Summarise

Shop at a reputable gallery, listen to what you are told with your ears open, ask plenty of questions, never allow yourself to be “sold” a picture, only buy pictures not promises, unless you are an expert don’t expect to buy as an investment, try to resist buying from a stack of identical pictures on a shelf, purchase strictly by the two rules and as you do, remember one last thought. The pictures on your wall tell others more about you than you might think. Consider the pictures you or your friends own now. What do they tell you about the people living in that house? Are they sporty, humorous, well travelled, pretentious, old fashioned, modern, driven by the herd, spontaneous, lovers of safe recognised artists, cultured or haven’t they got a clue? You be the judge but for what ever reason, do allow yourself to enjoy your chosen art whatever it may be and to yourself be true. After all, your taste in art is as individual as you are – or it should be.

Andy Warhol is overrated

Is Andy Warhol overrated? In the assessment of art, and in the assessment of pop art in particular and any style considered “modern”, the artists often get criticism from the public. Since there is an Andy Warhol exhibit currently in Memphis, where I live, I have heard several negative comments about his work recently.

Before we can make claims that an artist’s work is “overrated” or “bad” or makes no sense, we first need to try and understand what the artist was trying to do and what the culture was like when he began to work. All artists are influenced by these things. The pop art movement was an attempt to make artwork that iconized the things which were poular at that time. It began in the sixties and carried over into the seventies. It frequently used bold colors and almost cartoon like images. Warhol experimented with things such as soup cans, yes, but his portraits are the images for which he is best known. He began the soup can style when he was working as an advertising artist. He began his career drawing shoe ads for department stores. The portraits are primarily done as silkscreens, and were influenced by the famous people of the era as well as the bold, pscydelic colors of the fashion world he had worked in. Even more interesting however, are the portraits of people such as Mozart that he also did portraits of.

Part of being “known” as an artist is to develop a recognizable style. Warhol certainly attained this goal. Famous also as the person who coined the phrase “everyone has fifteen minutes of fame,” Warhol created work that seems to be ‘too easy’ to be considered ‘good.’ Frequently the general public associates ‘good’ art with complexity of the subject or the amount of detail the artist uses. What needs to be understood is that most of the work we as a public generally like, the Impressionists for example, was once considered inferior or overrated.

Most people who have not been trained in art and art movements want art to be “pretty.” Thus, we tend to put down or dismiss the work that is perhaps not stunningly beautiful, but is “interesting.” Beofre we call an artist’s work “overrated,” we need to study all of the body of his work and try to understand what he might have been trying to accomplish. In Warhol’s case, he was tring to epitomize the people and objects that popularized his era and the world he lived in. He was not afraid to play with color, to try a new style and to break out of the accepted mold.

Overrated? Perhaps. Probably not.

Things To See On Your Holidays In Colombia

Colombia is well known for one thing in particular, the famous dance of Salsa. Nobody could ever imagine the happy and joyous atmosphere of Columbia. Who can resist the soaring Andean peaks, the Lush Amazonian jungle and the crystal clear Caribbean waters? Everyone wants to see the vibrant cities with soaring skyscrapers, the elegant port towns cut by cobbled alleys and bougainvillea-shrouded balconies, spectacular national parks, and the late night salsa dancing.

Head of the dizzying heights is the capital city Bogota. It reflects the blend of Colombian tradition and Spanish colonial influences. Must see historical landmarks include the Capitol and the Cathedral or the Capilla del Sangrario, both located on the main square Plaza Bolivar. In the Gold museum, you can see collections of over 100, 00 pre-Colombian artworks. Wander and enjoy the beautiful site of eloquent paintings and voluptuous sculpture of the Colombian artist Fernando Botero in the Plaza Botero.

You can see over 120 inspiring collections of impressionists and modern art at the Museo Botero. In the town of Zipaquira you can enter the famous Salt Cathedral. Stalactites and specks of salt jostle with crosses and chapels.

You can also join in with the lively Barranquilla Carnaval festival. Tourists can enjoy the sights of the vibrant costumes, energetic dancing and lively atmosphere that transform the industrial port. This colourful festival takes please three days before Ash Wednesday.

Colombia is known for its highly classified parks. On the Caribbean Coast, you must visit the Tayrona National Park. The park is in the south of Santa Marta. The park is the most popular. The major attraction includes its deep bays shaded with coconut trees, beautiful beaches and several coral reefs. This is one major attraction because the combination of the varieties of tropical wildlife makes the park well worth a visit.

In the same Caribbean Coast, Cartagena, an ancient walled fortress city on the north coast, is also worth a visit, particularly for its fascinating Old Town. You can explore the one of kind labyrinthine streets. You can also enjoy a horse-drawn carriage ride because the old transportation makes the place an unforgettable destination. After taking the horse drawn carriage, you must tour and join the cruise to the Isla Del Rosario. It is an archipelago of about 25 small coral islands. Taking pictures underwater on your digital camera could make a great photo postcard for your friends and family back home.

Colombia has much to offer to those interested in archaeology. The San Augustin Archaeological Park contains a great number of relics and massive stone statutes. You will be amazed and surprised at the wondrous and largest group of religious monuments and megalithic sculptures in South America. In Ciudad Perdida or the Lost City, people can climb high into the jungle-covered Sierre Nevada de Santa Marta to the archaeological ruins.

Birmingham and Cardiff

Why Tapestries Have Become A Popular Home Décor Choice

For millennia people have used tapestries and textiles to decorate their homes and today that trend continues. Wall tapestries are one of the most accomplished textile-based art forms and come from a wide variety of cultural backgrounds lending them a diversity often envied in traditional art mediums.

In recent years tapestries have become a much talked about element of home décor and they are being used in a variety of interesting and unique ways and many well-known artists are licensing their artwork to be made into tapestries. Any subject matter from nature and landscapes to fantasy, impressionist and modern art can be used to create a tapestry providing the weaver has the skill to do so. These add an entirely unique dimension to this traditional form of art and modern day art lovers enjoy the blend of traditional and modern found in tapestry art.

Versatile materials with a modern twist

Traditional tapestries, particularly those from the Medieval era, were made from wool. This provided a strong basis for applying dyes and pigments and had the added benefit of being hardwearing and easily available. Over time other fabrics have been added to the mix, but the basic principle of natural materials has remained with tapestry weaving, even to the present day, with the very best examples of tapestry art often using traditional materials and weaving techniques.

Natural fabric tapestries, usually incorporating wool as a main constituent, hold dyes and pigments well, creating a vitality and richness that shows why wall tapestries have been an important and popular art form for centuries. More recently tapestries now include synthetic fibers that help add strength to the original material. Wool tapestries when mixed with synthetic polymers have the distinct advantage of preserving the traditional warmth of wool tapestries, but add a long-lasting robustness that would have made them the envy of Medieval weavers.

The very best quality modern wall tapestries make the most of this blend of old and new, using new improved fibers to reproduce classical art and famous tapestry art from the past. With the improvements made to pigments and dyes in the last century we can now easily buy faithful reproductions of centuries-old tapestry designs; unseen in such vibrant colors since the time they were originally designed.

As well as traditional materials chenille is a popular choice for modern tapestry wall hangings mainly because it is a flexible material that is soft and adaptable. It can be used in a broad range of household décor items, including wall tapestries and throws. When decorating your home chenille tapestries can add an elegant finishing touch which also has a degree of versatility that is hard to accomplish in other ways.

A chenille piece can often be hung as a wall hanging and used as a throw, with all the range of design and color options you find in traditional wall tapestries. However the real popularity of chenille tapestries derive from the fact that they warm the room and make it feel cozy and comfortable.

A decorating challenge

Some spaces can present a decorating challenge. A room may feel too small while others feel large and cold. Sometimes smooth, modern walls don’t quite gel with antique style furniture or accents. Like any form of high quality art tapestries can aide the informed home décor enthusiast and open a window to the past, expand living space both emotionally and visually, create the basis for a theme, add color and give your living space individuality, personality and charm.

Furnishings that are otherwise bland will assume character when complimented with a beautiful tapestry. Choosing a tapestry and using it creatively can minimize and solve a decorating problem by presenting a flash of color or opening a window to another time or place. With a vast range now available it is easy to find a wall tapestry that will provide you with many years of viewing enjoyment.

If a room is small and needs something to make it feel less cramped, consider choosing a tapestry that will bring a breath of fresh air into your living space. This could be a city, land, seascape or a traditional tapestry design such as Medieval. Choosing a horizontal tapestry will help add length to a room or try opening a space by choosing a tapestry with doorways and windows. These types of tapestries give an illusion of added space by leading the eye of the viewer outward.

If your room is large and cold, scale it down by hanging a series of smaller tapestries together. This creates the illusion of a smaller space and can bring a large, blank wall down in size. Hanging small tapestries together will also add warmth to your room. When creating this illusion be sure to choose tapestries of a similar theme.

Charming, versatile and beautiful

Wall tapestries, often rich in history, can transport us to another time and place and reduce the stress of today’s busy world. They encourage reflective and tranquil moments, enlighten the human spirit and are great subjects of conversation. They also elevate our personal space, add charm and coziness to our homes and are balm for the soul.

All of these qualities have made wall tapestries a popular choice amongst art lovers for centuries. Today with modern textiles and fabrics and centuries of tradition, art and design behind them many are finding wall tapestries as charming, versatile and beautiful as ever.

Copyright © The Tapestry House, all rights reserved.

Picci Designs Bring Art to Life Blending Contemporary, Impressionistic and Primitive Styles

Contemporary Tapestries Can Be Serious Yet Fun

A growing amount of art prepared through fabrics are made and people are also after these art works as they have the desire to decorate their offices and homes with art works that are textile made. The one kind of art that people are utilizing for a long period of time is the wall hangings and tapestries. On the fabrics many artists created art and they for thousands of years can also be dated back.

Everyone in these days is in search for wall décor further than the conventional types of wall decors and among many one reason is this that the wall hangings and tapestries are becoming so significant. Another reason of it being popular is that it can give you a sense of history as well as from one generation to another you can pass it down.

Modern-day tapestry design

In the traditional designs you will find out a great number of tapestries but of late, people are noticing the tapestries that has modern-day designs. The weaver can make in the tapestries most of the designs by utilizing modern weaving method. Obviously, for this purpose the weaver must have talents. Thus, most modern day artists regard tapestries as one option and in place of canvases and prints the artists use tapestries.

The traditional designs are used with the modern-day designs for making tapestries more superior for example, fantasy art, peaceful coastal scenes, present day cityscapes, impressionist inspired landscapes and many more.

Although printed ones also looks great and many home decorators also appreciate them but to create the most of it woven textiles are used. Before producing the work the artists although do not plan it but while the tapestry is placed on the walls then the designs of the tapestries look lively as the walls add more feel and intensity to these beautiful art works. There’s no wonder that instead of the framed paintings tapestries are used.

Contemporary textile art

To create art those artists who use fabrics they gain extra popularity for that. Artists in great numbers are using tapestries as well as other mediums to make their artwork in place of paintings as to put across their skills tapestries as well as other types of wall hangings are the major means. This conventional art form has been improved and similarly using textile as well as the creative work of the modern artists like Elda Abramson, Ulrika Leander and Monique Lehman also creates intensity and variety.

Creating intensity is vital and that cannot be created if other resources like canvas are used. Tapestry designs are modern, outstanding and on them bright colors are used. In any type of home background tapestries can always become center of attraction because after you hang them on the walls then the room will brighten up.

A growing amount of art prepared through fabrics are made and people are also after these art works as they have the desire to decorate their offices and homes with art works that are textile made. The one kind of art that people are utilizing for a long period of time is the wall hangings and tapestries. On the fabrics many artists created art and they for thousands of years can also be dated back.

Everyone in these days is in search for wall décor further than the conventional types of wall decors and among many one reason is this that the wall hangings and tapestries are becoming so significant. Another reason of it being popular is that it can give you a sense of history as well as from one generation to another you can pass it down.

Biography: Vincent Van Gogh – Part 4

“When I have a terrible need of-shall I say the word- religion.Then I go out and paint the stars.”Now who has not seen and been awed by Vincent Van Gogh’s

stunning painting,”Starry Night”?

This poor soul who has become the Archetypical “artist persona”

only painted for the last ten years of his life and only sold one painting!

Yet he has altered the history of art forever.

How could this be so?It is so because Van Gogh distilled all of his emotional

torment into his paintings.His terrible inner struggle with madness and his inherent spirituality gave his canvasses a surface tension never seen before.

He was born in Holland in 1853 but didn’t become an artist until 1880.

After he met several impressionist painters he began to change his palette

and paint in a lighter mode.

Having cut off his ear with a razor he began a downward spiral into madness.

His brother Theo was his champion and best friend.He supported Vincent to the end.

However he could not protect Vincent from himself and after a long bout with severe depression,Vincent shot himself in the stomach.

He died two days later saying it was ,”For the good of all”.

His paintings were definitely for the good of all.

He made our world a more special place.

May he rest in peace in the grave next to his brother Theo forever.

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