January 2009

Touch MyHeART

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The local charity event, Touch My HeART, is in its seventh year of fundraising for The Museums of Los Gatos, supporting the activities of Art Museum of Los Gatos. I will be participating in the show this year.  Although they have changed the format over the years, it basically goes like this…patrons may purchase a ticket for $120 for the “Gala Event” on Valentines Day, February 14.  They then get to choose one of the miniature paintings contributed for the show.

I will have 3 paintings in the show, all 5×7 gallery wrap.  Gallery wrap means the painting is not framed, but the painting wraps around the end to a depth of about an inch. I have one painting each of Lake Tahoe, Yosemite Valley, and Big Sur in the show.  Below is the Yosmite Valley Painting.

yosemite valley

If anybody is interesting in obtaining one of my miniatures, then be sure to check this venue out, as they will be going for about 1/3 my normal gallery prices…plus you get food and wine! More information and tickets may be found on their web site.

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Prado Museum on Google Earth

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I am a real fan of Google Earth.  If you haven’t tried it, please do!  From virtually scouting out plein air painting sites, to finding houses I lived in as a child, to virtually exploring a Greek isle before a Mediterranean cruise, it has many uses.

Now, Google has added artistic masterpieces to Google Earth and Google Maps.  You can read a Time article about it here, and access the masterpieces here on Google Earth or Maps.

The 14 current images that have been scanned at the Museo del Prado include..

  • Artemis by Rembrandt
  • Self Portrait by Albrecht Durer
  • The 3rd of May 1808 in Madrid by Francisco Goya
  • The Nobleman with his Hand on his Chest by El Greco
  • The Cardinal by Raphael
  • Descent from the Cross by Roger van der Weyden
  • Emperor Carlos V on Horseback by Titian
  • The Garden of Earthly Delights by Hieronymus Bosch
  • Jacob’s Dream by José de Ribera
  • Inmaculada Concepción by Giambattista Tiepolo
  • The Annunciation by Fra Angelico
  • Crucifixion by Juan de Flandes
  • The Family of Felipe IV, or Las Meninas by Diego Velázquez
  • The Three Graces by Peter Paul Rubens

So, if you haven’t downloaded Google Earth yet you’re missing out! Hopefully Google will continue to expand this feature.

Google says “The paintings have been photographed in very high resolution and contain as many as 14,000 million pixels (14 gigapixels). With this high level resolution you are able to see fine details such as the tiny bee on a flower in The Three Graces (Las Tres Gracias), delicate tears on the faces of the figures in The Descent from the Cross (El Descendimiento ) and complex figures in The Garden of Earthly Delights (El Jardin de las Delicias)” on their Google Earth and Maps blog here.

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Leonardo, 500 Years Into the Future

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Leonardo da Vinci is celebrated as the inventor of extraordinary machines and mechanical devices that entered the common heritage of technical culture only several centuries after his death.

The San Jose Tech Museum of Innovation has had an exhibit about Leonardo da Vinci for the past several months.  I visited the exhibit today.

I haven’t studied Leonardo closely, so was interested to see what I could learn.  I have seen many of his paintings in the Louvre in Paris, including the Mona Lisa.  The exhibit centered more around the machines and mechanical culture of the Renaissance period than paintings.  The only original pieces in the exhibit actually by da Vinci were some of his notebooks.  There were only two paintings in a separate gallery, none by da Vinci, but by two of his disciples.

I walked away with two major impressions about the man.  First, not to diminish his genius, but da Vinci was more a product of his time and didn’t work in a vacuum.  Much of his inventiveness was built on the shoulders of others, including contemporaries, and not in isolation.

Secondly, and most important, is summed up by one of the plaques in the exhibit:

For Leonardo painting is supreme among the sciences, since it is based on the mathematical principles of perspective, it recurs to the to the verification of experience and is nourished by universal knowledge.

In other words, he considered painting the ultimate science vigorously applying the other sciences of perspective, proportionality, mathematics, atmosphere, etc.to his paintings.  Much of this was explained in the exhibit including the Golden ratio, human proportionality, etc.  Quite a contrast to today’s modern artists who declare “anything you say is art, is art”.

Below are a few pictures from today–

Showing the construction of the Renaissance era:

davinci4.jpg

Some of the actual manuscripts–

davinci3.jpg
davinci2.jpg

Machines invented during that period for construction and other uses–

davinci1.jpg

If you live in the area, be sure to visit the exhibit as it is closing soon!

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Creative Spotlite Features Demo

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Creative Spotlite, a great online source for free art lessons, discount art supplies and other resources just featured my new Commission/Demo to their art instruction blog.  If you haven’t checked out their website and blog, it is a great resource for any artist.  You can also subscribe to their art instruction blog just like any weblog, and/or receive emails with updates to their Artist Spotlite and Painting Lessions.  Be sure to check them out!

You can check out my demo on their site here, or on my own website here.

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