painting

New Bacon Book to Accompany Met Exhibit

If you can't make it to "Francis Bacon: A Centenary Retrospective" at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York this month you can still enjoy the great painter's works courtesy of art book imprint Skira Rizzoli. Francis Bacon, a comprehensive study of the seminal 20th-century painter (and oligarch favorite) "provides a radical reassessment of his major achievements and his enduring importance for the twenty-first century."

Bacon developed a way of portraying the human body that was unique in the history of painting - "usually in isolation, at moments of extreme tension or even pain, his figures distorted as if in a fantastical nightmare," as the authors note. In addition to 250 full-color plates, the book also reveals Bacon's inspirations, including magazine tear sheets, photographs, and imagery from films. The book, which will be published later this month, is currently available for pre-order on Amazon.

Tags: contemporary art, ContemporaryArt, Francis Bacon, FrancisBacon, Metropolitan Museum of Art, MetropolitanMuseumOfArt, museums, New York, NewYork, painting

Hitler's Paintings Sell For Thousands

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Auctions, Art

This sad little watercolor scene would not be of any real note except for the fact that the artist was Adolf Hitler. This is one of a series of pieces painted by Adolf Hitler that sold for over 100,000 euros this week through Mullock's Art Auctioneers in London. Richard Westwood-Brookes from Mullock's said that the pieces were only expected to sell for a few thousand, the piece above was estimated at £1000 to £1500. Hitler was rejected twice by the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna in the early 1900s.

Source

Tags: adolf hitler, AdolfHitler, auction, painting, watercolors

JP Morgan Chase Sues Dutch Museum Over Painting

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Art

The beautiful painting shown above is now part of a dispute between Amsterdam's Rijksmuseum and JP Morgan Chase. The painting, Gerrit Adriaensz Berckheyde's The Bend in the Herengracht near the Nieuwe Spiegelstraat in Amsterdam (1672), was purchased by the museum from Dutch businessman Louis Reijtenbagh last year. But it turns out that the painting is on a list of art that Reijtenbagh used as collateral to secure a loan. The bank got most of his art collection earlier this month and now wants this painting too. JP Morgan Chase filed a claim in a New York federal court to seize the painting saying that the businessman shouldn't have sold it to the museum if he was using it as loan collateral.

The painting is currently in Washington D.C. It is on loan to the National Gallery through May 3 as part of the exhibition "Pride of Place: Dutch Cityscapes of the Golden Age."

Source

Tags: amsterdam, art, jp morgan chase, JpMorganChase, painting, Rijksmuseum

Jesus Stops Traffic on 5th Ave

by Tom Johansmeyer (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Art

A row of cars waiting for a green light was concealed by four large canvases proceeding across New York's busy Fifth Ave., creating the appearance of emptiness from W. 51st St to Central Park and beyond. Artist Nelson Diaz chose Palm Sunday to reveal his latest project, "The Isolated Christ," to the people of New York. The response to this unique mix of street art, performance art and oil on canvas was nothing short of astounding.

Five years in the making, The Isolated Christ is a four-part rendering of the most famous figure in one of Leonardo Da Vinci's most recognized works. Diaz "isolated" the image of Jesus Christ from the apostles in DaV inci's "The Last Supper" and plotted thousands of points on the image by hand. Then, using advanced calculus techniques, he fed the point into an equation that exposes "hidden" four dimensional space in the original image and used the results as the foundation for his signature perspective.

The result is four faces of DaVinci's Jesus, reflecting various situations. The final canvas – transcendence – offers an obscure, almost headless presentation, signifying the departure from the norm. The meaning is left to the viewer, with the religious assuming resurrection and the atheist likely to posit obsolescence. Diaz remains coy with his intention, believing that interpretation (like faith) is a personal affair.

With half a decade spent on the vision and production of The Isolated Christ (all four paintings were completed by hand – sans brushes, literally with his fingers), Diaz spent the last few months struggling with venue. He decided last summer to skip the traditional alternatives (such as art galleries) during his protest against the treatment of art as a commodity, during which he auctioned 10 paintings on eBay for the princely starting bid of $1 each.

"The old way of doing things is dead," he explained during several of our meetings. Deep-pocketed buyers writing checks for pieces they don't understand, he believed, would not be able to sustain itself ... a lesson to which the art market was treated last September. Diaz wanted a public setting. As with his eBay experiment, he wanted to return the aesthetic to everybody, not a self-proclaimed elite.

That left only one "gallery" from which to choose: the streets of Manhattan.

Gallery: Nelson Diaz and The Isolated Christ

Tags: art, art galleries, art gallery, ArtGalleries, ArtGallery, artist, artwork, cathedral, davinci, fifth avenue, FifthAvenue, gallery, leonardo da vinci, leonardo davinci, LeonardoDaVinci, manhattan, moma, museum, museum of modern art, MuseumOfModernArt, museums, new york, new york city, NewYork, NewYorkCity, painting, paintings, st. patricks day cat, street art, street artist, street artists, StreetArt, StreetArtist, StreetArtists

Continue reading “Jesus Stops Traffic on 5th Ave”

Stolen Caravaggio Painting Found

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Art

Often when paintings are stolen they never are seen again but this Caravaggio painting,Taking of Christ, or the Kiss of Judas , has been found. The painting had been stolen from the Museum of Western and Eastern Art in the Black Sea port of Odessa last July. Thieves bypassed the alarm system, removed a window pane and took the work from its frame, according to Art Daily. The finding of the painting was revealed by sources close to the Ministry of the Interior in Ukraine.

Source

Tags: art, art theft, ArtTheft, caravaggio, painting

Canaletto's Visions of Venice Up For Auction

by Rigel Celeste (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Auctions, Art

Two masterpiece paintings of Venice by artist Canaletto will soon find themselves up for sale as Christie's has announced they'll be part of the Important Old Master and British Pictures auction scheduled for December 2nd. The paintings are believed to have been commissioned back in 1738 and have been passed down through family generations ever since, so this is the first time in their centuries of existence that they'll be up for sale.

Canaletto is one of the most celebrated artists of the 18th century, with his works involving Venice being especially popular. The paintings will be on display at Christie's of London from Nov 29th thru Dec 2nd.

Source

Tags: art, auction, canaletto, christies, masterpiece, painting, paintings, venice

Monet Painting Sells For Over $80 Million

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Auctions, Art

I'm no art critic, which is perhaps why I'm a little mystified by the astronomical sale of Le Bassin aux Nympheas by Claude Monet for £40,921,250, ($80,451,178) at a recent sale at Christie's London. This new sale obliterates the record set at Christie's New York in May by Monet's "Le Pont du chemin de fer a Argenteuil" which went for $41.181 million.

Le Bassin aux Nymphéas was fought for by three bidders, two on the telephone and one woman at the front of the room. The Guardian reports that at one point the woman bidder asked for more time but she eventually had the winning bid. The painting is one of Monet's large-scale Nymphéas which led to his Grandes décorations, the frieze now in the Musée de l'Orangerie, Paris. Dated 1919, when Monet signed the picture and sold it with three sister-works, Le bassin aux nymphéas is one of the tiny handful of pictures from this period that he sold.

As the Guardian article mentioned, quoting art expert Charles Dupplin, right now the art market is an interesting spot. Records are being smashed all over the place while the middle section of the market appears to be sagging. This mimics in some ways the state of the entire luxury market which has remained robust at the ultra high end but has shown serious weakness in the lower and middle ranges.

Source

Tags: art, auction, christies, monet, painting

Artist Richard Prince Exhibits In St. Barths at the Eden Rock Hotel

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Luxury Travel & Hotels, Art

Earlier this week I mentioned the contemporary art auctions and the high price commanded by American artist Richard Prince for one of his paintings. Now art lovers can check out Prince's latest works at the Eden Rock Hotel Gallery in St Barths from December 18, 2007 - February 28, 2008. The exhibition is a partnership with the Gagosian Gallery and will showcase new paintings as part of his "Eden Rock" or "Deathlands" series. This is just the first of a series of exhibitions by high profile artists planned at the Eden Rock Hotel Gallery. Winter season rates for 2008 start at 665€, based on double occupancy and include breakfast, airport transfers and taxes. In the gallery below check out a few teasers of what the completed paintings look like.

Gallery: Richard Prince Paintings

Source

Tags: art, eden rock, painting, richard prince, RichardPrince, st barths

Churchill Painting To Be Auctioned Off

by Sandy Maple (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Auctions, Art

Winston Churchill was a man of many talents - the master statesman was a Nobel Prize winning author as well as well-respected amateur artist. He painted Marrakech around 1948 and gifted the work to President Truman. In a note accompanying the painting, Churchill described his work as as "about as presentable as anything I can produce." The painting, which depicts one of the city's gates against the backdrop of the Atlas mountains, became one of the American president's most prized possessions, leading him declare, "I shall treasure the picture as long as I live and it will be one of the most valued possessions I will be able to leave to (daughter) Margaret when I pass on." Truman did leave the painting to his daughter upon his death in 1972 and now she is putting it up for auction. Now valued at $1.03, it hits the auction block at Sotheby's in London on December 13. The previous record for a work by Churchill was set in July, when his Chartwell Landscape with Sheep sold for $2.06 million.

Source

Tags: art, art auction, ArtAuction, chartwell landscape with sheep, ChartwellLandscapeWithSheep, churchill painting, ChurchillPainting, marrakech, painting, president truman, PresidentTruman, sothebys, winston churchill, WinstonChurchill

The Case of the Mysterious Sargent Painting

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Auctions, Art

Often the "name" paintings go to the bigger auction houses like Christies and Sothebys but this lovely lady is being auctioned off at Gallery 63 in Atlanta on September 23. And she comes with a bit of mystery.The painting is an original oil-on-canvas portrait of Jenny Jerome (Lady Randolph Churchill), by John Singer Sargent. The problem is that no record of the finished portrait exists, making provenance hard to establish. Studies of Lady Churchill are known but not an oil painting. In the press release, Paul Brown of Gallery 63 says that "with the right research, this painting could be worth millions." The person who buys the painting will be responsible for establishing the true history of the painting which is signed John S. Sargent but is undated. The painting has been in the possession of the current owner since 1970, when he purchased it from the Estate of Leroy Ireland, a well known art collector associated with the American artist, George Inness.

The sale also includes the American furniture collection of the curator of the Michael Carlos Museum at Emory University in Atlanta, a 1932 Chevrolet Super Confederate Roadster, a Civil War reunion medal commemorating the West Virginia Militia members, Civil War documents, bronze fountains and a massive Baccarat chandelier.

Source

Tags: art, auction, john singer sargent, JohnSingerSargent, painting

The Most Expensive Birthday Card

by Rigel Celeste (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Art

70 year old Joan Hardee got quite the birthday greeting in the mail when she received a painting from artist Damien Hirst. Joan had been Hirst's college secretary, so when her son was planning a surprise birthday party he asked Hirst if he wouldn't make a special card for her. Hirst, though, took it a step farther and sent her an entire painting instead with the words "Happy Birthday Joan" written on it. At the time the painting had an estimated value of £30,000.

Joan Hardee had attempted to sell the painting back in 2001 (rumors are she couldn't afford to insure it) but was unsuccessful, so assuming she still has it how much to do suppose it's worth now?

Source

Tags: art, artist, birthday, birthday card, BirthdayCard, card, damien hirst, DamienHirst, expensive, hardee, hirst, joan hardee, JoanHardee, most expensive, MostExpensive, painting

Joe Bravo's 'Tortilla Art'

by Rigel Celeste (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Decor, Art

When someone says "tortilla" to you, what pops to mind? Lunch, right? A nice big burrito with extra sour cream. But Mr. Joe Bravo isn't like most of us, when he thinks "tortilla" he starts thinking of his next artistic inspiration. To him tortillas are canvases on which he paints amazingly detailed and deep creations with acrylics. Of course, the tortillas must be prepped and treated beforehand, and for each painting Bravo searches through several tortillas until he finds the one with just the right appearance and texture. This month Bravo will be heading to Hong Kong to showcase his floury creations while painting a celebrity live and in person. I'd love to see him paint -- must be an interesting process!

Via Book of Joe

Source

Tags: art, bravo, joe bravo, JoeBravo, paint, painting, paintings, tortilla, tortillas

Van Gogh Painting is a Fake

by Sandy Maple (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Art

When Rupert Murdoch's father, Keith Murdoch, staged a contemporary art exhibit in Australia in 1939, Vincent Van Gogh's "Head of a Man" was on display. It was later purchased by Australia's National Gallery of Victoria for $3,500 and has been a part of their collection ever since. However, last August, when the painting was shown at the Dean Gallery in Edinburgh, Scotland, critics noticed something wasn't right. The work, dated 1886, appeared to be of a different style than other Van Gogh paintings during the same period. What's more, the painting was never mentioned in the artist's letters.

"Head of a Man" was then sent to the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam where experts have now declared it to be a fake. Gerard Vaughan, director of the National Gallery of Victoria, says the painting was most likely the work of a Van Gogh contemporary and makes clear that the painting was simply misattributed, not a deliberate forgery. Had the painting been authentic, it would have been valued at around $21 million.

Source

Tags: art, australia national gallery of victoria, AustraliaNationalGalleryOfVictoria, dean gallery, DeanGallery, fake, forgery, head of a man, HeadOfAMan, painting, rupert murdoch, RupertMurdoch, van gogh, VanGogh, vincent van gogh, VincentVanGogh

Woman Arrested for Kissing $2.7 Million Dollar Painting

by Rigel Celeste (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Art

Normally a kiss as a sign of affection is a good thing, but when it happens in an art gallery on a $2.7 million dollar painting it's not only not a good thing -- it's a crime. It happened last Thursday in the Museum of Contemporary Art in Avignon, France. The woman, 30-year-old Sam Rindy, had apparently been admiring a 9'x6' bone white painting by Cy Twombly valued at over £1 million and was suddenly overcome and just had to kiss it. She's quoted as saying "The artist left this white for me."

Yeah, well it's not white anymore since there's a lipstick imprint left behind. Ms. Rindy is awaiting trial on August 16 for "damage to a work of art."

How stupid can you be?

Source

Tags: arrested, art, crime, crimes, cy twombly, CyTwombly, kiss, kissed, kissing, painting, twombly

Sir Anthony, The Artist

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Celebrity Shopping, Art

Sir Anthony Hopkins has joined the ranks of celebrities who paint (a group that includes Tony Bennett, Jane Seymour and Sylvester Stallone among others). Dreamscapes, an exhibition of paintings by Hopkins is currently on display at theMW Gallery in Aspen, Colorado through July 10. In an article on Artnet, dealer Robert Casterline says the works include abstract landscapes and surrealistic faces. The star began painting a few years ago and according to icWales, he would rather be painting than acting at this point because there are no more challenges for him in the acting world. The paintings are priced at $4,000-$20,000.

Source

Tags: anthony hopkins, AnthonyHopkins, art, aspen, expire-images:2008-7-1, mw galleries, painting

← Previous Page|Next Page →