PaintingsToGo.com - Corporate and Residential Fine Art Firm for Interiors

PaintingsToGo.com Corporate and Residential Fine Art Firm
Rita de Acuna Founder/President of Paintings To Go, Inc.

As a corporate and residential art firm, we bring knowledge and experience to creating and finding artwork for the enhancement of interior space. Services include the creation of custom oil paintings, fine art museum-quality oil painting reproductions, murals, portraits, custom frames and delivery/ installation.

PHILOSOPHY
We honor the power of art to calm our senses, focus our attention, challenge our intellect, and expand our imagination. Art has the ability to create a conversation, make us laugh, or tell a story. Bringing this to our clients is our measure of success.

OUR PARTNERSHIP WITH YOU
A great collaboration is central to the successful outcome of every project. Developing a dynamic partnership takes attention to detail, clear communication and a sense of adventure. We respond by finding solutions that are fresh and unique.

ENRICHMENT OF YOUR SPACE
From empty to enriched, random to refined, and unremarkable to memorable, finding artwork appropriate to each interior space creates balance and makes a statement. Based on knowledge, experience, and intuition, we implement creative concepts that are progressive and practical. Achieving our vision with diligence and care cultivates thoughtful and well-integrated solution.

PAINTINGSTOGO.COM works closely with corporations, architects, designers, art dealers, public and private sectors. Ms. Acuna has long been acclaimed for her ability to blend New York sophistication with her warm, winning ways with her fine art clientele. A broad exposure to the fine art from the Italian and Northern Renaissance, through Contemporary art and artists has won her much popularity online, and within her community. "I have a strong belief that all budgets deserve great art; because everyone deserves to live life in high style, with beautiful art." ~ Rita Acuna

FEATURED ARTISTS
Alama-Tadema, Bierstadt, Bonnard, Bosch, Botero, Botticelli, Bouguereau, Bruegel, Cassatt, Cezanne, Chagall, Church, Copely, Da Vinci, David, Degas, Duchamp, Dufy, Durer, Fantin-Latour, Fragonard, Gainsborough, Gauguin, Giotto, Van Gogh, Goya, Hals, Heade, Hogarth, Holbein, Hopper, Ingres, Inness, Kahlo, Kandinsky, Klimt, La Tour, Leighton, Leutze, Magritte, Manet, Matisse, Monet, Munch, O'Keeffe, Raphael, Rembrandt, Renoir, Vermeer, Wildbank, Warren Godfrey, Ivan Sherman.

Art as shown above:

Artist, Ivan Sherman
Out of the Box:
Art Created From
Recycled Corrugated Boxes

Artist, Warren Godfrey
Original Folk Art
Garden of Eden -
Acrylic on Canvas

PaintingsTogo.com
Custom Oil Painting Reproduction.
Children of Charles 1 - Original artist
Anthony van Dyke, Windsor Castle,
Royal Collection, UK 1637,
Custom Canvas Oil Painting: 40"w X 50"h

Claude Monet (1840-1926)

Born November 14, 1840, in Paris, France. Claude Monet was raised in Le Havre, where he developed a reputation as a caricature artist by the time he was 15. In 1858, the young artist met landscape painter Eugène Boudin, a mentor who first introduced him to outdoor painting. Monet was reluctant to leave the studio and the familiarity of indoor scenes, but plein air painting eventually became the basis for his life’s work.

Against his parents’ wishes, Claude Monet left home for Paris in 1859 to pursue a career in painting. There, he was inspired by the work of Eugène Delacroix, Charles Daubigny, and Camille Corot. He studied at the free Académie Suisse, where he met Camille Pissarro, and was a frequent patron of the Brasserie des Martyrs, a gathering place for fellow realist artists such as Gustave Courbet.

Claude Monet took a brief hiatus from his artistic pursuits to serve in the military in Algeria from 1860 to 1862. Upon his return to Paris, he picked up where he left off, studying art, experimenting with new styles, traveling, and forming important friendships with fellow painters, including Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Alfred Sisley, Frédéric Bazille, and Édouard Manet. He also worked in the forest at Fontainebleau with the Barbizon artists Théodore Rousseau, Jean François Millet, as well as with Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot.

During the 1960s, Claude Monet was constantly traveling, having become captivated by natural light, atmosphere, and color. The artist continually sought to convey the remarkable variety and subtle particulars of each new landscape. Terrace at Sainte-Adresse (1867) exemplified this experimentation with its shimmering array of bright, natural colors, eschewing the somber browns and blacks of the earlier landscape tradition. Tragically, few of Monet's canvases from this early period survived. The artist was financially unstable and frequently destroyed his own paintings rather than have them seized by creditors.

In 1870, Claude Monet married his wife, Camille, and the two traveled to London and eventually settled at Argenteuil. His best-known, most popular works were produced during this time at Argenteuil, where he often painted alongside Renoir, Sisley, Caillebotte, and Manet. Monet regularly exhibited his paintings in the private Impressionist group shows, which first took place in 1874. During that first show his painting Impression: Sunrise (1872) inspired a hostile newspaper critic to call all the artists "Impressionists," a name that persists to characterize the artistic movement today.

Claude Monet's paintings from the 1870s, notably Red Boats at Argenteuil (1875), are fine examples of the new Impressionist style. The paintings are essentially illusionist, but ring with a chromatic vibrancy. Monet worked directly from nature and revealed that even on the darkest, gloomiest day, an infinite variety of colors exist. To capture the fleeting lights and hues, Monet had to employ a new painting technique using short brushstrokes filled with individual color. The result was a canvas alive with painterly activity, the opposite of the smooth blended surfaces of the past.

While traditional landscape artists painted what they saw in their mind, Claude Monet, sought to paint the world exactly how he saw it, not how he knew it should look. So rather than painting a myriad of separate leaves, he depicted splashes of constantly changing light and color. It’s important to note that in this aspect, Monet belongs to the tradition of Renaissance illusionism. In depicting the natural world, he based his art on perceptual rather than conceptual knowledge.

In 1883 Claude Monet moved to Giverny, and likewise most of his Impressionist colleagues left the security of the cohesive group to explore their own directions. While his home was in Giverny, he never ceased traveling—to London, Madrid, and Venice, as well as within his native country. Thanks to the art dealer Durand-Ruel, Monet gradually gained critical and financial success during the late 1880s and the 1890s. A lifelong supporter of Monet and his work, Durand-Ruel sponsored one-man exhibitions as early as 1883 and organized the first large-scale Impressionist group show in the United States.

How to Spot a Real Rembrandt

A new Getty show offers tricks for telling the difference between master and pupils

By CANDACE JACKSON

A show that opened this week at the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles features dozens of authentic Rembrandt drawings—and just as many that aren't. The idea is to reveal to museum-goers the tricks experts and art scholars use to identify his unsigned artwork, something the museum world rarely publicizes.

The "fake" Rembrandts in the Getty's show are all drawings attributed to the Dutch master painter for hundreds of years, until as recently as a few years ago. Over the past 30 years, new scholarship and cataloguing techniques have helped scholars determine that at least half of the more than 1,000 "Rembrandt" drawings were by others.

One reason for all the confusion: Rembrandt had one of the largest teaching practices in his day, with at least 50 pupils studying closely alongside him in his sprawling Amsterdam studio. The curriculum included close imitations of his style and subject matter, says Lee Hendrix, the Getty curator for the show.

In the 17th century, some students eventually became more famous than Rembrandt, though of course that's not true today. (In the latter years of his life, Rembrandt's naturalistic style fell out of favor with wealthy patrons, who came to prefer a more flattering, less realistic painting, says Ms. Hendrix.) The Getty show features early training drawings by several of his best-known pupils, including Ferdinand Bol.

Another problem for scholars has been that although Rembrandt drew prolifically, very few of his drawings are signed. Scholars have used the signed drawings, and drawings connected to signed paintings, to find themes and symbols common to the unsigned work. These characteristics—like his use of storytelling, expressive faces and directional light— form the basis for determining modern historians which unsigned works are actually Rembrandts.

"Most people see [authenticating artwork] as a sort of scary, mystical process," says Ms. Hendrix. "It's not."

The Getty has organized the show in several galleries. In each, it has paired drawings side by side, on the left a real Rembrandt and on the right a work done by a student, with text explaining the clues to authorship. There's a central room that viewers can visit and revisit to check, via touch-screen video and text, the tips for identifying Rembrandts.

One pair includes one drawing that depicts St. John the Baptist preaching to a group (Rembrandt often painted biblical subjects), another of St. Paul preaching. On the left, Ms. Hendrix points out, the listeners' eight faces each have a distinct expression (bored, fascinated, confused, skeptical). In the other, the listeners are roughly sketched, their faces similar. These drawings were chosen to illustrate Rembrandt's tendency to focus on facial expressions.

Several pairs at the Getty depict the same nude model or street scene, but drawn from slightly different angles, a tip-off to scholars that one might not be a Rembrandt. Ms. Hendrix says the master would often join his students in drawing exercises—but of course would have a slightly different view, depending on where he was standing. Two drawings titled "A Quack and His Public" roughly sketch a snake-oil salesman putting on a show for a street crowd. For years they were both thought to be Rembrandts, but the one painted from a side view shows a defined emotion in the charlatan's face, while student Gerbrand van den Eeckhout has drawn the man from behind, with no expressions on faces in the crowd, Ms. Hendrix says.

Further confusing the matter is that some drawings even feature corrections done by Rembrandt himself, or lines drawn to show students what they should have done.

The exhibition is one of several devoted to the artist's work opening soon in Southern California. On Jan. 9 a show featuring Rembrandt prints will open at the Hammer Museum in L.A. On Jan. 22, the Timken Museum of Art in San Diego opens a show focusing on Rembrandt's New Testament prints from the 1650s. The Getty show closes Feb. 28 and won't travel: The drawings are too delicate.

Ms. Hendrix says that even though scholars generally agree that the drawings designated as Rembrandts in the Getty's show are legit, "in the end, it is always hypothetical."

Write to Candace Jackson at candace.jackson@wsj.com

PaintingsToGo.com Open To The Trade And Retail. Contemporary Art And Famous Masterpieces: Gustav Klimt - Son of Gold Engraver

PaintingsToGo.com Open To The Trade And Retail. Contemporary Art And Famous Masterpieces: Gustav Klimt - Son of Gold Engraver

Gustav Klimt - Son of Gold Engraver

Gustav Klimt was born at the XIV district of Baumgarten in Vienna on 14 July 1862 as son of a gold engraver. In 1876 he began his studies at the Vienna Kunstgewerbeschule under the influence of the history painter Hans Makart, which was apparent in his first orders for theatre decorations and ceiling paintings. Soon Klimt received prizes for his works. At the turn of the century - he was just designing wall and ceiling decorations for the university - he developed a new two-dimensionally-ornamental, decorative style, which combines naturalistic details of bodies with abstract, colourful, mosaic-like patterns. His orderers protested resolutely and legal proceedings erupted. In 1905 Klimt was allowed to keep the designs in return of his payment. At the same time the Vienna Secession emerged and Klimt was a founding member and its first president from 1897 to 1905. In 1902 Klimt executed the famous Beethoven frieze for Josef Maria Olbrich's Secession building, which can still be visited in the basement of the building. In 1905 Klimt and a group of like-minded people left the Secession due to conflicts with the artist association's naturalistic wing. Klimt's motifs were partly provocatively erotic, partly playfully ornamental. He created impressing portraits, especially of ladies from the Viennese high society, but also intensively dense landscape paintings. Like no other artist and as the favourite of certain circles of the Viennese society of the ending monarchy he was able to depict the spirit of the feudal bourgeoisie with its aspirations to cultivate the aesthetic and its yearning for the pleasures of life at the Fin-de-Siècle. Klimt travelled extensively - one of his most important works is not in Austria, but in Brussels: he executed the decoration of the dining room in Josef Hoffmann's Palais Stoclet, a Gesamtkunstwerk of Viennese Art Nouveau. The artist's international approval was proven by numerous exhibitions and finally moved the conservative spirits, who honoured him: Although a professorship for Klimt was repeatedly refused, he became honorary member of the academies in Vienna and Munich. Gustab Klimt died from a stroke in his hometown Vienna on 6 February 1918.

What Scientists in Italy Say About Art

Scientists In Italy Say To Ease Pain, Gaze At A Painting.

A glance at a painting may help as much as aspirin, say scientists in Italy.

Volunteers who viewed famous works of art while exposed to uncomfortable stimuli reported less discomfort while looking at paintings they liked. Scientists say the brain's pleasure center lights up when we see something we find beautitiful, distracting us from unpleasant sensations. The paintings that proved the best? Botticelli's Birth of Venus and Starry Night by Van Gogh. See some right now. Find these works of art online at http://www.PaintingsToGo.com

Art Collecting for Pennies on the Dollar

(Above) Lady with Her Maid Servant Holding A Letter
by Jan Vermeer 1632-1675 b. Netherlands


Become an Art Collector for Pennies on the Dollar
by Rita Acuna ~The Art Diva of PaintingsToGo.com

Have you ever dreamed about owning a really impressive work of fine art? Even if you don't know much about art, having a priceless painting hanging over the fireplace or in your office is a thought that appeals to just about everyone. Not only can great artwork really impress your friends or clients, owning such a piece is truly a joy. Of course, most of the priceless original pieces painted by the master artists of yesteryear are now on display in museums or they are in personal collections of multi-millionaires. But what about the rest of us? You could probably find a poster or print of a priceless Renoir, Da Vinci or Van Gogh, but this just doesn't offer the same quality look and feel as a real painting. But there is an affordable alternative. Consider buying an "original reproduction." Original reproductions are hand-painted by real artists, but they're copied from original pieces. Companies who do this kind of work are able to provide you with high-quality reproductions of just about any famous (or not so famous) painting you would like. These high-end oil painting reproductions...are real, hand-painted oil on canvas works of art that are 99% true to the original work. Artists can also make any requested changes in color and size that differ from the original. For example, if you always wanted to see Mona Lisa in a red dress, or would like as a smaller or larger size, chances are you can get it. The next time you picture something nice hanging over your fireplace, or in your office, don't settle for a print. Look into fine art reproductions, and own a real work of art.

Author Rita Acuna is the Founder/President, of PaintingsToGo.com.
Located in New York, PaintingsToGo can reproduce just about any painting in any size or style you like. All works are hand-painted oil on canvas, by professional and dedicated artists. Money-back guarantee. Most orders are completed in 6 to 8 weeks.

For more information about PaintingsToGo, visit http://www.paintingstogo.com/ or call Rita Acuna at 866-5260922

Richard Serra - Fernando Pessoa, 2007 -2008

RICHARD SERRA
Fernando Pessoa, 2007-2008 Weatherproof steel
354 1/2 x 118 1/8 x 8 inches (900.4 x 300 x 20.3 cm)
Photo by Joshua M. White

"The intellectual power of Richard Serra's work verges on the infinite." ~ The Art Diva of PaintingsToGo.com

Born in 1939, Richard Serra is one of the most significant artists of his generation. His groundbreaking sculpture explores the exchange between artwork, site, and viewer. He has produced unparalleled large-scale, site-specific sculptures for architectural, urban and landscape settings. In the summer of 2008, he conceived Promenade, a course of five steel sculptural elements towering seventeen metres, for MONUMENTA at the Grand Palais in Paris.

Other recent projects include the eight-part permanent installation The Matter of Time at the Guggenheim Bilbao (2005) and a survey exhibition at The Museum of Modern Art (2007). Work comes out of work, an exhibition of works on paper 1989-2008, was presented last yeat at the Kunsthaus Bregenz, Austria. The exhibition is accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue with an essay by Kate Nesin. For further information, please contact the gallery at +44.20.7841.9960

Italian Art and the Artists of Italy

(Above) Lamentation of Christ
Giotto di Bondone, Renaissance 1266-1377 b. Italy

(Above) Modonna and Child
Benozzo Gozzoli, Renaissance 1421-1497 b. Italy

(Above) Elenora of Toledo with her son Giovanni de Medici

Agnolo Bronzino, Mannerist 1503 - 1592 b. Italy

Italian Art and the Artists of Italy

The Etruscans

Etruscan bronze figures and terra-cotta funerary reliefs include examples of a vigorous northern Italian tradition which had waned by the time Rome began building her empire on the Italian peninsula. The Etruscans were the most powerful force in central Italy until Roman unification of the peninsula. Vestiges of their art, architecture, and unique language have long intrigued scholars, and the search for this mysterious civilization continues to fire the imagination. Despite a history of pillage, rich archaeological evidence survives: thousands of tombs, many of them frescoed and filled with vases, sculpture, jewelry, and metalwork; and the mysterious Etruscan sites that are places of tourist pilgrimage, such as Cerveteri, Vulci, and Tarquinia.

The Roman Period

The Roman period, as we know it, begins after the Punic Wars and the subsequent invasion of the Greek cities of the Mediterranean. The Hellenistic styles then current in Greek civilization were adopted. The cultic and decorative use of sculpture and pictorial mosaic survive in the ruins of both temples and villas. As the empire matured, other less naturalistic, sometimes more dramatic, sometimes more severe, styles were developed -- especially as the center of empire moved to eastern Italy and then to Constantinople.

Byzantine Period

With the fall of its western capitol, the Roman empire continued for another 1000 years under the leadership of Constantinople. Byzantine artisans were used in important projects throughout Italy, and Byzantine styles of painting can be found up through the 14th Century.

Gothic Period

The Gothic period marks a transition from the medieval to the Renaissance and is characterised by the styles and attitudes nurtured by the influence of the Dominican and Franciscan order of monks, founded by Saint Dominic (1170 to 1221) and Saint Francis of Assisi (1181 to 1226) respectively. It was a time of religious disputes within the church. The Franciscans and Dominicans were founded as an attempt to address these disputes and bring the Roman Catholic church back to basics. The early days of the Franciscans are remembered especially for the compassion of Saint Francis, while the Dominicans are remembered as the order most responsible for the beginnings of the Inquisition. Gothic architecture began in northern Europe and spread southward to Italy. The earliest important monument of the Italian Gothic style is the great church at Assisi. The Basilica of San Francesco d'Assisi (St Francis) is a World Heritage Site. The Franciscan monastery and the lower and upper church (Basilica inferiore e superiore) of St Francis were begun immediately after his canonization in 1228, and completed 1253. The lower church has frescos by Cimabue and Giotto di Bondone. In the Upper church are frescos of scenes in the life of St Francis by Giotto and his circle. Cenni di Petro (Giovanni) Cimabue (c.1240-1302} and Giotto di Bondone (better known as just Giotto) (1267-1337), were two of the first painters who began to move toward the role of the artist as a creative individual, rather than a mere copier of traditional forms. They began to take an interest in improving the depiction of the figure. The Byzantine style was unrealistic and could be improved upon by a return to forms achieved in ancient Greece. Other terms sometimes applied to describe the artists of this period are The Primitives and the Early Renaissance.

The Renaissance

The Renaissance is said to begin in 14th century Italy. The rediscovery of Ancient Greek and Roman art and classics brought better proportions, perspective and use of lighting in art. Wealthy families, such as the Medicis, and the papacy served as patrons for many Italian artists, including Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo Buonarroti Donatello, and Raphael.The focus of most art remained religious. Michelangelo painted the Sistine Chapel, and sculpted his famous Pietà® Leonardo painted the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper. Raphael painted several Madonnas. Both Michelangelo and Donatello sculpted visions of David.

Mannerism

As the Renaissance had moved from formulaic depiction to a more natural observation of the figure, light and perspective, so the subsequent, Mannerist, period is marked by a move to forms conceived in the mind. Once the ideals of the Renaissance had had their effect artists such as Giulio Romano (ca 1499? to 1546) were able to introduce personal elements of subjectivity to their interpretation of visual forms. The perfection of perspective, light and realistic human figures can be thought of as impossible to improve upon unless another factor is included in the image, namely the factor of how the artist feels about the image. This emotional content in Mannerism is also the beginnings of a movement which would eventually, much later, become Expressionism in the 19th century. The difference between Mannerism and Expressionism is really a matter of degree. Guilo Romano was a student an protege of Raphael. Other Italian Mannerist painters included Pontormo and Rosso Fiorentino, students of Andrea del Sarto. The Spanish Mannerist El Greco was a student of the Italian Renaissance painter Titian. The most famous Italian painter of the Mannerist style and period is Tintoretto (Jacopo Robusti) (1518-1594).

Modernity

From Mannerism onward there are more and more art movements representing tides of opinion pushing in various different directions, causing art philosophy over the centuries from about the 16th century onward to gradually fragment into the characteristic isms of Modern art. The work of Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio sometimes simply called Caravaggio (1571-1610) stands on its own as one of the most original and influential artists who ever lived. He did something completely contraversial and new. He painted figures, even those of classical or religious themes, in contemporary clothing or as ordinary living men and women. This in stark opposition to the usual trend of the time to idealise the religious or classical figure. Caravaggio set the style for many years to come, although not everyone followed his example. Some, like Agostino Carracci (or Caracci) (1557 to 1602) and his brothers were all influenced by Caravaggio but leaned toward the idealism and spirituality from which Caravaggio was perceived to have strayed.

Baroque

A movement to reform Mannerism, Italian Baroque art saw Mannerism as excessive and tried to bring it back to Christian piety. Nevertheless, this reform took place within the context of the Mannerist attempt to introduce more movement and passion and is part of a conceptual dialogue with Mannerism.

Rococo

Rococo was the tail end of the Baroque period, mainly in France of the 18th century. The main artist of the Rococo style in Italy was Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (1696 to 1770).
Impressionism and Post-ImpressionismItaly produced its own form of Impressionism, the Macchiaioli artists, who were actually there first, before the more famous Impressionists.

Expressionism

The great Italian Expressionist was Amedeo Modigliani (1884 to 1920). Cubism, Futurism and DadaAcross all forms of art, architecture, literature, painting etc. new approaches were taken. Futurism was the Italian movement contemporaneous with Cubism. Futurism was started by the poet Filippo Tommaso Marinetti in 1909. Marietti influenced Italian painters and suggested that the paintings seen in Parisian Cubist exhibitions were examples of the direction Italian painters should be taking. The most famous Italian Cubist/Futrist painter was Gino Severini (1883-1966). As Cubism attempted to modernise perspective representation by adopting not one but several points of view, so Futurism attempted to modernise all the arts and imbue them with force and dynamism by multiple methods. The Futurists loved movement and dance. The Futurists were also great enthusiasts of science and machines. Their love of machines was mercilessly parodied by the Dadaists. Much of Dada's style and methods came originally from subverting Futurism.

Metaphysical painting and Surrealism

Giorgio de Chirico (1888-1978) was the Italian painter who founded the Metaphysical school of painting and was an enormous influence upon the Surrealists.

Classical Modernism of the 20th Century

At the beginning of the 20th Century, Italian sculptors and painters joined the rest of Western Europe in the revitalization of a simpler, more vigorous, less sentimental Classical tradition,that was applied in liturgical as well as decorative and political settings. The leading sculptors included: Libero Andreotti, Arturo Martini, Giacomo Manzu, Emilio Greco, and Lello Scorzelli. Leading painters included Pietro Annigone.

Post-Modern Italian Art

Post-Modernism is a highly controversal label which generally refers to a period of time after the project(s) of modernism have ended and in which all time periods and styles are not necessarily separated anymore. Just as paints of different colours can be mixed on a palette, so all the styles of antiquity, gothic, renaissance, baroque, expressionist, cubist, surrealist etc. can all be merged and produce hybrids which access and are informed by all the knowledge of art history. Nothing is positively forbidden. Even Bad art and Kitsch are part of the vocabulary employed to question the Metanarratives of art (and world) philosophy. A good example of Italian Post-Modern painting is that of Carlo Maria Mariani.This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Art of Italy"

Leonardo da Vinci - High Renaissance Artist - 1452-1519 b. Italy

Leonardo da Vinci,
Universal Man























Portrait of Ginevra de' Benci
























The Madonna of the Carnation

Leonardo da Vinci was a Florentine artist, one of the great masters of the High Renaissance, who was also celebrated as a painter, sculptor, architect, engineer, and scientist. Leonardo da Vinci was born on April 15, 1452, in the small Tuscan town of Vinci, near Florence. He was the son of a wealthy Florentine notary and a peasant woman. In the mid-1460s the family settled in Florence, where Leonardo was given the best education that Florence could offer. In his teens Leonardo was sent to apprentice as a painter under Andrea del Verrocchio where he quickly developed his own artistic style which was unique and contrary to tradition, even going so far as to devise his own special formula of paint. Later da Vinci became the court artist for the duke of Milan. Throughout his life he also served various other roles, including civil engineer and architect and military planner and weapons designer. Although Leonardo produced a relatively small number of paintings, many of which remained unfinished, he was nevertheless an extraordinarily innovative and influential artist. The Mona Lisa, Leonardo's most famous work, is as well known for its mastery of technical innovations as for the mysteriousness of its legendary smiling subject. This work is a consummate example of two techniques—sfumato and chiaroscuro—of which Leonardo was one of the first great masters. Leonardo deserves, perhaps more than anyone, the title of Homo Universalis, Universal Man.

Leonardo da Vinci

Leonardo da Vinci was a Florentine artist, one of the great masters of the High Renaissance, who was also celebrated as a painter, sculptor, architect, engineer, and scientist.

Leonardo da Vinci was born on April 15, 1452, in the small Tuscan town of Vinci, near Florence. He was the son of a wealthy Florentine notary and a peasant woman. In the mid-1460s the family settled in Florence, where Leonardo was given the best education that Florence could offer. In his teens Leonardo was sent to apprentice as a painter under Andrea del Verrocchio where he quickly developed his own artistic style which was unique and contrary to tradition, even going so far as to devise his own special formula of paint.

Later da Vinci became the court artist for the duke of Milan. Throughout his life he also served various other roles, including civil engineer and architect and military planner and weapons designer. Although Leonardo produced a relatively small number of paintings, many of which remained unfinished, he was nevertheless an extraordinarily innovative and influential artist.

The Mona Lisa, Leonardo's most famous work, is as well known for its mastery of technical innovations as for the mysteriousness of its legendary smiling subject. This work is a consummate example of two techniques—sfumato and chiaroscuro—of which Leonardo was one of the first great masters. Leonardo deserves, perhaps more than anyone, the title of Homo Universalis, Universal Man.

John William Waterhouse - Pre-Raphaelite Painter, 1849 - 1917 b, Rome

Tristan and Isolda

(Above)
The Enchanted Garden

The lady of Shalott

John William Waterhouse was an English Pre-Raphaelite painter most famous for his paintings of female characters from mythology and literature. He belonged to the later phase of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.Waterhouse was born in Rome on the 6th of April, 1849. Both of his parents were English painters who moved to Italy in pursuit of art. Waterhouse and his parents eventually moved back to England in the late 1850's. While growing up, Waterhouse assisted his father in art studio where the young Waterhouse developed his talents for sculpting and painting.

Claude Monet - Inspirational Quotes & Beautiful Oil Paintings

(Above)

La Japonaise by Claude Monet

(Below)

Water Lilies (The Clouds) by Claude Monet

(Above)

Water Lilies by Claude Monet

I have chosen these inspirational art quotes and oil paintings by the famous French Artist Claude Monet Claude Oscar Monet for their sentiment and true beauty. It is wonderful that the words and art of Monet can bring joy and warmth to us even now.

~ The Art Diva of Paintingstogo

- My garden is my most beautiful masterpiece.

- I can only draw what I see.

- Everything I have earned has gone into these gardens.

- Colour is my day-long obsession, joy and torment.

- It took me time to understand my waterlilies. I had planted them for the pleasure of it; I grew them without ever thinking of painting them

- I know that to paint the sea really well, you need to look at it every hour of every day in the same place so that you can understand its way in that particular spot and that is why I am working on the same motifs over and over again, four or six times even.

- It's on the strength of observation and reflection that one finds a way. So we must dig and delve unceasingly.

Michael Jackson - King of POP

The King Of Pop Michael Jackson

He has gone through personal scandal, family squabbles and numerous career quakes but Michael Joseph Jackson remains one of the planet's best known figures.
Born in 1958, Jackson has spent his whole life in the public eye as he began performing at the age of four.
Though the youngest member of the Jackson Five, he became the group's lead vocalist, projecting a self-confident image which belies the private personality he shows today.
Despite his age, he managed to make chart-toppers like I Want You Back and I'll Be There completely credible.
By the time he was 10, the Jackson Five had signed to Motown Records and were well on the road to US success, bullied into fame by their father Joe.
"There is a lot of sadness in my past life," Jackson told Oprah Winfrey in 1993.

Animals and Toys

Rumours began of slightly odd behaviour at this time, with Michael said to be seeking solace in the Scarecrow role and going home at night with his make-up still on.
He was really launched as an adult star with Off The Wall in 1979, a collaboration with legendary producer Quincy Jones.

The album topped the UK and US charts and had the singles Don't Stop Till You Get Enough, for which Jackson won a Grammy, and Rock With You.
But the rumours about Jackson's behaviour grew.
He seemed to be trying to capture the youth he never had, surrounding himself with animals and toys.

In 1982 he released the very adult album Thriller, the most successful album of all time, selling more than 47m copies and winning seven Grammys.
It produced a run of hits such as The Girl Is Mine - a duet with Paul McCartney - Billie Jean, Beat It and Thriller.

He landed the largest individual sponsorship deal in history from Pepsi in 1983 and his involvement in the 1984 Victory tour sparked the greatest demand for concert tickets in history.
Michael Jackson had become a myth and as his career headed for the stratosphere, rumours about him started to gain mythical proportions too.

Michael Jackson - The King of POP

Michael Jackson - The King of POP












The King Of PopMichael Jackson

He has gone through personal scandal, family squabbles and numerous career quakes but Michael Joseph Jackson remains one of the planet's best known figures.

Born in 1958, Jackson has spent his whole life in the public eye as he began performing at the age of four.
Though the youngest member of the Jackson Five, he became the group's lead vocalist, projecting a self-confident image which belies the private personality he shows today. Despite his age, he managed to make chart-toppers like I Want You Back and I'll Be There completely credible. By the time he was 10, the Jackson Five had signed to Motown Records and were well on the road to US success, bullied into fame by their father Joe.

"There is a lot of sadness in my past life," Jackson told Oprah Winfrey in 1993.
Solo success "My father beat me. It was difficult to take being beaten and then going onstage.
"He was strict; very hard and stern."

Michael Jackson's first solo release was the ballad Got to Be There.
As a cute child singing sentimental but catchy ballads, he was a hit.
But eclipsed by their biggest star, the Jackson Five's fortunes began to slip.
In 1978, Jackson starred as the Scarecrow in an all-black pop version of The Wizard of Oz, called The Wiz, which starred Diana Ross as Dorothy. But it was a box office disaster.
Animals and toys Rumours began of slightly odd behaviour at this time, with Michael said to be seeking solace in the Scarecrow role and going home at night with his make-up still on.
He was really launched as an adult star with Off The Wall in 1979, a collaboration with legendary producer Quincy Jones.

The album topped the UK and US charts and had the singles Don't Stop Till You Get Enough, for which Jackson won a Grammy, and Rock With You.
But the rumours about Jackson's behaviour grew.
He seemed to be trying to capture the youth he never had, surrounding himself with animals and toys.

In 1982 he released the very adult album Thriller, the most successful album of all time, selling more than 47m copies and winning seven Grammys.
It produced a run of hits such as The Girl Is Mine - a duet with Paul McCartney - Billie Jean, Beat It and Thriller.
He landed the largest individual sponsorship deal in history from Pepsi in 1983 and his involvement in the 1984 Victory tour sparked the greatest demand for concert tickets in history.
Michael Jackson had become a myth and as his career headed for the stratosphere, rumours about him started to gain mythical proportions too.

Marriage

He was said to be trying to change his appearance with plastic surgery, to be taking drugs to make his skin white and to be obsessed with his own ageing process.
Later, he would blame his changing appearance on a skin pigmentation deficiency.
But at the time Jackson seemed to do nothing to stop the rumours and got on with his own life, recording Bad, which appeared in 1987.
His next release was Dangerous in 1992, which received more critical acclaim than Bad.
But in 1993, allegation of sexual abuse were made by a 13-year-old friend of Jackson's, and police were called in.

Jackson settled with the boy's family a year later, for an estimated $20m, and the criminal investigation was dropped in 1994.
Despite his categorical denials of any wrong-doing, there was a media frenzy, heightened by Jackson's 1994 marriage to Lisa Marie Presley, Elvis' daughter, which some claimed was a publicity stunt. The marriage soon collapsed. Jackson remarried in 1997, this time to a 37-year-old nurse called Debbie Rowe. The couple have two children; Prince Michael Junior, born in 1997 and Paris Michael Katherine, born in 1998. Rowe filed for divorce in 1999, leaving Jackson with the children at his huge Neverland ranch in California. He marked 30 years in showbusiness in 2001 with a huge concert, starring Britney Spears, N'Sync, and a reunion of the Jackson Five.
A new album, Invincible, met with a lukewarm reception. In 2002, his third child, Prince Michael II, was born to a mystery mother.

But the first time the world saw him threw Jackson into yet more controversy - as he dangled the infant out of a hotel window in Berlin, causing an international outcry.
There, the seeds were sown for yet further trouble. British journalist Martin Bashir filmed the scenes in Berlin for a documentary, transmitted in February 2003.
In it, Jackson admitted to sleeping in the same room as children at his Neverland ranch, and a 12-year-old boy who had survived cancer was seen cuddling up to him.
The film sparked another international storm - although he received a more sympathetic reception from fans in the US - and Jackson claimed he had been "betrayed" by Bashir.
He even went as far as to release his own film showing Bashir praising his "spectacular" relationship with his children.

2003 has since brought more upheaval for the famously secretive star.
He has been hit by a flurry of lawsuits by former aides and promoters amid rumours that he is on the verge of bankruptcy - a claim his current advisers deny.
Whatever the truth of Jackson's life, his musical career seems doomed to be eclipsed by the myths and legends surrounding him.Source:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/2809465.stm

Andy Warhol - Pop Artist - Art and Quotes

Birth Name
Andrew Warhola
Born August 6, 1928 (1928-06) Pittsburgh
Died February 22, 1987 (aged 58) b. United States









Pepsi Cola

(Above) Turquoise-Marilyn

Campbell's Soup Can

Personal Quotes

- I would rather watch somebody buy their underwear than read a book they wrote.
- In the future everyone will be famous for fifteen minutes.
- I am a deeply superficial person.
- Success is when the checks don't bounce.
- (His advice about audiences, to) "The Velvet Underground" Always leave them wanting less.
- Living in New York City gives people real incentives to want things that nobody else wants.

Warhol's First Paintings
1960, Warhol began to make his first paintings. They were based on comic strips in the likes of Dick Tracy, Popeye, Superman, and two of Coca-Cola bottles. In 1961, using the Dick Tracy comic strip, he designed a window display for Lord & Taylor, at this time, major art galleries around the nation begin noticing his work. In 1962, Warhol made paintings of dollar bills and Campbell soup cans, and his work was included in an important exhibition of pop art, The New Realists, held at Sidney Janis Gallery, New York. In November of this year, Elanor Ward showed his paintings at Stable Gallery, and the exhibition began a sensation. In 1963, he rented a studio in a firehouse on East 87th Street. He met his assistant, Gerard Malanga, and started making his first film, Tarzan and Jane Regained... Sort of (1964). Later, he drove to Los Angeles for his second exhibition at the Ferus Gallery. In November of that year, he found a loft at 231 East 47th Street, which became his main studio, The Factory. In December, he began production of Red Jackie, the first of the Jackie series. In 1964, his first solo exhibition in Europe, held at the Galerie Ileana Sonnebend in Paris, featured the Flower series. He received a commission from architect Philip Johnson to make a mural, entitled Thirteen Most Wanted Men for the New York State Pavilion in the New York World's Fair. In April, he received an Independent Film Award from Film Culture magazine. In November, his first solo exhibition in the US was held at Leo Castelli Gallery. And at this time, he began his self portrait series.

Pablo Picasso - Personal Life

Pablo Picasso

Dora Maar au Chat, 1941

Personal life

In the early 20th century, Picasso divided his time between Barcelona and Paris. In 1904, in the middle of a storm, he met Fernande Olivier, a Bohemian artist who became his mistress. Olivier appears in many of his Rose period paintings. After acquiring fame and some fortune, Picasso left Olivier for Marcelle Humbert, whom he called Eva Gouel. Picasso included declarations of his love for Eva in many Cubist works. Picasso was devastated by her premature death from illness at the age of 30 in 1915.

He maintained a number of mistresses in addition to his wife or primary partner. Picasso was married twice and had four children by three women. In the summer of 1918, Picasso married Olga a ballerina with Sergei troupe, for whom Picasso was designing a ballet, in Rome; and they spent their honeymoon in the villa near Biarritz of the glamorous Chilean art patron. Khokhlova introduced Picasso to high society, formal dinner parties, and all the social niceties attendant on the life of the rich in 1920s Paris. The two had a son, Paulo, who would grow up to be a dissolute motorcycle racer and chauffeur to his father. Khokhlova’s insistence on social propriety clashed with Picasso’s tendencies and the two lived in a state of constant conflict. During the same period that Picasso collaborated with Diaghilev’s troup, he and Igor collaborated on Pulcinella in 1920. Picasso took the opportunity to make several sketches of the composer.

In 1927 Picasso met 17-year-old Marie-Thérèse Walter and began a secret affair with her. Picasso’s marriage to Khokhlova soon ended in separation rather than divorce, as French law required an even division of property in the case of divorce, and Picasso did not want Khokhlova to have half his wealth. The two remained legally married until Khokhlova’s death in 1955. Picasso carried on a long-standing affair with Marie-Thérèse Walter and fathered a daughter, Maia, with her. Marie-Thérèse lived in the vain hope that Picasso would one day marry her, and hanged herself four years after Picasso’s death.

Dora Maar au Chat, 1941
The photographer and painter Dora Maar was also a constant companion and lover of Picasso. The two were closest in the late 1930s and early 1940s and it was Maar who documented the painting of Guernica.

War years

During the Second World War, Picasso remained in Paris while the Germans occupied the city. Picasso’s artistic style did not fit the Nazi views of art, so he was not able to show his works during this time. Retreating to his studio, he continued to paint all the while. Although the Germans outlawed bronze casting in Paris, Picasso continued regardless, using bronze smuggled to him by the French resistance.

After the liberation of Paris in 1944, Picasso began to keep company with a young art student, Françoise Gilot. The two eventually became lovers, and had two children together, Claude and Paloma. Unique among Picasso’s women, Gilot left Picasso in 1953, allegedly because of abusive treatment and infidelities. This was a severe blow to Picasso.

He went through a difficult period after Gilot’s departure, coming to terms with his advancing age and his perception that, now in his 70s, he was no longer attractive, but rather grotesque to young women. A number of ink drawings from this period explore this theme of the hideous old dwarf as buffoonish counterpoint to the beautiful young girl, including several from a six-week affair with Geneviève Laporte, who in June 2005 auctioned off the drawings Picasso made of her.

Picasso was not long in finding another lover, Jacqueline Roque. She worked at the Madoura Pottery in Vallauris on the French Riviera, where Picasso made and painted ceramics. The two remained together for the rest of Picasso’s life, marrying in 1961. Their marriage was also the means of one last act of revenge against Gilot. Gilot had been seeking a legal means to legitimize her children with Picasso, Claude and Paloma. With Picasso’s encouragement, she had arranged to divorce her then husband, Luc Simon, and marry Picasso to secure her children’s rights. Picasso then secretly married Roque after Gilot had filed for divorce in order to exact his revenge for her leaving him.

Picasso had constructed a huge gothic structure and could afford large villas in the south of France, at Notre-dame-de-vie on the outskirts of Mougins, in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur. By this time he was a celebrity, and there was often as much interest in his personal life as his art.

In addition to his manifold artistic accomplishments, Picasso had a film career, including a cameo appearance in Jean Cocteau’s Testament of Orpheus. Picasso always played himself in his film appearances. In 1955 he helped make the film Le Mystère Picasso (The Mystery of Picasso) directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot.

Leonardo da Vinci - Portrait of Mona Lisa

Portrait of Mona Lisa (1479-1528), also known as La Gioconda, the wife of Francesco del Giocondo; 1503-06 (150 Kb); Oil on wood, 77 x 53 cm (30 x 20 7/8 in)

Musee du Louvre, Paris
This figure of a woman, dressed in the Florentine fashion of her day and seated in a visionary, mountainous landscape, is a remarkable instance of Leonardo's sfumato technique of soft, heavily shaded modeling. The Mona Lisa's enigmatic expression, which seems both alluring and aloof, has given the portrait universal fame.

Reams have been written about this small masterpiece by Leonardo, and the gentle woman who is its subject has been adapted in turn as an aesthetic, philosophical and advertising symbol, entering eventually into the irreverent parodies of the Dada and Surrealist artists. The history of the panel has been much discussed, although it remains in part uncertain. According to Vasari, the subject is a young Florentine woman, Monna (or Mona) Lisa, who in 1495 married the well-known figure, Francesco del Giocondo, and thus came to be known as ``La Gioconda''. The work should probably be dated during Leonardo's second Florentine period, that is between 1503 and 1505. Leonardo himself loved the portrait, so much so that he always carried it with him until eventually in France it was sold to François I, either by Leonardo or by Melzi.

From the beginning it was greatly admired and much copied, and it came to be considered the prototype of the Renaissance portrait. It became even more famous in 1911, when it was stolen from the Salon Carré in the Louvre, being rediscovered in a hotel in Florence two years later. It is difficult to discuss such a work briefly because of the complex stylistic motifs which are part of it. In the essay ``On the perfect beauty of a woman'', by the 16th-century writer Firenzuola, we learn that the slight opening of the lips at the corners of the mouth was considered in that period a sign of elegance. Thus Mona Lisa has that slight smile which enters into the gentle, delicate atmosphere pervading the whole painting. To achieve this effect, Leonardo uses the sfumato technique, a gradual dissolving of the forms themselves, continuous interaction between light and shade and an uncertain sense of the time of day.

Leonardo da Vinci - Portrait of La Gioconda

Portrait of Mona Lisa (1479-1528), also known as La Gioconda, the wife of Francesco del Giocondo; 1503-06 (150 Kb); Oil on wood, 77 x 53 cm (30 x 20 7/8 in); Musee du Louvre, Paris
This figure of a woman, dressed in the Florentine fashion of her day and seated in a visionary, mountainous landscape, is a remarkable instance of Leonardo's sfumato technique of soft, heavily shaded modeling. The Mona Lisa's enigmatic expression, which seems both alluring and aloof, has given the portrait universal fame.

Reams have been written about this small masterpiece by Leonardo, and the gentle woman who is its subject has been adapted in turn as an aesthetic, philosophical and advertising symbol, entering eventually into the irreverent parodies of the Dada and Surrealist artists. The history of the panel has been much discussed, although it remains in part uncertain. According to Vasari, the subject is a young Florentine woman, Monna (or Mona) Lisa, who in 1495 married the well-known figure, Francesco del Giocondo, and thus came to be known as ``La Gioconda''. The work should probably be dated during Leonardo's second Florentine period, that is between 1503 and 1505. Leonardo himself loved the portrait, so much so that he always carried it with him until eventually in France it was sold to François I, either by Leonardo or by Melzi.

From the beginning it was greatly admired and much copied, and it came to be considered the prototype of the Renaissance portrait. It became even more famous in 1911, when it was stolen from the Salon Carré in the Louvre, being rediscovered in a hotel in Florence two years later. It is difficult to discuss such a work briefly because of the complex stylistic motifs which are part of it. In the essay ``On the perfect beauty of a woman'', by the 16th-century writer Firenzuola, we learn that the slight opening of the lips at the corners of the mouth was considered in that period a sign of elegance. Thus Mona Lisa has that slight smile which enters into the gentle, delicate atmosphere pervading the whole painting. To achieve this effect, Leonardo uses the sfumato technique, a gradual dissolving of the forms themselves, continuous interaction between light and shade and an uncertain sense of the time of day.

Marc Chagall Quotes

+ Will God or someone else give me the strength to breathe the breath of prayer and mourning into my paintings, the breath of prayer for redemption and resurrection?

+ Only love interests me, and I am only in contact with things I love.

+ I am out to introduce a psychic shock into my painting, one that is always motivated by pictorial reasoning: that is to say, a fourth dimension.

+ The habit of ignoring Nature is deeply implanted in our times. This attitude reminds me of people who never look you in the ye; I find them disturbing and always have to look away.

+ If a symbol should be discovered in a painting of mine, it was not my intention. It is a result I did not seek. It is something that may be found afterwards, and which can be interpreted according to taste.

+ Changes in societal structure and in art would possess more credibility if they had their origins in the soul and spirit. If people read the words of the prophets with closer attention, they would find the keys to life.

+ My hands were too soft.. I had to find some special occupation, some kind of work that would not force me to turn away from the sky and the stars, that would allow me to discover the meaning of life.

+ In our life there is a single color, as on an artist's palette, which provides the meaning of life and art. It is the color of love.

+ My name is Marc, my emotional life is sensitive and my purse is empty, but they say I have talent.

+ But perhaps my art is the art of a lunatic, I thought, mere glittering quicksilver, a blue soul breaking in upon my pictures.

+ Great art picks up where nature ends.