New Mona Lisa

Joaquín


Recently the art world was sent all a twitter by the discovery of a new Mona Lisa copy. Unlike previous copies though, it appears that this one was created along side the original in Leonardo's studio. The full article on this discovery can be read here.

Martin Bailey, the author, stated that there could have been any number of reasons for this to have occurred. He also stated that the work was most likely completed by a student studying under Leonardo, and that the close examination of this copy would shed new light on how Leonardo composed this famous painting.

I have never been a huge fan, however the Mona Lisa has fascinated other viewers for centuries. When I taught art history and art appreciation, no other single work of art was asked about more regularly than this one. With this new discovery more questions are sure to be raised. What I do find interesting is the hope to learn more about how Leonardo worked. All artists work differently and I think it is interesting to compare strategies and techniques.

Calls to Artists

Petroleum Paradox: For Better or For Worse?
Eligibility: Open to all US self-identified women artists.
About the Exhibition: Petroleum Paradox: For Better or For Worse is a collaborative exhibition with the Women’s Caucus for Art and Denise Bibro Fine Art. Please upload a current Bio and Artist Resume as the Denise Bibro Gallery will be promoting the artists selected and their work.


2012 Sequim Arts Juried Art Show
Sequim Arts, located in Sequim, Washington, is seeking entries for its annual juried art exhibit. Work in both 2D and 3D form will be accepted. Cash and merchandise prizes totaling over $1,500. The show will be hosted at the Museum & Arts Center in the Sequim~Dungeness Valley exhibit space and will run from May 1 to May 28.

Works on PAPER and of CLAY - 22nd Mid-Atlantic
The d'ART Center in Norfolk, VA is holding a Call to Artists for the 22nd Annual Mid-Atlantic Art Exhibition: “Works on PAPER and of CLAY”. This national art exhibition awards $3,200 in prizes! The juried exhibition is held at d'ART Center from April 27 - June 29, 2012.
Entry Deadline: March 6, 2012. Entry Fee: $30 for 5 entries.

2012 Maritime Art Exhibition & Sale' Call for Artists
International Deadline: March 15, 2012 - The Mackinac Arts Council of Mackinac Island, Michigan is pleased to announce an exhibition of maritime themed art to be held at the Mackinac Island Public Library June 30 to July 31, 2012. The submissions will be juried by the Mackinac Arts Council Jury Committee.

First Street Gallery, New York, Call for Artists: 2012 National Juried Exhibition
Eligibilty: Open to U.S. resident artists at least 18 yrs. old. Exception: Artists currently represented by First Street Gallery.

Eligible works include oils, acrylics, watercolors, pastels, drawings, prints and sculpture in any medium. No photography, video, film, installation, or mechanically reproduced artwork (computer, printer, giclees, etc.). The width of work, including the frame, may not exceed 30 inches. No height limit. Maximum weight of sculpture: 50 pounds. No wall hung sculpture. Sculptors must provide floor stand with a maximum footprint of 30″ x 30″. Maximum width or depth for sculpture is 30 inches. No height limit. All work must be suitably framed, wired and ready for hanging. Works on paper must be framed under plexiglass or glass.

Christo Project in Colorado

The environmental artist Christo is working on another big project here in the United States. This time he wants to cover a few miles of the Arkansas River with a fabric canopy. NPR covered some developments in this project, and it is linked here.

Wolfgang Volz/Copyright Christo 2007

The NPR article discusses the major points of this project including the viewpoints of both those in favor of the project, and those against it. The author described how Christo works; creating sketches models and mock-ups of the project and then selling them to raise the funds necessary to put the project in place. Christo was interviewed and he again commented how the entire project is the art, including the people protesting, the permits, and everything associated directly or indirectly with the completion of the project.

I have always had a love/hate relationship with the work of Christo. On the one hand I can see the arguments that it is not art, and more a construction project. On the other, I like how Christo brings issues of land use into the realm of art. One thing is certain: he makes valid arguments in a creative way that really get people to respond, both positively and negatively.

How an artwork develops

The above image is one of several that I sent off for exhibition in New York later this month. For this show I was looking at pipes. Each image is one relating to pipes, and the structures created supporting the movement of liquid though pipes. For this blog entry I could write all about my thoughts on pipes and why I was interested in creating a body of work focused on pipes, but I don't feel like posting that here. Most of that information is included in the artists statement for the exhibition, and I would rather write about how these images came together.

I spent the better half of the last month looking at pipes, thinking about pipes, and sketching pipes. I almost always have my sketch book close at hand, and for this show that frequently meant going out and sketching pipes. An example of these sketches is below.

This was one of the first sketches I made, and therefore one of the first paintings created for this show emerged from this sketch. Is it here.

I think it is interesting that for this project the first paintings nearly matched the sketches. As I got more involved in the the process however, the paintings began to deviate slightly from the sketches. Look at the example below.

This image was derived from the following sketch, but notice how it has slight differences.

From here I moved further into my own interpretations of the sketches I had made. For example this sketch:

helped to inform this image:

Some of the most interesting images, I think, are amalgamations of several sketches:

To be clear, the deviation from the sketches I made to the more imaginative paintings was not something that I conscientiously set out to do. I'm not sure why this happened, but I do think that the more I thought about pipes, the more comfortable I became in creating my own interpretation of their architecture. There were a few images in this set of paintings that I really like, including the one at the opening of this post, which is my favorite. This project has given me a lot to think about, not the least of which is how the more thought I put into an image, the more interesting it becomes.