Paintings in the news

This week two paintings were in the news. It isn't often that paintings make the papers, so I thought I would respond to these news items. The first is about Picasso's The Actor, and the second is about the Mona Lisa, and Leonardo DaVinci.

Earlier this week a lady visiting The Metropolitan Museum of art tripped and fell into Picasso's The Actor. This resulted in a rather severe tear. The full story can be read here. I find this type of thing humerus. While I feel very bad for the woman involved and would not want to be in her shoes, I think this incident serves as an example of the impermanence of things. I think this is especially true for art. Far to often galleries, museums, and collectors view their art as this precious item, that is meant to last forever. Nothing lasts forever, and this proves it. Things can be damaged, destroyed, or stolen. Nothing is too sacred as to be permanent. A photo of the painting before it was slashed can be viewed below.



The second item concerns the Mona Lisa, and the painter that created it; Leonardo DaVinci. Apparently, new evidence has come to light that may show how this painting is actually a self portrait. There are some Italians that want to exhume DaVinci's grave and run some tests. This story can be read here. In my opinion this is just silly. Who cares if the Mona Lisa was meant as a self portrait or not? Is that really going to change the painting? I doubt it. There will always be those that disagree with whatever the outcome of the tests is, so this exercise isn't going to solve anything. I'm including a picture of the Mona Lisa as well (although I'm sure you already know what it looks like.)



Those are my thoughts on these news items. What do you think? Leave your response in the comments.

Latest Painting

It's been a while since I have posted anything here. But it has been a while since anybody has read anything posted here. So I guess we are square. This is my latest painting. What do you think? Do you have any comments or suggestions? I had some trouble with the background. I didn't really know what to do with it. I eventually decided to work with color, and I think the color in this composition works very well. This was based on a sketch I did several years ago, and the sketch includes more of the figure. I may try this one again later, in order to get the full image of the dancer. The original sketch can be seen below.

Teaching Perspective

Happy New Year to all! The first post for the New Year is about another teaching experience I had. Before school let out for the holidays I taught basic perspective drawing to some Jr. High students. I believe they really enjoyed the exercises. This is important, because the school I was in does not currently have an art program. Therefore, my teaching is the only true exposure to art and art making these students have. The samples below are from some of their work. Unfortunately I did not get to see the fully completed projects. These examples are how the students started.










As you can see we started out by drawing simple shapes that recede into the distance. I think they did a very nice job here. For the second part, I had the students draw their ideal room. They were free to fill this room with whatever they wanted. The two examples above, although nice, are incomplete. I do hope they finished them after I left. What do you think? Leave your questions and comments, and I will see you next time.