More Italian Nudes

P. Conti, Nudo di giovinetta, 1933
Francesco Trombadori, Fanciulla nuda , 1933
Titian, Venus of Urbino, 1538
I love all of these Italian nudes in art history. The top two are new to me. I found them while surfing the internet. These two painters were around during Antonio Donghi's time. Conti has painted a wonderful study of red hair. Check out the position of the hands and arms on all of these paintings. All are interesting compositions.
In fact, I used this Titian image in one of my works from the early '90's that I exhibited at the Portland Art Museum. link: The Art of Amy Crehore

Nostalgia

The Three Graces by Raphael 1504
I always loved this picture of my mom (in the middle) and her sisters.
It's a classic sort of image like "The Three Graces”.
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Favorite Artist of the Hollywood Stars

Tamara de Lempicka was a figure painter of massive volumes who also had art deco-cubist tendencies. She was a very skilled painter who invented an unforgettable style. During her day, she was very popular and at one point during the 1930's, she became the favorite painter of the Hollywood stars. She lived in Paris, Beverly Hills and NYC and finally Mexico. "She painted them all, the rich, the successful, the renowned -- the best. And with many she also slept." - this is a quote from her daughter Kizette's book about her, Passion by Design.

In other words, she was a whore. Both with women and with men. I don't know how she found time to be one because she was quite a prolific painter. Her work is a little bit too stylized for my taste, but some of it is pure painting and a new book called, Lempicka by Patrick Bade shows many wonderful works that I have never seen before. She did lots of nudes and nude bathers and groups of figures in complex compositions. She also liked to paint people playing stringed instruments. They are rendered almost like sculptures. Read more about Lempicka, a fascinating woman artist who had a huge influence on graphic arts and interior design: Tricky Micky Art Page

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Study for "The Bathers"

"The Bathers" by Renoir 1887 Philadelphia Art Museum
Study for the Bathers 1884-85 Chicago Art Institute

I found this beautiful study for Pierre-Auguste Renoir's magnificent painting, "The Bathers". This is my favorite Renoir painting. I especially love the character of this girl with the braid down her back. She's rendered so lovingly. This painting has it all. Movement, charm, sex appeal, complexity of composition, rhythm, soul, classicism. And his style is not as brushy in this picture as in his other works.

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That's the way it goes

I said that I would unveil a new painting this past week...but, I am still finishing it up. It's been an extremely difficult painting to realize. I have been working on it intensely every single day. It keeps changing. I hope to be done very soon and then I will be able to catch up on other things.

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A Botticelli Face

1482 Sandro Botticelli, Tempera on wood, Detail from "Primavera"
Picasso drawing of Marie-Terese Walter

"Italian painter Botticelli was Florentine and extremely successful at the peak of his career, with a highly individual and graceful style founded on the rhythmic capabilities of outline. With the emergence of the High Renaissance style at the turn of the 16th century, he fell out of fashion, died in obscurity and was only returned to his position as one of the best-loved quattrocento painters through the interest of Ruskin and the Pre-Raphaelites."

link

I added the Picasso drawing because I like it. It seems to have that same feeling of soulful youth that the Botticelli does, with the girl gazing directly at the viewer. Both girls are rendered like angels. I definitely relate to the painters that came before the High Renaissance- the Early Italian Primitive ones like Giotto, Fra Angelico and Botticelli.

The Art of Amy Crehore

Kamaka Pineapple Ukes

Sam K. Kamaka and his famous pineapple uke

I love Kamaka's ukes that are painted to look just like a pineapple.

"The most famous ukulele design invented by Sam Kamaka, Sr. was the pineapple ukulele. He came up with this shape in 1916 with the purpose of making a small ukulele with a fuller and warmer sound, although there is another story that the pineapple uke was just easier to make (no bending of the sides)." Read more history here:

Kamaka Ukes

The Art of Amy Crehore

Wuthering Heights and Balthus

Illustrating the book, "Wuthering Heights" (1932-1935), shaped the painting career of Balthus. Many of his paintings were derived from these drawings. As you can see, it's all about angles and geometry with Balthus. That is why I find him so fascinating. For more glimpses of the book : Art Textbooks

and a quote from Balthus via Philosophical Conversations:

‘I am a very emotional man, perhaps too much so… My youth was an absolute whirlwind of Feelings, exactly like Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights, which I illustrated. I was completely at home in this novel. It described my youth perfectly. I was in love with Antionette – de Watteville – and I was determined to win her. But Antionette, on top of being a difficult girl, was already engaged to someone else. I reread her letters every evening. I think that, like Heathcliffe, I didn’t want to leave adolescence.’

And, from artic.edu Caty Telfair :

"The drawings that Balthus produced for Wuthering Heights proved to be seminal for him as an artist; no fewer than ten of his later best-known canvases draw compositional elements directly from these illustrations."

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On Painting

I still have one more day to go on my new painting. It's psychedelic and the girl figure has a twisty-turny pose, so it's a been a puzzle to get just the right balance of angles and curves. This painting has a lot of geometry. And I'm going a litle crazy on it.

Stay tuned.

The Art of Amy Crehore

Marion Peck News

Here's Marion Peck standing in front of a magnificent painting at the opening of her exhibit at Billy Shire Fine Art over the weekend. It must have taken her a year to paint this painting. Photo courtesy of Val Gal Art . You can read more about her opening by following the link. More power to women painters! I can totally relate to the time spent, the attention to detail and layering of oil paint to get these effects. Good job Marion.

The Art of Amy Crehore

Odalisque by Gauguin

The new gallery of 19th and 20th-century art at the Pushkin Museum in Moscow includes Gauguin's "Te Arii Vahine" ("The King's Wife"), from 1896. She's posed like an odalisque, but she's the king's wife (not a slave girl). By the way, my new painting will be unveiled early next week. It has taken much longer than expected.

(Thanks to Chris Keeley at Daily Dreamtime)

The Art of Amy Crehore

The Genius of Ishikawa Toraji

Playing 1936
Standing Nude 1934
Black Cat 1934

These prints by Ishikawa Toraji are inspiring in so many ways. The colors and sense of design, the gestures and narrative. It's so great to discover someone's art that I can completely relate to. See more of them here:
Hanga Gallery

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Odalisques in Art

Gustave Caillebotte
Henri Matisse

Here are two odalisques that have a similiar feel and pose, although they are done by two vastly different artists. Caillebotte's is so naturalistic. Matisse's odaliques are all about patterns and colors. He did dozens of them.

I realize now that the new painting I am working on is an odalisque of sorts. But, it is also much more than that. It is narrative, surreal and imaginary, not posed. And my girl is not asleep.

I will unveil the painting some time this week. I still have some details to finish up. Stay tuned.

Here's an interesting essay: THE ARCHETYPAL FEMALE IN MYTHOLOGY AND RELIGION: THE ANIMA AND THE MOTHER by Dr. Joan Relke (Feb. 17,2007)

"The existence of the anima in the male unconscious is easily attested in mythology and the history of art, both largely the product of male writers and artists. With the anima such an obvious psychological reality in men, one would think that women, if they have as Jung says, a male counterpart in their unconscious, would project male images in the creation of artistic images. But now that women are free to make 'serious' art, the images that appear are rarely male. Instead, a multitude of female images have been born."- an excerpt from Europe's Journal of Psychology

The Art of Amy Crehore

Anders Zorn 1860-1920

Studio Idyll 1918 by Anders Zorn
Red Sand 1902 by Anders Zorn
I was not familiar with Anders Zorn, but I saw a post about him on
Internet Weekly tonight.
These nudes are intriguing and very original. I especially like his nudes by the river. His sense of coloring, brushstrokes and natural expressions in the faces are wonderful. It looks like she's playing a mando-cello in the top photo.
"Anders Zorn (1860-1920) is the most well-known Swedish painter. He is famous for his paintings of the people of Dalarna, the part of Sweden where he was born, and his nudes in the open space."
More images here: Anders Zorn
The Art of Amy Crehore

The Silent Vamps

Anna May Wong
Louise Brooks
Lily Damita
Jean Harlow
Silent Ladies
had all the fun.
The Art of Amy Crehore

Vintage Labels

British Cracker Label with banjo and guitar
Vintage Cigar Box Label
See more examples here:
Cerebro

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Casino De Paris Nudes

Check out this amazing collection of vintage costumed hand-colored nudes on flickr:

Casino De Paris

(Thanks Daily Dreamtime for the link via All About Nothing )

The Art of Amy Crehore

Giovanni Bellini's Nude

Naked Young Woman in Front of Mirror 1515

Giovanni Bellini (1430- 1516)painted his first female nude when he was about 85 years old!

It was only a year before he died. I really like this painting.

"He is considered to have revolutionized Venetian painting, moving it towards a more sensuous and colouristic style. Through the use of clear, slow-drying oil paints, Giovanni created deep, rich tints and detailed shadings. His sumptuous coloring and fluent, atmospheric landscapes had a great effect on the Venetian painting school, especially on his pupils Giorgione and Titian."

read more at Wikipedia

The Art of Amy Crehore

A Corset Made of Bosch

Miss Suzanne G of the wonderful wurzeltod art blog

sent me a link to a stunning corset her friend

made out of printed Bosch fabric. Cool! Check it out:

Entre Nous

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The Hip Fashions of H. Bosch

Details from the "Garden of Earthly Delights" by Hieronymus Bosch (Prado, Madrid)

Cherries and dice make good hats. Especially when you are wearing nothing else. Just ask Hieronymus Bosch. Oh, you can't...he's dead. Well, nevermind. He was ahead of his time obviously. These fashions he created are quite contemporary, don't you think?

"The extraordinary painter Hieronymus Bosch (c. 1450-1516) stands apart from the prevailing Flemish traditions in painting. His style was unique, strikingly free, and his symbolism, unforgettably vivid, remains unparalleled to this day."

Read more about Bosch here: ibiblio.org
The Art of Amy Crehore

Practicing One's Craft

"Curtains" Painting copyright Amy Crehore

Seth Godin posted this on his blog the other day:
Art that's not for sale
"Jordan Tierney and her colleagues have been working for months on the Periodic Tableaux, a one-of-a-kind art book that's not for sale.
Why invest the hours and the sweat and the talent in a piece of art you can't (and won't) sell?
Two reasons. The best reason is that when you practice your craft for yourself, not for the market, it drives you in new and important ways. And the other reason is that people are going to talk about it. Ideas that spread, win."

LINK

I totally agree about practicing your craft for yourself first. That is what I have done all of my life and certain people who think "money first" tend to think I am crazy. I have actually had people say, "Why even do it, if you aren't selling it?" They just don't understand the creative process and the goals of an artist. I could have been strictly a cartoonist-type illustrator (I did plenty of it) when I was younger for money, but I wanted to learn how to paint in a more representational way. I wanted to come up with my own unique way of painting. Not realism, but imaginative painting that transports you to a place that is "realer than real". I needed the challenge of painting with oils. I had a vision. It was a long-term goal. I struggled for years. Over humps and into valleys. I devoured art history books. Sometimes a painting would take me months with a hundred paintings underneath. I persevered. It was all about putting love and my own experiences into the work and letting my humor and ideas flow freely without fear. And painting things over and over and over until they "felt" right. I think it was worth it - to get to the place I am now.

(Thanks to Marshall at artnewyorkcity.com for the link)

The Art of Amy Crehore

(above image from my "Little Pierrot" series which started as an experiment and has evolved into 3 different series of works.)

Monkeys Galore

Monkey Wallpaper
Red-Ruffed Lemur 1894 Chromolithograph
Spider Monkey 1894 Chromolithograph
Monkey -1894 Chromolithograph

My friend sent me this great sample of monkey wallpaper and I found these antique prints here: Collectors Prints

I have been locked away for the last 5 or 6 weeks working on a new painting in my "monkey love" series. It's more ambitious than most and it is taking me forever to finish. If I owe emails to anyone, I hope they will understand that I must block out all distractions temporarily.

I start from scratch with my paintings and don't use any reference materials except perhaps my own previous works (to stay consistent). My first painting ("Banana Eater") in the "monkey love" series was researched, however. It was loosely based on the people, animals and plants of French Guiana or Devil's Island. (I needed a background setting- like a novelist would have in the opening paragraphs of a book.) That is where my squirrel monkey came from. Some people think my work is Polynesian or Hawaiian-based, and I have to admit that it has evolved now into a kind of cross-over art, but it wasn't my intention. It is all intuitive. The drawing comes first (from my imagination) and then I transfer it to canvas. I do enjoy looking at all kinds of vintage art, though, and over the years, it has become a part of me- my roots. One thing I don't do is look at contemporary art too closely. One must stay pure and create one's own unique little modern symbols and icons without straying into anyone else's territory. That's my philosophy, although I know that some current day artists tend to mimic whatever is "in" at the moment (nevermind copyrights). To me, that is not real art and defeats the whole purpose of creating something entirely new!

The Art of Amy Crehore

Surrealist Playing Cards

Two Jokers by Salvador Dali.

Surrealist Playing Cards

(Thanks, Internet Weekly)

The Art of Amy Crehore

Jayne Mansfield's Double Entendre

Still from the movie, "The Girl Can't Help It", showing Jayne holding a couple of milk jugs.

Read the post about this movie on mardecortesbaja

The Art of Amy Crehore

French Postcards

This is a great book by Martin Stevens. The images are sepia-toned, hand-colored photo postcards of female nudes in Paris at the turn of the 20th century. And they are quite humorously posed. It's a steal at $14.96 on Amazon :"Artfully posed with classical architecture or in flirtatious dishabille with stockings and lingerie, the winking models embody the erotic fantasies of a repressed society. Some of the women shown are demure and shy, wearing a slip or low-cut blouse-a great tease in an age when showing an ankle was scandalous. Their daring glimpses of decolletage carry a particular charge, so rare in today's world of overexposure. These cards were sold, often in packets, at street kiosks and under tabac counters, hush-hush but nevertheless ubiquitous. As foreigners flooded the city in the early part of the 20th-century, the cards became cherished souvenirs that were secretly collected and shared among men abroad."

The Art of Amy Crehore

Painted Portraits of Girls

Eugène Delacroix: Girl Seated in a Cemetery (1824, Oil on canvas)
Portrait by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot 1833, oil
Portrait by Angelo Bronzino 1542, 0il
Portrait by Juan De Flandes, around 1500, oil

Wikimedia Commons has a wonderful collection of painted portraits of girls.
I love all of these. Corot and Bronzino have been two of my favorite painters for a long time, but this Delacroix painting leaves me breathless. It is unbelievably alive. The Juan De Flandes portrait has a marvelous primitive style to it and a nice sense of design.
(Thanks again to Internet Weekly!)
The Art of Amy Crehore