Piero Di Cosimo 1462-1521

The Death of Procris 1510

Venus and Mars 1498

There is something strange and unusual about these two paintings by Florentine painter Piero Di Cosimo. The dog in the top painting and the rabbit below both seem to have empathy for the human characters. I especially like the "Death of Procris". It's got a lot of feeling, glowing colors and nice composition.

Piero Di Cosimo

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The Art of Amy Crehore

Martin Johnson Heade 1819-1904

"Magnolia on Red Velvet"
"Cattleya Orchid and Three Brazilian Hummingbirds"
"Thunderstorm on Narragansett Bay"
I have a special place in my heart for American artist Martin Johnson Heade: his dark seascapes with approaching storms, tropical landscapes with hummingbirds and orchids, magnolia blossums on red velvet, and beautiful sprawling marshlands. He was a painter with an amazingly accurate technique who rendered nature's changing weather patterns unlike anyone else. He discovered a way to capture the translucency of exotic orchids and the metallic feathers of Brazilian hummingbirds and set it all off against atmospheric, lush, surreal mountain backdrops. He had an impeccable design sense, too. The quality of his work is astounding.
He was born in rural Bucks County, PA (a place I know well) and learned to paint from his neighbor, folk artist Edward Hicks. In 1858, he moved to the new Tenth Street Studio Building in New York City -- home to leading Hudson River School artists such as Frederic Edwin Church. Read more about his fascinating life:
Martin Johnson Heade and here
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It Doesn't Have to Be Explained

Painting by Balthus

Great painting doesn't have to be explained. It doesn't need a political tagline to make you understand the meaning of it. You won't squint at it and scratch your head, you'll just soak it in, because you can't take your eyes off it. It will make you feel something. And no one has to tell you what to feel. It's a personal experience. And you will come back and look again. It will resonate. Balthus doesn't need to explain his hard work. You don't have to ask why?... or what is it? He didn't just slap it together and try to fool somebody into thinking it was something more than it is. He spent months and years on his paintings. Slowly layering and building them up. Each one is provocative and powerful. Each stands on it's own. Each has an organized design of angles, color and form. It's not just about the idea or a superficial style. It's like a great book. Or a great film. He didn't talk about it. He just did it. And gave it to the world. No matter how long it took to paint it and get it right. This painting called "Therese Revant" (1938) is a masterpiece. And I'm sure he struggled with it until he was satisfied.

The Art of Amy Crehore

Dingulators

Photo by Maya Lama of Charlie Nothing


Photo by Joan Martin

What are they? Guitar sculptures made out of American Cars called Dingulators™ by artist Charlie Nothing. He is featured in the current issue of "Fretboard Journal" (#6).

Check out his wonderful website:
Charles Martin Simon

The Art of Amy Crehore

Marie, Chloe and ChouChou

"Kittens looking out the door"

How on earth did they get these little creatures to do this? Beautiful!

Link: Belladia.typepad.com
The Art of Amy Crehore

Faces of Women in Art

Women in Art by eggman913

at YouTube has been viewed over 4 million times.

It's a video of beautifully painted faces of women morphing into each other with a classical music soundtrack. 500 years of art history. Very nice.

The Art of Amy Crehore

Penny Arcade Cards

Ebay's got some penny arcade cards from the 1940's up for bidding. Who are these women? Is there such a thing as an ideal love mate? Young boys and girls who partied in the arcades could dream about their future. To get one of the pretty girl cards in the machine instead of a homely one was a boy's lucky day.

I used to love to roam the penny arcades at Asbury Park and Wildwood, N.J.

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B & W Movie Stills

"Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" 1958 Paul Newman and Elizabeth Taylor
"A Place in the Sun" 1951 Montgomery Clift and Elizabeth Taylor
" The Blue Angel" 1930 Marlene Dietrich

"Sadie Thompson"1928, Gloria Swanson
"The Lady From Shanghai" 1948 Orson Welles, Rita Hayworth

There is a great site called "The Palace" put together by Michael Mills with articles and images, links and audio clips about the history of Hollywood films. I picked out a few beautiful stills from a few great films that I like. Who doesn't like Tennessee Williams stories or Orson Welles films? Who isn't inspired by great old films with wonderful narratives? Somehow black and white is way better than color - it's a lot more dramatic. Check out the eyes on Elizabeth Taylor and Gloria Swanson. I know how they feel.
The Art of Amy Crehore

Strange Sisters

A collection of silly 50's and 60's pulp fiction covers

from the who-needs-men side of the tracks.

Strange Sisters

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A Uke is all I Want

Uke gal

This cool vintage photo came from from Wikipedia (it's a Ziegfeld Follies Girl) via Steve of Finkbuilt Blog . Steve thought that it might spruce up my blog, which it does. Thanks, Steve! Finkbuilt Blog has a review of Mark Frauenfelder's great new book (which I am reading right now) called "Rule the Web" . There is also a section on ukes at Finkbuilt that you might find intriguing. I am finishing up my paint job on a hand-built uke right now. It should be ready for viewing by next week.

The Art of Amy Crehore

Henri Rousseau 1844-1910

The Sleeping Gypsy 1897
The Dream 1910
The Snake Charmer 1907

One can't underestimate the power of Rousseau. It is easy to take him for granted. The large tropical masterworks that he dreamed up in his studio were like no one else's art at the time. Truly modern, yet traditional. Naive and wise all at the same time. A singular style. Surreal. Funny. Dreamlike. Unforgettable. "The Sleeping Gypsy" is my fav.

Henri Rousseau

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Harlequins in Art

Antonio Donghi
Antonio Donghi
Andre Derain
Paul Cezanne
Pablo Picasso
Picasso did it countless times. Antonio Donghi did it more than once. Derain did it and even Cezanne did it. What did they all do? They all painted the Harlequin.
Picasso painted numerous circus families and harlequins in his early periods (those are my favorite) before he became a self-confessed "charlatan".
Here is a quote from Picasso about what happened to him after Cubism:
"From the moment that art ceases to be food that feeds the best minds, the artist can use his talents to perform all the tricks of the intellectual charlatan. Most people can today no longer expect to receive consolation and exaltation from art. The 'refined,' the rich, the professional 'do-nothings', the distillers of quintessence desire only the peculiar, the sensational, the eccentric, the scandalous in today's art. I myself, since the advent of Cubism, have fed these fellows what they wanted and satisfied these critics with all the ridiculous ideas that have passed through my mind. The less they understood them, the more they admired me. Through amusing myself with all these absurd farces, I became celebrated, and very rapidly. For a painter, celebrity means sales and consequent affluence. Today, as you know, I am celebrated, I am rich. But when I am alone, I do not have the effrontery to consider myself an artist at all, not in the grand old meaning of the word: Giotto, Titian, Rembrandt, Goya were great painters. I am only a public clown - a mountebank. I have understood my time and have exploited the imbecility, the vanity, the greed of my contemporaries. It is a bitter confession." - Pablo Picasso, Space and Motion

The Art of Amy Crehore

The Art of the Print

Harlequin, 1870, Lithograph, A. Hoen & Company, Richmond, Virginia
Nellie's Dream, Harper's Weekly 1881, Wood Engraving
This website has some really beautiful original prints on it that you can buy (or look at) from all over the world. Here are two vintage images that I like.
The Art of the Print
The Art of Amy Crehore

Yuri Klapoukh's Magic Paintings

"Sheperdess", painting by Yuri Klapoukh

"Rain Through Sunshine", painting by Yuri Klapoukh

I got an email invitation to look at a Russian Painting website. And there I found a remarkable painter named Yuri Klapoukh. Here are two of his paintings that I like. They are very different from anything that I have seen before. Go here to see more of his work as well as the work of other contemporary Russian painters:

Russian Paintings

The Art of Amy Crehore

Leonetto Cappiello 1875-1942

I love this guy's posters. The designs are so charming and animated. Leonetto Cappiello was an Italian designer who lived in Paris. He is now called the "father of modern advertising". Read here:

Leonetto Cappiello

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Old Engravings from Paintings

These are some very nice prints from

Intaglio Fine Art

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Herbert James Draper 1864-1920

Pot Pourri 1897
Lamia 1910
A Water Baby
Ulysses and the Sirens

"Herbert James Draper was one of the finest painters of nudes in the last years of Victoria's reign. As we begin a new century, we are more able to reassess the prejudices and snobbery of some of the last generation of art historians and see the qualities of the work of the last stance of Classicism in British art."

Read more about painter Herbert James Draper at the Victorian Web and see more paintings there. And more painting at: Illusions Gallery.

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(Thanks to Tom C. for sending me the postcard book of mermaids.)

Little Men Inside of Big Cat

I painted a little woman on top of a big cat, but here are some little men inside of a big cat.

I got this image from Make blog and they got it from Miss Mary's Victorian Halloween. It's a costume-built-for-two.

The Art of Amy Crehore

3 Reminders from Amy Crehore

"Wild Cat Fever", oil painting, 2007 by Amy Crehore for Venus Show
"Homage to the King of Cats", oil painting, 2001 by Amy Crehore (Monovita Magazine) "Bubble Gum Encore" 2005 "Little Pierrot" series by Amy Crehore
" The Two-Timer" 2006 "Monkey Love" series by Amy Crehore

There's another week or so left to catch the Venus Show at Roq La Rue Gallery in Seattle, WA where you can see my new painting, "Wild Cat Fever". Monovita Magazine has a little feature about me in their June Issue: Link
And, last but not least, all of my limited edition, signed prints have free shipping:
Click here to view my prints:

Little Pierrot or Monkey Love
The Art of Amy Crehore

Girl Cicada with Guitar

Click to enlarge

I found this beautiful hokum image on cannibol's live journal page.

(Thanks, Vince.)
The Art of Amy Crehore

The Crehore Skyscraper

I blogged about playing cards designed by Tom Crehore (1802) and I blogged about a piano built by Ben Crehore (1800). Both were thought to be the earliest known in America. I am now blogging about my great grandfather's skyscraper in NYC which is still standing at 150 Nassau Street. The building is thought to be one of the earliest skyscrapers ever built in this country. You can see it towering over the other buildings in this picture. It's called The American Tract Society Building and William W. Crehore was the chief engineer on the project and Robert H. Robertson was the architect in 1894. Read about it here:
NYC Architecture
The Art of Amy Crehore