Archive for February 12, 2014

Artist of the moment……John Butler Yeates

{ February 12, 2014 @ 5:00 pm } · { Uncategorized }
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John Butler Yeats was the father of the artist Jack Butler Yeats. John Yeats was fantastic painter and draftsman who enjoyed working with the face and figure. Yeats was in high demand for his portrait work. Its tough to grasp a true inventory of his output, but his work is found in many private collections of the upper class in the region. The last picture in the gallery was a self portrait done by Yeats.

John Yeats was born in Lawrencetown, Ireland in the northern part of the country in the year 1839. He went to college at the Trinity College located in Dublin, Ireland. He worked in the field of law for brief period of time before he decided to give it up and become an artist. This decision would eventually cause his wife to go insane.

For his artistic education Yeats attended Heatherley Art School.

I recognized this picture as I have spent thousands of hours looking at John Singer Sargent’s wonderful charcoal portrait drawings. This work is of one of the six children of John Butler Yeats, W.B. Yeats. W.B. Yeats was a great writer and winner of the Nobel Prize for literature work in 1923.

j6

What a wonderfully artistic family! From painters to nobel prize winner authors what wonderful creativity!

D

Artist of the moment….Jack Butler Yeats

{ February 12, 2014 @ 12:27 pm } · { Uncategorized }
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Jack Butler Yeats comes from a family of artists and was born in London, England in the year 1871. He would go on to win a medal the Olympics for his paintings and have a lengthy and successful painter in a realist manner. His father was renown portrait painter John Butler Yeats. His brother was WB Yeats who won a Nobel Prize for his literature work.

The artist was raised mainly with his grandparents.

The artist began his career as an illustrator of comics.

Some favorite subjects include the landscapes and animals.

What I enjoy most about Jack Butler Yeats is his many layers of paint he uses. Like Sorolla, Yeats used a lot of paint and bold brushwork to make wonderful visual images packed with emotion, great design, and great use of color.

Elected to the Royal Hibernian Academy.

The artist won the first prize for his country after they became independent. In 1924 in the Summer Olympics Yeats was able to win a silver medal for a work titled “Swimming.”

The artist passed away in 1957.

In this clip a montage of works by Jack Butler Yeats:

Price range information: Works range from $3,000 for watercolors, inks, drawings, and prints. Yeats has broken the one million dollar barrier at auction.

Another great family of artists!

In this clip a work up for auction by Jack Yeats is explained:

D

Artist of the moment……Gajin Fujita

{ February 12, 2014 @ 12:11 pm } · { Uncategorized }
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Gajin Fujita takes two of my favorite forms  of art, street art and japanese woodblock prints to make some spectacular designs. Gajin Fujita was born in East Los Angeles, California in  the year 1972. His works use many mediums and are quite vast in size.

In this clip we visit a gallery show that took place in 2011:

The artist uses many mediums to complete one piece of artwork. Pencil, spray paint, gold and silver leaf, and felt tip markers. This gives the surface a wonderful paint quality. My favorite artist who works with many mediums at a time is the great Robert Kushner. I have written about Kushner many times, the artist makes floral designs and uses many mediums to complete a work including a final coat of resin that helps the glitter he uses on most works even more play of light.

Fujita is based out of Los Angeles and works with some graffiti crews in the area.

In this clip a montage of works by Gajin Fujita:

For his artistic education Fujita attended the Otis College of Art and Design in California earning a BFA. For his MFA the artist attended the University of Las Vegas, Nevada.

Fujita has shown his work at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

In this clip a behind the scenes look at Gajin Fujita in action!:

Its great to see such high quality street art!

D

Artist of the moment……George Rodrigue

{ February 12, 2014 @ 1:50 am } · { Uncategorized }
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George Rodrigue was born New Iberia, Louisiana in the year 1944. Rodrigue was most famous for his paintings featuring a blue dog that was based on his own dog.

The artist was also known for his regional landscapes that featured such “cajun” items as swamps, oak trees, bugs, and rivers.

For his artistic education Rodrigue attended the University of Southwest Louisiana at Lafayette. He went on to attend the Otis Center College of design located in Pasadena, California.

Price range information : The artist was a highly productive printmaker, especially towards the latter part of his career for the hurricane relief.

Prints start in the $3,000 and reach up to $ 125,000 for an original oil. Rodrigue also worked in acrylics.

The artist passed away in 2013. The artist thought his poor health came from mixed medium work done at the beginning of his career in a studio with poor ventilation.

In this clip art beat has an interview with the artist. Rodrigue talks about his early paintings and why he chose the oak tree as a common symbol in his early works. Also covered are the fantastic relief efforts Rodrigue went through to help rebuild his beloved city of New Orleans:

In this clip we view an interview with  the artist and P.B.S.: