Archive for February 4, 2015

Artist of the moment………..William Wendt

{ February 4, 2015 @ 6:19 pm } · { Uncategorized }
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William Wendt was a German/American painter renown for his impressionist landscapes. William Wendt was born in Bentzen, Germany in the year 1865.

The artist emigrated to the United States in 1880 at the age of fifteen. The artist settled in Chicago, Illinois. Wendt worked as a commercial illustrator and attended the Art Institute of Chicago.

In this clip a montage of works by William Wendt:

The artist married a sculptor named Julia Wendt. Wendt taught at the Otis Art Institute located in Los Angeles.

Wendt was a founding member of the California Art Club.

For much of his life in California Wendt was based out of Laguna Beach. It was during his time spent in California that Wendt became a terrific painter of the outdoors and also sunsets.

William Wendt passed away in 1946.

Price range information: Works range from $20,000 to $350,000. Wendt worked mainly with oils but occasional produced pastel works.

I enjoy the use of color by Wendt. The artist used a small amount of purples on mauves in his landscapes to show distant mountains. He avoids a problem that I see in many landscape works, too much green. Though in person a summer scene may have an overwhelming amount of greens, its tough for these works to sell as green is a tough color to match in the interior wall of house.

Another artist to check review who painted in similar style to Wendt would be Ovanes Berberien.

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Artist of the moment…….John Woodrow Wilson

{ February 4, 2015 @ 5:48 pm } · { Uncategorized }
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John Woodrow Wilson was an African-American social realist artist. John Woodrow Wilson was born in Boston, Massachusetts in the year 1922. Wilson was inspired to create art because when he visited nearby museums as a teenager he didn’t see anyone that looked like him.

Wilson wanted to show that people of color could also be beautiful and often portrayed people of color in his artwork. As a social realist artist Wilson’s goal was to show racial injustice and to show the dignity and pride of persons of color.

Wilson took art classes at his local boys club where he was mentored by current art students that were attending the School of the Museum of Fine Arts located in Boston. After the student’s showed some of Wilson’s fantastic works to the faculty and they were impressed giving Wilson a scholarship immediately.

Wilson went on to earn a B.F.A. from Tufts University. The artist also won awards and fellowships that allowed him to study abroad in Paris, France with modernist Fernand Leger.

The artist taught at the collegiate level at Boston University.

You may have seen John Woodrow Wilson’s most renown work, a bronze sculpture of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., which is located in Washington D.C. on the capital rotunda. Wilson beat out many other artists for this prestigious commission. The work is the first image in the picture gallery.

The artist was an outstanding and prolific printmaker.

John Woodrow Wilson passed away just a few days ago in late January of 2015. The artist was 92 years old.

Price range information: Sorry none available.

Some other artists who worked in a similar style include Elizabeth Catlett, Robert Gwathmey, Jacob Lawrence, Charles White and Jack Levine.

John Woodrow Wilson is included in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art located in New York City.

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