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Jean Hélion: Apostate Abstractionist
Jean Hélion (1904-1987) gained artistic notoriety during the 1930s as an abstract painter. Then he threw that overboard in the early 1940s when abstract painting was in the process of becoming the...
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Up Close: Manchess at the Society of Illustrators
I like Greg Manchess' way with brushwork, having written about him here and here.Lucky me, I was subjected to a 24-hours layover in New York City when returning to Seattle from Paris last month, and...
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Alexander Mann: An Almost - Glasgow Boy
Alexander Mann (1853-1908), as this Wikipedia entry indicates, had an independent income and so could paint pretty much whatever and wherever he pleased. Because he was born in Glasgow and at times...
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The Vermeer Museum in Delft
Delft in South Holland was the place where famed painter Jan Vermeer (1634-1675) lived and made his comparatively small number of paintings. It is a pleasant small city that's worth a visit if you are...
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Pierre August Cot: No Longer Icky?
Pierre Auguste Cot (1837-1883) died fairly young. Worse yet for his reputation according to historians of the Modernist Art Establishment persuasion, he didn't have much of a chance to "evolve" in a...
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Maxwell Parrish Mazda Calendar Illustrations
Maxfield Parrish (1870-1966) was primarily an illustrator, though he made fine art paintings and many of his illustrations followed the tedious, exacting technique he used for his fine art work. For...
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Robert Lewis Reid: A "Ten"
No, I'm not talking about a perfect gymnastic score nor how attractive a woman might be evaluated. This has to do with Robert Lewis Reid (1862-1929) who was a member of a group called the Ten American...
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Clayton Knight: Illustrator, Clandestine RCAF Recruiter
Illustrators tend to be a solitary lot unless they happen to share studio space with others. Given that, it's easy to jump to the conclusion that they are mild-mannered sorts who avoid flash, dash and...
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Molti Ritratti: Favorite Pino Models
Pino Danae, born Giuseppi Dangelico (1939-2010), known professionally as Pino, was a successful book cover illustrator who made an equally successful transition to gallery painting. Some biographical...
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In the Beginning: Helene Schjerfbeck
Helene Schjerfbeck (1862-1946) was a Finnish painter who is much better known in Scandinavia than here in the United States. Which is too bad, because her artistic journey is interesting in that she...
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Reginal Marsh, Yalie Gone Slumming
Reginald Marsh (1898-1954) was never a starving artist. His grandfather was wealthy, so Marsh happened to be born in Paris while his parents were there; the family moved to New Jersey when he was two...
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C.C. Beall, Watercolor Illustrator
C.C. (Cecil Calvert) Beall (1892-1967) was an illustrator who has become so little-known these days that a quick Web search came up nearly dry where biographical information is concerned. I did find...
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Brussels' Comic Strip Museum
For some reason, Belgians are very fond of comic strips. So of course Brussels has a museum, the Centre Belge de la Bande Dessinée dedicated to that field. The Web site for the museum is here.I had a...
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Stuck (Franz von) in Seattle
Franz von Stuck (1863-1928), Symbolist and Secessionist, is Munich's version of Vienna's Gustav Klimt (1862-1918), an almost exact contemporary. Biographical information about Stuck on Wikipedia is...
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Émile Aubry, Accomplished, yet Obscure
Émile Aubry (1880-1964) got off to a good start. Born in Algiers, he made it to Paris where he studied under Jean-Léon Gérôme and won the Prix de Rome. Later in life he continued to find himself part...
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Cecilia Beaux, Portrait Artist
Cecilia Beaux (1855-1942) was one of America's best portrait artists during what I consider a golden age of portraiture: the late 1800s and early 1900s.Wikipedia has a useful entry dealing with her...
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Impressions of the Musée d'Orsay Renovation
The Musée d'Orsay was partly closed for renovation the last time I was there, July 2010. It reopened in the fall of 2011, but I didn't get to see the results until last month. Moreover, I was focusing...
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István Zádor, Obscure Hungarian
The world is and was filled with competent (but not great) artists who never became very well known. To some degree this is a matter of luck. And an important instance when luck runs against the artist...
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Studies Displayed at the Louvre
Paris'Louvre is considered one of the finest of the world's art museums. It is huge, with many hundreds of works on display. Even so, paintings and sculptures made after 1850-70 or thereabouts must be...
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Józef Mehoffer, "Young Poland" Symbolist of Sorts
Józef Mehoffer (1869-1946), a Pole, was one of those painters I used to call "peripheral" when blogging on the Two Blowhards blog. Even though some readers questioned my use of the term, I rather like...
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