30 March 2009

etsy:
“All Life is An Experiment” by Blenda Tyvoll, etsy seller blendastudio

This piece is a limited edition print of a mixed media painting by Blenda Tyvoll, etsy seller blendastudio. The piece depicts two birds on the plane of a 4 X 5 grid of squares which is presented with collage elements and lettering that reads “all life is an experiement.” Color is one of the primary active visual components of the piece. The viewer’s eye is drawn to the pure cerulean blue and crimson red hues of the birds. The clarity with which those colors are presented contrasts with the overall tone of the background grid of squares, which while is contains many isolated areas of pure color is mostly a combination of beige, gray, and ochre tones. The background, while it has blips of bright color, is duller and more subdued. However, those bright blips of color in the background, many of which are floral patterned elements of collage, act in concert with the color of the bird to keep the composition active, drawing the viewer’s eye throughout the entirety of the piece. Further directing the eye of the viewer is the contrast presented between light and dark color through the use of black outlines or the visual suggestion of black outlines. The selective use of black draws the eye towards certain areas; were every square of the grid or every contour of the birds outlined with the same intensity, then the outline would be less effective in drawing the eye to certain shapes with a certain emphasis. In other words, black outline is presented in the form of intellectual line. Black or dark color is also presented in a limited fashion, which makes it visually emphatic, like the presence of sepia tones at the top and bottom of the piece (more so than in the middle of the composition). The application of emphatic colors is very selective and capricious; it’s intentional or intrinsic without being patterned or clichéd. It also contributes to the emotional tone of the piece, which is capricious and whimsical, but also mature and sublime.
available at:
blendastudio: http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5748726

song:
“True Colors” by Cyndi Lauper from the album “True Colors”

artist: Henri Matisse
Henri-Émile-Benoît Matisse (31 December 1869 – 3 November 1954) was a French painter known mostly as a Fauvist. He was born in Le Cateau-Cambrésis, Nord-Pas-de-Calais, France. He studied law in Paris, and worked as a court administrator in Le Cateau-Cambrésis. He became interested in painting while convalescing from a bout with appendicitis. In Paris he studied at the Académie Julian. He painted in a style that emphasized color, line, and two-dimensionality. And exhibited with artists using a similar style; they came to be known as Fauvists through the critique of an art critic, referring to the work of one of their shows as "Donatello au milieu des fauves!" (translation: Donatello among the wild beasts). He is best known for such works as “ The Dessert: Harmony in Red (The Red Room)”, oil on canvas 1908, and “The Dance” oil on canvas 1909.
National Gallery of Art
Matisse Museum
artcyclopedia
artchive
wikipedia
artelino
Matisse.net

random:
surprise…