Satisfying Video Shows the Restoration of 17th Century Painting

 

Dora let her fingers hover over Monet’s signature but didn’t touch. “Don’t take off anymore, Jed. You could damage it.”

She was right. Jed stemmed his impatience and set the rag aside. “I know somebody who does some restoration work. She could probably handle this, and she’d keep quiet about it.”

Hidden Riches

_________________

Anonymous 18tn-century painter, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Adept restorers are a mix of art historians and chemists, examining a painting closely to determine the type of varnish and what agent will work best to dissolve it. Using test patches, they will see which chemicals work best to melt the yellowed layers of varnish, releasing the clear, brilliant colors below.

My Modern Met

The Creation of a Bronze Sculpture

Simone inspected every inch of the investment casting over the wax mold. 

She’d done the wax chasing, using delicate tools for minute scraping, 

hot tools for filling in imperfections. She studied it now, and deemed it ready. 

Shelter in Place

______________________

______________________

And the pour—that moment of truth—always enthralled her. Those quick movements of workers moving in unison, the fluid flow of deep, glowing gold like melted sunlight. 

Inside the shell, her work, her art, her vision filled with that melted sunlight. 

The negative became positive, and the symbol and study of the man she’d come to love would be born.

Shelter in Place 

Awesome Backyard Home Offices

Now she pulled open the door of the utility shed. It was a big square building, as wide as the

average barn, with hardwood floors and paneled walls. Uncle Jolley hadn't believed in the primitive.

Hitting the switch, she flooded the building with light.

As per her instructions, the crates and boxes she'd shipped had been stacked along one wall. The shelves where Uncle Jolley had kept his gardening tools during his brief, torrid gardening stage had been packed away. The plumbing was good, with a full-size stainless-steel sink and a small but more than adequate bath with shower enclosed in the rear. She counted five workbenches. The light and ventilation were excellent.

It wouldn't take her long, Pandora figured, to turn the shed into an organized, productive

workroom.

It took three hours.

A Will and A Way

____________________

Photo by Garrison Foundry Architecture + Decor - Look for living room design inspiration

Tour the personalized studios and sheds Houzz pros designed and built for themselves

HOUZZ

____________________

Boyd gave a hoot of laughter and opened the door of the workshop. "What do you think?"

The garage-size room was full of tables, machines, shelves, tools, stacks of wood There appeared to be a number of projects in progress, but Jonah couldn't tell what they were, or what they were intended to be.

"Impressive," he decided, diplomatically. "What do you do here?"

"I make a great deal of noise. Other than that, I haven't figured it out. I helped Keenan build a

bird-house about ten years ago. Came out pretty good. Cilia started buying me tools. Boy toys, she calls them."

He ran his hand over the guard of a skill saw. "Then I needed a place to keep them. Before I knew it, I had a fully equipped workshop. I think it was all a ploy to get me out of her hair."

Night Shield

Georgia O’Keeffe

"Could be we've got a thief with what you could call an eclectic taste in art. 

Me, I like that Georgia O'Keeffe stuff. It's bright, looks like what it is. 

I appreciate your time."

Homeport 

_____________

By Georgia O'Keeffe - High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Public Domain, 

https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=55040866

Beautiful flowers or provocative anatomy?

A traveling exhibition is willing to talk about something else already.

Double Scoop

Art Can Improve Your Room Design

The pretty plants and
bland pastel paintings on matte-white walls didn't hide the fact
that law was the order here. The carpet was a muted gray, the
deeper-toned chairs in the waiting area were likely just the wrong
side of comfortable.
"We wouldn't want people to be at their ease now, would we?" she
thought bitterly.

The Pride of Jared MacKade

_________________

Artwork can bring together the elements of a room by 
being a focal point, 

a color inspiration, a harmonizer 
and more

Photo by Horchow - More living room photos

Artwork can often make or break a space. 

HOUZZ

_________________

 She stopped by a landscape, all rocky hills and trees gone violent with autumn.

"This one," she decided. "He needs this one where that horrible white-orchid still life is hanging."

"I'd have thought you'd go for the orchids." When Regan turned, her eyes narrowed blandly, Savannah smiled fully 
for the first time. "Yeah, I can see I'd have been wrong."
"Greens and mauves," Regan announced. "Deep greens. And those chairs in the outer office have got to go. 
I've got a couple of library chairs in mind. Deep-cushioned, high-backed. Leather.
And I figure hardwood with area rugs, instead of that gray sea of
wall-to-wall."
Yes, of course. Savannah could already see it. Regan MacKade was obviously a woman who knew what she wanted. 
"Look, I'm not a humble person, but can you actually see my paintings jibing
with your taste... or Jared's?"
"Yes. And I think, all things considered, that you and I will work together very well." Regan held out a hand, waited. 
"Well, are we going to give Jared a break and get him out of that tomb?"

The Pride of Jared MacKade

"Paintings have a life of their own that derives from the painter's soul." ~Vincent Van Gogh

Van Gogh, she knew, could have done no better.

The Art of Deception

_____________________

This Exhibit Gives Visitors the Experience of Stepping Inside Van Gogh’s Paintings

Last year, Culturespaces introduced us to the Atelier des Lumières. Putting a technological twist on the glistening work of Gustav Klimt, this luminous exhibition magically transformed an old iron foundry in Paris into an immersive installation. Now, the Atelier des Lumiéres is back, turning that same space into a Vincent van Gogh wonderland.

My Modern Met

_____________________

She laughed. “Aye, an elephant. And a zebra

and a kangaroo. I’d like to see the paintings from

the artists you’ve seen, and the ones I found in your

books. Michelangelo and DaVinci, Van Gogh,

Monet, Beethoven.”

“Beethoven was a composer. I don’t believe

he could paint.”

Valley of Silence

Handbags that fit in the palm of your hand

Maybe Annika didn’t hit Riley’s goal of lightning round, 

but she managed to buy earrings

—two pair—sandals—one with five-inch heels 

she navigated as if born in them—

a tiny purse that would hold little more than air, 

but had a seashell clasp that charmed her.

Bay of Sighs

______________________

By Nick Karvounis nickkarvounis - https://unsplash.com/photos/FmD8tIkf8boarchive copy at the 

Wayback Machine (archived on 2 October 2016), CC0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=61780469

To say artist Phillip Nuveen has an eye for detail would be an understatement, as evidenced through his creation of perfect miniatures — exacting replicas of luxury items from high-fashion bags to midcentury modern chairs, all tiny enough to sit in the palm of your hand.

YAHOO!

‘I am still alive, I am still curious. I am not a piece of rotting flesh’ ~Agnès Varda

Turning, she studied the woman who sat in a royal-blue tufted chair.

The hair was pure white, but as full and thick as Laurel’s. It surrounded a face layered

and lined with wrinkles and unashamedly rouged. Olivia Armand wasn’t ashamed of

anything. Eyes as sharp and green as the emeralds in her ears studied Laurel in turn.

“Grandma.” With a sigh, Laurel bent to kiss her. “Will you never grow old?”

“Not if I have anything to say about it.” Her voice was raspy with age and stunningly

sensual.

Partners

_________________

By Festival Internacional de Cine en Guadalajara - cropped version of 18.03.10 Agnès Varda.

 © Cortesía de FICG 25 / Oscar Delgado, CC BY 2.0, 

https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=9855552

The 90-year-old giant of the Nouvelle Vague on her latest film, Faces Places, life with Jacques Demy, and that ‘dirty rat’ Jean-Luc Godard

Agnès Varda is a dizzying blur of dots – polka-dot trousers, polka-dot shirt, polka-dot socks, polka-dot scarf. “I’ve always loved polka dots. Ah, oui. It is a joyful shape, the polka dot. It is alive.” You could say the same of Varda. She is more joyously alive than anybody I have ever met.

GUARDIAN

Drawing can help you think and focus better

Since one of Sasha’s sketch pads sat on the table, he picked it up, 

took one of her pencils. He drew quickly.

The structure, to Riley’s eye, looked more like a barn

 than Bran’s house, but it made the point. So did the curved lines, 

the squiggles to represent garden paths, shrubs, trees, the cliff wall.

And as far as she could tell, he had everything in its place, 

and nearly to scale.

Island of Glass

___________________

UnknownUnknown author [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Do you ever draw? Most of us don't, and the reason we usually leave drawing to the artists is because we're not very good at it. Who wants to do something they're bad at? 

But maybe we should rethink this assumption, especially since drawing has so many benefits, artist or not.

Mother Nature Network

___________________

But it was the drawing on his worktable, one he'd anchored with an empty beer bottle and a chunk of quartz, that grabbed her attention.

He'd taken their grid, their site survey, their map and had created the settlement with paper and colored pencils.

There was no road now, no old farmhouse across it. The field was wider, the trees ranging along the creek, spreading shadows and shade.

Around the projected borders of the cemetery he'd drawn a low wall of rock. There were huts, grouped together to the west. More rocks and stone tools collected in the knapping area. Beyond, the field was green with what might have been early summer grain.

But it was the people who made the sketch live. Men, women, children going about their daily lives. A small hunting party walking into the trees, an old man sitting outside a hut, and a young girl who offered him a shallow bowl. A woman with a baby nursing at her breast, the men in the knapping area making tools and weapons.

There was a group of children sitting on the ground playing a game with pebbles and sticks. One, a young boy who looked to be about eight, had his head thrown back and was laughing up at the sky.

There was a sense of order and community. Of tribe, Callie noticed. And most of all, of the humanity Jake was able to see in a broken spear point or a shattered clay pot.

Birthright

Mentions in Nora's books

“It’s a favorite of mine, so I hope you like it.”
Curious, he ripped the protective brown paper off, then broke into a huge grin.
“You’re not going to believe this.”
“You have it already?”
“Nope. My mother does. Happens it’s one of her favorites, too.”
It pleased her to hear it. “I imagine she was fond of Maxfield Parrish’s work or she
wouldn’t have named her son after the artist.”
“She has a few of his prints. This one’s in her sitting room. What’s it called again?”

”Lady Violetta About to Make Tarts” Laine told him as they both studied the framed
print of a pretty woman standing in front of a chest and holding a small silver pitcher.

Remember When

________________

Beautiful: Ceramics Masters doing their work

The wheel hummed. The clay spun, succumbing to the pressure of her hands, 
yielding to the unrelenting demands of her imagination. 
She formed a thick-walled ring, pressing her thumb in the center of the ball, 
then slowly, very slowly, pulled it upward between her thumb and fingers to form
 a cylinder. She could flatten it into a plate now, open it into a bowl, 
perhaps close it into a sphere, according to her own pleasure. 

She was both in control and driven. 
Her hands dominated the clay as surely as 
her creativity dominated her. 

All the Possibilities

Ian @ MacGregors

_____________________

_____________________

The afternoon sun poured into Megan‟s studio. 
She was oblivious to it, and to the bird song outside the windows. 
Her mind was focused on the clay her hands worked with,
 or, more precisely, 
on what she saw in the partially formed mound.   

Less of a Stranger 

Memory Games

He smelled of rain and soap and... 

Brut, she realized. 

And the aftershave had some flicker of memory 

trying to light in her brain. 

Remember When

_________________________

By Frieda Menshausen-Labriola - Offizieller Katalog 
der Münchener Jahres-Ausstellung 1900 im kgl. 
Glaspalast, 2. Ausgabe, Verlag der Münchner Künstlergenossenschaft
München, 23. Juni 1900, Public Domain, 
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=11090195

Smelling Art with Sissel Tolaas

We’re used to looking at art, hearing art, perhaps touching it. But smelling? This artist is trying to change the way we think about using our noses.

BROADSHEET

Artist Surprises Girlfriend

 He tapped one of the sketches. 
"Thats her. Thats you, Cilla. Just the way I see you."


Tribute

___________________

Artist Surprises Girlfriend with Illustrations of Them Together in 10 Different Cartoon Styles

Minnesota-based character artist and graphic designer Kells O'Hickey decided to use his drawing skills to make a creative gift for his girlfriend, Lindsay. His illustrations depict portraits of the couple in the style of 10 of their favorite cartoons. From Disney to anime, the thoughtful drawings showcase the talented artist’s diverse drawing skills.

MY MODERN MET

___________________

She took the paper back from him and stuck it in her pocket. It was something she intended to keep forever. 

“You’ve used me rather lavishly in your work recently.” 

She had to tilt back her head in order to keep her eyes level with his. Grant thought she looked more regal than ever. If she turned her thumb down, she could throw him to the lions.  

“Didn’t it occur to you to ask permission first?”

“Artist’s privilege.”

One Man's Art

Go Ahead—Draw On The Walls

“She showed me the mural in the parlor. The one with all the mythical creatures.” 

“I was twenty, and romantic.” 

And he’d asked his mother a dozen times to have it painted over. 

“I like it.” 

Gabriel's Angel

__________________

Mom and Dad always said not to draw on the walls. These two Minneapolis women politely disagree.

Imagine wallpaper, minus the paper. Just an imaginative pattern painted directly on the canvas that is your home. Sure, it’s unorthodox. But for Minneapolis artists Kate Worum and Jennifer Jorgensen, it’s an expression of bravery—in style, and in life.

MidwestLiving

__________________

“What’s wrong with unicorns and centaurs and fairies?” 

“They have their place, I suppose.” 

Gabriel's Angel

Fashionable Masterpieces

"I spent a lot of time studying that face. Then you walked into the room that day,

and I was staggered. She woke up, and she walked out of the painting, and there she is."

"But it isn't me in the painting."

"Ssh. I couldn't think."

Key of Valor

_________________

Artistic Masterpieces Behind Modern Fashion

MY MODERN MET

Prince Rupert's drops

"I've something for you." Watching him, she took one of the glass drops from her pocket, held it out in her palm.

"It looks like a tear."

"Aye." She waited while he held it to the light and studied it.

He rubbed a thumb over the smooth glass. "Are you giving me your tears, Maggie?"

"Perhaps I am." She took another one out of her pocket. "It comes from dropping hot glass in water.

When you do, some shatter right away, but others hold and form. Strong." She crouched and chose a rock. While Rogan watched she struck the glass with rock. "Strong enough that it won't break under a hammer." She rose again, holding the undamaged drop. "It holds, you see. Does nothing more than bounce away from the blow and shine. But there's this thin end here and it only takes a careless twist."

She took the slim, trailing end between her fingers. The glass turned to harmless dust. "It's gone, you see. Like it never was."

Born in Fire

___________________

400 year-old mystery of Prince Rupert's drops finally cracked

A Prince Rupert's drop looks like a glass tadpole from a beginner's crafts festival, but it's so strong it can take a hammer hit without breaking. That would be impressive enough, but if you break its tail, which can be done with finger pressure, the drop explodes into powder. The reason for this has mystified scientists for 400 years, but a team from Purdue University, the University of Cambridge, and Tallinn University of Technology in Estonia finally has an answer.

NEW ATLAS

Bring Out Your Inner Artist

But she was already moving in, eyes wide and delighted. 
"You're an artist. This is wonderful. You sculpt."
The single room was nearly as big as the main area of the cottage. And much more cramped. A
worktable stood in the center, crowded with tools and hunks of stone, pots of clay. A half dozen sketch pads were tossed around. Shelves and smaller tables were jammed with examples of his work. Mystical, magical creatures that danced and flew.
A blue mermaid combed her hair on a rock. A white dragon breathed fire. Faeries no bigger than her thumb ringed in a circle with faces sly. A sorcerer nearly as tall as she, held his arms high and wept. 
"They're all so alive, so vivid." She couldn't help herself, she had to touch, and so she ran her finger down the rippling hair of the mermaid.


Ever After

_________________

See how fine artists, writers and other creatives make room for their talents to roam free

Photo by Sarah Greenman - Discover farmhouse living room design inspiration

Whether you are a professional, working artist or have art-related dreams, a dedicated studio space fuels your creativity. Here are seven home studios that may inspire you to dust off your paintbrush or potter’s wheel.

HOUZZ

_________________

Cilla saw the gorgeous wide-planked chestnut floor, the beautiful tall windows and the wide,
glossy trim. “
"What a wonderful room."
“"Big. It was designed as the master bedroom, but I don’t need this much space to sleep.”"
Cilla tuned into him again, and into the various workstations set up in the room. 
Five large, and very ugly, filing cabinets lined one wall. Shelves lined another with what seemed to be a ruthless organization of art supplies and tools. He’d devoted another section to action figures and accessories. She recognized a handful of the collection, and wondered why Darth Vader and Superman appeared so chummy.
A huge drawing board stood in the center of the room, currently holding what she assumed to be the panels he’d talked about. Spreading out from it on either side, counters and cubbies held a variety of tools, pencils, brushes, reams of paper. Photographs, sketches, pictures torn or cut out of magazines of people, places, buildings. Still another leg of the counter held a computer, printer, scanner—a Buffy the Vampire Slayer action figure.
Opposite that, to form a wide U, stood a full-length mirror.
"“That’s a lot of stuff."”
"“It takes a lot of stuff."


Tribute