Thomas R. Dunlay

Thomas R. Dunlay
Thomas R. Dunlay is a painter from Boston who, on finding the instruction offered in the art school in which he initially enrolled lacking in the traditional methods he sought, turned to individual instruction — first with Boston painter Robert Douglas Hunter, and then with Hunter’s teacher, the renowned R.H. Ives Gammell.

Dunlay paints brilliant, sun-infused landscapes, lyrically atmospheric cityscapes, and figurative works that, to my eye, show the influence of the great “Boston School” painters like Frank W. Benson, Edmund Tarbell and William McGregor Paxton, (who were in turn, Gammell’s teachers).

Dunlay’s oils appear at times to have a fascinating textural quality, almost suggestive of pastel, but it’s difficult to tell in the relatively small images on his website.

Unfortunately, his website is devoted primarily to the sale of prints, so there is little information on his technique, or the size and materials of the originals. There are a few examples of originals on the Lilypad Gallery website. There is also an article on South Boston Today.

Dunlay teaches workshops in Maine and Nantucket.

 
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Eye Candy for Today: Daniel Ridgway Knight’s Shepherdess of Rolleboise

The Shepherdess of Rolleboise, Daniel Ridgway Knight
The Shepherdess of Rolleboise, Daniel Ridgway Knight

On Google Art Project. High resolution downloadable image available on Wikimedia Commons. Original is in the Brooklyn Museum.

I know that Knight’s softly atmospheric pastoral scenes were crafted to be appealing to a certain sensibility, and I’m all-in on that.

 
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Paleo artist shows us new feathered dinosaur species, “The Chicken from Hell”

New feathered dinosaur, Anzu wyliei, paleo art by Robert F. Walters
When new discoveries are made in paleontology, most interestingly in the realm of dinosaurs, it’s up to paleo artists to interpret the findings and give them a visual form based on the available scientific data.

In this case, a new dinosaur species was discovered by scientists from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History, the Carnegie Museum of Natural History and the University of Utah — not by digging in the earth, but by digging through existing fossils in the collections of several museums and piecing together the evidence.

Anzu wyliei, as the new dinosaur is called, sports some jaunty feathers and looks a bit like the nightmare chicken of your worst post bar-b-que dreams; and some of the scientists on the team have nicknamed it “The Chicken from Hell”.

As reported in the article, “One Scary Chicken—New species of large, feathered dinosaur discovered“, on Smithsonian Science, the name is taken in part from the name of a feathered demon from ancient Mesopotamian myths. The beast was about 5 feet tall at the hips and 11 feet long.

The new find is here brought to life by noted paleo artist Robert F. Walters, who I have profiled before. Walters and his partner, Tess Kissinger, created the dramatically large mural of the Hell Creek Formation at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History, and are well versed in the visual reconstruction of animals from this period.

 
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Welcoming Spring with John William Waterhouse

John William Waterhouse
Today marks the Vernal Equinox.

Sigh.

I can’t think of a painter who does “Spring” better than J.W. Waterhouse, and I’ve selected a few of his wonderful paintings depicting the season, or just young women and flowers.

Sigh.

For more Waterhouse, see my previous posts, below; and for an additional variety of paintings to celebrate spring, revisit Irene Gallo’s “Picturing Spring: An Equinox Celebration” on Tor.com.

 
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Fallin’ Floyd

Fallin' Floyd
Fallin’ Floyd is an 8 minute animated short from the Netherlands, written and directed by Albert’t Hooft and Paco Vink.

It chronicles a romantically jilted jazz musician, and his struggle through the resulting bout with depression, as portrayed by a little demon figure.

The film is well realized, and effectively changes color palettes to create mood in particular scenes. At least partially CGI, judging from the motion, it nonetheless has a nice hand-drawn look and feel.

[Via Digg]

 
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Joseph McGurl

Joseph McGurl
Well known American landscape painter Joseph McGurl works both in plein air an larger studio compositions. McGurl draws on the traditions of the American landscape painters of the 19th century, but in his pursuit of light, has a fresh, contemporary approach.

McGurl is based on Cape Cod, and many of his scenes are of the coast. Some of them are painted from the deck of his 44 foot sailboat Atelier.

His website has examples of his work in plein air and in the studio, and you can find others on the sites of the galleries in which he is represented (linked below).

 
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