Comic Book Cartography is a blog by John Hilgart in which he features maps, charts, diagrams, infographics and — always my favorite — cut-away views from the pages of comics past.
[Via Wired]
The Color of Nature: Recent Acquisitions of Landscape Watercolors is a new exhibition at the National Gallery of Art, DC, in which they are highlighting 15 watercolor and gouache paintings acquired in recent years.
Like drawings and other works on paper, watercolors can’t be on permanent display in museums because of their susceptibility to light damage, so museum exhibitions of watercolors are worth taking advantage of.
Unfortunately, the online presentation of the exhibition is not well organized for browsing (one of my disappointments in the NGA’s fairly recent website makeover). You must click “Related Works” in the right hand column of the exhibition’s information page to be presented with a list of the works, accompanied by tiny thumbnails (literally thumbnail size – c’mon, this is 2014, not 1994), you must then click through to the dedicated image page to view a zoomable image or follow links to download some (though not all) of the images. It’s worth the effort, though, as there are some beautiful pieces here.
To download the highest resolution versions of the images, you must sign up for a free account, but the ones that don’t require sign-up (download arrow with a single underline) are large enough to enjoy. See my post on NGA Images for more information.
The Color of Nature will be on Display in the NGA West Gallery until September 14, 2014.
(Images above, first three with detail crops: Franz Skarbina, François-Louis Français, Anton von Werner, Jules-Ferdinand Jacquemart, Henri-Joseph Harpignies, François-Auguste Ravier, Franz Kaisermann)
Wapping Warf, James McNeil Whistler
Original is roughly 6×9 inches (15x23cm). In the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Use download or enlarge icons below image.
Another of Whistler’s stellar etchings of riverfront architecture and activity — a beautiful use of line and texture.
Eva Gonzalès was a 19th century Franch painter associated with the Impressionist circle.
More specifically, after studying with portrait painter Charles Chaplin, she became the only formal pupil of Édouard Manet. Manet’s influence is certainly visible in some of her work.
Manet painted a portrait of her in which she is posed as if painting one of Manet’s own works, and she posed for a number of other painters in the wider Impressionist circle.
Gonzalès died young, at the age of 34, while giving birth. I’m uncertain how prolific she was as a painter, as sources of information and images are somewhat scattered and incomplete.
The best resource for her work is The Athenaeum. There is at least one high-res image on the Google Art Project.
I’m particularly drawn to some of her still life subjects, in which she has obviously absorbed Manet’s lessons, and begun to go her own way with them.
Sekishozan (Shi-shung-shan, South China), Hiroshi Yoshida
Large version here.
As much as I recognize and admire the influence Japanese printmakers had on European artists, notably the French Impressionists, my favorite synthesis of Japanese and European artistic conventions is found in the woodblock prints of Japanese painter and printmaker Hiroshi Yoshida.
There is something about his blend of lines and colors (if you’ll excuse the expression), his suggestions of texture, atmospheric perspective, evocative composition and choice of subject matter that just connects directly to the pleasure center of my visual cortex.
This version of the print is from Ukiyo-e Search (my post here), on which you can find more images by Hiroshi Yoshida and many other superb printmakers (Timesink warning!).
Xiaodi Jin is a freelance concept artist based in Bejing, China. Beyond, that, I can find little information, and only a few images.
The images that are available, however, are tantalizing — wonderfully atmospheric and textural — and leave me waiting for more.
[Via Spectrum Fantastic on Twitter @SFantasticAL]
