The elegantly refined still life paintings of Belgian painter Stefaan Eyckmans resonate with the traditions of the 17th century “Golden age” Dutch and Flemish still life masters, as well as evoking the sense of stillness and the transformation of the ordinary into the extraordinary exemplified by Chardin.

Taught primarily by his father, painter and commercial artist Louis Eyckmans, Stefaan Eyckmans took inspiration from his norther European predecessors as well as more contemporary artists.

Primarily, however, he takes his inspiration from life, and the clarity of presentation that comes from keenly focused observation.

His website contains three galleries of his work, and you can see more on the websites of galleries in which he is represented (linked below).

[Via Jeffrey Hayes]

Even though most people in North America, north of the 37th parallel or so, are pretty tired of seeing show (and wishing they could send it to Sochi, where they are apparently having trouble keeping it from melting during the Winter Olympics), there is one sub-group of people who see snow differently — painters.

Some painters see in the snow covered landscape a subject as irresistible as the most brilliant colors of spring. This was particularly true among the French Impressionists, who pursued their fascination with the effects of light on the landscape avidly in the snows of winter.

Monet, Pissarro and Caillebotte are known for their landscapes in which they evoked the “effect of snow”. The fascination with snow scenes was especially strong for Alfred Sisley, who painted villages, roads and hillsides that convey not only the subtle light and color of the snowy landscape, but the sense of stillness and quiet that is part of the experience.

There is a page on the Web Gallery of Art that lists and links to larger versions of many of the paintings shown above.