Friday, October 30, 2009

I'm still travelling. I'll be back in a week. See you then.
• A guide to museum women. A must read. (identitiytheory)
• Giving Damien Hirst a hard time. (The Times) (The Telegraph)

Thursday, October 29, 2009

• F. Scott Fitzgerald's tax returns. (The American Scholar)
• Was chess master Bobby Fisher a genius or an idiot? (CSI)

























Burning Maple Leaves to Heat Sake

woodblock print c. 1766

Suzuki Harunoba 1724-1770. Art Institute of Chicago.

Wednesday, October 28, 2009


























Act Seven

woodblock print 1801-2

Kitagawa Utamaro 1756-1806: from the series Treasury of the Royal Retainers. Art Institute of Chicago.

Monday, October 26, 2009


























Asakura Rice Field During the Cock Festival at the Otori Shrine

woodblock print 1857

Ando Hiroshige 1797-1858: from One Hundred Views of Edo 1857. Art Institute of Chicago.

Sunday, October 25, 2009

• Beauty and the bento box, and the question of Japanese aesthetics. (The New York Times)
• The photography of British photographer Jane Brown. (The Guardian)
• Irving Penn photographs at the National Portrait Gallery in London. (The Guardian)

Thursday, October 15, 2009

• Peter Paul Rubens the diplomat. (The Wall Street Journal)
• The Somme. (The Atlantic)

























Cloud Study

gouache
20.3 x 20.3 cm (8" x 8")


Wednesday I found myself on the top level of a car parkade staring at a bright sky with large clouds. The painting is the remembrance of one particular cloud.






























Pregnant Model No. 2

ink and gouache
30.5 x 22.9 cm (12" x 9")


This is a reworking of yesterday's drawing. I've made a couple of changes: the left leg has been moved down to be more in line with the hip, and the eye has been darkened.

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

• Canadian collector Peter Silverman may have a new Leonardo. (CBC News)
• Lehman Brothers is auctioning off its' art collection, beginning November 1st in Philadelphia. (The Wall Street Journal) (via C-Monster)
• The fall of nuclear physics. (The New Atlantis)






























Pregnant Model

ink and gouache
30.5 x 22.9 cm (12" x 9")


The model for this drawing was admirably still. Her unborn baby, however, was not. He, or she, could be seen bopping along with the music which was playing.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

• McDonald's conquers the Louvre. (edward_ winkleman)
• George Washington, made in China. (ARTnews)




















Cowboy Hat No. 2

ink and pastel
27.9 x 25.4 cm (11" x 10")


I'm not sure what inspired the delicate colouring. I guess pastels aren't called pastels for nothing.

Monday, October 12, 2009

• Winnipeg artist Andrew Valko has won the Kingston Prize for Portraiture present every year by the City of Kingston, Ontario. (CBC News)
• Current artistic repression in Russia. (ARTnews)
• Leon Trotsky and his like of self-deception. (Literary Review)
• A slideshow of art selected by the Obamas for the White House. (The New York Times)

























Boy with Baseball Glove

ink
27.9 x 22.9 cm(11" x 9")


I've never been quite sure about this drawing. For one thing, that's an awfully big baseball glove.

Saturday, October 10, 2009

• What kind of investment is art? (Reuters) (via C-Monster)
• Irving Penn died on Wednesday. (The New York Times)

Thursday, October 08, 2009

• Alfred Brendel, poet. (The Times)
• The ghost of Thomas Hobbes. (The Nation)


























Hands

ink and charcoal
27.9 x 20.3 cm (11" x 8")


This pose was made for a painting. The model's hair was dark and she was wearing black. The only colour was in her face and hands. It would have made for a dramatic painting. I might yet try to make something out of it.

Wednesday, October 07, 2009

• Nero had a rotating banquet hall. No surprise. (Yahoo!News) (via C-Monster)
• The French. (The Financial Times)
• A short history of Dazzle camouflage. (Wikipedia)
M. as a Gourd
ink and charcoal
20.3 x 27.9 cm (8" x 11")


The title is probably self-explanatory. In this drawing M.'s body looks like a ____ .

Tuesday, October 06, 2009

House of Fire by Winnipeg artist Sarah Anne Johnson has been acquired by the Art Gallery of Ontario. (CBC News)
• Don't you wish that Knut Hamsun hadn't been such a nasty case? No? (The Wilson Quarterly)
• A villian in the collapse of AIG. (Vanity Fair)

























Man with His Eyes Closed

graphite, charcoal, and pastel
30.5 x 27.9 cm (12" x 11")

This particular man was a young dancer, a tired young dancer.

Friday, October 02, 2009

• Who or what was Andy Warhol? Three new books on Andy Warhol. (The New York Review of Books)
• Jackson Pollock signatures hidden in Pollock's paintings. (ARTnews) (Smithsonian)
Pensive Model
ink and watercolour
30.5 x 45.7 cm (12" x 18")


The leg looks like it might have a hard time connecting with the body in this drawing. Please ignore this.