David Gentleman has lived in London for almost seventy years, most of it on the same street. This book is a record of a lifetime spent observing, drawing and getting to know the city, bringing together work from across his whole career, from his earliest sketches to watercolours painted just a few months ago. Here is London as it was, and as it is today: the Thames, Hampstead Heath; the streets, canals, markets and people of his home of Camden Town; and at the heart of it all, his studio and the tools of his work. Accompanied by reflections on the process of drawing and personal thoughts on the ever-changing city, this is a celebration of London, and the joy of noticing, looking and capturing the world. 'David has spent a lifetime depicting with wit and affection a London he has made his own' Alan Bennett 'He delivers a poetry of exultant concentration ... The surface fusion of the sensuous and the sharply modern is echoed by Gentleman's imagery' Guardian 'The artist and illustrator has been responsible for some of the most-seen public artworks in this country' The Times 'Perhaps the last of the great polymath designer-painters' Camden New Journal
There is a world behind the canvas. Past the flat façade and the crackling paint is a realm where art lives, breathes, creates, and destroys. Claudia Miravista loves art but only sees what is on the surface-until the Dutch boy Pim appears in the painting in her room. Pim has been trapped in the world behind the canvas for centuries by a power-hungry witch, and he now believes that Claudia is his only hope for escape. Fueled by the help of an ancient artist and some microwaveable magic, Claudia enters the wondrous and terrifying world behind the canvas, intent on destroying the witch's most cherished possession and setting her new friend free. But in that world nothing is quite as it appears on the surface. Not even friendship.
In Bad Boy, renowned American artist Eric Fischl has written a penetrating, often searing exploration of his coming of age as an artist, and his search for a fresh narrative style in the highly charged and competitive New York art world in the 1970s and 1980s. With such notorious and controversial paintings as Bad Boy and Sleepwalker, Fischl joined the front ranks of America artists, in a high-octane downtown art scene that included Andy Warhol, David Salle, Julian Schnabel, and others. It was a world of fashion, fame, cocaine and alcohol that for a time threatened to undermine all that Fischl had achieved. In an extraordinarily candid and revealing memoir, Fischl discusses the impact of his dysfunctional family on his art—his mother, an imaginative and tragic woman, was an alcoholic who ultimately took her own life. Following his years as a student at Cal Arts and teaching in Nova Scotia, he describes his early years in New York with the artist April Gornik, just as Wall Street money begins to encroach on the old gallery system and change the economics of the art world. Fischl rebelled against the conceptual and minimalist art that was in fashion at the time to paint compelling portraits of everyday people that captured the unspoken tensions in their lives. Still in his thirties, Eric became the subject of a major Vanity Fair interview, his canvases sold for as much as a million dollars, and The Whitney Museum mounted a major retrospective of his paintings. Bad Boy follows Fischl’s maturation both as an artist and sculptor, and his inevitable fall from grace as a new generation of artists takes center stage, and he is forced to grapple with his legacy and place among museums and collectors. Beautifully written, and as courageously revealing as his most provocative paintings, Bad Boy takes the reader on a roller coaster ride through the passion and politics of the art world as it has rarely been seen before.
The first biography in over sixty years of a great American artist whose paintings are more famous than the man who made them. George Catlin has been called the “first artist of the West,” as none before him lived among and painted the Native American tribes of the Northern Plains. After a false start as a painter of miniatures, Catlin found his calling: to fix the image of a “vanishing race” before their “extermination”—his word—by a government greedy for their lands. In the first six years of the 1830s, he created over six hundred portraits—unforgettable likenesses of individual chiefs, warriors, braves, squaws, and children belonging to more than thirty tribes living along the upper Missouri River. Political forces thwarted Catlin’s ambition to sell what he called his “Indian Gallery” as a national collection, and in 1840 the artist began three decades of self-imposed exile abroad. For a time, his exhibitions and writings made him the most celebrated American expatriate in London and Paris. He was toasted by Queen Victoria and breakfasted with King Louis-Philippe, who created a special gallery in the Louvre to show his pictures. But when he started to tour “live” troupes of Ojibbewa and Iowa, Catlin and his fortunes declined: He changed from artist to showman, and from advocate to exploiter of his native performers. Tragedy and loss engulfed both. This brilliant and humane portrait brings to life George Catlin and his Indian subjects for our own time. An American original, he still personifies the artist as a figure of controversy, torn by conflicting demands of art and success.
Painting on canvas poses many exciting opportunities for the artist. Along with the immediacy, vibrancy and unpredictability of watercolours, it is a liberating and creative process. This practical book explains how to start painting with watercolours on canvas and goes on to encourage new style and experimentation. It gives step-by-step demonstrations on different techniques to achieve loose, dynamic images. It is a beautiful and passionate account of how to work on a non-traditional surface to achieve striking and innovative paintings. It covers; advice on selecting and preparing canvases to accept watercolour; ways to adapt your materials and working process to canvases; step-by-step demonstrations on different techniques to achieve loose, dynamic images; Ideas for experimentation, both in style and subject, and stunning, finished images to inspire; A beautiful book that shows how to paint with watercolour on canvas to achieve bold, stunning results. Of great interest to all artists and craftsmen, it is superbly illustrated with 149 colour photographs. Liz Chaderton is a professional watercolour artist and specializes in painting animals.
"A fun-filled art activity book that will encourage kids to express themselves while teaching them about key artistic styles and a selection of pioneering artists from history"--
Benny Andrews loved to draw. He drew his nine brothers and sisters, and his parents. He drew the red earth of the fields where they all worked, the hot sun that beat down, and the rows and rows of crops. As Benny hauled buckets of water, he made pictures in his head. And he dreamed of a better life—something beyond the segregation, the backbreaking labor, and the limited opportunities of his world. Benny’s dreams took him far from the rural Georgia of his childhood. He became one of the most important African American painters of the twentieth century, and he opened doors for other artists of color. His story will inspire budding young artists to work hard and follow their dreams.
A must-have reference book for today's artists and art students. Every artist needs to learn and master the still life. Written by a well-known artist and expert instructor, The Art of Still Life offers a comprehensive, contemporary approach to the subject that instructs artists on the foundation basics and advanced techniques they need for successful drawing and painting. In addition to Casey's stunning paintings, the work of over fifty past and present masters is included, so that the book will do double duty as a hardworking how-to manual and a visual treasure trove of some of the finest still life art throughout history and being created today.
"The best way to learn about art is to make it. Discover the secrets of great figure drawing as you sketch along with past and present masters. This working artist's sketchbook guides you from beginning gestures to delicate rendering. It's your art, your tradition, your time. Take your voice and add it to the tradition as if the history of art has saved the best for now."-- Juliette Aristides Figure Drawing Atelier offers a comprehensive, contemporary twist to the very traditional atelier approach to the methods that instruct artists on the techniques they need to successfully draw and ultimately paint the figure. The book offers art instruction, practical and progressive lessons on drawing the figure, and high-quality sketchbook paper in a beautiful package that includes blank pages for sketching and copying. Artists will then have a record of their process, like with a sketchbook, which many artists like to document and save. In this elegant and inspiring workbook, master contemporary artist and author Juliette Aristides breaks down the figure drawing process into small, manageable lessons, presents them progressively, introduces time-tested principles and techniques in the atelier tradition that are easily accessible, and shares the language and context necessary to understand the artistic process and create superior, well-crafted drawings. Atelier education is centered on the belief that working in a studio, not sitting in the lecture hall, is the best way to learn about art. Every artist needs to learn to master figure drawing. Ateliers have produced the greatest artists of all time--and now that educational model is experiencing a renaissance. These studios, a return to classical art training, are based on the nineteenth-century model of teaching artists by pairing them with a master artist over a period of years. Students begin by copying masterworks, then gradually progress to painting as their skills develop. Figure Drawing Atelier is like having an atelier in a book--and the master is Juliette Aristides, a classically trained artist and best-selling art-instruction author with almost rock star popularity in the contemporary world of representational art. On every page, Aristides uses the works of Old Masters and today's most respected realist artists to demonstrate and teach the principles of realistic figure drawing and painting, taking students step by step through the learning curve yet allowing them to work at their own pace. Unique and inspiring, this book offers a serious art course for serious art students and beginners alike.
