The Fine Art Thread

[JM]

Well, I couldn't find a dedicated thread about fine art here, so I thought it was about time we had one. This is discussion about art, so I think it goes here, not in the galleria.

All I'm after here is for everyone to list their favorite artists. Modern art, Classical, Asian, Sculpture, whatever. Just tell us who you like & why. Provide links or attach images if at all possible. I'm sure the members of this board have diverse enough tastes to ensure that we are all exposed to something new through this thread.

**Please, lets keep this limited to fine artists. No anime, Video Game, or Comic book/Manga art here. There are already threads & boards dedicated to that. Thanks**

Alphonse Mucha - One of my very favorite artists. He is one of the forefathers of Art Nouveau, most of his work was commercialy comissioned. This doesn't keep it from having some of the finest linework & design I have ever seen.


Gustav Klimt - Just amazing. I have a hard time picking one painting to show here, so I will go with a more obscure piece. I just love his use of patterns.


Odd Nerdrum - A Swedish painter from Oslo, Nerdrum paints in the style of the 17th century masters. His execution is amazing. I could sit & study his work for hours. Be forewarned! His subject matter is sometimes very disturbing. Any of you who whined about having to draw a penis, may want to avoid digging any deeper into his work.


Ivan Albright - insanely detailed paintings that generally tended to show things in various states of disarray & decay. The detail in his work is staggering, & it is wonderfully creepy.


OK, that is enough from me for now, I will post more later.
Discuss & enjoy.

JM

[Tracer]

I wish I knew more about it ^^;

The nerd inside me says, "umm... I like the art in Panzer Dragoon." I lack culture

[Rich]

I love all the art from The Divine Comedy. This is my favorite, though.

[Tracer]

Hey, that's used on Emperor's "Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk" album. Cool find.

[Rich]

Which?

[Tracer]

The one you posted.

[Rich]

Ah.
Sonuvabitch took me 2 hours to find on the internet, because apparently it goes by 2 names, and the amount of art in The Divine Comedy is staggering, so I had to search..ALOT of art, and most stuff I searched didn't even have it. Even searching for Gustave Dore (Artist), I couldn't find it.

[Lobo]

M. C. Escher is probably my favorite artist. His spatial illusions, impossible buildings, and tessellations are all a mix of mathematics and art.

A fine example of one of his impossible buildings is "Waterfall"


"Day & Night" does a fine job of showing the incorporation of tessellations.


More odd architecture in "Ascending and Descending;" whose main focal point is an endless loop of stairs.

[Diff-chan]

I enjoy Medieval Art. Byzantine Art is stunning, especially the mosaics and the illuminated manuscripts, and Gothic Art is among the best the world has ever produced. When you get into late Medieval/Early Renaissance, its a real treat.

Here is a picture from San Vitale in Ravenna, of Empress Theodora. This picture quality sucks ass, but when you realize that mosaics are basically little cubes fitted together, you can kinda get an idea of how cool they are:


Byzantine Mosaics are incredible, especially later ones (900+). This is an earlier one, from maybe 550.

Anyway, here's the Book of Hours for Jeanne d'Evreux, from 1325-1328:



The Book of Hours was a fabulous marriage of form and function. If anybody has ever had the pleasure of seeing one of these in person (drag your ass to a museum), it's pretty fucking awesome. They're so small (this book is roughly 3"x3", so you can imagine it), so beautiful. The art style here is called graisalle, and its meant to emulate sculpture. Oftentimes, though, the artists used gold extensively, which gives the pages a brilliant, vibrant, lively look - which is the total opposite of the adjectives that pop in one's head with the word "gothic".

The pictures that are shown here, if you're not up on your Gospels, is of Judas' Betrayal and the Anunciation. Cool stuff.

One of the most stunning examples of Medieval Art is the 10th century Book of Kells. Here's one picture from it:



You can spend a fair bit of time just enjoying each individual page, but this is a huge work, about 340 pages I think, and many are lavishly detailed like this one. You need a higher quality picture, though, to fully see the craftmanship in the work. Most of the latticework is created out of a single thread! You can't see that on this picture.

Gothic Sculpture is simply brilliant. Oftentimes entire Biblical stories would be told in sculpture, or there would be processions of kings, saints, etc. Gothic Cathedrals often had 50 or more sculptors working on them, and for the most part, individual styles were suppressed so that the look would be consistent. Quite amazing if you think about it:



And few seem to really appreciate stained glass, though it's amazing and stunning. This is from Chartres in France.


Nobody really gives Medieval Art the time of day anymore, which is a shame, because its obviously brilliant in so many ways.

[Green]

Originally posted by JM
**Please, lets keep this limited to fine artists. No anime, Video Game, or Comic book/Manga art here. There are already threads & boards dedicated to that. Thanks**
JM

But could any of these guys draw an awesome Nightcrawler?
I like this thread.