PragmaticStatistic

Here is something a bit radical and different. I bet most of you never thought of what I am going to show you as art. But such natural art rivals that of Jackson Pollack.

Creative Concrete Canvas.wmv - YouTube

Fireatwill

My current favorite work of art:

BBC News - Artist Banksy 'marks Queen's Jubilee'

Young Guard

PubliusBassus

Glad to see some William Bouguereau love on this forum (especially tjadams). Bouguereau is by far the most underrated painter - his works are masterful and his career was as accomplished as an artist's can be. He is arguably the best figurative painter of all time, and easily one of the great artists of all time. Unfortunately, he came along at a time when Academic painting was falling out of favor and the Impressionists were rising. Had he lived a century earlier, he would be a household name. Thankfully his image is being resurrected somewhat. Here are some of my favorites:

Nymphs and Satyr - elite level figurative painting



Flagellation of Christ - combination of religious theme and another superb figurative work


Song of the Angels - vintage Bouguereau


Orestes and the Furies - classical theme, more excellent figures


The Secret - enigmatic, idyllic, pastoral, faintly erotic.

i_am_the_walrus

My avatar is one of my favourite paintings. Picasso's Old Guitarist:

i_am_the_walrus

Also Rene Magritte's The Empire of Light:

Solidaire

Wonderful paintings, especially the Magritte one!

Linschoten

Yes, especially the Magritte!

PragmaticStatistic

With all this exotic art mixed in with the religious art, its getting hard to focus on the brush technique, composition, light transition, emotion, focus, and the other important characteristics that make a great painting.

PubliusBassus

I also like Joseph Wright of Derby, along with French artists Paul Delaroche, and his pupil, Adolphe Yvon, both of whom specialized in evocative historical paintings.

Wright of Derby was famous for his dramatic candlelit scenes that often chronicled the Enlightenment, and landscape paintings, such as these:

Bird in the Air Pump Experiment - one of my favorite paintings



The Synot Children



Paul Delaroche is famous for his historical paintings:

The Execution of Lady Jane Grey - excellent painting, not at all accurate historically, but technically and emotionally superb


Cromwell before the Coffin of Charles I - again, historically unlikely but nonetheless emotionally poignant


Central Panel of the Hemicycle at the Ecole des Beaux Arts depicting the architect and sculptors of the Parthenon (seated in the center), with the female figures representing muses and goddesses of art


Adolphe Yvon was a student of Delaroche, and painting primarily commissioned historical depictions. The paintings below respresent quasi-historical events with plenty of metaphorical trappings.

Caesar


Genius of America