How is it possible to break artistic rules and still create a great painting? That question has led to a compelling group exhibition for both the eyes and mind.

“Over the years,” writes McBride Gallery owner Cynthia McBride, “I have heard artists comment that a painting just delivered to the gallery ‘may have broken the rules’ but, ‘it’s one of my favorites!’ These are the same artists who teach workshops, instructing painters in the long-standing traditions for a well-designed composition. It made me curious.” The results? A fascinating group exhibition titled “Breaking the Rules.”

Opened on April 2, “Breaking the Rules” features several works that have used — and compensated for — “errors” in such traditional design principles as balance, harmony, and the rule of thirds, among others. Represented artists include Valerie Craig, Howard Eberle, Charlie Hunter, Abigail McBride, Terry Miller, Larry Moore, Jason Sacran, John Brandon Sills, and Carol Lee Thompson.

To learn more, visit McBride Gallery.

This article was featured in Fine Art Today, a weekly e-newsletter from Fine Art Connoisseur magazine. To start receiving Fine Art Today for free, click here.

In this ongoing series, Fine Art Today delves into the world of portraiture, highlighting historical and contemporary examples of superb quality and skill. This week we feature a stunning contemporary portrait that recalls Renaissance origins.

I suppose that it shouldn’t come as a surprise that classically trained and internationally acclaimed painter Jacob Collins creates vivid portraits that are steeped in tradition. This week’s featured portrait, titled “Carlos,” appears to be taken straight from the Italian Renaissance playbook — a frontal, stoic, and superbly executed visage set against a landscape.

Imaged in bust, “Carlos” — a gray-bearded man wearing a cap, turtleneck sweater, vest, and cardigan — stares blankly outside of the frame just toward the viewer’s left. The landscape beyond displays a few mountains along with some evergreen trees and feathery clouds at dusk. Along with the sitter’s clothing, the overall tone of the canvas is muted and shadowed. However, this allows the face of “Carlos” to sparkle and separate from the surface. The smooth light that blankets his face draws our attention to those subtle details that make him an individual.

Intriguing are his expression and gaze, which beg contemplation from the viewer. What is he looking at? What is he thinking? As such, the arresting portrait evokes participation from the viewer, a consideration of the unknown identity behind the image.

To learn more, visit Jacob Collins.

This article was featured in Fine Art Today, a weekly e-newsletter from Fine Art Connoisseur magazine. To start receiving Fine Art Today for free, click here.

by Max Gillies, contributing writing to Fine Art Connoisseur Magazine

Horses have played a starring role in art from its very beginnings.  On the walls of the Chauvet cave complex in southern France—believed to be approximately 30,000 years old—they appear prominently among the animals these prehistoric artists recorded.  And of course horses’ dynamism drives forward the procession depicted in the British Museum’s Elgin Marbles (5th century BCE), which originally adorned the Parthenon in Athens.

From the Crusades and Genghis Khan to Columbus and the Wold West, horses have featured in human history every step of the way, universally revered for their speed, power, grace, intelligence, and nobility.  When we learn of horses being eaten by famine victims or dispatched to the glue factory, we are instinctively repulsed because they are not merely animals to us: they are somehow a version of our better selves, regardless of whether we have mounted one, or even touched one.

This is an excerpt from “The Timeless Appeal of Horses”. Find the full article in the March / April 2017 Edition of Fine Art Connoisseur Magazine.

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The nude figure has been a muse for academic painters for quite some time, and a celebration of this tradition is underway at one of the nation’s top ateliers, in New Jersey.

The Florence Academy is synonymous with representational and fine art excellence at home and abroad. Many of the atelier’s graduates have gone to establish incredible careers with major exhibitions and gallery representation.

The Academy is currently celebrating the tradition of academic nude drawing during a stunning group exhibition in early 2017. Opened on February 13, “Drawn to Life” features more than 14 masterful works on paper and is “a unique opportunity to view a rare collection of American, French, and Russian academic drawings and paintings that have been put together thanks to the generous loans from The Art Students League as well as private collectors and friends of the Academy,” the organization writes.

Among the artists included in the exhibition are Richard Tweedy, Augustus Vincent Tack, Louis Fancher, Victor Hecht, and Dennis Miller Bunker. Two rarely seen paintings by Abbott Thayer will also be on view.

“Drawn to Life” will remain on view through May 5. To learn more, visit The Florence Academy of Art.

This article was featured in Fine Art Today, a weekly e-newsletter from Fine Art Connoisseur magazine. To start receiving Fine Art Today for free, click here.

Our souls age like a fine wine as our physical elements diminish as Father Time taps us on the shoulder. Artist and Iceland native Vala Ola has made it her mission to capture the inner light that resides in all human beings — a venture that has been achieved time and again.
 
Throughout her life and artistic career, Vala Ola has travelled the world from her native Iceland, to Europe and – since 1994 – the United States. At each stop, she’s come across countless individuals, each of them endowed with a soul that made them beautiful in their own special way. This, she asserts, has always been a driving force for her art. “My source of inspiration is always the figure and the soul that lives within,” she says. “The figure itself has its own beauty that can be a feast for the eye. Looking at people makes me want to create art. The challenge is to keep the soul of my subject alive through the process. The knowledge of anatomy and the technique of the Old Masters are tools which I use to breath life into the figure when sculpting or painting.”
 

Vala Ola, “Clear Vision,” bronze, (c) Vala Ola 2016

 
Primarily a sculptor today, Ola has also employed illustration, painting, and drawing — among other approaches — for the same artistic endeavors. Despite her eclectic range, her art has remained profoundly successful. And it should come as no surprise that the artist was greatly moved by the soulful master himself, Rembrandt van Rijn. Ola writes, “The body houses the soul. Rembrandt proved to me while I stood in front of him in the Metropolitan Museum that it is possible to capture the human soul and keep it alive through a work of art. I felt closer to him than to the people standing next to me. This is my chase: that the artwork keep the soul alive. Our bodies vanish but our soul lives on and can manifest through the artwork. The beauty of being an artist is that I feel a responsibility to see the deeper essence and in order to do that I not only want to exercise my technical skills, but also find myself wanting to grow within.” To be sure, it seems that Ola gains as much from her process as viewers and collectors do from her art.
 

Vala Ola, “River Song,” bronze, 14 x 7 x 4 in. (c) Vala Ola 2016

Vala Ola, “Ulele,” bronze, 8 ft. (c) Vala Ola 2016

 
Ola’s sculptures indeed display an uncanny sense of the soul, that energy that emanates from us all and requires a discerning artist to capture. Whether it be the casual play of children, the sensual touch of partners, or the commemoration of America’s native peoples, each work radiates life, purpose, and gravity. Ola adds, “There is a level of seeing where you can push through to see subtle shapes and colors you couldn’t before. There is also a spiritual understanding where the artist can bring life and soul even to a brick. This light has to also live within the artist in order to bring it forth.”
 

Vala Ola, “Sensuality,” bronze on wood base, 33 x 10 x 10 in. (c) Vala Ola 2016

 
Ola’s light must be bright, because many have noticed — and will continue to notice —her art, which has landed the artist several commissions for public monuments. “My primary goal in both life and art is to expand my heart” she adds, “and through my art to find a heart that beats like mine. Art feeds my soul.”
 

Vala Ola, “Lost Tribes Monument,” bronze, 8 x 6 1/2 ft. (c) Vala Ola 2016

 
I think many readers would agree that art feeds our souls as well, and as long as artists like Vala Ola are continuing to capture it, connoisseurs, collectors, and enthusiasts alike will have much to look forward to in the future.
 
To learn more, visit valaola.com
 
This article was featured in Fine Art Today, a weekly e-newsletter from Fine Art Connoisseur magazine. To start receiving Fine Art Today for free, click here.