Works from some of the most accomplished painters head to the walls of this equally esteemed New York City gallery through July 8. Are your favorites among them?
 
For years, Dacia Gallery in New York City has become synonymous with the top national and international artists. The tradition continues through July 8 with “Pictores Aestas” — a stunning group exhibition of works from numerous artists, including 11 featured artists.
 
Among the featured artists in the show are Dean Adams, Erin Anderson, Arik Bartelmus, Diana Corvelle, Joseph Daily, Brian DiNicola, Vincent Giarrano, Christopher LoPresti, Daniel Midman, Afnan Rauf, and Victoria Selbach. An artist reception and talk will be hosted at the gallery this evening, June 23, from 6 to 9 P.M. Eastern.
 
To learn more, visit Dacia 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 for Fine Art Today, we take a longer look at the history and features of a soon-to-be-available artwork of note. This week: Sir Peter Lely, “Self-Portrait.”
 
Although Sir Peter Lely (1618-1680) was born in the small German town of Westphalia to Dutch parents, the renowned artist would spend most of his career in England, completing a vast array of mythological works and dignified — sometimes royal — portraits.
 
Lely was a master of the Guild of Saint Luke in Haarlem in 1637; his early works display his penchant for mythological scenes with a distinct flair for Anthony van Dyck and the Dutch baroque. Arriving in London in 1640, Lely would eventually become the official portraitist for Charles I, his talent unmistakable even after the monarch’s execution.
 
A naturalized citizen of England in 1662, Lely led a prolific workshop and is considered one of the first English artists to leave an enormous mass of work. Among the most notable works by Lely are a series of about 10 portraits of ladies from the royal court, known as the “Windsor Beauties,” and a series of 12 portraits of the admirals and captains who fought in the Second Anglo-Dutch War, known as the “Flagmen of Lowestoft.”
 
Lely was known as a profound and talented portraitist, and the opportunity to own a personal work — his “Self-Portrait,” in fact — is one collectors should consider taking. Highlighting Sotheby’s July 5 and July 6 “Old Master and British Works on Paper” sale is Lely’s magnetic “Self-Portrait” drawing. Although it is executed with a dry rather than a wet medium, Lely has afforded his self-portrait the same attention, delicacy, and honor that can be seen in his royal portraits. Lely, shown in half-length while resting his arms on a ledge, gazes confidently out upon the viewer. Most attention has, naturally, been paid to his visage, while the rest of the drawing remains rather rough. Auction estimates for the exquisite drawing range from $874,000 to $1.1 million.
 
To view the full catalogue, visit Sotheby’s.
 
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.
 

Beauty. That’s what visitors to Oh-Be-Joyful Gallery can expect through June 26 in Crested Butte, Colorado. Can you guess the medium?
 
An exquisite display of watercolors by Carolyn Lord, Leon Loughride, Meredith Nemirov, and Peggy Stenmark is can be seen now through June 26 at Oh-Be-Joyful Gallery in Colorado.
 
The range of artists included will showcase for viewers a diverse range of approaches to watercolor — an often overlooked but wildly versatile and gorgeous medium. From beautiful floral compositions to landscapes and beyond, there will surely be something for everyone to enjoy.
 
To learn more, visit Oh-Be-Joyful 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.
 

Dutch and still life traditions reign supreme at Wally Workman in Texas this month, with an enticing group exhibition of works by the acclaimed Sarah Ferguson and James Andrew Smith.
 
It’s impossible to ignore an exhibition in which the names James Andrew Smith and Sarah Ferguson are included. Indeed, this is case through July 2 at Wally Workman Gallery in Austin, Texas. The works of the two artists will present the viewer with differing styles and approaches to the canvas, Ferguson preferring artistic experimentation with color gradation and geometric shapes while Smith’s pictures are firmly rooted in Dutch still life traditions.
 

Sarah Ferguson, “Pique PY+PGL+TW+PB,” 2016, acrylic on canvas, 30 x 30 in. (c) Wally Workman Gallery 2016

 
The gallery suggests, “Although their subject matter is quite different, the precise execution of their craft is quite similar. Viewing their works side by side brings a heightened appreciation to the relationship between the eye and the hand and the craft that they can defyingly produce.”
 
To learn more, visit Wally Workman 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.
 

An outstanding selection of beautiful domestic interiors by Aaron Morgan Brown graces the walls of this esteemed gallery through June 30. Don’t miss out!
 
The latest display of outstanding contemporary realism from painter Aaron Morgan Brown is currently on view at the lovely Gerald Peters Gallery in Santa Fe, New Mexico, through June 30.
 
The gallery reports, “Like his previous work, these recent paintings offer a transcription of the intersection of his subconscious mind and the everyday world, although their content is relatively distilled. They also display a renewed enthusiasm for the materiality of paint, although this has always been an abiding interest. The evolution of an artist is often elliptical, a series of uneven orbits around an innate sensibility, complete with seasonal changes.”
 
To learn more, visit Gerald Peters 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.
 

Gary Akers and Marieluise Hutchinson are, during this magnetic group exhibition in Massachusetts. Details here!
 
Tree’s Place — one of America’s finest contemporary galleries — is proud to play host to a joint exhibition of two of its staple artists: Gary Akers and Marieluise Hutchinson. Titled “The American Dream,” the exhibition will showcase each artist’s unique style with “compositions that reflect their patriotism and love of America,” the gallery suggests.
 

Marieluise Hutchinson, “Sailing by, Sandy Neck,” oil, (c) Marieluise Hutchinson 2016

 
“The American Dream” opens on June 18 and will be on view through July 1 at Tree’s Place Gallery in Orleans, Massachusetts. To learn more, visit Tree’s Place 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 searching for meaning, joy, and purpose in life, many find art, including artist Brad Overton. His mysterious yet compelling portraits are the subjects of a solo exhibition in Santa Fe.
 
In many ways, the works and creative process of Brad Overton truly embody artistry because of his openness to multiple sources of inspiration. Indeed, this just might be a common feature of all artists — individuals who continually find, and look, for their next masterpiece in all things.
 
“My paintings are realistic,” Overton writes. “The ideas I think of show up that way so that’s how I paint. All of my dreams are in realism. The whole world, in fact, looks pretty realistic to me. So I’m interested in that. I’m interested in the choices I can make, the inventory or ‘visual vocabulary’ I can build which is unique to me, but accessible to those I come into contact with through my paintings. At times I choose subjects or arrangements because they are funny, which is essential and miraculous. Other paintings are meant to host the sublime, which is the undercurrent of our world; its origin and mystery. Other paintings are meant to remind the viewer of an aspect or attribute to lay claim to. But the common thread is that they are meant to serve the viewer. I paint paintings that I want to see, that I can’t wait to paint. I simply trust my own interest and taste expecting others to come along.”
 
“Embodying Myth through Imagination: New Portraits and Figures by Brad Overton” opens on June 18. To learn more, visit Blue Rain 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.
 

Since the early 1960s, artist John Baeder has led an incredibly productive life as a fine artist, producing a wealth of painting, sculpture, watercolor, photography, and more. Haynes Galleries offers you the chance to revisit Baeder’s journey through small-town America.
 
Can you remember when gasoline cost 25 cents per gallon? Or when John F. Kennedy was elected president? It was during the “Swinging Sixties” that artist John Baeder began what would become a storied career — known for his paintings that captured a much simpler time in small-town America, whether that be classic aircraft, classic cars, or the roadside diners for which he is best known.
 
Opening June 30 at Haynes Galleries in Thomaston, Maine, “John Baeder: Work from 1962 to 2015” is a tantalizing retrospective that showcases the full breadth of Baeder’s artistic accomplishments. The Gallery writes, “‘John Baeder: Work from 1962 to 2015’ will include works from every point in Baeder’s career and thus present works in a variety of genres and media. His black-and-white photographs, originally taken in the 1960s before Baeder committed himself full time to painting, have only recently become available for display. Traveling through small-town America, Baeder photographed the rural poverty that still mired the South. He took his camera with him to Europe to explore not the grandiose architecture of the Old World but the mundane moments and lives of its ordinary people. These images are much more interested in the implied human relationships than in documenting the reality of the place. 
 

John Baeder, “Charlies Diner,” oil, (c) Haynes Galleries 2016

 
“Any exhibition on John Baeder and his career would be incomplete without his diner paintings. Made in watercolor and oil over the course of his career, the diner paintings are Baeder’s most known and acclaimed works. As Jay Williams elegantly explains in the new book, Baeder ‘was able to subtly convey that each diner or mom-and-pop eatery was at the heart, or was the hearth, of its community—a skill far more important than simply recording the transitory details of roadside subjects.’”
 
To learn more, visit Haynes Galleries.
 
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.
 

Art lovers will have a rare opportunity to see — and acquire — artworks from 50 top-tier painters and sculptors of Western art. Find out where you need to be on June 24 & 25.
 
Located in the heart of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado, Evergreen Fine Art Gallery has established itself as one of the nation’s top spaces for celebrated Western art. This perception will undoubtedly be bolstered on June 24 and 25 when the Gallery hosts its 6th Annual Weekend in the West Art Show and Auction, which will showcase works from 50 top painters and sculptors.
 

Don Stinson, “The Spud Redux,” oil, 30 x 73 in. (c) David B Smith Gallery 2016

 
Many of the works available for exhibition and purchase will be created over the weekend in Evergreen, Colorado. The gallery reports, “The bright galaxy of participating artists includes such recognized luminaries as Quang Ho, Edward Aldrich, G. Russell Case, Karen Roehl, Jeff Legg, David Santillanes, Pem Dunn, Jill Soukup, Ron Hicks, Walt Gonske, Robert Spooner, Don Stinson and Kim English. Masters in three dimensions will include Evergreen sculptor Pati Stajcar and bronze artists Jan Mapes, Stephen LeBlanc, and Sandy Graves.”
 

Quang Ho, “Every Which Way,” oil, 48 x 70 in. (c) Evergreen Fine Art 2016

David Santillanes, “Last Dollar Road,” oil, 30 x 40 in. (c) Evergreen Fine Art 2016

 
The weekend kicks off with a Western-style Gala reception at 5 p.m. on the 24th. On Saturday, patrons will have the opportunity to see outstanding works of art created in about 90 minutes. Continuing, the gallery writes, “Folks wishing to take advantage of everything Weekend in the West has to offer should consider purchasing a Patron ticket package that includes the champagne brunch and auction, plus a picture-perfect gallery dinner with the artists on the evening of Thursday, June 23. Even better, the entire cost of a Patron ticket can be applied to any artwork purchased during Friday’s opening reception.”
 
To learn more, visit Weekend in the West.
 
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.
 

Did you know that the oldest commercial building in Southern California is about to celebrate its 200th anniversary? What better way to celebrate than to capture this monumental moment in brush and paint?
 
The California Art Club — one of the nation’s oldest and most acclaimed artist organizations — recently announced a paint-/sculpt-out scheduled for Saturday, June 18. The event is planned in conjunction with a celebration of the Old Mill, Southern California’s oldest commercial building. Also on view through September 11 is an outstanding exhibition at the California Art Club Gallery at the Old Mill.
 
During the 200th-anniversary celebration, the CAC has worked with the Old Mill Foundation to present a series of themed exhibitions that rotate and change throughout the year.
 
To learn more, visit the California Art Club.
 
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.