Karen F Rose My Painting Journey

Sunday, December 26, 2010

Beyond the Frame, Impressionism Revisited

La Promenade, by Gustave Caillebotte rendered in life size sculpture
If you are in Key West, Florida, be sure to visit the current exhibit, Beyond the Frame, Impressionism Revisited, at the Custom House Museum, where you can become part of an impressionistic painting.

After a successful career as a painter, internationally famous artist J. Seward Johnson turned his talents to creating life size bronze sculpture.
Johnson creates life size scenes from famous impressionistic masterpieces. These are artworks you are invited to step into!
A video camera captures you at that moment and displays your image on a monitor in a grouping artfully displayed on the staircase wall.
Visitors to the museum are encouraged to walk into these scenes and interact with the figures in the painting.
"You" in the framed video painting.
Monitor paintings on display on the grand staircase.
You'll also want to see the Ernest Hemingway exhibit on the museum's second floor. Hemingway, author of The Old Man and the Sea is perhaps one of Key
West 's most famous former residents.

What's your must see adventure while in Margaritaville...
ah hmn... I mean Key West?

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

The Louvre Museum's Seated Scribe- Making That List and Checking It Twice.

Seated Scribe
Louvre Museum,  Paris

Writing, writing. writing. Tis the season for writing holiday and Christmas cards, writing year end to do lists and making those all important other "lists" and checking them twice.

Last night seated with my legs crossed, writing and writing, I thought about the figure of the Seated Scribe, in the Louvre museum in Paris. He is a masterpiece of Egyptian art.

I remembered the first time I saw him. wondering then, as I do now, "What was he writing?"

Quite a striking figure, he is rendered geometric, yet with very realistic touches. That day years ago, his fixed gaze starred right through me. He looked beyond me with his 4000 year old eyes to the courtyard of the Louvre, out to the streets of Paris and beyond.

But, last night with a chuckle, I thought of him with his fingers wrapped not around his scroll and quill pen, but with an I Pad in his lap instead.

My how our instruments of writing have changed over the years from papyrus, to 
I Pad.
What's on your list of to do's before the year end? Do you use lists to make yourself more accountable to achieve your goals?  If so, good luck with that!

If you are interested, there is a closer look at the Seated Scribe in an interactive view on the Louvre's web site Seated Scribe
Oh, by the way, unless you practice yoga, I wouldn't advise sitting with your legs crossed, guaranteed to put your left leg to sleep!

Tuesday, December 7, 2010

Gator Gothic

Tail Gators
© 2010 Karen F. Rose
archival print
Sometimes you gotta have a little fun, so when George Ferreira invited artists to create works for his gator themed art exhibit, Waniguchi, the Gator and the Sake Cup ...well I just couldn't resist a parody. 
Gainesville has a gothic style Century bell tower, the "bat house" bats, Saturday tailgate burgers and football fans with the craze for a certain "T-rrific quarterback".
Please visit Ice House Gallery in McIntosh before the exhibit closes on January 29th, 2011. 
Who modeled for the painting American Gothic by Grant Wood? It was not a husband and wife as some think. Do you know?

Monday, December 6, 2010

Painting the Intimate Landscape Conversation

Quiet Conversation
© 2010 Karen F. Rose
oil on canvas
There's a little group of trees I pass every morning as I am on my way out and about. I am in a hurry but they will not be part of my hustle and bustle. They are pensive and seek my observation. They ask of me a moment of quiet introspection. 

Do you have a landscape that "speaks to you"? Perhaps in your garden, at a lake or in the cool of the forest. What scene makes you stop and reflect?