Eric Forstmann, Wounded Crabs, 2017, Oil on board, Eckert Fine Art.  Click to inquire.

Ushering in the fall season with the North East’s favorite fruit: the apple.  An emblem of the season, its colors and crispness perfectly analogous to fall.  The apple is also integral within the history of American Art.  As many FADA galleries specialize in 19th century American Art, their inventories’ are resplendent with American artists’ pictorial translations of Dutch still lifes.

William McCloskey, Lady Apples in an Overturned Basket, Oil on artist board, Godel & Co. Fine Art.  Click to inquire.

Replacing the fish and chalices native to those sixteenth-century works with apples-both an homage to American rural life and the perfect object for an artist to render.  The rotundness of its shape, the variety of its orange, red and green tones allows for the artist to display their mastery.

Jeffrey Ripple, Genevieve’s Apples, Oil on panel, Arcadia Contemporary.  Click to inquire.

As the first fruit plucked from the earth-seemingly emulated in Botera’s sculpture from FADA Member Rosenbaum Contemporary- these artworks encapsulate the sensations of the apple. In viewing them we immediately get a sense of what it felt like when Eve had her first tantalizing bite.

Victor Gabriel Gilbert, La Vendeuse des Pommes (The Apple Seller), Oil on canvas, Guarisco Gallery.  Click to inquire.

Fernando Botero, Donna Seduta Con Mela (Woman Sitting with Apple), Bronze with black patina, Rosenbaum Contemporary.  Click to inquire.

Ross Eugene Braught, Forest Interior, Ink on paper, David Cook Galleries.  Click to inquire. 

In anticipation of Halloween’s hoopla, this post looks beyond the costumes-covered in our post on the P(arty)-and to the landscapes breeding the frightful.  The forest.  As a setting for famed fairy tales and Disney stories, the forest exudes the mysterious.

Aron Wiesenfeld, God of the Forest, Oil on canvas, Arcadia Contemporary.  Click to inquire.

Out of reach of civilization, more so now than ever, the forest is a realm of the supernatural.  In Victorian times, through the industrial revolution, saw it as the habitat of fairies “captured” through the new medium of photography.  In works of art, many artists place their perspective on the forest entrance.

Charles Emile Jacque, Moutons sous un arbre (Sheep under the Trees), Oil on panel, Schiller & Bodo European Paintings. Click to inquire.

Hermann Herzog, Deer in Forest, Oil on canvas, Questroyal Fine Art.  Click to inquire.

Whether lured there through its fauna, or by the breadcrumbs in Hansel and Gretel, the forest, and its unknown inhabitants, allows humans to speculate. A facilitator of imagination and untouched by humans, anything and everything can arise from its depths.  Spooky.

Theodore Robinson, Spring Sunlight: Forest of Fontainebleau, France, Oil on board, Godel & Co. Fine Art.  Click to inquire.

FADA Members exhibited at 2017’s Boston International Fine Art Show at the Cyclorama. As a significant locus for American Art, FADA Members share Bostonian art destinations along with art fair tips. Here’s a recap of the fair from FADA exhibitors Jerald Melberg Fine Art (Charlotte, NC) and Questroyal Fine Art (New York, NY).

Jerald Melberg Gallery booth at 2017’s Boston International Fine Art Show

Jerald Melberg Gallery 

Thomas McNickle
SNOW COVERED BROOK-HIGH COUNTRY   2001
Watercolor on Paper
20 3/4 x 28 7/8 inches

Apart of their booth’s program was Contemporary Realist and Pennsylvania artist, Thomas McNickle.  His watercolor, Snow Covered Brook-High Country, 2001, received much attention during the fair.

Step into the ancient courtyard of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum 

Beyond the booth: Jerald Melberg Gallery associates explored Boston gem Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and the Center for Conservation at the Harvard Art Museums.

Art Fair Tip: Fuel up at one of the many South End restaurants surrounding the delightfully small venue!

Foodie Central: South End Eats

Questroyal Fine Art

SOLD! John Ferguson Weir At Day’s End sold at the fair. 

In the gallery halls: MFA

Beyond the Booth: Questroyal Associates, like Jerald Melberg Gallery, explored the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum as well as the Museum of Fine Arts (For Sargents galore, check out their redesigned American Wing)

Questroyal Fine Art booth at 2017’s Boston International Fine Art Show

Art Fair Tip: Always come back for a second look!

In this edition of FADA Art Destinations, FADA Member and namesake owner of Thomas Nygard Gallery in Bozeman, MT revealed the places and faces of the city’s art scene.  With a gallery dealing in 19th and 20th century American Art, Thomas Nygard’s specialization ties into his gallery’s location amongst the spectacular mountains.

1. If someone were to come to Bozeman for an art adventure, where would you recommend they stay?

Element Hotel, Lark Motel

 

2. Favorite art spots in Bozeman?

Montana Historical Society, Charles M. Russell Museum, Museum of the Rockies, Museum of the Yellowstone

3.  How does your gallery space and collecting speciality relate to the Bozeman Art Scene?

I specialize in historic Western Art of the period that made Montana famous.

 

Thomas Nygard Gallery in Bozeman, MT

4. Do you have a favorite artist who worked in the Bozeman area or artwork most evocative of the Bozeman regional style?

Charles M. Russell, Joseph Henry Sharp, Thomas Moran

Beyond the museum-Charles M. Russell’s bronze, The Spirit of Winter, in the collection of Thomas Nygard Gallery.  

5. Where to refuel in Bozeman?

Open Range, Blackbird Kitchen, Montana Fish Company (Sushi).

See you on the range.

Birger Sandzen, Kansas Farm, Watercolor, David Cook Galleries.  Click to inquire.

The unsung hero in artworks tends to be those invisible forces-aka the wind-energizing an artwork’s atmosphere.  Although the wind is famously personified as the huffing and puffing Zephyr in Botticelli’s Primavera, the wind often reveals itself in art through teetering trees and unruly hair.  Its invisibility hints to the artist’s technical mastery and sensitivity to its windswept subject.

Wind personified in Botticelli’s Primavera

Marc Chagall, Le Couple au Crepuscule, Lithograph, Leslie Sacks Gallery.  Click to inquire.

Chagall’s airborne couple is evocative of Botticelli’s Zephyr

The depiction-or hint- of wind spans the sublime landscapes of Hermann Herzog’s Seeking Shelter (Eckert & Ross Fine Art), to modernist Thomas Hart Benton’s electric figures as artists have continually sought out to imbue a dynamism in their works.

Hermann Herzog, Seeking Shelter, Oil on canvas, Eckert & Ross Fine Art.  Click to inquire.

The figures in Hart Benton’s modernist work mirror the movement and shape of the skies above.

Thomas Hart Benton, Photographing the Bull, 1950 Lithograph, Eckert Fine Art.  Click to inquire.

Examples of this motion manifest themselves in different mediums, as reflected in the canvases, watercolors and lithographs in FADA’s inventory. The winds seemingly contribute to the essences of the artworks: mirroring the inexplicable feelings we have when experiencing them.

Andrew Newell Wyeth, The Outermost Bell, 1959, Watercolor, Avery Galleries.  Click to inquire.

Subjects in mid-action-wheter rendered in watercolor or oil.

Istvan Sandorfi, Rebecca, 1996, Oil on canvas, Jane Kahan Gallery.  Click to inquire.

With gallery spaces in cities throughout the country-and abroad-FADA Members are experts in unique regional schools of art and offer invaluable insight into the art communities their galleries work in.

Using gallery intel, FADA Art Destinations highlights these art communities and institutions shaping local culture.

Get a personalized tour of an art-filled city beyond its museum with Jim Ross of FADA Member Eckert & Ross Fine Art, located in Indianapolis, ID.  Jim offered his favorite Indy art locations and the places to relax and refuel after enjoying them.

1. If someone were to come to Indianapolis for an art adventure, where would you recommend they stay?

The Alexander Hotel (filled with art, great restaurant & bar)

Willem Vester, Summer Landscape, 1871, Oil on canvas laid on panel, Guarisco Gallery.  Click to inquire.

Pastoral settings, glorified in the Baroque canvases of Claude Lorrain, idealized nature’s harmony.  Throughout the history of art, pastoral scenes, replete with livestock and their keepers, provided a pure background for modern artists to explore the moral connotations of the bible’s and antiquity’s stories.

Gene Kloss, Along the Roaring Fork; 8/75, Etching, David Cook Galleries. Click to inquire.

Marie Dieterle, Vaches et les moutons par l’eau, Oil on canvas, Res Galleries, Inc.  Click to inquire.

Whether in 19th century Europe or 20th century America (as in the Western watercolor from Thomas Nygard Gallery), FADA’s artworks of livestock, the most prominent indicator of country living, hints to an artistic heritage left over by Lorrain. These works capture the majesty of the countryside, enhanced by its flora and fauna.

Edward Borein, A Goatherder with his Flock, Ink and gouache on illustration board, Thomas Nygard Gallery.  Click to inquire.

Constant Troyon, The Shepherd and the Sea (Le Berger et la mer), Oil on canvas, Schiller & Bodo European Paintings. Click to inquire.

As artistic hubs have shifted to urban centers, contemporary art has seemingly excluded the furry subjects of yesteryear.  Now, livestock are the actors in recent, interactive art installations.  In 2015, Gavin Brown’s Enterprise “displayed” Jannis Kounellis’ Untitled (12 Horses), with 12 live horses camping out in the gallery. At 2016’s Frieze fair, patrons gawked at Maurizio Cattelan‘s live donkey as it grazed around a booth lit by an opulent chandelier.  Both experiences were reminders of a foreign agrarian lifestyle.  Simarly, Julian Opie’s Sheep, from FADA Member Jonathan Novak Contemporary Art isolates its subject from its normal haystack accessories.

Jannis Kounellis’ Untitled (12 Horses) at Gavin Brown’s Enterprise, 2015.

Julian Opie, Nature 1-Sheep, Jonathan Novak Contemporary Art.  Click to inquire.

Maurizio Cattelan, Warning! Enter at your own risk. Do not touch, do not feed, no smoking, no photographs, no dogs, thank you. Frieze Projects, 2016. PHOTO CREDIT

Whether thrown into the middle of New York City, or on the wall, sheep and steeds no longer plow the land in Lorrain’s landscapes. Regardless of this potent displacement, gazing at the sheep in Troyon’s The Shepherd or at Kounellis’ Horses, viewers are aware of animals’ ability instill a universal calmness.  The art of livestock still aspires to evoke the contentment of seeing nature.

Barton S. Hays, Fishing, Oil on canvas, Eckert & Ross Fine Art. Click to inquire.

The depiction of fishing in art history-though a seemingly odd subject to focus on-denotes subtle social positions when contemplating the leisure activity.

Hunting and fishing scenes in early modern art, as popularized by the English and French, glamorized the pastimes of its privileged subjects.  Idyllic fishing scenes in Rococo works appropriated pastoral imagery for the rich’s imagination.  Often these scenes served the dual purpose of alluding to sexual pursuits-metaphors for their daily lives.

S.C. Yuan, Fishing off the Wharf, Oil on canvas, Trotter Galleries.  Click to inquire. 

Virginia McCallister, Fishing Scene, Watercolor, George Stern Fine Arts.  Click to inquire.

However, when transferring hunting and fishing scenes to American waters, the connotations of these activities often invites images of the working class, the pastimes of localized communities.

Joseph Raphael, Fishing Boat, Oil on canvas, William A. Karges Fine Art. Click to inquire.

Many FADA galleries specialize in the art schools surrounding these areas.  In these works, fishing scenes evoke a sense of comradeship, rather than distinguishing its sitter’s social class.

William Merritt Chase, On the Lake-Central Park, Oil on panel, Godel & Co. Fine Art.  Click to inquire.

Nonetheless, throughout both eras (and continents), pictorial depictions fishing offers viewers a sense of escape-and naivety. Especially in viewing works with a contemporary lens, they seemingly hold in place a lost time.

David Bates, Crab Fisherman, 2014, Oil on board, David Dike Fine Art.  Click to inquire.

Samuel S. Carr, By the Seaside, Oil on canvas, Godel & Co. Fine Art.  Click to inquire.

In this ode to the last days of summer, this post captures the visual history of the bikini (and its more modest prototypes).

Renaissance artworks replete with bathing scenes of Bathsheba and Susanne hint at the uneasiness of depicting contemporary women in the same settings. Replacing real women with mythological or biblical counterparts when referencing the nude, the lack of overt bathing scenes closely parallels art history with societal modesty.

Henri Lebasque, L’Heure de Bain (Bathing Time), Watercolor, Guarisco Gallery.  Click to  inquire.

1920’s Bikini Fashion

Most importantly, it seems to take a while before artists depict women enjoying swimming for the pleasure of it.  FADA’s inventory represents a pictorial ease into the depiction of bikinis.  Samuel S. Carr’s By the Seaside portrays a trio of fully garbed women-in the outfits of our Victorian dreams-with background dwellers rolling up their dresses before a dip into the water.

In  L’Heure de Bain (Above(, Henri Lebasque, a French Post-Impressionist painter, showcases the swimming trunks of the early 1900’s, apart of the burgeoning fashion industry.

William Berra, The Dive, Oil on linen, Nedra Matteucci Galleries. Click to inquire.

Bikinis, a badge of summertime, with its expanding geometric cuts and colors a staple of a woman’s wardrobe, has re-entered popular culture as an indicator of feminine liberty. As its depiction transfers from oil canvases to spreads in fashion magazines, they have become more relevant to the style choices of their wearers. 

Johannes Wessmark, Floating, Acrylic and oil on canvas, Arcadia Contemporary.  Click to inquire.