16th November 2008 - Who's made a mark this week?

As you read this I'm around and about Somerset House sketching with Friends of the Royal Watercolour Society (but I'm still using my coloured pencils!).

Life Room at the Royal Academy Schools
photo copyright Katherine Tyrrell

Yesterday I was life drawing in the Life Room at the Royal Academy Schools - which is the oldest art school in the UK - and sat on the very same curved benches that Turner and Constable had sat on when students at the school! Oddly enough, Turner would have sat on them at Somerset House - which was the original home of the Royal Academy and its schools. The benches apparently moved along with the School.

While at Somerset House, I'm going to be trying to get to see the new exhibition of Turner Paths to Fame: Turner Watercolours from The Courtauld at the Courtauld Gallery which occupies part of Somerset House.

I'm now running out the door...........

Congratulations to:

• Tracy Hall (Watercolour Artist Diary ) whose having a cracking year for her debut in miniature art. Her post Miniature Art Society of Florida relates her latest achievement which is that only has her entry been accepted for their show but the the Miniature Art Society of Florida also wants to buy it (before the show) and add it to their permanent collection. I guess news travels!
  
• Dan at EmptyEasel.com who is celebrating two years blogging EmptyEasel Celebrates 2 Years With A Long Look Back (And a Quick Look Forward)
• Andrea Joseph who has reached her 300th post in out of the blue AND joined the artist colleborative group Modofly. Like she says - check out the contributors and the Modofly Blog (I must confess I'm a little confused by the website and blog.)
  

Art Blogs

• Thanks to The Pastel Journal Blog for highlighting the website of the Great Lakes Pastel Society - which has a featured artist on its home page which changes every day. What a really great idea - and I'm only surprised this isn't being done by more art societies!
  
• I greatly enjoyed meeting Olha Pryymak this week. She's one of the ING Discerning Eye selected artists (see By the well) and is also my fellow London correspondent for Urban Sketchers (see below). Olha posts about her old home in the post Soviet Ukraine on her blog Olechko
  
• Portrait sculptor and painter Lucie Geffre is blogging in three languages on her blog
  
• Luan Udell (Luann Udell) had a recent 'learning experience' of a rather different kind. It's very relevant to anybody who finds they're corresponding with somebody who appears to be saying they're going to copy your work rather than buy it. This story has a twist - see Scary shadow artists and me.
• Vivien Blackburn (Paintings, Prints and Stuff) is Painting Russian Dolls 2 as Christmas presents - a fascinating process and absolutely delightful. I loved the 360 degrees perspective shots!
  

Vivien Blackburn's Russian Dolls
copyright Vivien Blackburn

• Armand (Moleskinerie) has an Open Session : The Moleskinerie Open Thread Discussion on the Scent of Paper.
• I wrote about People watching and sketching - outside Tate Modern on my other blog.
• ..........and I'm trying to get a new blog up and running - of which more anon!
  

Team Blogs

• Rose Welty (Virtual Sketch Date ) has posted the Plans for November Virtual Sketch Date - which are changing the normal routine - plus the Reference for November VSD. There are now about 100 people who've listed with this project.
  
• I love Karin Jurick's Week 11 Challenge - Upside Down Walker
• on Different Strokes From Different Folks. She also has an interesting post in An Added Feature
• Urban Sketchers continues apace - and what a pace - it appears to be averaging 7 posts a day and is generating more than more than 1,200 visitors are checking out Urban Sketchers every day since we launched just two weeks ago! See Thanks for the links!

I think I'm going to have to create a new blogroll category for the group blogs!

Art Business & Marketing

• Do read Hitting or Missing Deadlines by Gayle Mason (Fur in the Paint). I know Gayle well and she is one of the most sensible and well organised people I know - and she always hits deadlines - so take a tip from Gayle!
• Seth Godin (Seth's Blog) has some generic advice - which is probably more relevant than ever in the current economic circumstances. Too good to be true (the overnight millionaire scam) I've noted a little bit of frisson recently on Squidoo (which Seth founded) about people creating Squidoo 'help' books and sites which in effect repackage what is already available for free. There seems to be a move afoot to freeze them out. I wonder if it's connected? Nevertheless, the advice is good - and transferable.
  

Art Collectors

• Art Info had an item recently about Artists' Most Wanted - the artists who are now rich enough to be serious collectors of high-end contemporary art

Artists today still buy and swap works because they admire and appreciate them, but they also seem to have another agenda. Having watched the social and professional status of art buyers rise along with auction prices, art creators, too, are seeking the benefits bestowed by the collector designation. No longer content to be producers, they want to be connoisseurs, as well.

Art Economy

The art economy blog post was bumped this week. However New York art auctions continue to do badly with a large percentage of lots remaining unsold and others going for figures below the low estimate.

However I continue to spot 'rumblings'

• This is I Like to Move It, Move It from Art Market Monitor by Marion Maneker
• who, in turn had spotted Lehman to Sell $8 Million of Art to Pay Creditors (Update2) By Linda Sandler and Lindsay Pollock in Bloomberg

I'm now wondering what is going to happen to some of the other art collections within the context of enormous borrowings by the (former) investment banks.

Art Education (Children)

• On Monday I looked at The Obama Agenda for the Arts, Artists and orphan artworks which was interesting and surprising in equal measure. The biggest surprise being that it didn't look like any agenda I'd seen from a politician before.
  
• By Friday I'd decided that Obama and the Prince of Wales had rather a lot in common in terms of their mutual emphasis on making sure kids get to access to good quality arts projects - see my summary of the Prince's contribution to the art in Drawing on art and the Prince of Wales

Art exhibitions

Works by Cedric Huson - in the 2008 Discerning Eye exhibition
all work copyright Cedric Huson

• I saw the ING Discerning Eye on Wednesday and it opened on Thursday and is well worth a visit if you're in London. See ING Discerning Eye 2008 - a review

Art event at the ING Discerning Eye
last Wednesday evening

• They subsequently published the prizewinners - which I covered in my blog post yesterday ING Discerning Eye 2008 - Prizewinners
• On the same day I also went to see the Renaissance Faces exhibition at the National Gallery. I'll be writing about this next week. In the meantime, you can read Marion Boddy Evans review
  
• On Monday evening I went to the Private View of the Lloyds Art Group Exhibition. Thanks to Les Williams for the invite and for an insight into that amazing building by Norman Foster
  
• Then yesterday I paid a quick visit to the Miró, Calder, Giacometti, Braque: Aimé Maeght and His Artists exhibition at the Royal Academy. I think what I was most amazed about was watching 'cine' film of Matisse, Bonnard, Braque and Giacometti! Click here to watch one of the films featured in the exhibition.
• The Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize 2008 opened at the National Portrait gallery this week. It showcases the work of the most talented emerging young photographers, photography students and gifted amateurs alongside that of established professionals. Art
• Thanks to Belinda Lindhardt (Belinda Lindhard Art Journal ) for highlighting the Monet and the Impressionists exhibition at The Art Gallery of NSW. It's an exhibition of impressionist paintings from the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, including 29 works by Claude Monet alongside masterpieces by Cézanne, Degas, Pissarro, Renoir, Sisley and others.

This week the Lynn Painter Stainers Prize Exhibition opens at Painters Hall in the City of London on Wednesday 1th November. These are the accepted artists (pdf)

Art History

Three of the paintings of Rouen Cathedral by Monet
(images from The Atheneaum)

• On Tuesday I wrote about Monet's series paintings - Rouen cathedral
• Charley Parker (Lines and Colors) originally highlighted the Essential Vermeer website in his blog post Essential Vermeer. Last week he wrote about A Vermeer Comes to California and then A Vermeer in Rome
• Charley then followed up with a time sink warning as he proceeded to wrote about The Museum of Online Museums
  

Art Supplies

• Digital Art Papers - A look at the various types of digital art paper available by Marion Boddy-Evans, painting.about.com
• Jeanette (Illustrated Life) has Pinot Noir charcoal for sale.

Book reviews

• This is my most unexpected post this week. "He who must not be bored while I sketch" brought me a book - completely out of the blue - and it's great! See Book Review: Art - the definitive visual guide

Tips and Techniques

• Robert Genn (Painters Keys) - Glazing keys has a really excellent demonstration, advice and recipe for glazing in acrylics. I highly recommend signing up for his twice weekly letter.
  
• I notice that Richard Schmid is advertising his new book 'The Landscape Book' which is due out in 2009.

Websites and blogging

• China recognises internet addiction as new disease Really!
• Blogoscoped Google’s SEO Starter Guide highlights Google’s PDF titled “Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide” includes basic tips for making sites more accessible to search engines.
  
• the Official Google Reader Blog announced this week that you can now subscribe to a blog in a foreign language and then arrange for it to be translated for you to read in Google reader - see Is your web truly worldwide?
  

and finally..........

Google Maps Mania is an unofficial Google Maps blog tracking the websites, mashups and tools being influenced by Google Maps. This week it created a post about Grandad's War on Google Maps for November 11th which is both Armistice Day in Europe and Veterans Day in the USA.

November 11th 2008 marked the day ninety years ago on November 11th, 1918 when the armistice was signed between the Allies and Germany in a railway carriage in the Forest of Compiègne, France. This officially ended World War I - the war to end all wars.........