11th November 2012 - Who's made a mark this week?

Today is Remembrance Sunday and the eleventh day of the eleventh month - when people all around the Commonwealth remember all those members of the Commonwealth armed forces who have died in the line of duty that others might live.  On Monday last week I watched members of the British Legion hammer small crosses with poppies on them into regimented boxes on the grass outside Westminster Abbey.  Each was for a different part of the armed forces - with the biggest section given over to the unknown soldiers.

However, many of the crosses had names on.

Sometimes the simplest images are the most powerful - although oddly I can find no artwork associated with Remembrance Sunday.

A number of the crosses have names on and messages from loved ones
photographed outside Westminster Abbey

In the USA:

• Vets preserve memories of war with their own art
• in Houson Texas, an exhibition of war photography WAR/PHOTOGRAPHY: Images of Armed Conflict and Its Aftermath has opened at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH).  The FT has a slideshow of images of conflict from 1847 to today
• The National Post reports that Painting Belgium’s battlefields: Wartime scenes part therapy for 93-year-old Second World War veteran

and in Newfoundland, Jeanette Jobson (Illustrated Life) painted and posted a painting of a poppy for Remembrance

Artists and Art Blogs

Who Painted This?

•  My new series of posts is proving to be very popular and everybody seems to be being good and sticking to the rules - because this week nobody has worked it out as yet!  Who painted this? #3 has the answer to Who painted this? #2 at the end of the post and two supplementary clues in the comments

Drawing and Sketching 

• Sadie J Valeri (Sadie J Valeri) has written a short but very pertinent post for those want to learn how to draw - How to draw in 5 steps 
• Pete Scully (petescully) has been participating in nanodrawmo which is 50 drawings in a month - see nanodrawmo 2012 – part 1.  You've still got time to join.  Having a structure as per Pete seems to be the trick to getting 50 drawings done.

Loosely defined goals are for each participant to produce 50 individual works/drawings between Nov 1 and Nov 30. You can always do more than 50 if you've got it in you! That's just the minimum everyone should be shooting for.

Painting

• Stapleton Kearns Stapleton Kearns writes blog posts which, at times, are music to my ears - plus I clap and cheer!  Two such are
• Some thoughts on the challenges facing today's workshop participants
• More thoughts on the challenges facing todays workshops participants.  
• I think of him as the Simon Cowell of professional landscape painting.  You only have to look at the image for the second post to see what I mean!
• Harold Speed - On Painting a Head, and The Science and Practice of Oil Painting on Underpainting
• Sadie J Valeri has also been featured in Dezzy's Amazing Art Finds - see her post Sadie J. Valeri.  Very nice paintings - however a commentary appears to be missing.
• Women in the Act of Painting is described as
  

"an ever-growing collection of fine art images that depict women in the act of making visual art: painting, sculpture, drawing, printmaking etc."

and includes one of my favourite paintings of a woman painting - next to a Fountain -
by John Singer Sargent 

The Fountain, Villa Torlonia, Frascati, Italy by John Singer Sargent

oil on canvas, 714 mm (28.11 in). Width: 565 mm (22.24 in).

Printmaking

• I liked the curated collection of fine art prints on Etsy called Printmaking - Not just another pretty Repro! by Monique from RedTailStudios

Sculpture

• Henry Moore Sculpture - a very poor precedent for public art This is my commentary on the decision by the Mayor of Tower Hamlets to sell Henry Moore's bronze sculpture "Draped Woman Seated".  The implications for public art are very worrying.

Art Business & Marketing