The Frick Collection is a relatively small museum in New York, housed in the former mansion of Henry Clay Frick, and displaying the artworks collected by him and his daughter, Helen Clay Frick.

The collection, though not as extensive as those of larger museums, has the density of an expensive fruitcake, with so many yummy masterpieces in such a small space that it’s mind-boggling. It includes major works by Vermeer, Rembrandt, Holbein, Whistler, Constable, Corot, David, Goya, Hals, Ingres, Renoir, Titian, Turner, Velázquez, Whistler and Van Eyck, among others.

For those who can’t get to the collection physically, the museum has databased much of the collection online, with Zoomable images of most works.

Their collections database search feature, though poorly organized and something of a drag to wade through, is usable once you understand how it works.

Choose Browse the Collections, then focus on a subject, like Paintings, focus on a region, say, Dutch, Flemish, German and Swiss, narrow down further, let’s say to Dutch, and then you’ll finally see some thumbnails of works.

In the initial display of a limited number of works, it’s easy to miss the tiny “next” button at the top of the interface (and not at the bottom of the list where you might expect it), but you may find it easier to select a particular work from the drop down menu.

If you click on an artist’s name instead of a specific work, you’re dropped on a page with a description of the artist, but no thumbnails of works. Just when you’re tempted to think that your search has returned no visible results, look for the linked (though not underlined) text saying “View objects by this artist”.

Then you will see thumbnails of viewable works. Click on the thumbnail or title of the work to view the main image, and then look for the link to the Zoomable image (and sometimes a selection of detail images).

The Zoomable image, like those of so many museums, is restrained in a box and partially obscured by the zooming thumbnail (wouldn’t want you to get away with a high res image, you naughty image thief, you), but the box is large enough to see detail in enough of an area to make the effort worthwhile.

Upkeep on the site has apparently been a low priority, as some items are missing or unviewable. (Hans Holbein’s portrait of Sir Thomas Moore is among them, alas. See my post on Hans Holbein the Younger.)

What is there, however, reflects the Frick’s superb collection. Many of the works are among the finest examples by the artists represented.

That includes three (count ‘em three) Vermeers, not far from the five in the nearby Metropolitan Museum (see my most recent post on Vermeer, with links to others).

For those who can get to the the collection in person, it’s worth noting that the usual $18 entry fee will be waived tomorrow, Thursday, December 17, 2010, in celebration of the 75th anniversary of the day the collection first opened its doors to the public.

In addition to the usual gems, there is currently an exhibition of 17th and 18th Century drawings, The Spanish Manner: Drawings from Ribera to Goya, on display until January 9, 2011.

One of the things that art does best it to make the ordinary extraordinary. By focusing attention on commonplace objects artists can reveal them in ways that make us see them anew.

I was amused and delighted by Pete Scully’s series of 50 drawings of fire hydrants, standpipes, water tanks, meters and even a water tower, in which he finds great variety of form, color and texture.

The drawings, which he has also put together as a single, poster-like image (above, top, larger image here) were done as Scully’s participation in the Flickr pool NaNoDrawMo challenge. (Inspired by National Novel Writing Month, or NoNoWriMo, NaNoDrawMo was a challenge to produce 50 individual drawings during the Month of November.)

Scully posted the individual drawings on his blog over the past month. You’ll also find other series of drawings accessible from the menus at the top of the pages, with drawings from places like San Francisco and London.

Scully is originally from the U.K. and now lives in California. He is a contributor the Urban Sketchers Blog. (See my previous post about Urban Sketchers, and note that they have changed the address of the blog from .com to .org).

Unlike his fellow members of the inner circle of French Impressionism, who largely eschewed drawing for the more immediate direct application of paint, Edgar Degas put great emphasis on drawing.

He was, to my mind, one of the greatest proponents of draftsmanship of the late 19th Century, creating a great many striking drawings in pastel, graphite and crayon. Of course, it’s always a matter of discussion whether works in pastel can be considered drawings or paintings, but many of Degas’ pastel pieces definitely fall into the former classification.

The Morgan Library and Museum in New York, one of the few major art venues in the U.S. that consistently pays attention to drawings, is hosting an exhibition of Degas Drawings and Sketchbooks that features 20 beautiful drawings and two sketchbooks. The exhibition is on view until January 23, 2011.

I mentioned it back in September in my general post on Edgar Degas, but I don’t think I put enough emphasis on the online exhibition.

The Morgan, as they often do, has posted an online exhibition associated with the physical one, with Zoomable images.

It’s always a delight when the Morgan posts art images that are Zoomable. Unlike many museums that feel compelled to confine Zoomable works to a tiny window (lest we art image thieves and brigands abscond with a large image), the Morgan provides a “Full Screen” option, at the bottom right of the controls, that lets you fill your entire monitor with Degas’ drawings in glorious high resolution.

Enjoy.

As an adolescent and teenager I was taken with the wild art and illustration associated with mid-1960′s hot rod and “Kalifornia Kustom Kar Kulture” (see my post on Big Daddy Roth), so I was immediately delighted with Nate Greco’s take on the same from the vantage point of a couple of generations later.

Greco is an illustrator and display concept artist based in Tampa Bay, Florida. He studied at the Ringling College of Art and Design in Sarasota.

Greco works in pen and ink, oil, watercolor and digital media. His automotive themed paintings and drawings often feature vehicles post or during a car wreck, but minus the object or other vehicle causing the impact, producing an interestingly isolated event.

I find his drawings particularly appealing in their informal, sketch like quality and their bizarre arrested motion portrayal of ghostly impacts.

Greco also maintains a blog in which he posts additional art as well as preliminary drawings and sketches for various projects, including some sketches of “Old Florida” (images above, bottom) drawn from antique photographs.

I came across Frederick Cayley Robinson by chance, and unfortunately missed the dates of the recent exhibit at the National Gallery in London that brought some attention to this otherwise little known painter and illustrator.

The National Gallery exhibition focused on the best known of Robinson’s works, a series of four large scale paintings created for the Middlesex Hospital, collectively titled Acts of Mercy (two top images, above).

Though the exhibit itself is past, the national Gallery site has a bit of online information and a link to a slideshow with audio commentary, and some close-ups of the paintings, on the BBC News site.

There is an insightful review of the show on The Guardian, and their accompanying slideshow is still accessible.

When the Middlesex Hospital was closed, the four paintings were purchased by the Wellcome Trust and are on permanent display in the Wellcome Library.

Robinson was active around the turn of the 20th Century. He studied at the Royal Academy and at the Académie Juilan in Paris.

His crisply delineated, oddly quiet canvasses might be though of as symbolist, and have some feeling of the Pre-Raphaelites, particularly Edward Byrne-Jones.

Wow. Good week for J.C. Leyendecker fans.

If my post last Sunday about the Leyendecker studies on David Apatoff’s Illustration Art blog weren’t enough, we now have a wonderful post about J.C. Leyendecker by illustrator Scott Anderson, in which he posts a number of images of a few Leyendecker originals that he had the opportunity to study in detail.

Anderson has been kind enough to pass some of that “study in detail” experience on to us by posting close up shots of areas of the paintings in glorious high resolution, allowing for the study of Leyendecker’s brushwork and application of paint texture.

Beautiful.

While you’re on Scott Anderson’s blog, check out his own work, as well as on his illustration site. (I’ll be featuring Anderson’s work in a separate post in the near future.)

[Via Drawn!]

The Society of Wood Engravers is a U.K. organization devoted, as the name states, to the art of wood engraving.

Though similar in many ways to the more familiar process of woodcuts, of which it is a subset, wood engraving shares similarity to the process of metal engraving in the nature of the tools used.

Wood engraving involves carving in wood, and is, like other woodcuts, a relief printing technique rather than an intaglio process like copper plate engraving, but wood engraving is performed on the end grain of a block of hardwood, rather than the softer side grain.

Engraving tools, like the burin, allow for finer lines and more detail than in traditional woodcut technique, and artists can use this to great effect (wood engraving was one of M.C. Escher’s primary mediums). The Society has a description of the process on their site.

The Society of Wood Engravers has a long history, and in their online gallery is currently showing a selection of prints from their 73rd Annual Exhibition.

The online galleries are slightly awkward to navigate, there are 31 pages of thumbnails accessed by small numbers above the thumbnails, and the larger images are displayed in Lightbox style pop-ups, but perseverance will be rewarded with some wonderful gems.

The physical exhibition will be at the Bankside Gallery in London from 21 January to 2 February 2011.

Wood engraving can have an almost photographic quality, and was used for book illustrations in the 19th Century; it can also have a character somewhat like scratchboard with white lines appearing out of dark areas.

Overall, it is a medium with a variety of styles and approaches and an abundance of visual charm.

(Images above: Cordellia Jones, Stanislav Filipov, Rosamund Fowler, John Bryce, François Maréchal, Geri Waddington, Sarah van Niekerk)

[Via MetaFilter]

Ben Hatke’s charmingly whimsical comics character Zita the Spacegirl first appeared as a webcomic and then in print in Flight Explorer, a small volume published in 2008 as a kid-focused companion to the Flight comics anthologies, to which Hatke also contributed.

Zita went on hiatus for some time, leaving those of us who enjoyed her slightly off-kliter explorations of other worlds to wait for her return.

Hatke has brought Zita back, doing the character justice with a full length volume of Zita the Spacegirl that takes her from curious young girl on her way home from school to spacefaring adventurer out to rescue her captured friend in one story.

Though his work is carefully crafted, Hatke manages to keep a feeling of innocence in his drawings, and a loose, almost casual feeling to the linework. He applies color with a muted and atmospheric palette, placing his plucky adventurer and her oddball collection of companions in dark toned scenes that contrast with the bright fields she left behind.

Zita the Spacegirl is available as both a hardbound and trade paperback edition. There is a preview on MTV Geek, that I noticed at the bottom of their article, Buying Comics for Girls: A Gift Guide.

The feature lets you leaf through the pages and enlarge them, but there has been a loss of image quality in the process (particularly to the ink lines) and I can’t recommend it. Try instead the smaller, but crisper excerpt at the bottom of this page on the Macmillan site (images above, top three).

Hatke has created a website for Zita that, in addition to basic info, features new Zita webcomics (images above, bottom).

You can also find some Zita sketches on the publisher’s Flickr pages.

Hatke’s blog also has Zita updates and information, including the Great Zita the Spacegirl Jolly Giveaway Contest, in which you can win a a signed hardcover edition with a tiny (and very nice) original watercolor. You can enter by just adding a comment to the post. (Contest started yesterday, December 8, and runs for one week.)

The blog also mentions Tales from the Bohemian Highway, a small collection of comics and sketches Hatke has published through Lulu. In the edition that Hatke was kind enough to send be as a review copy, it includes his entry to the wonderful Draw yourself as a teen challenge started by Dave Valeza (see my post here).

Hatke has a separate website, House Hatke, with portfolios of his gallery art and illustration (life drawings linked at bottom); he is also a contributor to the Catholic Illustrator’s Guild blog.