William Degouve de Nuncques was a French-born Belgian Symbolist painter.

He was self-taught, though his style was influenced friends and roommates Jan Toorop and Henry de Groux.

His art was particularly shaped by his contact with the group of Symbolist poets to whom he was introduced by Juliette Massin, also an artist, who he married in 1894.

His paintings are often of representational scenes, landscapes, views of buildings and parks, but strongly tinged with a poetic softness and muted colors. He frequently chose to depict the subtle lighting of mist, dusk or night. He traveled and painted extensively in Austria, Italy and France and was at one time part of the group of painters known as “Les XX” (”The twenty”).

His painting The Pink House (image above, bottom left) is said to have inspired René Magritte’s famous Empire of Light paintings (also here). (Here’s an article about that notion on The Blue Lantern.)

Someone has put together a short video of some of Degouve de Nuncques’ work, set to a bit of Bach.

MicroVisions is an auction, now in its fourth year, in support of the Society of Illustrators scholarship fund.

The auction is organized by Irene Gallo, the well known art director at Tor Books and author of the excellent blog, The Art Department, along with illustrator Dan Dos Santos (see my posts on Irene Gallo, Tor Books and Dan Dos Santos).

The participating artists, all renowned illustrators, particularly in the field of fantastic art, science fiction and fantasy illustration, each donate a small artwork, usually created specifically for the event, to be auctioned off via eBay. All of the proceeds go to the scholarship fund. The first three MicroVisions auctions raised a total of $16,000 for the fund.

This years contributing artists are: Welsey Allsbrook, Volkan Baga, Chris Buzelli, Justin Gerard, Michael Kaluta, Greg Manchess, Paolo Rivera, Greg Ruth, Francis Vallejo and Michael Whelan.

(See my posts about Volkan Baga, Greg Manchess, Paolo Rivera, Justin Gerard and Michael Whelan.)

The auction will take place via eBay in late April. I’ll try to keep you informed about the exact dates, but to be sure, you could follow Irene Gallos posts about MicroVisions 4 on The Art Department. (Anyone who is interested in science fiction or fantasy illustration should be reading The Art Department on a regular basis anyway.)

(Image above, left to right: Chris Buzelli, Greg Manchess, Volkan Baga, Justin Gerard, Paolo Rivera)

For some reason, I just love to look at the studios and workspaces of artists, designers and other “creative” workers.

In part, I suppose there is a thought that one might get usable ideas form the way others have arranged their work area; but mostly I think it’s just curiosity and the vaguely inspirational nature of being around or in artists’ working areas.

Even art school studio and work spaces, which always seem to have a “same as it ever was” feeling to them, can feel inspirational, just because of the associations they have for those of us who attended classes at one time or another.

Parka Blogs, who I profiled here, has a post about Creative Workspaces and Home Offices, with links to a number of individual workspace articles from blogs (including Man Arenas, who I profiled here); as well as links to collections of workspace and studio photos on Flicker.

Some of them are: The Creative Workspace Pool, The Workspaces – No Computers Pool, The Art Studio Pool, The artist STUDIOS Pool, The Professional Creatives at Home Pool, and even The Inspiration Boards Pool, devoted to those collage-like amalgams of inspirational and reference images most of us have accumulating push pins above our drawing tables and computers somewhere.

(Images at left: “sweet sweet life“, “lavadera“, “the arborgeist project“, “jacanegra“)

[Via Drawn!]

Paint the Parks 2009 it the third installment of an annual competition sponsored by PaintAmerica, a non-profit association ‘devoted to providing opportunities for artists all across America”.

They sponsor two artist competitions, PaintAmerica Top100, which happens in the fall, and Paint the Parks100, for which the call for entries deadline is May 31, 2009.

The competition is designed to highlight the U.S. National Parks, and the entries must be realistic (to some degree) representations of scenes from one of the 390 areas supervised by the National Parks Service (the inclusion of National Monuments and Historic sites expends the possibilities considerably).

The current entry form hasn’t been posted yet, so I don’t know the entry fee, but you can download a Regions Map from this page that lists the eligible National Parks, Monuments and Historic sites.

There are prizes for each of three national regions, and a grand prize, a $10,000 Purchase Award. There is also a Mini Competition with a $5,000 Grand Prize for paintings of 180 square inches or less. There are more details here.

Winning paintings will be be featured in a touring exhibition and online, providing additional exposure.

There is a PaintAmerica blog, on which you can find more information, as well as see paintings from last years winners from both competitions.

(Image above: Robert Gunn, Thomas Marcotti, Robert Highsmith)

[Via Nita Leland (whose latest book is Confident Color)]

One of the issues facing working artists is that many of us are self-employed, a state that brings with it some of the logistical difficulties faced by almost all self-employed workers.

Most notable among them are things like health insurance, which can be a make it or break it factor in the ability of artists to support themselves.

There are other factors, like retirement savings and an unfairly high tax rate on self-employed people here in the U.S., based on various government excuses, the gist of which are that the government assumes that we’re cheating in some way.

All of these are factors that the Freelancers Union is intended to deal with. The Freelancers Union is an organization started by Sara Horowitz, a labor organizer and attorney from New York, whose family has been involved in unions and labor relations for a couple of generations.

Membership is free and open to all freelancers, consultants, independent contractors, temporary and part time workers and anyone who is self-employed.

The Freelancers Union offers access to group health, dental, term life and disability insurance, and in the state of new York is acting as it’s own insurance provider. There are also seminars, workshops, networking events and a member directory and gig listing, as well as offers of discounts with Staples, Zipcar and other companies.

I learned about the Freelancers Union from a story on the NewsHour on PBS.

I can’t speak about the organization from personal experience, at least not yet; but I intend to join, even if only to learn more.

Justin Gerard is an illustrator about whom I have little background information. His web site has galleries of his beautiful fantasy themed illustrations, but lacks a simple bio.

His blog has some fascinating details, like his confession about swiping a copy of a Step by Step Graphics from a college library because of an article on the art of Gregory Manchess that Gerard found dramatically influential; and his hope to somehow atone with his contribution to this year’s MicroVisions art auction in support of the Society of Illustrators scholarship fund (more the MicroVisions auction in a subsequent post).

I also found an interview with Gerard by Irene Gallo on the Tor Books site, in which Gerard discusses his project to create illustrations of his own interpretation of The Hobbit, apparently as a personal project, which I find amazing (image above with detail below, larger version here). If this work is not slated to be printed in some form it certainly should be, even if as a self-published version through Blurb or something similar (I’d certainly buy a copy).

In other sections of his web site gallery, I found wonderful fantasy illustrations of various subjects and a section devoted to illustrations of Beowulf, as well as the series from The Hobbit.

Gerard’s illustrations are intricately textured, make great use of chiaroscuro and leverage the power of a limited palette to produce drama and control focus. His style, though based on intensely observed realism in some respects, has a feeling of whimsey and charm that is ideally suited to his subject matter.

I also found a number of books that he has illustrated on Amazon, and a gallery of his work on the Tor Books site.

I finally found a brief bio on the site of Portland Studios, an illustration, animation and interactive firm of which he is a part. From it I learned that Gerard lives in South Carolina and won an IPPY Award for his interpretation of Beowulf Book One: Grendel the Ghastly. There is also an animation called The Mad Bull on the home page of the Portland Studios site for which he is listed as co-creator.

The Sheridan Illustration Council (which, if I’m not mistaken, is part of Sheridan College in Ontario, Canada), is holding an exhibit themed Birds and Bees as a fundraiser for the benefit of the 4th year graduating class.

From the press release:

The Sheridan Illustration Council proudly presents the Birds and the Bees Fundraiser Group show. The show features work from Sheridan alumni and faculty, consisting of well-known and emerging illustrators belonging to the fields of illustration, fine arts, comics, and much more. The hopes are to be able to raise funds to help put on a successful year-end show for the 4th year graduating class.

The show will offer collectors and new buyers the opportunity to acquire original artwork from renowned illustrators, and a chance for them to help support the next generation illustration stars.

The show is at SMASH Industrial Salvage|| Jerome Jenner Gallery, 2880 Dundas West, Toronto, ON. I’m a little late in listing the actual show, the opening was March 20, and it only runs to this Saturday, April 4, but the online version will be up until April 11th, 2009.

There is a listing of artists and an online gallery.

(Image above, left to right: Anita Kunz, Tessar Lo, Clemente Botelho, Peter Chan, Claton Hanmer, Benjamin Rivers)

[Via Nimit Malavia]

As I pointed out in my previous post about Gustave Caillebotte, he is one of my two favorite underappreciated French Impressionist painters (along with Alfred Sisley).

Though he was not the draughtsman Degas was (few were), or as facile with brush and color as Monet or Pissarro, Caillebotte nonetheless epitomized many of the characteristics we associate with French Impressionism, the bright strokes and dabs of pure color, optically blended into luxuriously beautiful images of gardens, rivers and brightly dressed members of the leisure class enjoying the sun.

It is in his differences from the other Impressionist painters, though, that he resonates most strongly for me. I think it’s in his subtle appreciation for shadow, soft light, rain, fog and snow that he displays his greatest visual poetry.

He also differs form the other French Impressionists in that his approach often leaned more toward realism; putting him, perhaps, in the company of the American Impressionists and others who adopted the Impressionist palette and free brushwork, but without abandoning the realist underpinnings from Academic painting that Monet and Pissaro rejected. He was also one of the first painters to be fascinated with and influenced by then new art of photography.

Caillebotte was an engineer by training, but also studied at the Ecole des beaux-Arts, and became acquainted with Degas, Renoir and Monet early on. He became a supporter and patron of his friends’ work, using his considerable family resources to purchase paintings for himself (often at prices well above their market value, basically to help them survive and keep painting) and to organize the Impressionist exhibitions in Paris.

It was Caillebotte’s eventual donation of his collection of Impressionist works to the French government, which at first was refused at the urging of the conservative Academy, and only later accepted in part (40 of the 60 offered), which now forms the core of the Impressionist collections in the Musée d’Orsay.

Many of the remainder (lesser in terms of quality) were sold to American physician and art collector Albert Barnes, and are here in Philadelphia in the collection of the Barnes Foundation. Others are in museums and collections around the world.

His own work received less respect after his death than the works he collected, but his reputation is being restored as public appreciation for his work gains ground.

Gustave Caillebotte: Impressionist Paintings from Paris to the Sea is an exhibition currently at the Brooklyn Museum (until July 5, 2009). It features about 40 paintings showing a range of Caillebotte’s work and subjects, though it focuses in large part on paintings of activities on and around the Yerres and Petit Gennevillers rivers near his family’s estates, like Skiffs (above, top, sometimes called The Oarsmen).

There is a catalog accompanying the exhibition (hardback only, I believe this is the same book on Amazon).

Much to my delight, the exhibit includes one of my favorite paintings, Yerres Riverbank in the Rain (above, bottom, larger version here, unfortunately not well reproduced; smaller but a little better here).

This is not a dramatic Impressionist painting, busting with sunlight and brilliant color; quite the opposite, in fact — subtle, quiet; a gentle suggestion of a painting, with the soft light and subtle colors of a summer shower, but so evocative you can smell the rain.

Mark Covell is a concept artist, storyboard artist and character designer as well as an illustrator. His illustration clients include Playboy Magazine, Universal Studios, Mercer mayer, Harper Festival, Simon and Schuster, and Lillyfield Press.

His web site has sections devoted to illustration and storyboards as well as concept art, characters and environments. Covell has done concept design for companies like Vivendi Universal Games and Genuine Games.

Covell’s style ranges from softly atmospheric, to sharply rendered to whimsically sketchy. There is also a section of nicely direct life studies on the site.

Covell’s professional work can be seen in the upcoming Volume 16 of the Spectrum collection of contemporary fantastic art. You can see some of his work at the Copro Nason Gallery (via Artnet).

Covell also maintains a blog in which he posts about his work in progress (which includes his recently born son).

Slagsmålsklubben – Sponsored by destiny is an animation by Tomas Nilsson, in which the classic fairy tale of Little Red Riding Hood is reinterpreted as a series of animated infographics.

The video traces, in that wonderful isometric projection style of vector art common to modern infographics, not only Little Red Riding Hood’s route to Grandma’s house and the events that transpire there, but lots of “info” about stuff on the way, from wild animal density of the forest to the specs for a classic VW microbus as it passes by.

The info also includes such tidbits as the nutritional content of one Grandma, presumably for the wolf’s benefit.

[Via Daring Fireball]