Saturday, July 30, 2011

Congratulations Bryan Taylor!

Our artist, Bryan Mark Taylor, won first place in the Quick Draw competition at Plein Air Easton, Maryland (July 18-24, 2011). Congratulations, Bryan! Learn more here...
See the piece and the artists remarks on it at his blog, here.

Here are a couple of my favorite pieces we have by Bryan:
"Morro Rock Memories," o/c, 9 x 12.

"Along Adobe Road," o/c, 8" x 10".
See Bryan's page on our website here.

Thursday, July 28, 2011

Recent Bill Cone work, and framing

Bill Cone recently brought in these two beautiful pastels for The Summer Show.
"Gateway Morning," pastel on paper. 8" x 8".
"Wildflowers," pastel on paper. 9" x 12".

We've also just completed framing a few of Bill's works for a customer. Here they are:


All are profiles that are simple but designed to suit Bill's direct and no nonsense views of the natural landscape. They're done in carved walnut, muted with a light stain, which is just right with the artist's palette and texture.

Bill's blog is always fascinating. Top notch!

Thursday, July 21, 2011

The Arts and "Reverence for Life"

A new entry for the quotes on the page, "Re-framing Art"


William Morris
"It is indeed in...the belief in the beneficent progress of civilisation, that I venture to face you and to entreat you to strive to enter into the real meaning of the arts, which are surely the expression of reverence for nature, and the crown of nature, the life of man upon the earth." —William Morris

The idea of "reverence for life", famously credited to Albert Schweitzer, reverberates through the twentieth century, inspiring ethicists, philanthropists and environmentalists (Rachel Carson dedicated Silent Spring to Schweitzer). The concept came to Schweitzer as the culmination of a deep personal moral struggle in 1915, and would inform and infuse his great humanitarian career as doctor and pastor over the next 50 years—a career acknowledged in 1952 by a Nobel Peace Prize.

Albert Schweitzer
But it's never been fully appreciated that well before Schweitzer's epiphany—in 1880, when Schweitzer was just 5 years old—William Morris articulated the ideal in the words above (in his lecture "The Prospects Of Architecture In Civilisation").