May 31st, 2010 | Filed under: Notes | Add a Comment »
NERD ALERT: I probably shouldn’t even know stuff like this. But I do, and because you looked at this blog, now you do too.
Because of a three-year tug-o-war between MGM and New Line over rights for JRR Tolkien’s The Hobbit and the two movies that were to be made from it, the clock on Guillermo del Toro’s commitment has run out, and the prized director is off the project.
We’ll have to wait and see where the project goes from here… del Toro is best known for his creature-creation and world-building, which (as I understand) has largely been accomplished with Weta Workshop. Jackson & co are now on the hunt for a new director. It will be interesting to see how much of del Toro’s artistic vision remains a part of the film. Who knows, maybe he brought his strengths to the table and now they’ll hire one heck of a storyteller to carry out the actual story telling.
To read more, go here. Also, lots of good in-depth artistic info under “Direction” on the Wiki article.
May 30th, 2010 | Filed under: Portfolio | Add a Comment »
Acrylic on canvas. © 2010 David Somerville / SMRVL
May 28th, 2010 | Filed under: Art Theory | Add a Comment »
I’ve been thinking about perspective, and about how we build a horizontal and vertical world, full of crisp 90° angles.
But then we live in a diagonal world, where every carefully laid set of parallel lines converges towards the horizon.
It just goes to show… something.
May 28th, 2010 | Filed under: Art Theory, Notes | Add a Comment »
“And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.” -1 Cor 13:13
I’ve often heard it said in Christian circles that “real art” (which is notoriously difficult to determine, for what I believe are many good reasons) involves three elements:
- Truth
- Beauty
- Goodness
I am unconvinced.
I’ve read materials on this (the excellent Art for God’s Sake, by Philip Graham Ryken for one), but “beauty” invalidates much of what’s truly resonated with mankind over the past century (I’m looking at you, Giacometti), and “goodness” for most amateur artists seems to be a mushy ground of “stuff that’s not mean.”
I’m kicking around the idea that art is what deals, positively or negatively, with the themes of faith, hope, and love. By these I think I mean…
- Faith: man’s relationship with truth/eternity/God
- Hope: conceiving of what could be as better than what is
- Love: relationships between people, or a person’s emotional relationships
Whenever I’m truly moved by something and I seek to understand why, these three often crop up. I’m not saying this is a definitive way to understand art… I’m a 24 year-old with a bachelor’s, for crying out loud… but I find these categories much more compelling, rich, and nuanced than truth, beauty, and goodness.
Aside: For those of you who are interested, this is why I’d say that LOST falls into the category of commercially-driven-but-real art (dealing with faith, hope, and love), but Dark Knight (which seemed to me to deal strongly with hope and love, but left out faith) fell short of the mark.
Again, I barely know what I’m talking about. I’d love any input anyone may have on this… especially those who have found the Truth-Beauty-Goodness definition helpful. And it’s possible the two systems are complementary rather than contradictory. I don’t know. I just thought I’d post it up here to get it out of my brain.
May 28th, 2010 | Filed under: Artists | Add a Comment »
Eyvind Earle is one of my all-time favorite artists. Between him and Charley Harper, my world explodes into lots of little happy pieces. You know him from his work on Disney’s Sleeping Beauty. Hey, can someone loan me $270?
May 27th, 2010 | Filed under: Articles | Add a Comment »
Love the diagonal dimensionality of this work by concept artist François Baranger. This is worth some study and emulation.
(via linesandcolors)
May 25th, 2010 | Filed under: Notes | Add a Comment »
- God (especially as encountered through the Bible & prayer)
- Casey
- Sketching for Kingdom of Monsters
- Old jeans
- Good music
- Warm air & sunlight
- War and Peace
- Good friends
These things are the opposite of clutter, and I love them.
May 24th, 2010 | Filed under: Notes | Add a Comment »
I’d say this show edged up out of mere entertainment into art. I’ll be happy to discuss if you’re interested.
(Because this is a personal/private blog, I conveniently don’t have to justify this in a long, tedious post.)
May 22nd, 2010 | Filed under: Artists | Add a Comment »
I’ve been staring at this for the past few days. I love El Greco. His work rides this amazing line between realism and abstraction, and completely fascinates me.
I look at this painting and I see the Hudson River School and Braque’s houses in perfect harmony. There’s this also amazing dimensional tension … the whole painting feels flattened, stretched, pushed, but also perfectly in perspective. It’s just beautiful.
It also occurs to me that Peter and Paul in my mind’s eye are El Greco’s Peter and Paul.
Can’t you feel the fabric in this one? Look at the texture and light on that robe.
And finally, the light in this is just… well, it’s incredible.
Get to know El Greco. You’ll be glad you did.
May 22nd, 2010 | Filed under: Books, Notes | Add a Comment »
Here’s a fascinating thought I came across today.
It was a small step from Puritan journal writing to John Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress and Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe. Both are interior adventure stories that paved the way for character development in the novel. Edward Said, a leading Palestinian scholar, pointed out that “the novel is a specifically Christian form of writing. It presupposes a world that is incomplete, that is yearning for salvation, and moving toward it. By contrast… the world of Islam is a closed and complete world.”
— “A Praying Life,” by Paul E. Miller.
I have never heard or guessed this before, but it makes total sense, and is especially exemplified in some of the greatest novels ever written, such as Les Miserables, Crime and Punishment, and The Brothers Karamazov.
Win for Christian art.
