New Gallery Representation!

Great news!  

I am happy to announce that I have been invited to join the beautiful OA Gallery.  They will be representing my artwork and I am delighted to be a part of such an esteemed group of artists!

invitation below

Friday Favorites


William Merritt Chase 1849 - 1916

William Merritt Chase was fluent in many mediums; using oil, pastel, watercolor, and printmaking methods.  He was especially fluent in oil and pastel.  I have been enjoying reading about this American Impressionist in a beautiful book that includes his many pastel paintings, written by Ronald G. Pisano.                
                        

A native of Indiana, his family later moved to St. Louis, where he became active in the St. Louis art community, winning prizes for his paintings at local exhibition. Chase's talent elicited the interest of wealthy St. Louis collectors who arranged for him to study in Europe.  He returned to the United states in 1878 to live in New York.  He was a highly skilled artist representing the new wave of European-educated American talent.

Meditation

pastel on canvas

20 x 16

His pastels are amazing! They are so painterly....you almost seem to see the brushstrokes!  This pastel is one of Chase's most exhibited and reproduced pastels. His wife was the model.

One of the most bizarre happenings associated with this pastel was reported in an article, New York Mail and Express 1893

"...'I never before realized,' said the artist, 'that a mental shock could cause physical pain.  But I learned it the other day when I found some vandal in Chicago had RUBBED OUT THE FACE of my pastel portrait of my wife.  The canvas is well known here, and has been frequently exhibited.  I had been offered $1,500 ($40,000 in today's dollars) but refused.  I sent the work to the (1893) Chicago World's Fair and found that someone had rubbed out the face, probably thinking it was done in oil. I don't know how it was done, but the news of it made me ill.' "

Wow! Can you imagine that happening to your artwork in a public display? No wonder he was upset!

My only question is, why would this pastel on canvas not have been protected under glass?  Was that typical in that day? If I can find more info on this incident I'll let you know.  If anyone out there would know additional information, I'd like to learn more.

Here is another beautiful work of his, once again a pastel.  Amazing!

Back of Nude

Pastel

18 x 13

Day 25 "30 in 30 Art Challenge"

Summer Cirrus 

Pastel on Wallis Sanded Paper 

9" x 12"

As I was working on this sky, I couldn't help but think about wonderful 

summers growing up. It would be so much fun to lay in the grass

and look up to a beautiful sky filled with wispy Cirrus Clouds.  Ahhh....

We are on Day 25 of the challenge.  This piece gets me current!
 Five more to go!