Velazquez, true or false?

No such person.

The persona known as 'Velazquez' was invented in the 1500s as a kind of camp-fire tale - a "been everywhere, painted everything" Artist's bogeyman.

In the ensuing years the legend grew; people claim to have seen the so-called Velazquez, met him, even to have been painted by him - until things spun out of control and exceeded the limits of rational credibility.

As a result, there are literally hundreds of portraits and scenes of historical significance attributed to his hand. Most of us outgrew him along with Sasquatch and the Tooth Fairy. Anyone who honestly believes that one man could be that good and have painted that many extraordinary paintings should come see me. I have some magic beans I want to sell you.

In the meantime, here are some details of one of (ahem) Velazquez' paintings called The Vulcan Forge, from the book 'Velazquez: The Technique of Genius', by Jonathan Brown and Carmen Garrido. Click on each one to enlarge and get a sense of that brushwork.

Urbino marquetry panel

Here's a plate from the book 'The Studiolo of Urbino: An Iconographic Investigation,' by Luciano Cheles. It shows the South Wall panel elevation of the breathtaking marquetry from  the room (now in the Met) known as the Gubbio studiolo of Urbino.

A masterpiece of inlay, the panels of the Studiolo display the most convincing perspective I've ever seen. Every time I stand in the middle of this small room, I'm stunned at the skillful design, workmanship and (let's face it), the insane amount of time it must have taken just to create the perspective of the imbrocated coin motifs in the borders, let alone the entire room.

This is a drawing that I know you haven't seen before. I drew this myself, based on the panel above. Anyone out there care to use this as a template for marquetry?

I drew my own version of Uccello's polyhedron in perspective, as one of the elements in the cabinet scene below. I did stop short of trying to create the perspective of the borders though, opting instead for more standard ornament. What do you want from me, blood?

I posted a number of really great drawings of this kind of ornament as part of a set of drawings that come from the Pierre Ramond set of volumes called Masterpieces of Marquetry. They're worth taking a look at. Here's a separate article on this blog about Ramond and his work.

 

Here's a nice Flickr set of images of the Urbino room.

NY Public Library carved wooden doors

I came across these door panels while doing some research in the New York Public Library.

I rarely get asked to create trompe l'oeil boiserie, but it's always good to have a sample in your portfolio. Besides, these panels are beautifully carved and worthy of a close look. A staple of the Van Der Kellen Institute, raised paneling such as this would be taught as a paint technique to every serious student.

What I find especially nice about these panels is the use of low and high relief. There are areas with delicate relief in the manner of a porcelain cameo, where the three-dimensionality is very understated (around the scrolls of the central panel, for example), and there are passages where the artist has gone for full relief (as in the fleur-de-lis).

Worth studying for that alone, but also to note how the grain of the wood and the light plays across the raised surfaces.

With my business partner Mark, we developed a method of creating three-dimensional boiserie like this digitally. Here, I used a low gloss relief, though I can control the direction of light as well as the refraction and reflection to create high gloss effects.

Russian Parquetry Designs

I'm a bit of a nerd when it comes to books.

This one is from 1953 and is written in Russian (translations welcome), so I don't understand a word. Never mind; the illustrations and copious photographs of Russian Palace floors more than make up for the information I'm losing through being unable to read the text.

Presented below are some of the beautiful schematics from this volume. I'd give you a link to the book, but there's no ISBN, and the title is in Russian, so you'll just have to hunt it down the same way I did.

I've been interested in parquetry and marquetry for some time now. Along with my partner Mark, I started a company developing digitally printed versions of some of these Russian designs, among others. Check out the website here for more images.

My aim is always to provide work that will be of some real value to the decorative artist on this blog. I guess I should have scanned these images instead of photographing them in that case. Oh well, don't want to make it too easy for anyone, do I?

Psyche wallpaper panel by J. Dufour

Late Empire, after the design by L. Lafitte (1770-1828) and M.J. Blondl (1781-1853), c. 1785
[Wooden forms by J.C.X. Mader, paper with Grisaille handprint]

This is probably the most famous panel. The version here is large enough to really see the structure of the work. As soon as I have the time I'm going to publish a whole set of French woodblock wallpaper panels on this blog. They really are spectacular; some single panels utilizing literally thousands of blocks of wood to assemble the image.

If Cupid and Psyche are your thing, this is where you need to look.

Woodblock printing has always fascinated me. I've never tried it as a technique (probably because I'm way too lazy), but I did paint a mural of this panel for the Kips Bay Showhouse in New York City, which definitely gave me an appreciation of both Lafitte and Mader.

Here is the mural that I hand-painted on canvas and then installed in the foyer. Probably a mistake in retrospect. If I do Kips Bay again, I'll do an original piece. However, I always learn a lot by copying the work of the masters!

I can't resist posting Bouguerau's version of the Cupid and Psyche myth.

Robert Adam

 I love this hilarious quote from Adam himself:

"What a pity it is that such a genius (as myself) should be thrown away upon Scotland where scarce will ever happen an opportunity of putting one noble thought in execution."
Robert to his sister Nelly. Rome, 12 July 1755

Luckily for that pompous old windbag, he really was a genius. Poor old Scotland gets bad-mouthed again, as they do in the British national anthem every time someone sings the line 'rebellious Scots to crush.' The appropriate response is the same one Billy Connolly came up with: "Oh, do you bloody think so?"

Adam rejected strict Palladian Architectural style as "ponderous" and "disgustful". Yet it is obvious that he too looked to antiquity for inspiration. His intent was to introduce 'movement' into the strict Classical Orders, and along with his brother James he developed what became known as Adam Style, infusing Classicism with Rococco and Grottesque sensibilities.

I'm presenting this large file here as a template for your grisaille and trompe l'oeil work. I did a lot of work on the image to tidy it up and to render it readable. As far as Neo-Classical architecture, he really has few if any peers.

Kedleston Hall is considered to be one of the benchmarks of Adam Style

I hope that you will find these useful.

Here's the image of the stucco panels as they stood either side of the fireplace in Bowood House, before it was demolished, that is.

Here are some more of my favorite pieces, from the book 'The Genius of Robert Adam', by Eileen Harris. By the way, Dealoz is the best place to find deals on any books I mention on this blog. It trawls the internet for the best bargain, factoring in shipping in the total cost, then re-directing you to the original website to make your purchase. Sometimes the cheapest books will ship to me from France.

The image below is from a furniture catalogue I found. I don't believe it is an Adam piece, it's more 'Adam Style', but beautiful nonetheless.