Karen: About the Grand Master

Happy New Year and Happy New Term, and a new project. This project is about to re-master a chosen historical (basically before I was born) artwork from a contemporary viewpoint. First thing first, I have thought about whose masterpiece I'm going to choose and how can I develop further in order to relate it to what I want to present. Thousand of question and thousand of thought strike into my head.

We was brought to visit the local Art Gallery to practice the understanding towards this project. There is a exhibition of series of painting from York Art Gallery. Our tutor has demonstrated how they read the painting in several aspects and related to the present viewpoint. The demonstration did help me a lot on sorting out the mess in my mind.

So, back to the questions, speaking about the grand masters, just like what our tutor said, I'm really lack of knowledge in this area, even I'm interested in painting and start my journey of art since I was young, and for that, I feel quite ashamed for myself. Grand masters, those name in the first few of the list would be Vincent van Gogh, Leonardo da Vinci, Andy Warhol. I won't believe that those are the only I know, I think I just have problem on remember names. So, digging deeper, I found (Edgar) Degas, (Paul) Cézanne, (Paul) Gauguin, (Pablo) Picasso, (Piet) Mondrian, (Claude) Monet, (François) Millet, Roy Lichtenstein, (Sandro) Botticelli, Michelangelo, Kasimir Malevich. Some of them I've knowledge them for ages and some of them I just dug out through those world famous masterpieces.

To be honest, Vincent van Gogh was the first grand master I would like to study. I'm impressed by his form of painting, the thick, flowing texture, the use of colour, the expressionism painting. The painting I may pick for further development might be my favourite piece, "The Starry Night". The stars and the blue of the painting catch my eyes, I probably will relate the painting with interior design, children bedroom.

The Starry Night, Vincent Van Gogh, 1889

Instead of picking a grand master, looking for a certain kind of painting maybe easier to match the theme of my project -- to design a picture for commercial purpose, maybe desktop wallpaper or poster, etc. I will aim for the painting which is mythology related, like greek mythology or the japanese demon mythology. There are several famous masterpieces worth to refer to, for example, "The Birth of Venus" by Botticelli, "The Creation of Adam" by Michelangelo, "The School of Athens" by Raphael, "The Illustrated Night Parade of Hundred Demons" (画図百鬼夜行) by Toriyama Sekien, etc.