Choosing Pictures.

[Emil Miller]

Deciding to spend a bit of money on my humble abode, I have recently had the ground floor painted and decorated and am currently waiting for some new furniture to be delivered next month; during which time I have been looking at various pictures to replace those that have occupied the living-room walls for years. It has proven to be quite a task, for while it's hardly of the same order as that of a curator at an art gallery, the desire to 'get it right' conflicts with the sheer multiplicity of prints and frames on offer.
Anyway, I have finally decided on Hunters in the Snow and A Peasent Wedding by the 16th century Flemish artist Pieter Bruegel and a still life by the German painter August Macke to replace a Monet, a Raoul Dufy and an original silkscreen print by Mary Barnes dated 1973.


http://imgur.com/7EPJi0P


http://imgur.com/5nQKsN4


http://imgur.com/Q86p9F2


Has anyone else experienced similar problems in choosing pictures to suit their individual circumstances ?

[Lokasenna]

'Hunters in the Snow' is a lovely painting - a friend of mine has a print of it above her fireplace, and I think it very fetching. Sadly, I earn nowhere near enough to afford art of my own - though I have been know to stick up the odd poster reproducing someone's work. In the past, I've had works by Van Gogh, Gallen-Kalleka, Arbo, Millais, Doré, and William Blake on my walls, not to mention a large number of images from medieval manuscripts.

My new landlady has a 'no blu-tac on the walls' rule, meaning my new house has much less art. The only painting I've got hung up is one a friend made, a nice picture of the Eiffel Tower by night, done in a rather abstract manner with a focus on lighting.

[Emil Miller]

'Hunters in the Snow' is a lovely painting - a friend of mine has a print of it above her fireplace, and I think it very fetching. Sadly, I earn nowhere near enough to afford art of my own - though I have been know to stick up the odd poster reproducing someone's work. In the past, I've had works by Van Gogh, Gallen-Kalleka, Arbo, Millais, Doré, and William Blake on my walls, not to mention a large number of images from medieval manuscripts.

My new landlady has a 'no blu-tac on the walls' rule, meaning my new house has much less art. The only painting I've got hung up is one a friend made, a nice picture of the Eiffel Tower by night, done in a rather abstract manner with a focus on lighting.

Interesting that your friend's 'Hunters in the Snow' is over the fireplace for that's exactly where I intend hanging mine. I had a copy of the Bruegel 'Peasant Wedding' where I lived previously but it was mounted on a wooden block and subsequently faded. I first saw these paintings in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna many years ago.
It's also interesting what motivates some people to purchase pictures. I noticed a small picture hanging in my piano teacher's home. It's of a blackbird perched on a musical stave and she told me that she had bought it from an antique store in Brighton because in her native croatian, 'blackbird' equates to her second name of Kos.

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

Excellent choices you made there Emil, I recall a couple of those paintings featured on the art related threads.
It's funny, I realized we do not have ictures of notable paintings hung in the house.
We do have Ansel Adams Moonrise Over Hernandez...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moonris...ez,_New_Mexico
and a few of my own B&W photos.
I suppose our books on the shelves create a nice aesthetic.

[Emil Miller]

Excellent choices you made there Emil, I recall a couple of those paintings featured on the art related threads.
It's funny, I realized we do not have ictures of notable paintings hung in the house.
We do have Ansel Adams Moonrise Over Hernandez...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moonris...ez,_New_Mexico
and a few of my own B&W photos.
I suppose our books on the shelves create a nice aesthetic.

I remember reading Anthony Powell's novel 'Books Do Furnish a Room' and thinking how true was the title.
I suppose it depends on how much space is available as well as personal predilection where books and paintings are concerned but although there are quite a few books around the place I do like paintings, especially as the recently emulsioned walls look oppressively bare.
The problem is that I may decide on a different furniture arrangement when it arrives in October so I don't want to buy and hang all the pictures until that's done and I can get a better idea as to exactly where to locate the other Bruegel and the Macke to their best advantage.

[Puff]

I make no apologies for being in love with the paintings of Sir Lawrence Alma -Tadema, his classical pictures are so beautiful esp Expectations which I have hanging on my chalet wall at the beach , it looks like an extension of the veranda outside. Warm blue seas , hot verandas & bougainvillea plants soaking up the heat. It blends in with the planters I have that resemble Ionian columns so its neo classical for me every time.

[Emil Miller]

I make no apologies for being in love with the paintings of Sir Lawrence Alma -Tadema, his classical pictures are so beautiful esp Expectations which I have hanging on my chalet wall at the beach , it looks like an extension of the veranda outside. Warm blue seas , hot verandas & bougainvillea plants soaking up the heat. It blends in with the planters I have that resemble Ionian columns so its neo classical for me every time.

There's seldom a reason to apologise for paintings, be it Alma-Tadema or even Roy Lichtenstein as opposite ends of artistic presentation. What people choose to buy is entirely up to them and, while I personally would balk at Andy Warhol or Jackson Pollock, if you will forgive the expression , I did consider this Picasso that cleverly sums up the ambience of the French riviera but rejected it as being incompatible with the other pictures I want to buy.

[stlukesguild]

As an art student... and shortly after... my walls were covered with prints of favorite paintings. Among these were Giorgione's Adoration of the Shepherd's:



Giotto's Madonna and Child:



Albrecht Dürer's Self Portrait 1498 & The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse





Vermeer's Girl with a Pearl Earring:



and Ruben's Three Graces:



In fact we still have a print of the Three Graces on our bedroom door. Honestly, I don't think there was much by way of rhyme or reason as to which prints I had... outside the fact that I had come upon them cheaply and liked the particular painting (or wood engraving in the case of the Four Horsemen...)

My studio walls used to be plastered with reproductions by artists I admired. At the time these were taken I was working as an abstract painter/collage artist... and yet with few exceptions, almost all of the art on my walls was figurative. My studio mate, Tom, the guy on the photograph, drew attention to this fact. This... and my experience of a great exhibition of Venetian Renaissance painting at the National Gallery, Washington, really inspired my return to figurative painting.

By the way, the two colorful abstract paintings that Tom is virtually pointing at in the first photo are "book lithos" by Miro. This means they were printed from the original lithographic stone... just as in an artist's print... but the edition is of a higher number (perhaps a couple hundred to a couple thousand) and the the print is not signed in pencil but on the stone. I discovered shortly after this photograph was taken that these particular prints were valued at several hundred dollars each. Worse yet... I had four more of these hanging in my classroom... with masking tape!!!





Now I have few images at all hanging in my studio beyond those temporarily tacked next to the painting I am working on as reference material. I do, however, have hundred of art magazines and art books that I leaf through while relaxing... or stumped momentarily.

Beyond the Rubens' painting, we have no prints of paintings hanging in our home. We do have perhaps half a dozen original paintings and prints including a gorgeous image of a butterfly rendered in a rich, smoldering mezzo-tint by one of my former professors. We also have a large acrylic painting... an interior scene with a beautiful writhing potted plant... painted by another of my former professors and in this instance, my painting mentor. We also have a number of my smaller works... abstract collages that speak of my love of books...









I also have a number of my small still-life paintings from when I first returned to figurative painting and I was getting a feel for the materials once again:





As might be expected, these hang in the bathroom.

None of my newer work hangs at home as these are far too large, and quite fragile unless framed due to the use of pastel.