PHOENIXVILLE Pennsylvania Painting Masters helps people find purpose and value while recovering from addiction. Specializing in interior house painting, the business employs individuals in the Phoenix Recovery Project, a residential treatment program.

Brandt Norton, who founded the Phoenix Recovery Project, and partners Shawn McGinness and Matt Carey, each struggled with addiction themselves. With this new business, they aim to help people in the recovery process develop useful working skills and find work as they go through the program.

We want to be able to help the guys and girls in the houses who need income and cant find gainful employment, maybe because of their record. It seems like there are a lot of jobs, but sometimes it is still a struggle to find something, said Norton, who began working as a behavioral health professional 11 years ago after getting sober.

I turned my life around. We started up the recovery houses and outpatient facility. Thats what we love to do, we love helping people, he said.

The Phoenix Recovery Project started in 2018 and currently has four recovery houses in Phoenixville. There is also an outpatient facility that provides clinical mental health and addiction therapy. Norton noted the importance of treating the mind, the body and the spirit in order for people to recover from addiction and mental health issues.

We looked at Chester County specifically. We noticed there were no recovery houses, so we wanted to be a resource. Phoenixville seemed like it would be perfect for people to have a safe place to live and restart their life. Its a very welcoming and open community which is crucial, Norton said.

The idea for Pennsylvania Painting Masters began a year ago when Carey, a professional painter, became a resident at one of the recovery houses. Norton and McGinness realized Carey had viable working skills he could teach fellow residents and they could begin working while in recovery. The first project was repainting several rooms in one of the residential treatment houses.

Its not only providing a good service, we are providing work to people who are in the recovery houses or in the recovery community who have been told no and rejected at some point. Thats why they end up here. They are looking for help and for answers. You hear about how many jobs are out there, but it is tough when you have a record. Were putting people to work and theyre able to pay their bills and help their family, McGinness said.

Matt is a great guy and was taking his recovery seriously. We wanted to invest in him because he had skills and could teach other people in the houses so we could give them employment right away. A lot of our employees are in recovery. We even get customers in recovery which is pretty cool. We do discounts for people in recovery, seniors, veterans and health care workers, Norton added.

Sergio Albino, who has been in treatment since November, noted how the recovery program has made a positive impact on his life. He noted that Painting Masters helps residents in recovery find employment.

It has been life-changing for me. It provides community connection and has allowed me to form relationships that I never had the chance to, he said. I do case management for second chance employment so I know where help is needed, and that is one of the areas. It is great to have people who are willing to give a second chance and be able to have resources for the residents so we can get positions that we may not get with our backgrounds.

Pennsylvania Painting Masters provides residential and commercial painting services both interior and exterior. The company serves the Greater Philadelphia region including Berks, Chester, Delaware and Montgomery counties.

For more information about the companys services or to get a quote call 610-492-9033, visit https://www.facebook.com/papaintingmasters or https://papaintingmasters.com/

For more information about Phoenix Recovery Project visit parecoverycenter.com.

Read more:

Phoenixville painting company is about more than just paint - Daily Local News

Actor Ukon Onoe is a rising star in Japan in the prestigious world of Kabuki, the classical theater genre marked by elaborate costumes, highly stylized performances, and the distinctive make-up by its performers.

Coming from a family of Kabuki performers, the 30-year-old Tokyo-based actor has been performing since the age of 7. In addition to Kabuki, Ukon has also acted in film and television, evne winning a Japan Academy Award for Best New Actor.

Ukon recently visited the studio of another rising star in Japans art world, Yukimasa Ida. Ida is a 31-year-old contemporary artist who works primarily in paintings, sculptures, and prints. Like Ukon, Ida is also comes from an artistic family. His father, Katsumi Ida, is a well-known sculpture artist in Japan.

ARTnews Japan joined Ukon and Ida in the painters gymnasium-sized studio to record an impassioned talk between the two young artists, covering everything from their families to their creative mindsets:

The following talk has been translated and edited for clarity and length.

Ukon: Its a very spacious and cool studio. Among them, this painting in the back [pictured in the photo above] is a stunner in terms of size and presence.

Ida: The painting was completed last year at the request of Mr. Yusaku Maezawa. I had a theme that I had wanted to paint for a long time, and he told me that I could do whatever I wanted, so I let myself paint it as the culmination of my 20s. Then he said, You really did whatever you wanted.

Ukon: Even at this size, do you suddenly draw it full-size?

Ida: I made a blueprint and painted this based on it. Inspired by Courbets The Painters Studio, it depicts the world of death and the world of the living. I am the one holding the paintbrush here, and the white canvas is the future. I painted from one end to the other, and in the end it took me three years.

Ukon: Three years!Do you sometimes not take requests?

Ida: Of course there is. I will talk with the client about various things under the condition that they allow me to do what I want to do. I dont want to leave behind something with half-baked vibes, because my work will remain forever, and it will go out into the world as my expression.

Ukon: That is very different from the expression I am doing. A live stage is something that does not remain. The En( character in the word Acting is written as Tiger() in Sanzui(), right?

The work is to draw a tiger on water, so no matter how heroic the tiger is, it will soon fade away. In other words, it is like creating an atmosphere, and, even if a Kabuki performance is preserved on film, that atmosphere can only be experienced by those who saw it that day in the theater.

I feel that every performance is a once-in-a-lifetime encounter.

Ida: Once in a lifetime, isnt that a nice word? I have consistently used the concept of once in a lifetime in my work. I want to express a moment that will never happen again.

Ukon: Ida-san, your father is the sculptor Katsumi Ida. How much influence do you think your father had on you?

Ida: I used to play in my fathers studio when I was little, and I watched him create, so I think there is definitely an influence. But there was a time when that was a complex. Everywhere I went, my fathers name came up, and I really hated that. But after doing a lot of research on my dad and his family history, I was convinced and came to respect him. Respect from rebellion. Then I started to feel more at ease and thought, I just have to live my life. The complex was also a driving force, and I was able to find a kind of grit and passion in my own way.

Ukon: Environment affects us in a much deeper way than we think. I have tried many different things, but in the end I feel that Kabuki is the best fit for me because of the power of the environment that has nurtured my senses and ways of thinking.

Ida: Ukon-san seems to be much more involved with his family than I am. The world of traditional performing arts is, in a sense, a special or different world from the general public.

Ukon: Of all the special worlds, ours is an even more special case. My great-grandfather was a Kabuki actor named Onoe Kikugoro VI, and his daughter, my grandmother, married into a Kabuki music family called Kiyomoto. So, although I was born into a family of Kabuki actors, I was not born into a family of Kabuki actors.

Ida: I see.

Ukon: Then, when I was a small child, I was fascinated by the images of my great-grandfathers kabuki performances that I saw at my grandmothers house, and I expressed my desire to become a kabuki actor. And when I was allowed to perform on stage for the first time, thanks to the people around me who wanted to give me an experience, I fell even more deeply in love with the role. During my adolescent years, it was very difficult for me because of the tension between my father and me.

Ida: Similarly, when I was still an art student, we would argue about art every time I returned home. My father was a senior who had been in the art world for decades, so I think he felt like, I wont accept you so easily. But nowadays we get along well, and my father often says to me, Were family, but Ive never thought of you as my son. I interpret this to mean that he sees me as an artist, and that it is a compliment to me.

Ukon: When did you start painting seriously?

Ida: I was 16 years old. There was a time when I hated painting. But with the help of my fathers words, I learned how to think about painting, and I began to enjoy it. I failed many times in my university entrance examinations, but as I studied in frustration, I also realized the fun of painting. Between my history of perseverance and my history of realizing the appeal of painting, I somehow became completely absorbed in painting, and I began to think that I was going to become a painter.

Ukon: Where do you get your inspiration for your works?

Ida: It is a case-by-case basis. Sometimes I have a stock of images of what I want to create, so I use those images, and sometimes I just go with the flow when I want to express the atmosphere I felt on my trip. Abstract paintings are the output of images, thoughts, and concepts that are still unclear.

On the other hand, if I have a clear image, I output it clearly. As for the motifs of people, I basically paint people who have influenced me. So there are people who are close to me, and there are people who have changed the world.

Ukon: You mentioned earlier that Yusaku Maezawas painting took about three years to complete. Isnt it difficult to keep the idea you had when you started a painting until you finish it, while time is moving forward and many things are changing?

Maybe I feel that way because I myself am working to carve the vibes of the day into the stage of that day.

Ida: I believe that our initial thoughts and feelings change. As I draw, I myself change, and I always think that the present me is the best, so if that present is not used in the work, there is no point in drawing it.

Ukon: Where do you make the decision to say, Well, thats it.

Ida: The painting says, Dont paint anymore.

Ukon: Oh, my!

Ida: I often refer to it as the mass of a painting. When a certain amount of information or emotion is loaded onto a painting and it reaches its mass, something that has never existed in the world before comes to me with a thump and a bang as a solid presence. At that moment, the brush stops. I cant put my hand in anymore. Its weird to say this, because it sounds like Im praising myself, but theres a sense of awe that comes over me when that happens.

Ukon: Recently, I have been feeling that good/bad depends on whether or not I am into it. Of course, objectivity is important, and I think it is also important to become better at expressing oneself through experience, but I like myself better when I am absorbed in my work, no matter if it is bad or not.

Ida: I think the balance between the two is an eternal issue for expressive people. As one becomes more proficient, something is inevitably lost. Still, I believe that a true professional must be absolutely skillful. When I look at Katsushika Hokusais prints, he is technically very good, but I wonder how much he devoted himself to his work. I think it is amazing how crazy and immersed he was in his work when he drew it.

Ukon: By the way, in the area where the large wood carvings were placed, I saw a painting based on an actors picture by Sharaku.

Ida: I painted it as a bit of an experiment. I tried printmaking to broaden my horizons, and just recently I became interested in ukiyoe and other classical Japanese works. Three-dimensional wood carving is also something I started doing as an extension of printmaking.

Ukon: You are always stimulating yourself by trying many new things.

Ida: I would like to cherish the ability to be amused at any time. We are planning to build a studio overseas, and that is also from this feeling. Ah, I recently joined Chicago-based Marian Ibrahim. I was a bit repulsed by the idea of belonging to a gallery, so I set up my own company, but I have come to think that other forces are important as well.

I thought that by being exposed to the opinions and values of people other than myself, I would come to a different realization, which would lead to a reinterpretation of my own. I have grown up a bit and am finally willing to listen to other peoples opinions. It was at this point in my life that I was able to have an intense conversation with you, and I had a lot of fun today.

Ukon: Thank you very much for a pleasant time. My great-grandfather, Onoe Kikugoro VI, was friends with Yokoyama Taikan. Taikan said to him, I envy you. Even if you make a mistake on stage, only the audience that day will see it, right? In my case, even a painting I thought was bad could be liked and displayed for a long time. Its tough to stay in shape. Then Onoe Kikugoro VI replied, No, it may be handed down, but no matter how good my play is, only the audience of that day will be able to see it.

I envy painters whose good works will last forever. There is an episode in which they said to each other, We are both in a causal business.

Ida: Lovely story.

Ukon: I would love to have that kind of talk with you, at the end of my life!

Read more:

Two of Japans rising stars interview each other about family, creative expression, and the difference between painting and acting - ARTnews

Denver gets ready for baseball by bringing back a special tradition: the painting of the purple stripe outside Coors Field.

DENVER The tradition of the purple stripe outside Coors Field is back ahead of Friday's home opener for the Colorado Rockies.

Denver crews were painting the stripe Wednesday morning on Blake Street between 22nd and 19th streets right in front of the ballpark with a few Rockies logos along the way.

The city usually brings the spray-painters out a few days ahead of the home opener to allow the paint to dry.

Some years, the weather throws a curveball and snow showers wash away the water-based paint that happened in 2014 but Denver isn't expecting any precipitation between now and Friday.

The painting of the purple line is a tradition that started in 1995, when the Rockies held their first home opener at Coors Field.

That opener was on April 26, 1995, and it was 39 degrees for the first pitch. The Rockies won 11-9 against the New York Mets with a walk-off homer.

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Painting the town purple: Stripe is back on Blake Street ahead of Rockies home opener - 9News.com KUSA

Philip Guston, Nile, 1958. Courtesy of Sotheby's

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Sothebys will offer a top Philip Guston abstract-expressionist work that had been in the collection of Peter and Edith ODonnell in Dallas for more than four decades at a marquee sale of modern art in May in New York.

Nile, 1958, a rare example of an Guston abstract-expressionist work that is still in private hands, is expected to realize between US$20 million and US$30 million.

Its an archetypal masterpiece for an incredible private collection, which very rarely arrives in an auction setting, says Michael Macaulay, Sothebys senior vice president of contemporary art. We are all holding our breath to see what will happen.

The painting, rare for being among only 10 painted from 1956 to 1960, also exemplifies Guston's intensity as a painter who worked close to the picture itself, a technique that distinguished him from peers such as Mark Rothko and Jackson Pollock, or Franz Kline.

His revolution was that he divorced himself from the brushstroke, Macaulay says. He worked too close to have too much narrative control over his gesture.

That said, the title Nile evokes several potential narratives or references that could have been literary or even cinematic, considering Cecil B. DeMilles dramatic technicolor Ten Commandments came out only two years before Nile was painted.

Sothebys considers the appearance of the painting at auction a major market event. Thats because of the paintings rarity within Gustons body of work, the fact it hasnt been widely seen for 40 years, and because its being offered at a time when Guston is in the spotlight as an artist.

The Museum of Fine Arts Boston will be the first of four institutions to present a postponed retrospective of the artists works beginning this May and running through February 2024, when the touring exhibition will be at Tate Modern in London.

Such a major retrospective of Gustons work is overdue, in Macaulays view, considering the artist was a leading abstract expressionist alongside Rothko and Pollock, who was a friend, and that so many museums and institutional collections hold his work.

By contrast, the commercial art world hasnt had many chances to broadcast his importance to mid-20th century art history, Macaulay says. This is one of those moments.

Nile also comes to market at the same time as Sothebys is offering several Guston works from his later figurative period. Those will appear at the auction houses evening contemporary sale.

The pre-sale estimate for Nile reflects the sale nine years ago of To Fellini, 1958, a Guston abstract-expressionist work comparable in size and composition to Nile. To Fellini realized US$25.9 million, with fees, at a May 2013 sale at Christies in New York, which was also the last time a work from this period appeared at auction. The high estimate for the work was US$12 million at the time.

Proceeds from the sale of Nile will go to the ODonnell Foundation, which supports a expansive list of causes in higher education, science, engineering, and mathematics, and in medical research, in addition to arts and culture.

Among many contributions the foundation endowed hundreds of chairs, professorships, and fellowships across the UT [University of Texas] system, and supported research and teaching facilities, according to an article in the Dallas Morning News following Peter ODonnells death in October 2021 (His wife, Edith, died in 2020). In all, the foundation has granted more than US$900 million since it was founded in 1957.Other works owned by the ODonnells to be sold at Sothebys to benefit the foundation include Stuart Daviss Closed Circuit, 1962, (estimated between US$100,000 and US$150,000), and Louise Nevelsons Moon Zag X, 1979, (estimated between US$70,000 and US$100,000).

Read more from the original source:

Sothebys to Offer Rare Guston Ab-Ex Painting - Barron's

5 fun wall painting ideas to refresh your home

Apr 06, 2022, 01:13 pm 2 min read

Walls are those blank canvases that can be made fun and interesting by painting them with some colorful and statement hues. Quirky and cool wall paint can instantly add oomph to your drawing room or bedroom and speak a lot about your personality. It also creates the perfect background for your zoom calls and Instagram pictures. Here are five fun wall painting ideas.

An ombre wall adds a water-colored effect and texture to your walls. It uses different tones of a single paint that shade into each other. You can choose any color you like and paint the top section of the wall with the lightest shade, the bottommost with the darkest shade, and blend the colors between the shades to achieve the ombre effect.

If you want to keep it simple and let your wall do all the talking, then ditch the colorful paints this time and go for text wall art to amaze your guests. You can keep the wall background plain white, warm, and welcoming, and use a stencil to write some beautiful poem stanzas or meaningful quotes on the wall.

You can instantly change the entire look of a plain white wall by painting hexagons and filling it with different shades of brown or orange. The pattern can fill a large portion of the wall and adds a natural element. Don't go bright in the entire house though. Choose muted colors for the living room and bright shades for your bedroom.

A vibrant and funky shade like orange in a gloomy corner of your room can instantly lift up your mood. Orange is a very energetic color and will keep your spirits high. You can choose to give the ombre effect described above. You can also pick a pattern and fill it with different shades of orange. Don't overdo the color in the entire house.

This watercolor effect will add that vibrant and bright pop of color to your otherwise plain all-white wall. This fun wall paint idea will definitely catch the eyes of your guests. To flaunt the colorful watercolor effect on your walls, dilute some acrylic paints in water and paint your walls using it. The overall room colors must be muted for the design to pop.

Read the original here:

5 fun wall painting ideas to refresh your home - NewsBytes

The Gemaldegalerie acquired Landscape with Arched Bridgein 1924, when it was attributed to Rembrandt. The work came from the private holdings of Friedrich August II, the last Duke of Oldenburg, whose prodigious art collection was sold off after the abolishment of the German monarchy.

Like many of Rembrandts innovative landscapes, it depicts the Dutch countryside dramatically lit by sunlight and shadow. The museum hailed the acquisition as closing an important gap in the narrative it presents about Rembrandt.

In the late 1980s, the Rembrandt Research Project, comprised of Dutch art historians who judge by consensus the authenticity of Rembrandts worldwide, reattributed Landscape with Arched Bridge to Rembrandts student Govert Flinck. Defending their decision, they cited the paintings astonishingly far-reaching stylistic, technical, and thematic similarities to an earlier Rembrandt, Landscape with Stone Bridge, which is held by the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam.

In other words, they thought it was a conspicuous attempt to replicate a Rembrandt, like a forger tracing a signature.

Determined to restore the Berlin paintings attribution, the Gemaldegalerie utilized technological advancements in painting analysis to evaluate the age and application of the paint. Researchers determined it was painted prior to the Amsterdam landscape, explaining the latter works more sophisticated manipulation of light.

Rembrandt also returned to the Gemaldegalerie work several times to revise the composition and color, settling on a denser atmosphere. By contrast, the Amsterdam painting is more precise and the sunlight more thickly painted, implying that the worst of the storm has passed.

Decisively attributing a work to Rembrandt is often a contentious task. He had a large workshop and a titanic visual impact on European painting, inspiring numerous imitators. Its common for a presumed Rembrandt to have its authenticity stripped and then later restored.

In 2020, a 400-year-old portrait in the collection of the Allentown Art Museum first credited to the Old Master, then in the 1970s reattributed to Rembrandts studio, was determined to have been executed by the Dutch painter.

A century ago, some 700 paintings were attributed to Rembrandt, but by the late 1960s the Rembrandt Research Project had downgraded that number by nearly half. Institutions including the National Gallery in London, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York have faced challenges to the authenticity of presumed Rembrandts in their collections. In the case of the Met, the labels of two workPortrait of a Man and Portrait of a Womanwere updated to read From the workshop of Rembrandt.

Independent Rembrandt historians have opposed the projects validating system and its resistance to outside opinions. Today, the groups energy is devoted to developing a comprehensive catalogue of Rembrandts oeuvre. Most major art institutions now have their own team of researchers.

Despite his influence on the genre, Rembrandt painted few landscapes. The reattribution of the Berlin painting brings the number of known landscapes by the artist to seven. Landscape with Arched Bridgeis currently on display in the exhibition David Hockney Landscapes in Dialogue, which includes Hockneys series Three Trees near Thixendale.

Together, Hockney and the restored Rembrandt create a striking conversation, according to the Gemldegalerie.

Visit link:

A Contested Landscape Painting in Berlin Is Deemed an Authentic Rembrandt - ARTnews

Lesson Overview

Featured Article: A Poem (and a Painting) About the Suffering That Hides in Plain Sight by Elisa Gabbert

With war looming, W.H. Auden stood in a museum and was inspired to write. The resulting poem, Muse des Beaux Arts, is one of the most famous ever written about a work of art. More than 80 years later, with war raging in Europe once again, human suffering is forcing us to confront many of the same issues.

In this lesson, you will experience a passionate and poetic close reading of Muse des Beaux Arts by the poet and essayist Elisa Gabbert, embedded in an interactive that can help you zoom in on specific details of both the poem and the painting that inspired it.

Then, via a menu of Going Further activities, we invite you to write your own analysis and interpretation of a poem or painting using the featured article as a mentor text; write your own ekphrastic poem; or learn more about W.H. Auden.

Part 1: Look closely at the painting Landscape With the Fall of Icarus by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, circa 1560.

Before reading the poem that is at the center of todays lesson, take several minutes to look closely at the painting that inspired it.

Then, respond in writing or through a class discussion, or conversation with a partner or small group, to the following prompts. The first three are borrowed from our weekly Whats Going On in This Picture? feature:

Share your thoughts with a group or the whole class: What ideas do you have in common with others? Where do you differ in your analysis or interpretations? What questions do you have?

Finally, discuss the title of the painting, Landscape With the Fall of Icarus. Icarus was the character in Greek mythology who flew too close to the sun on wax wings and fell into the sea and drowned. Why do you think Icarus the drowning man in the lower right corner of the painting is not the center of the painting?

Part 2: Read and respond to the poem Muse des Beaux Arts by W.H. Auden, 1938.

Now youll repeat the same set of activities with the poem. First, read it at least three times, both aloud and to yourself. Mark up a copy of it (PDF) with observations as you go. You can listen to W.H. Auden, the poet, read the poem here.

Return to the same partner, group or full class you joined to discuss the painting, and respond to the prompts again:

Whats going on in this poem?

What do you see, read or hear that makes you say that?

What more can you find?

Share your thoughts with a group or the whole class: What ideas do you have in common with others? Where do you differ in your analysis or interpretations? What questions do you have?

Finally, discuss the point of view of the poems speaker. What is this speaker saying about the Bruegel painting? About human suffering in general? How does this perspective resonate with your own understanding of suffering?

Note to teachers: The interactive article is longer than our typical featured pieces. If your time is limited, you might ask your students to read up to the lines Ignoring them is the most natural thing in the world. It is also a moral error., which is about a third of the way through the piece. They can still address the questions below.

Read the featured article, then answer the following questions:

1. Which images, themes, details, words or lines did Ms. Gabbert identify? Which aspects of the Bruegel painting and the Auden poem stood out for her? What personal connections did she make?

2. How did your observations from the warm-up activity compare with those of Ms. Gabbert? Does her analysis make you see the painting or the poem differently?

3. Ms. Gabbert says of the painting, As you can see, its not about the fall of Icarus, exactly. What does she mean by that statement? What, in her eyes, is the painting about?

4. Ms. Gabbert writes of the poem:

Somethings only a disaster if we notice it.

The message seems simple enough, but the poem is full of riches, hidden details that you might miss if, like a farmer with his head down or a distracted museumgoer you werent looking at the edges.

The edges, as Auden keeps reminding us, are part of the picture.

Ignoring them is the most natural thing in the world. It is also a moral error.

What do you think of this interpretation? Is ignoring disaster both the most natural thing and a moral error? Explain your thinking.

5. Of the poems final lines, Ms. Gabbert writes:

Theres a feeling of reluctant acceptance in the poems final lines, a surrender to forces beyond ones control, which may be the engines of commerce, or something like God, a God who either punishes us for our failings or has simply set the clockwork world into motion, and let it go.

On some reads Auden may seem to be offering a pass this is the way of the world, after all.

At other times it strikes me as implicating Icarus, Daedalus, the ploughman and shepherd, and God or the gods all equally as well as us you, me and Auden strolling the museum or reading the poem in comfort.

Do we spare a thought for the suffering, or sail calmly on?

How does Ms. Gabberts interpretation of the poem and its final lines compare with yours? What does it mean for a poem to implicate the author and the reader? What do you think is Audens moral stance on the seeming indifference of humans to the suffering of others? Do you think the poem excuses humanity for its indifference to suffering? Or implicates us? Provide evidence to justify your claim.

6. Why do you think Auden titled the poem Muse des Beaux Arts? If you had to give the poem or the painting an alternative title, what would it be and why?

7. What big takeaways are you left with after this experience of both closely observing yourself and following someone elses close observation. What qualities of the poem do you find most meaningful, moving or memorable in the end? Would you recommend it to others? Why or why not?

1. Create your own zoomed in analysis of a poem or a painting.

Ms. Gabberts interactive essay is a kind of instructive how-to for learning to read a poem, or a painting, closely. What lessons did you learn, if any, about appreciating poetry from her commentary?

Now its your turn: Write your own analysis using the featured article as a mentor text. Consider how you can draw on Ms. Gabbertss vivid, sensory language and ability to zoom in on many aspects of a single poem or artwork in order to draw conclusions about context and meaning for your own piece.

You can choose a poem or a painting, and for inspiration you might view the other works that are part of this New York Times series, Close Read. For example, you might look at Elizabeth Bishops poem One Art, discussed in the interactive 19 Lines That Turn Anguish Into Art.

You can write your analysis and interpretation as an essay, or consider a creative presentation application like Google Slides or Prezi to help you focus your audience on the details of the artwork you find most significant.

Use the questions from the warm-up activity to begin:

You might also think about questions like these:

What do you notice about the various elements of this work? (If it is a poem, think about aspects like the imagery, structure, punctuation and word choice. If it is a painting, think about things like the use of space, line, color and texture.)

Why does this work stand out to you? What do you find interesting or moving about it?

What connections can you make between the work and your own life or experience? Does it remind you of anything else youve read or seen?

What do you think is the purpose of this artwork? What do you think the artist wanted to communicate?

What questions would you ask the artist about this work?

2. Learn more about Audens life and his poetry.

Some of Ms. Gabberts analysis of the poem focuses on W.H. Auden the poet and the times he lived in. For example, she writes that the preoccupations of his work during this period were social and political the rising threat of totalitarianism, the evils of capitalism. How does having this historical context help to illuminate the themes and meaning of the poem?

You can learn more about Audens life and work by visiting some of these free online resources below, including poems, recordings, criticism, timelines and photos. You can also read his Times obituary from 1973 here.

After exploring one or more of these resources, discuss: What are two new things you learned about Auden his life and work? How does it affect the way you understand his poetry? What new question do you have about him or poetry in general?

3. Write your own poem based on a work of art.

Ms. Gabbert notes that Muse des Beaux Arts is one of the most famous examples of ekphrasis, a poem based on another artwork. Have you ever been inspired by a painting or work of art? What emotions and thoughts did it evoke? What about it made the experience memorable?

Now its your turn: Write a poem about a visual work of art, whether a painting, sculpture, photograph or drawing. Your poem can be long or short, rhymed or unrhymed, in prose or in verse as long as it is related to your chosen work of art.

Want more Lessons of the Day? You can find them all here.

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Lesson of the Day: A Poem (and a Painting) About the Suffering That Hides in Plain Sight - The New York Times

Cinthia Alaralak imagines her late father,John Illupalik, was longing for home when he painted a team of sled dogs resting beside two igloos, with an inukshukon a mountain in the distance.

He was perhaps eight or nine at the time, at the residential school in Chesterfield Inlet in what is now Nunavut, where he would spend much of the 1960s.

"I believe he was really homesick for igloos," she said.

Now, 60 years later, the painting has returned to his daughterin Igloolik. It came home after Valerie Ipkarnerk, who has had the painting for years, launched a search online for its rightful owner.

"He would feel happy, great about it. He would talk about it I know for sure he would talk about it, how he painted it, when he painted it," said Alaralak, imagining how Illupalik would react to having the painting home.

Illupalik passed away in late April 2021. Alaralak recalls him telling her about that painting he sold it for $20, which felt like a lot of money for a young boy in the 1960s.

For years after that, it hung in a room at the old St. Theresa hospital in Chesterfield. That's where Ipkarnerkremembers seeing it for the first time as a little girl.

"We used to go to the hospital and go visit the patients there, and every time I would use the phone, there was a little room for the phone and the painting would always be in there," she said.

"I knew it had a special meaning or something."

Years later, whenIpkarnerkwas helping with the sale of all the items left in the hospital before it closed, she decided to buy two of the paintings that hadn't sold. One of them was Illupalik'sartwork.

"That painting always caught my eye," she said.

Ipkarnerk said at first she didn't think about who painted it. Then, in 2012, her late cousin Bernadette Niviatsiak spotted it and exclaimed that she knew its creator.

"She said, 'Well, I should take this painting with me I know the person that made it!'" Ipkarnerk recalled with a laugh."But it seemed like I had a connection, a bond to that painting, so I kept it."

Niviatsiak passed away in January.

"I was thinking about her and I was thinking, I should maybe try to find the person who painted it," she said.

The search, once it began, was over in an instant. Ipkarnerk posted to an Iqaluit Facebook page, and within minutes, Cinthia's friends had tagged her on the post.

"I'm just so happy that Cinthia and her siblings are able to keep the painting, and I hope she will treasure it," Ipkarnerk said.

Alaralak said being reunited with the artwork of her ataata, her father, brought a mix of emotions. The painting arrived in Igloolikbefore the first anniversary of Illupalik's death.

"I was happy, I was emotional. I had them mixed at the same time, so I couldn't cry I was just happy about it when I received it," she said.

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Daughter reunited with late father's painting from Chesterfield Inlet residential school - CBC.ca

When Xeo Chu was four, he had a figurative period. Ears are very difficult to do, the 14-year-old Vietnamese art prodigy tells me at his first solo exhibition in London, as we examine his first painting, a portrait of his mother.

Nguyen Thi Thu Suong is a fitting first subject for the artist. She owns two galleries in Ho Chi Minh City and encouraged Xeo and his two brothers to take drawing lessons not long after they could walk.

Without mum, of course, I would be, like, nothing. I certainly wouldnt be here talking to you. He bows sweetly and takes my hands. Not that thats a bad thing.

The story his mum tells me is that Xeo Chu would beg to be allowed to attend art classes with his older brothers. So she gave him a pencil and an eraser and let him attend lessons after school. His brothers gave up the lessons, but Xeo Chu had found his passion. I love painting. Even if I am sometimes lonely when I paint it fills me with joy. I disappear for hours while I am painting.

If, to my eyes, there is nothing outstanding about that first portrait the charmingly oversized ears and even the maternal smile the little boy fondly gave his subject would be unexceptional, if delightful, if you saw them gracing a nursery school wall Xeo Chus artistic development in the decade since is extraordinary, at least judged in terms of sales and column inches. He sold his first picture to a visitor to his mums gallery. I was really happy. That was when I was like six. Since then his work has been collected all over the world from the US to Japan and beyond. Today critics regularly compare him with Jackson Pollock, his pictures come with $150,000 price tags and, with this new exhibition in Londons Mayfair following others in Vietnam, Singapore and New York, he has had solo shows on three continents. Not bad work for anyone, but especially remarkable for someone born in 2007.

Xeo Chu is even more of a rebuke to slacker teens than this suggests. He combines the precocity of Diego Rivera (who began drawing at the age of three) with the great-heartedness of Marcus Rashford. When he was 10, Chu had his first painting exhibition in Singapore and used the $20,000 proceeds to support heart surgery funds, the elderly living alone and street children in his city.

Last summer, Xeo Chu sold eight of his works as non-fungible tokens (NFTs) in an online auction on his Facebook pages, donating the total proceeds of the auction VND2.9 billion (96,000) to a hospital to buy medical equipment to combat Covid-19. His mother says: He may only be a little boy but I am learning from him. He is teaching me what it is to be generous.

And last summer, too, he proved himself to be at the cutting-edge of art during a show in Ho Chi Minh City that could be visited virtually by art lovers around the world, thanks to a wheeled telepresence robot that enabled spectators to look closely at 30 different paintings created during the pandemic. It also allowed them to interact with Xeo Chu as he painted live.

Now is the moment that you might want to break off from this article to text your underachieving offspring a cross-face emoji. I ask Xeo Chu if his brothers and school mates get resentful of his success? I really dont like talking about my painting to them for just that reason. I kind of keep it hidden from my friends.

We climb a staircase to the main exhibition of his work, passing on the way walls hung with his earliest paintings. These are the works that caught the eye of his art teacher, Nguyen Hai Anh, who told Chus mother: This is the first time I saw a four-year-old child draw like that. Palm lines fly, firm like a true artist. One of them is a landscape he painted aged five as he sat on a terrace overlooking the citys District 4 canal. There are other paintings of dogs, a trellis of bitter melon, sunshine slanting through the doorway and lots of flowers. I love flowers, says Thu Suong, and it makes me very happy when he paints them.

One day, she received a bouquet of peonies. She tells me that she loved them so much she stayed home for three days to look at them. Xeo Chu noticed her hugging the vase. I drew three colour pictures to prevent my mother from wilting any more, the boy told one interviewer.

As he developed, Xeo Chu (which means little pig his real name is Pho Van An) took photographs of what he saw on trips to the countryside and made paintings of them at home. I love nature. That is what I find beautiful. I want to draw and paint what I see.

This, I suggest, makes the comparison with Jackson Pollock seem misplaced. The abstract expressionist, after all, didnt paint what he saw at least not in the way that you do. Oh Jackson Pollock! laughs Xeo Chu, feigning exasperation. Everybody says Im like him, but Im not so sure.

Were standing before one of the colourful abstract paintings from his more mature, non-figurative period that induced New York gallerist George Bergs, who put on Chus first American show, to compare his work to Pollocks: Xeo Chu is creating similar works from the very beginning of his career.

Bergs argues that Chus 300-plus painting oeuvre taps into the collective unconscious in a way older artists struggle to manage. To me it was very interesting to work with an artist whos before puberty, because it challenged my notions about art and how life experience has to go into it. If there is depth and complexity in a piece of work from someone who has very limited life experience, it gives you a glimpse of the universal unconscious that we all have and can tap into.

Perhaps: or maybe the perspective of one of his collectors, Karlene Davis, New Zealand consul general in Vietnam is nearer the mark. I love the way Chu shows light and colour. He sees more than the naked eye and shows the spirit of the picture. They are so delicate.

Show me, I ask Chu, your favourite painting. He takes me to a work hanging over a fireplace, a sunburst of a sunset. I had been indoors for so long because of the pandemic and then finally we went to the country so this showed how I was feeling to be back in nature again. His best paintings, I think, are landscapes, such as his series depicting northern Vietnams Mu Cang Chai terraced rice fields (The wave of yellow [in the rice fields] when the harvest season comes is incredible, he says of his 2019 canvas October, Autumn in Canada). His biggest piece so far, Ha Long Bay in Cave, which measures 200cm x 480cm, took three months to paint.

Has your work evolved? It definitely has. When I started I saw mainly flowers so I painted them. Then I started to travel so I painted some of the really unique landscapes of Vietnam. We go to Canada sometimes. Will you paint what you see in London? I hope to have time.

Chu is hardly the first artistic child prodigy. In 2013, Kieron Williamson a 10-year-old from Norfolk dubbed the Mini Monet, saw his lifetime earnings soar to 1.5m after 23 of his works sold for 250,000 in under 20 minutes. When Romanian-American artist Alexandra Nechita, dubbed Petite Picasso for her cubist works, was 11 in 1996 her works sold in the $100,000 range.

But when collectors put pieces by these artists on the secondary market, they do not necessarily fare well, according to art appraiser Barden Prisant. Writing in Forbes magazine, Prisant found that the top recent auction he could find for a Nechita was only $20,000. Revealingly, and disquietingly, that very same piece had sold in 1998 for $92,000. Prisant found that two of Williamsons works auctioned recently did not sell. Perhaps Xeo Chus celebrity and bankability will be similarly brief.

None of this matters to Xeo Chu. I dont really know what prodigy means. And I dont really care. Thats not why I paint. His teacher rightly points out that his pupil is not bound by any school or rule, and so his work has a youthful freshness. He always let me be free to choose what I want to draw and paint, laughs Xeo Chu. Sometimes he will say that would look better done like this but theyre only suggestions.

The worry is that the youthful freshness will dissipate as Xeo Chu grows up and gets seized, as surely all adult artists are, by the anxiety of influence. Bergs says his client needs to be protected from too much press, which I suspect is right: too much exposure that could make Xeo Chu reflect on things that are irrelevant to making art. The exhibition in London is a retrospective of his first 10 years as an artist. Can you imagine what another exhibition in 10 years would look like? Who knows if I will still be painting, he replies.

Xeo Chu tells me he doesnt know much art, but he wants to learn. When I tell him that in the gallery next door to his exhibition is a show of work by the late Swedish mystical artist Hilma af Klint, Xeo Chu looks fascinated to learn that someone was instructed by spirits to paint her canvases. His mum tells me that they are spending time in London with a view to her son studying art here. You could become the next Tracey Emin or Damien Hirst, I tell him. Well maybe, he says, uncertain. But Im not really sure what I want to be when I grow up. Im just a kid.

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14-year-old art sensation Xeo Chu: I kind of keep it hidden from friends - The Guardian

Video: Artist Ben Miller fly-casts a painting of the Chicago River on April 3, 2022. (Courtesy of Friends of the Chicago River)

From mid-morning through early evening, Ben Miller cast his fishing line along the Chicago River on Sunday, and didnt have a single bite to show for the effort.

Granted, hed never actually dropped his lure into the water. Instead, Miller, an acclaimed artist who paints with a rod and reel, had spent his day angling his line toward a plexiglass canvas some 20 feet away,creating a portrait of the river. Its a style he calls fly cast painting in a nod to the techniques borrowed from fly fishing.

Depending on which fly brush is attached to the end of his line, Miller can lay down delicate whispers of strokes or powerful splotches that land with a thump. To add an extra degree of difficulty: He places colors in reverse. When hes finished with his casting, Miller flips the canvas to expose the actual work thats been taking shape in his minds eye.

It was astounding to watch, said Margaret Frisbie, executive director for Friends of the Chicago River.

Though shed only planned to swing by to catch a bit of the work in progress, Frisbie couldnt tear herself away and stood mesmerized for hours.

We were captivated, she said. It was magic.

Miller, whos in town for theExpo Chicagointernational art exhibit, had reached out to Friends of the Chicago River in advance of the show. With rivers as his primary subject matter, hes become an advocate for endangered waterways and has recently begun a series of paintings of environmentally threatened rivers. The Chicago River was a natural fit for the theme, though its the first that Miller, who makes his home in Montana, has painted in a large city.

A portion of the proceeds of the Chicago River paintings sale his works can fetch in the five figures will be donated to Friends, but the artworks real value lies in what it represents, said Frisbie, who was nearly brought to tears when Miller turned the canvas to reveal his vision of the river.

Miller, she said, came to the Chicago River with no preconceived notions or biases about what the waterway is or isnt. What he saw, and captured, was the living organism that Frisbie has been fighting to have acknowledged for decades.

Its just the river, she said. Its absolutely beautiful.

Contact Patty Wetli:@pattywetli| (773) 509-5623 |[emailprotected]

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The Chicago River Comes Alive in New Portrait Painted With Fishing Rod and Reel - WTTW News