Sandro Botticelli and The Birth of Venus

The Birth of Venus could be regarded as one of the most iconic paintings in Western Art, but is not without controversy. I have chosen it as my painting of the month for January for a number of reasons. Firstly it is also iconic for its representation of a new beginning; Venus appears from the sea at…

Happy Christmas from White Box Art

Not quite Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer, but nevertheless my Christmas painting for this year. I have always wandered how things of great beauty can become so commercial and, dare I say tacky. And this poor beast has suffered this fate over the years.  Sir Edward Landseer already had a reputation for painting and sculpture…

Happy Christmas from White Box Art

Not quite Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer, but nevertheless my Christmas painting for this year. I have always wandered how things of great beauty can become so commercial and, dare I say tacky. And this poor beast has suffered this fate over the years.  Sir Edward Landseer already had a reputation for painting and sculpture…

Joseph Wright of Derby at the National Gallery

Joseph Wright of Derby (1734 – 1797) is undoubtedly one of the great English painters of the eighteenth century. He was tutored in London by Thomas Hudson, the master of Sir Joshua Reynolds. As with most artists of that period he was accomplished in portrait painting, to make his living, and landscape where he made…

George Seurat, Radical Harmony and The National Gallery.

Georges Seurat was a giant in the modern history of European Art. A superb draughtsman, he was instrumental in bringing the curtain down on Impressionism and introducing new ways of thinking about painting using scientific calculation. He studied colour and instead of combining paint to produce different hues and tones he used pure colour and…