Kurt Wenner's 3D Underground (street painting)

Paintings of Sir Winston Churchill.

These painting are the creations of Sir Winston Churchill. It was in his 40's that he began painting.
'Sir Winston Churchill's life through his paintings' written & researched by David Coombs & Minnie Churchill, has 534 known paintings which have been catalogued into a beautiful book, the book follows his life through his paintings.

(Really) Stunning Pictures and Photos

Earliest Oil Paintings Discovered

Oil paintings have been found in caves behind the two ancient colossal Buddha statues destroyed in 2001 by the Taliban, suggesting that Asians — not Europeans — were the first to invent oil painting.

Many people worldwide were in shock when the Taliban destroyed the Buddha statues in the Afghan region of Bamiyan.

Behind those statues are caves decorated with paintings from the fifth to ninth centuries.

New experiments performed at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) show that the paintings were made of oil, hundreds of years before the technique emerged in Europe. The results are detailed in the peer-reviewed Journal of Analytical Atomic Spectrometry.

“This is the earliest clear example of oil paintings in the world, although drying oils were already used by ancient Romans and Egyptians, but only as medicines and cosmetics," said researcher Yoko Taniguchi.

In many European history and art textbooks, oil painting is said to have started in the 15th century in Europe.

However, scientists from the National Research Institute for Cultural Properties in Tokyo (Japan), the Centre of Research and Restoration of the French Museums-CNRS (France), the Getty Conservation Institute (United States) and the ESRF have recently identified drying oils in some samples studied from the Bamiyan caves.

Painted in the mid-seventh century, the murals show scenes with Buddhas in vermilion robes sitting cross-legged amid palm leaves and mythical creatures. The scientists discovered that 12 out of the 50 caves were painted with oil painting techniques, using perhaps walnut and poppy seed drying oils.

The researchers relied on a combination of synchrotron techniques, including infrared micro-spectroscopy, micro X-ray fluorescence, micro X-ray absorption spectroscopy and micro X-ray diffraction.

"On one hand, the paintings are arranged as superposition of multiple layers, which can be very thin," said Marine Cotte, a research scientist at CNRS and an ESRF scientific collaborator. "The micrometric beam provided by synchrotron sources was hence essential to analyze separately each of these layers. On the other hand, these paintings are made with inorganic pigments mixed in organic binders, so we needed different techniques to get the full picture."

The results showed a high diversity of pigments as well as binders, and the scientists identified original ingredients and alteration compounds. Apart from oil-based paint layers, some of the layers were made of natural resins, proteins, gums, and, in some cases, a resinous, varnish-like layer.

Protein-based material can indicate the use of hide glue or egg. Within the various pigments, the scientists found a high use of lead whites. These lead carbonates are often used paintings.

The paintings are probably the work of artists who traveled on the Silk Road, the ancient trade route between China, across Central Asia's desert to the West. However, there are very few studies about this region.

"Due to political reasons, research on paintings in Central Asia is scarce. We were fortunate to get the opportunity from UNESCO, as a part of conservation project for the World Heritage site Bamiyan, to study these samples, and we hope that future research may provide deeper understanding of the painting techniques along the Silk Road and the Eurasian area”, Taniguchi said.

The results, publicly announced today, previously were presented in a scientific conference in Japan in January. The research was funded by the ESRF, the Ministry of Information and Culture of Afghanistan and UNESCO. A part of this study was also funded by the Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research, Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists from the Ministry of Education and Culture,

Jeweled Eggs.

Rich Hinchcliffe

Commuters

Joe Coleman

The infernal Joe Coleman has a show of his mind-blowing paintings opening next week, May 2, at the Dickinson gallery in New York City. Titled "Devotio Moderno," the exhibition also features works by the 15th century Northern Primitives, artists whose work directly inspires Coleman. Seen here, Coleman's "The Book of Revelations," 1999, Acrylic, fabric, paper, blood on panel, 62.2 x 77.5 cm. The show runs until June 15 and the art is viewable online too. From the press release:

(Coleman's) fascination with themes derived from religion and primitive painting, and his meticulous and detailed style of unabashed realism, have led to numerous comparisons between his art and the paintings of the northern renaissance. All his works are united by a very personal autobiographical theme, and in many ways relate to the early primitive devotional paintings. This exhibition allows admirers of Joe's work to see the imagery that influences him, and provides a unique opportunity to see masterpieces of the northern renaissance side by side with masterpieces by today's greatest "primitive" painter. Similarly, seeing works by Memling and his contemporaries in this setting, gives us an opportunity to truly appreciate their shameless realism, and the modernity of expression they gave to religious work of the 15th century still provides a resonant critique of the human condition today.

3D Wall Painting Art.

Hidden Inside Wood

Sergei Kryzhanovski uses natural patterns found inside various wood (mostly pine) - to discern the hidden patterns and make interesting pieces of art from them: from wizards and gnomes to iris flowers -

Giuseppe Arcimboldo 'The Four Seasons'

Sony World Photography Awards 2008

Weird Public Art Displays

Augmented Nature in Ilkka Halso's Surreal Photography

This is the best attempt to build something in natural environment, period. Too bad it's only a rendering. Imagine wandering through the serene Finnish forests, and encountering such structures.... Simply sublime.

Cool statuary