John LaFarge

Wild Roses and Irises, 1887. Gouache and watercolor on white wove paper, 14.5 x 10". The Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC.

Seascape, 1883. Watercolor on paper, 6 x 4".

Mountain Gorge Near Dambulla, Ceylon. Watercolor on paper, 16 x 13". Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA.

Wild Roses in an Antique Chinese Bowl, 1880. Watercolor on paper 10 x 9" Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA.

John La Farge (1835-1910). US painter and ecclesiastical designer. He is credited with the revival of stained glass in America and also created woodcuts, watercolors, and murals. Lafarge visited Europe 1856 and Far East in 1886. In the 1870s he turned from landscape painting (inspired by the French painters, Corot) to religious and still-life painting. Decorating the newly built Trinity church in Boston, MA, he worked alongside the sculptor Saint-Gaudens. (Brockhampton).

Sense of Place

Paul Gauguin - Still Life with Peaches, 1889.

"I thought that by leaving Aix I should leave behind the boredom that pursues me. Actually, I have done nothing but change my abode and the boredom has followed me." - Paul Cezanne

Note: For those of you wondering why I chose a Gauguin painting to go with a Cezanne quote... I saw the image and automatically assumed it was Cezanne, later to realize it was not! Anyone else agree this painting is very much in Cezanne's style?

Janet Fish

Olive Oil from Provence, 1973. Oil on canvas, 48 x 60 ".

Janet Fish and Charles Parness, 1999.

Butterfly Collection, 1984. Oil on canvas, 54 x 68".

Butterfly detail

Four Honey Jars, 1970. Oil on canvas, 67 x 54 ".

Oh, how I love Janet Fish. She is known for painting still lives - especially collections of things and vignettes too. She's amazing at painting glass and reflections as well as fruit in packages. The subject seems to take on a life, even a 'personality' of it's own.

"Gloriously ripe oranges strain against their high-gloss grocery wrapping. Grouped tequila bottles create a visual symphony of reflected color and light. An afternoon tag sale, complete with badminton set and Barbie doll, is brought to life through lush brushstrokes and vivid color. Artist Janet Fish is well known for her richly executed oil paintings and watercolors of glass, fruit, and flowers, through which she 'captures the beauty of everyday objects.' Her art is 'beyond realism.'" (Vincent Katz)

Janet Fish was born in Boston, MA in 1938. She grew up in Bermuda, went to Art College in New Haven, CT and the Skowhegan School in Maine. She was big in the New York art world in the 1960's and 1970's.

Images from the fabulous book : Janet Fish Paintings by Vincent Katz - 2002, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.

Henri Fantin-Latour

White Cup and Saucer, 1864. Oil on canvas, 19x 28 cm. Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, England.

Henri Fantin-Latour (1836-1904) French painter who was most famous for his flower paintings and still life work. He also did many group portraits of his fellow artists like Monet, Manet, Whistler etc. While those painters were more 'cutting edge' at the time, Henri was more of a salon painter; a traditionalist. He was influenced by the Symbolists. As his career progressed he grew to love lithography and produced many prints in his later years. He died of Lyme Disease in 1904 and is buried in the famous Montparnasse Cemetery in Paris.

A Promise of Spring

A Bunch of Asparagus 1880, Edouard Manet

This luscious bunch of veg looks so appealing and fresh! I love all the different shades of green and the violet tips, it makes me long for an outdoor market. (Beaverton Farmer's Market in Portland, OR... what a feast for the eyes)

Manet (1832 - 1883) is probably most famous for his painting, Olympia (1865) and Dejeuner Sur L'Herbe (1863). Both of these paintings shocked the Paris Salon with such blatant nudity of a woman as she unabashedly gazes at the viewer, instead of purely being gazed at. What was also new about these paintings was she was depicted in scenes that are every day life settings while nude (as opposed to posing in a studio or playing a role/allegory etc.) His brother, Eugene, was married to the formidable Impressionist painter, Berthe Morisot.

'He was a French painter, active in Paris, one of the foremost French artists of the 19Th century. He was born in Paris, trained under a history painter and was inspired by Goya and Velazquez and Courbet. He never exhibited with the Impressionists, although he was associated with them from the 1870's.' (Brockhampton)