Hey everyone, I hope your week went well. I’ve been fairly busy between the start of my online courses and being as active as possible in supporting the #blacklivesmatter movement (refresher: here’s an awesome link as a jumping off point to donating, protesting, learning, etc…anything you can do, helps!).

To be very honest, I wasn’t entirely sure what to write about for this post. I feel like my past blog posts have been somewhat repetitive in their content, even though last week’s was more or less a journal entry to get out some frustrations about quarantine. That being said, I really want to hone in on looking at art rather than making my own. Times like these are when I REALLY miss going to museums and gallery spaces of all shapes and kinds and, instead, I have mostly shifted my focus to seemingly infinite universe that is the Instagram search page. I have an album saved in my Insta named “Cool Paintings” and I just wanted to mention some artists whose work I have found through the search page and added into my album.

Before giving y’all the artists’ handles, let me first say how amazing a resource Instagram is for finding art work. There are so many art history pages that both focus on a specific artist or era, or are just a compilation of multiple artists spreading across many eras…very helpful for my art historian self! Some people whose work I’ve discovered and fell in love with include :

https://www.instagram.com/peradolfsen_artist/

https://www.instagram.com/ullibothner/

https://www.instagram.com/fogo.alessandro/

https://www.instagram.com/youngkearton/

I’ve noticed that I really have a thing for abstract and really colorful work recently. The line work in @peradolfsen_artist’s work is so gorgeous and expressive and really reminds me of Van Gogh’s sketches and also his brush work in his paintings. Both artist’s beautifully emulate movement and their works look like they are vibrating.

I really love the emotional depth and meditative qualities of @ullibothner’s works. The brushstrokes are intense and lush. A lot of his works, especially those with icy grays and moody blues make me think of Henry Twachtman’s wintry impressionist paintings …both calming and energizing.

I just LOVE the blues that @fogo.alessandro uses…heavily reminds me of Maxfield Parrish’s “The Lantern Bearers”. He seems to echo that use of blue in a lot of his works and it’s just so electric and pleasing to the eye. His colors also remind me of the Frida Kahlo Museum in Mexico.

Last, but not least, I will discuss @youngkearton’s work…I wasn’t too sure what to compare her works to. Some reminded me of Caspar David Friedrich’s use of tiny figures against vast landscapes whereas a few compositions reminded me of Ivan Aivazovsky and his shipwrecks.

I hope this introduction to some of my current favorite artists has either opened your eyes to the world of the Instagram search page or reignited a love for looking at art! If y’all would like anymore recommendations, please don’t hesitate to drop a comment below, I would love to have a discussion with you! and, always, stay safe and have a great rest of your week!