Fine Art Connoisseur March/April 2020

The first decade of Fine Art Connoisseur trips have become legendary, ranging across Europe from Russia to Spain, from Scotland to Greece. Now we look forward to fresh adventures as our merry band of art lovers visits Vienna, Berlin, and Dresden this September. Editor-in-Chief Peter Trippi and I are finalizing the itinerary for this masterpiece-rich odyssey in Austria and Germany, which encompasses famous sites and also ones well off the beaten track. It is a joy to be reconnecting with our trusted colleagues in these cultured cities to ensure we get special access and behind-the-scenes experiences every day. The main program will start with four nights (September 11–15) at the gorgeous Palais Hansen Kempinski Hotel in the heart of Vienna. On our hit list in Austria’s capital are the grand Kunsthistoriches Museum…

What an inspiring experience! For the past few months, our editorial team has been engrossed in learning about real-life individuals who are collecting superb contemporary realist art. Our conversations with these enthusiastic patrons — conducted via telephone, e-mail, and in person — have confirmed our belief that much energy, and considerable cash, are being expended in support of the ever-growing number of talented realist artists working among us. We are particularly delighted that these visionaries live all over the country, and that each fell in love with this field in a different way. In preparing the profiles here, we learned that many of these collectors — sophisticated and well-connected as they are — are not accustomed to being in the spotlight. Knowing how much they value their privacy, we appreciate even…

As a librettist, Mark Campbell has his characters sing their thoughts. In the composer Laura Kaminsky’s opera Some Light Emerges (2017), Campbell and his co-librettist Kimberly Reed had the real-life character of Dominique de Menil (1908–1997) express her love for one of Campbell’s favorite artworks, the chapel in Houston she commissioned from Mark Rothko. In an aria, de Menil describes her love of the “silence,” the “quiet,” and the “shadows” of the chapel. She refers to it as a place “Where the eye and the mind/Are taken beyond…. to the infinite.” Campbell similarly loves “the emptiness of that space — the darkness of it, and I love how, when you enter the chapel, it’s often so dark you need to sit a while before some light emerges.” Indeed, the opera owes…

When a portrait is painted well, it is sometimes difficult to see beyond the surface beauty. In the case of California artist JONG LEE (b. 1972), however, not only are his likenesses aesthetically pleasing, they are also layered with thoughtfulness and intention. Take Red, for example, which is striking in its visual elegance and carries the gravitas of an unseen story as well. “I wanted to juxtapose the dynamic nature of the overall composition with the subject’s calm, contemplative expression,” Lee explains. “The figure’s sweeping diagonal movement creates an illusion that her body is in motion, yet her serenity suggests she is fixated on meandering thoughts. It’s a symbolic representation of the duality in all of us. This contrast — even contradiction — between what is real and what is…

This spring two shows of new paintings are coming to Steve Diamant’s gallery in Los Angeles, Arcadia Contemporary, created by the exemplary figurative artists Nick Alm (b. 1985) and Brad Kunkle (b. 1978). Both clearly venerate women, who are at the heart of their painted universes, yet each has a unique approach to expressing that esteem. Nick Alm’s solo show will be on view March 7–22, and then Brad Kunkle’s April 10–May 18. It is perfectly appropriate that two festivals celebrating the feminine principle will occur while these shows are hanging. The first was called Ostara by Celtic tribes. In Alm’s native Sweden (where he lives today), it is called Disablot, a marking of the vernal equinox, when the day is equally divided between 12 hours of day and night. For…

Now that spring has finally arrived, the editorial team at Fine Art Connoisseur opted to delight readers’ color-starved eyes with an array of superb contemporary artworks celebrating flowers, flowering foliage, and gardens. It never ceases to amaze us how each artist comes at what is essentially the same subject from a completely different viewpoint. Such individuality is just one of the things that makes the field of art so endlessly intriguing, just as flowers are among spring’s most welcome gifts. MATTHIAS ANDERSON is a contributing writer to Fine Art Connoisseur.…