Famous American artists. School encyclopedia

Each country has its own heroes of contemporary art, whose names are well-known, whose exhibitions attract crowds of fans and curious people, and whose works are sold to private collections.

In this article we will introduce you to the most popular contemporary artists in the United States.

Iva Morris

American artist Iva Morris was born into a large family far from art and art education I received it after school. She received her bachelor's degree in art from the University of New Mexico in 1981. Today, Iva has been engaged in art for more than 20 years, her works are known both at home and abroad, and have repeatedly brought her prizes and awards. They can be viewed in galleries in Albuquerque, Sante Fe, New Mexico, and Madrid.

Warren Chang

Artist Urren Cheng was born in 1957 in California, received a BFA in painting from Pasadena College of Design and spent the next 20 years working as an illustrator for various companies, starting a career professional artist only in 2009. Cheng's painting style is rooted in the work of the 16th century artist Johannes Vermeer - Warren Cheng works in a realistic manner, creating two main categories: biographical interior paintings and paintings depicting people at work. Currently teaches at the Academy of Art in San Francisco.

Christopher Traedy Ulrich

Los Angeles-based artist Christopher Ulrich is a surrealist with an iconographic bent. His work was influenced a huge impact ancient mythology. First personal exhibition Ulricha (collaboration with artist Billy Shire) took place in June 2009.

Michael DeVore

Young artist and Oklahoma City native Michael DeVore works in the classical realist tradition. He came to art with the help and support of his family, and won numerous awards in his home state before studying fine art at Pepperdine University in Malibu. Then the artist continued his studies in Italy. Currently, his works are exhibited around the world and are in private collections. Michael Devore is a member of the Oil Painters of America, the International Guild of Realism, National Society oil and acrylic artists and the Society of Portrait Painters of America.

Mary Carol Kenney

Mary Carol Kenny was born in Indiana in 1953. By education, she is very vaguely related to the fine arts, but since 2002, driven by the desire to become an artist, she began taking sculpture and ceramics classes at Santa Barbara City College, and then began studying with Ricky Shtrikh. Today she is a member of The Santa Barbara Art Ass, the guild of Santa Barbara sculptors and the winner of many awards in sculpture and painting.

Patricia Watwood

Realist artist Patricia Watwood was born in 1971 in Missouri. She graduated with honors from the Academy of Fine Arts, studied in the workshop of Jacob Collins and Ted Seth Jacobs. The artist’s style is modern classicism: mythology, allegories and modern life. For the past few years, Patricia has lectured on classicism throughout the country and now lives with her family in Brooklyn.

Paula Rubino

Paula Rubino, a contemporary American artist and writer, was born in 1968 in New Jersey and grew up in Florida. Has a doctorate in law. In the 90s she moved to Mexico and focused on painting. She studied the art of drawing in Italy, where she finished her first novel. A series of her short stories has also been published. Currently lives in Florida.

Patssi Valdez

Patssy Valdez was born in Los Angeles in 1951 and studied fine art at the Otis Art Institute, where she was named Distinguished Alumnus of the Class of 1980. In 2005, Valdez received the Latina Award and the title "Latina of Excellence in the Cultural Arts" from the United States Congressional Hispanic Forum. Has already become famous early stage his career while working with the avant-garde art group ASCO. He is the winner of many prestigious awards, including those awarded by the Trust Fund visual arts J. Paul Getty National Fund arts She received a Brody Fellowship in Visual Arts. Valdez's paintings are part of several major collections.

Cynthia Grilli

Artist Cynthia Grilli received a BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1992 and an MFA in painting from the New York Academy of Art by 1994. Her work has been published in numerous US publications, exhibited throughout the country, and is included in private and corporate collections in America and Europe. Cynthia is a two-time recipient of the Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation.

Eric Fischl

Eric Fischl was born in New York in 1948. In 1972 he graduated from the California Institute of the Arts and received a bachelor's degree. After graduation, he worked for some time as a security guard at a Chicago museum. contemporary art. Having moved to Scotland, Fischl began teaching at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design and began painting directly. His first personal exhibition took place in Scotland. The genres of his works are very diverse, but mainly figurative painting, episodes from modern American life.

Original taken from vanatik05 in AMERICAN PAINTING – 5 (Realistic traditions in the 20th century)

In 1913, the Association American artists and sculptors the first large International exhibition contemporary art, Armory Show, at the National Guard armory on Lexington Avenue. She became important event in the history of American art, evoked different emotions: surprise, admiration, indignation, worship and complete rejection among the American public, accustomed to realism, to some extent to impressionism, but not to the avant-garde European art that it saw at this exhibition. 1,300 paintings, sculptures and decorative works by more than 300 contemporary European and American artists visited not only New York, but also Chicago and Washington.

Reviews of the exhibition included accusations of immorality, unprofessionalism, madness, quackery, many works were called caricatures and parodies of painting, and Theodore Roosevelt said: “This is not art at all!”

Civil authorities, however, did not interfere and did not try to close the exhibition, and the scandals surrounding it only contributed to the successful sale of many works that can be seen today in American museums, and MoMA (The Museum of Modern Art) can generally be considered the heir and successor of that first contemporary art exhibitions.

It indirectly influenced artists of the realistic movement, and realistic traditions never died in America; it not only contributed to changes in drawing techniques and themes, but even gave birth to such new trends in painting as “magical realism”*

And its offshoot is “precisionism”**, characteristic specifically of American artists,

And the artistic movement “regionalism”*** (or regionalism) born in America.

Here's about the artists, representatives different directions realistic art of America of the 20th century, we'll talk.

Charles Burchfield(1893-1967), one of the most outstanding watercolorists in America, who painted his paintings at the easel using the dry brush technique, early (by 1915) developed his own neorealist style, combining modernist trends, traditional Chinese painting and elements of Fauvism.

Throughout his creative life, he changed directions and techniques, painted landscapes and paintings in historical subjects, scenes observed from the window of his house, and flowers, “hallucinatory”, in the spirit magical realism, views of nature and its divine power.

In his honor, in 1966, a Nature and Arts Center was created in Buffalo, called the Birchfield Penny Art Center, which also includes the world's largest collection of the artist's works.

Reginald Marsh(1898-1954), born in Paris, into a wealthy family of artists, was a student of D. Sloan, known primarily as a painter and illustrator of urban scenes, street life, New York beaches.

His paintings are distinguished by documentary thoroughness, imbued with an ironic love for characters; he painted a lot for burlesque and vaudeville, considering them “theater common man, expressing the humor and fantasies of the poor, old and ugly."

He worked in oil and ink, watercolor, egg tempera, and began his creative life with lithography. His style can be characterized as “social realism,” especially evident during the Great Depression, and his devotion to the old masters, whose work he worshiped, led to the creation of works containing religious metaphors.

Shortly before his death from heart attack March received Gold medal graphic art American Academy of Arts.

Fairfield Porter(1907-1975) was born into the family of an architect and a poet, studied at Harvard and the League of American Students, adhered to the realistic movement all his life, painted mainly landscapes and portraits of family and friends, trying to reveal the unusualness in ordinary life, make it more beautiful.

His work shows the influence of his architect father, the work of Velázquez, and later the artists Bonnard and Vuillard; he believed that “impressionism is capable of pictorially recreating the presence of reality.”

Perhaps the absence good teachers oil painting, a wary attitude towards sensuality and naturalism, inherent in many Americans of those years, helps explain the somewhat primitive nature of Porter’s works, the awkwardness, stiffness of his figures, their static nature.

And only in his later works does he begin to cross the border between impressionism and fauvism, his drawing becomes freer, the colors are brighter, and there is more light in his works.

Edward Hopper(1882-1967) was born in Nyack, a yacht-building center on the Hudson River, into a wealthy family of Dutch descent. Hopper's artistic talent manifested itself at the age of 5; his parents instilled in him a love of French and Russian art and encouraged his passion for painting and diverse interests.

Hopper worked in pen and ink, charcoal, watercolor, oil and lithography, painting portraits and seascapes, political cartoons and drawings from life. In Hopper's work one can discern the influences of Robert Henry, one of his teachers, and Manet and Degas,

William Chase and Rembrandt, especially his "Night Watch", and while living in Paris, painting scenes on the streets, in cafes and theaters, he remained in the tradition of realistic art, although some researchers attribute his work to precisionism due to the clear, clear lines characteristic of his work. geometric shapes, mechanicalness, sterility and emptiness of space.

He said that his “favorite thing in painting is sunlight on the wall of the house." During the Great Depression, Hopper had better luck than many other artists - he continued to exhibit annually and sell well throughout the rest of his life.

His work greatly influenced not only the visual arts, but also cinema with its cinematic compositions and dramatic use of light and dark.

Paul Cadmus(1904-1999), a representative of the “magical realism” movement, combined in his work elements of eroticism and social criticism,

gained scandalous fame thanks to overt homosexual motifs in his paintings and depictions of naked male figures.

He was born into a poor family of an artist, his father encouraged the boy to take up drawing, and at the age of 14 he entered courses at the National Academy of Design, and then to the Academy. He traveled a lot with his friends, painted large canvases reflecting his impressions of Europe, painted multi-figure paintings from the life of fishermen, sailors, scenes of city life,

And after meeting the impresario and balletomane Kirsten, Cadmus began to produce many works on ballet themes, mostly depicting dancers.

Paul Cadmus lived long life and died at the age of 95 in the arms of his friend and regular model, who was by his side throughout the last 35 years of his life. Cadmus liked to repeat the words of Ingres: “People say that my paintings are not suitable for this time. Perhaps they are mistaken, and I am the only one who keeps up with the times.”

Ivan (Ivan) Albright(1897-1983), one of the most famous representatives of magical realism, was born with his twin brother in the artist's family.

Brothers most were inseparable in their lives, both studied at the Art Institute of Chicago, brother Malvin became a sculptor, and Ivan became an artist, but began as an architect, and during the First World War he performed medical drawings for a hospital in Nantes. He was always very demanding about his work, carefully writing out all the details and devoting many of his works to such complex topics as life and death, materiality and spirit, the effect of time on appearance and inner world person.

Such work required a lot of time and therefore sales were rare; many paintings remained in his ownership. Albright made his own paints and coals and was obsessed with lighting to the point that he wore black clothes and painted his studio black to prevent glare.

He painted in a realistic but exaggeratedly detailed manner, he loved to observe the passage of time and painted over 20 self-portraits in the last 3 years of his life alone to reflect the changes taking place in a person.

George Claire Tooker Jr. (1920-2011), whose works represent the directions of socialist realism and magical realism, was born into a family with English-French-Spanish-Cuban and American roots, at the insistence of his parents he studied at Harvard English literature, but devoted most of his time to painting.

After serving in Marine Corps, from where he was dismissed due to poor health, attended courses at the Art Students League, worked a lot in the egg tempera technique, and admired the art of the Italian Renaissance.

Tooker's paintings depict scenes of everyday American life, the human figures in them often have no specific racial or sexual identity, expressing loneliness, isolation and anonymity.

He paid a lot of attention to the observance of geometric proportions and symmetry, because of this he painted very slowly - no more than two paintings a year. Since his first major exhibition in 1951, Tooker has exhibited continuously and successfully, and his work is in major museums in America.

Peter Blume(Peter Bloom) - (1906-1992), artist and sculptor, whose works contain elements of precisionism, purism, cubism, surrealism and folk art. He was born in Russia into a Jewish family that emigrated to America in 1912 and settled in Brooklyn.

After studying art in different educational institutions he opened his own studio under the patronage of the Rockefeller family. Like many of his realist contemporaries, he was a fan of the Renaissance, traveled around Italy, his first painting, which received recognition in 1934, was “The Eternal City,” in which one can discern the image of Mussolini, like a jack-in-the-box, emerging from the Colosseum.

His works, often depicting destruction, can nevertheless be interpreted as symbols of restoration and renewal after the Second World War, as evidenced by the stones, new beams, and figures of working people.

Blume's artistic style was an interesting hybrid of different artistic movements of American and European art, he is called “an artist of fairy-tale storytelling.”

Andrew Newell Wyeth(1917-2009), a representative of the predominantly regionalist style in realism, was born into the family of an illustrator who was attentive to the development of talents in his five children, teaching them good literature, music, and the study of nature. The father himself taught his children at home, and they were all talented: artists, musician, composer, inventor.

Their home was a creative place, often visited by celebrities such as Scott Fitzgerald and Mary Pickford. Wyeth himself, oddly enough, considered himself an abstractionist and attached great importance awareness of the deep meaning in simple objects, his favorite themes were the earth and the people around him.

His most famous painting, Christina's World, depicts a girl from a nearby farm, disabled by polio, crawling alone towards a house in the distance.

Helga Testorf dedicated 247 paintings and drawings to one woman; he studied her in various settings and emotional states, which is a unique experience in American art.

Although Wyeth produced many technically excellent works and had many followers, his art is considered controversial, with art critic Rosenblum describing him as "the most overrated and underrated" artist.

Grant Wood(1891-1942), one of the most famous representatives of regionalism, was born in Iowa, lost his father early, worked in a hardware store, studied at art school, and then at the Art Institute of Chicago.

Young Grant traveled to Europe 4 times to study painting styles, paying special attention to impressionism and post-impressionism, but he admired the works of Van Eyck and dreamed of combining modern methods and the clarity, precision, and depth of medieval art in his work.

No wonder his most famous painting is called “ American Gothic", it reflects the traditional 19th-century view of the roles of men and women in America; the picture was received ambiguously, some considered it a caricature, and newspapers parodied it in different ways.

Later, while teaching painting at the University of Iowa, Wood became a key figure cultural society University, but because of rumors about his homosexual relationship with his personal secretary, Wood was fired and soon died of pancreatic cancer.

Thomas Hart (Hart) Benton(1889-1975) was born into a family of politicians, his father, a colonel, lawyer and philanthropist, was elected to Congress four times. The father wanted his son to follow in his footsteps, but the boy was interested in art, his mother supported his choice, and he entered the Art Institute of Chicago, and then went to Paris to continue his studies at the Julian Academy.

Returning to America and continuing to paint, he served in the US Navy during World War I, working on camouflage images of ships and shipyards, which required realistic documentary depictions and later influenced his style. In the early 1920s, Benton declared himself an “enemy of modernism”, became one of the leading representatives of regionalism and adhered to “leftist” views.

He became interested in El Greco, the influence of his work is visible in the work on huge frescoes depicting different stages and events in the life of the country.

Benton taught at the Art Students League in New York, many of his students became famous artists(Hopper, Pollack, Marsh), but was fired for making condemnatory statements about the undue influence of homosexuals in art world. After World War II, regionalism as a movement lost its relevance, Benton continued to paint murals,

worked actively for about 30 more years, but no longer had its former popularity.

John Stewart Carrie(1897-1946) was born on a farm in Kansas, cared for animals, was interested in athletics, from childhood was surrounded by reproductions of paintings by Rubens and Doré, which played a role in his subsequent choice of artistic style.

John studied at the Art Institute of Chicago, worked as a magazine illustrator, and spent a year in Paris studying the works of Courbet, Daumier, Titian and Rubens. Returning to the United States, he worked in his studio for some time, traveled with the circus, was appointed the first artist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and traveled around the country to promote the development of art in farming communities.

He has painted murals for the Department of Justice in Washington and for the Capitol in Kansas. Carrie was one of the three (Benton and Wood) pillars of American regionalism, which was especially relevant during the Great Depression.

He depicted scenes of labor, family and land, the fight against natural disasters, to demonstrate to the world the perseverance, hard work and faith of the people, which Carrie believed to be the essence of American life.

To be honest, I am not very inspired by realist artists in general; I am somewhat interested in the work of only individual representatives of magical realism (Cadmus, Blume, Hopper), but in general this period in American art is not close to me, what can I do.
The next and final part will be devoted to contemporary American art. The ending follows...
As always, a slideshow with many more pictures and good music:

* Magic realism- As an artistic movement, magical realism developed on American soil, becoming the equivalent of European surrealism. In many ways, meeting the tastes and needs of the American audience, the works of the masters of magical realism were of a shocking nature, shocking in their frankness, while combining it with the anecdotal nature of situations and the caricature of the characters; reality was more like a restless dream or hallucinatory delirium.
**Precisionism, or preciginism (English precision - accuracy, clarity) - a direction characteristic of American painting of the 30s, a type of magical realism. Main plot for precisionists - an image of the city, main topic- mechanical aesthetics, the space of the paintings is sterile, it feels like the air has been pumped out of them, there is no person in it.
***Regionalism or regionalism (from the English regional - local) - an artistic movement in the art of the United States of 1920-1940, which was based on the desire to create truly American art as opposed to those coming from Europe avant-garde movements. Inspired by ideas of national identity, regionalist artists focused on depicting the “authentic” America. The themes of their works were American landscapes, scenes from the life of farmers, the life of small towns, episodes from history, local legends and folklore stories.

"Books give me a great sense of personal and creative satisfaction. When I'm working on a book, I wish the phone would never ring. My satisfaction comes from actually putting marks on paper."

American children's book illustrator Pinkney Jerry was born on December 22, 1939 in Germantown. In high school, his love and talent for drawing was noticed by cartoonist John Liney, who encouraged him to pursue a career as an artist. After graduating from Dobbins Vocational School, Pinkney received a full scholarship to study at the Philadelphia Museum College of Art. He later moved to Boston where he worked in design and illustration, eventually opening his own studio, Jerry Pinkney Studio, and later moving to New York. Pinkney Jerry still lives and works in New York, over the years creative career He conducted seminars at the University and art schools throughout the country.

"I wanted to show what an African-American artist can do in this country on national level V fine arts. I want to be strong role model for my family and for other African-Americans."

In 1776, America declared its independence, and from that time on, the development of national fine art actually began, which was designed to reflect the history of the country.

Artists of the 18th century Most were self-taught and based on the style of British art.
And in the 19th century. The first school of painting had already been created - the Hudson River School.

Hudson River School

The Hudson River School was the name of a group of American landscape painters. Their work developed in the style of romanticism. The paintings depicted the Hudson River Valley and its surroundings. Artists most often depicted American wildlife and questioned the feasibility of technological progress.

Thomas Cole "Oxbow" (1836). Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York)
The Hudson River School was not a homogeneous phenomenon in painting at that time: for example, there was an offshoot in the style of impressionism, which was called luminism. Luminism paid great attention to the artist's perception of light. Luminism differs from impressionism in that here more attention is paid to details and a hidden brushstroke is made. But in general, these two styles are similar.

Fitz Henry Lane "Ship in the Fog" (1860)
The founder of the School was the artist Thomas Cole. He left for the Hudson River in the fall of 1825. He was then joined by his close friend Asher Brown Duran. Other artists of the School:

Albert Bierstadt
John William Casilier
Frederic Edwin Church
Thomas Cole
Samuel Coleman
Jasper Francis Cropsey
Thomas Doty
Robert Scott Duncanson
Sanford Robinson Gifford
James McDougal Hart
William Hart
William Stanley Haseltine
Martin Johnson Hedy et al.

The paintings of the Hudson School artists were characterized by simplicity and spontaneity.

Thomas Cole (1801-1848)

Thomas Cole was born in England. In 1818, his family emigrated to the United States. Cole learned the basics of his profession from the traveling portrait artist Stein. But portraiture was not successful for him, and he began to paint landscapes. He was also successful in allegorical paintings, for example, the “Journey of Life” series, consisting of paintings about four periods of a person’s life: childhood, youth, maturity and old age. This cycle is stored in the National art gallery(Washington, USA)

T. Cole "Childhood"
In the first painting, the artist depicted a child in a boat floating along the river of life. This boat is steered by an angel, because... The child is not yet capable of independence. His horizons, like in the painting, are limited. The figure at the bow of the boat holds an hourglass, symbolizing time.

T. Cole "Youth"
The same boat, but there is already a young man in it. He already controls the boat on his own, but the angel still does not leave him - he watches him from the shore.

The angel continues to watch the man, but he is immersed in his own problems that overcome him - this is emphasized by the gloomy coloring of the picture, the trees fallen by the storm...

T. Cole "Old Age"
And now life path man is coming to an end. The figure with the hourglass is no longer on the boat - the time of earthly life is over. And the boat became completely decrepit...
A guardian angel came down to him to guide his further path to another world, and other angels were visible in the distance. Cole said about this picture: “The fetters of bodily existence fall away, and the mind is already able to see glimpses of eternal life.”

Winslow Homer (1836-1910)

Photo from 1880
American artist and graphic artist, founder of realistic painting. Best known for his seascapes. He painted in oils and watercolors. His work influenced all subsequent development of American painting.
Homer was influenced by various artistic movements, but was based primarily on purely American subjects.
His painting early period- light and serene, and the last period is characterized by dark tones and tragic themes.

W. Homer “Fog Signal”. Boston Museum of Fine Arts (USA)
The theme of the painting is the struggle of man with the sea, the relationship between fragile human life and eternal nature.

Thomas Cowperthwaite Eakins (Akins) (1844-1916)

American artist, photographer, teacher, leading representative of American realistic painting.

T. Eakins. Self-Portrait (1902)
He graduated from the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts and further improved his skills in Europe, mainly in Paris under the guidance of Jean Leon Gerome. He taught at the Academy of Fine Arts and was its director.
He paid great attention to the study and depiction of nudity, showing freethinking, for which he was fired. In Eakins's paintings and photographs, the nude and semi-nude body occupies a central place. He owns many images of athletes. Eakins was particularly interested in conveying the movements of the human body.

T. Eakins "Swimming" (1895)
He painted portraits in a multi-figure environment.
The most famous work- “Gross Clinic”.

T. Eakins "Gross Clinic" (1875)
The painting depicts the famous Philadelphia surgeon Samuel Gross, who is leading an operation in front of students at the medical academy. The artist portrays Dr. Gross as a genius of human thought, but the picture shocked contemporaries with its realism.
T. Eakins is also known for a number of significant portraits, including a portrait of the American poet and publicist Walt Whitman (1887-1888), which the poet himself considered the best.

T. Eakins. Portrait of Whitman (1887)

James Abbott McNeill Whistler (1834-1903)

Anglo-American artist, portrait painter, etching and lithographer. Predecessor of impressionism and symbolism.

D. Whistler. Self-portrait. Art Institute (Detroit)
Born in Lowell, Massachusetts. His father, George Washington Whistler, a famous railroad engineer, was invited to build roads in Russia in 1842; he designed the Nikolaevskaya railway. In Russia, James attended the Academy of Arts. In the USA he studied at a military school, but was expelled for poor academic performance.

D. Whistler “Arrangement in gray and black. The Artist's Mother (1871). Orsay Museum (Paris)
This is the most famous work James Whistler.
He studied painting in Paris, then in Venice (he studied watercolor sketches and etchings).
In the first period of Whistler's work, he was close to impressionism in his desire to capture the first impression of an object - a landscape or a person. But on many issues he disagreed with the impressionists: he did not approve of the cult of plein air, and thought about color tonality in advance. IN later works Whistler uses extremely diluted, watercolor-like transparent paints, which convey the feeling of the unsteady mobility of the atmospheric environment.

D. Whistler “Symphony in the Gray and Green Ocean” (1866-1872)

Everyday genre

Great development in American paintings of the 19th century V. received everyday genre. At first, this genre was based on the depiction of provincial life with cards, dances, etc.

Eastman Johnson, The Happiness of an Abandoned Stagecoach (1871)
But after the industrial revolution and urbanization began in the United States, artists began to depict the life of residents of large cities.

John Gast "American Progress" (circa 1872)
The painting depicts an allegorical Colombia with a textbook in her hands. She leads civilization to the west along with American settlers, stretching a telegraph line along the way. The picture shows different types economic activity the first settlers, history of transport. Indians and wild animals are depicted fleeing from settlers.

"Garbage Pail School"

On turn of the 19th century and 20th centuries The United States experienced rapid growth of large cities. Cameras of that time could not yet be used to quickly photograph incidents, so news newspapers hired artists for illustrations. This formed the Garbage Pail School, which included Robert Henry, Glenn Coleman, Jerome Myers, and George Bellows. The main objects of the studio's sketches were the streets with their typical representatives: street children, prostitutes, street performers and immigrants. The origins, education and political views of these artists varied. But Robert Henry believed that the life and activities of the poor, proletariat and middle class are worthy of embodiment in painting - these are the realities of the time.

George Bellows "The Help of Nurse Edith Cavell" (1918)
“The Garbage Pail School” revolutionized the visual arts of the United States, it was the forerunner

) in her expressive, sweeping works was able to preserve the transparency of the fog, the lightness of the sail, and the smooth rocking of the ship on the waves.

Her paintings amaze with their depth, volume, richness, and the texture is such that it is impossible to take your eyes off them.

Warm simplicity of Valentin Gubarev

Primitivist artist from Minsk Valentin Gubarev doesn't chase fame and just does what he loves. His work is incredibly popular abroad, but almost unknown to his compatriots. In the mid-90s, the French fell in love with his everyday sketches and signed a contract with the artist for 16 years. The paintings, which, it would seem, should only be understandable to us, bearers of the “modest charm of undeveloped socialism,” appealed to the European public, and exhibitions began in Switzerland, Germany, Great Britain and other countries.

Sensual realism of Sergei Marshennikov

Sergei Marshennikov is 41 years old. He lives in St. Petersburg and works in the best traditions of the classical Russian school of realistic portrait painting. The heroines of his canvases are women who are tender and defenseless in their half-nakedness. Many of the most famous paintings depict the artist's muse and wife, Natalya.

The Myopic World of Philip Barlow

In the modern era of high-resolution images and the rise of hyperrealism, creativity Philip Barlow(Philip Barlow) immediately attracts attention. However, a certain effort is required from the viewer in order to force himself to look at the blurry silhouettes and bright spots on the author’s canvases. This is probably how people suffering from myopia see the world without glasses and contact lenses.

Sunny bunnies by Laurent Parselier

Painting by Laurent Parcelier is amazing world, in which there is neither sadness nor despondency. You won’t find gloomy and rainy pictures from him. There is a lot of light, air and bright colors, which the artist applies with characteristic, recognizable strokes. This creates the feeling that the paintings are woven from a thousand sunbeams.

Urban dynamics in the works of Jeremy Mann

American artist Jeremy Mann paints dynamic portraits of a modern metropolis in oil on wood panels. “Abstract shapes, lines, the contrast of light and dark spots - all create a picture that evokes the feeling that a person experiences in the crowd and bustle of the city, but can also express the calm that is found when contemplating quiet beauty,” says the artist.

The Illusory World of Neil Simon

In the paintings of British artist Neil Simone, nothing is as it seems at first glance. “For me, the world around me is a series of fragile and ever-changing shapes, shadows and boundaries,” says Simon. And in his paintings everything is truly illusory and interconnected. Boundaries are blurred, and stories flow into each other.

Love drama by Joseph Lorasso

An Italian by birth, the contemporary American artist Joseph Lorusso transfers onto canvas subjects he spied in Everyday life ordinary people. Hugs and kisses, passionate outbursts, moments of tenderness and desire fill his emotional pictures.

Country life of Dmitry Levin

Dmitry Levin is a recognized master of Russian landscape, who has established himself as a talented representative of the Russian realistic school. The most important source of his art is his attachment to nature, which he loves tenderly and passionately and of which he feels himself a part.

Bright East by Valery Blokhin

In the East, everything is different: different colors, different air, different life values ​​and reality is more fabulous than fiction - so he thinks contemporary artist Valery Blokhin. In painting, Valery loves color most of all. His work is always an experiment: he does not start from a figure, like most artists, but from a spot of color. Blokhin has his own special technique: first he applies abstract spots to the canvas, and then completes the reality.