“The artist must work so hard, so long, that a brain develops and lives, all of itself, in his fingers …. The artist must not think of critical rewards or money he will get for [...]

By David Molesky The Chilean artist Guillermo Lorca (b. 1984) and I first met years ago at the master painter Odd Nerdrum’s farm in southern Norway. Initially he struck me as a South American James Dean, handsome [...]

Recognized as one of America’s most accomplished impressionistic plein air painters, New Mexico artist Kevin Macpherson judged PleinAir™ Magazine’s monthly Salon for July.  Kevin wrote about his thought process as he sifted through more than [...]

Inspiration comes in many forms, and creativity is its currency. But where does creativity come from – and what even is it? It’s thought that childhood play and adult creativity originate in similar processes in [...]

It’s not technique that makes you fall in love with art; learning technique opens the way so you can explore art’s ancient and miraculous forces. Art’s power is in what it means to you, how [...]

“Debauched!” went the outcry, "vice-ridden," “drunken indecency!” “The worst type of harlotry!” Bostonians were livid, and it was the scandal of the decade. It was 1896, the last gasp of the Victorian era, and the Women’s [...]

There’s a simple reason that this photo makes a good foundation for a painting: The natural curvature and dynamic angles of the rocky ledges give it an eye-catching composition out of the gate. The scene [...]

By their very nature as horizontal beasts, landscape paintings are prone to “stripey-ness.” They can become dominated by unbroken horizontal shapes stacked neatly one on top of the other. This can result in paintings that [...]

Art supplies are hard to come by on a tiny rockbound island 10 miles out at sea. Perhaps that’s one reason American Impressionist Childe Hassam used miniature cigar box lids to capture the fleeting fireworks [...]

In an article published not too long ago in The Atlantic, Arthur C. Brooks argued that art is as important to human helath as exercise and good nutrition. Art needn’t be primarily an escapist activity [...]