Happy Vampires

Prints are largely categorized into two distinct groups called analog prints and digital prints. The analog print, or manual print, is one where the picture has been taken with an optical camera that makes use of a film. A digital print is one where the picture or photograph is taken from a digital camera and makes use of a memory stick to save the pictures. Analog prints need to be developed in a dark room and can be done by any developing and printing studio. The development process involves the use of chemicals, and, hence, it is advisable to not touch the print with bare hands. In order to safeguard the long life of a print, it should be framed.

Framed prints serve a dual purpose. First, they serve as protection, and, secondly, they enhance the aesthetics of a living or working space. Framed prints are used in homes to create an interesting mix in a room. A frame is usually made up of paper, wood, or metal and is available in many shapes, designs, colors, and patterns. There is a vast array of frames to choose from, and it is advisable to make use of a matching color when buying frames for the house. Traditionally framed prints were used only in homes, however they have been installed in many banks, hospitals, hotels, museums, restaurants, schools, and universities.

Framed prints are of two types: digital and analog prints. Analog prints can be framed in wood, metal, or paper. However, digital prints cannot be framed unless they are first printed. However, a technologically advanced solution is a flat screen monitor that is usually 7 inches long diagonally and works on electricity. The pictures stored on a computer act as a slideshow on the frame, and can be controlled either by a remote control or keys provided on the frame. The digital frames are an expensive buy compared to the normal print frames.

Prints-Web.com Prints provides detailed information on Digital Photo Prints, Prints, Art Prints, Print Shops and more. Prints is affiliated with i-DigitalArt.com Digital Art Schools.

With today’s movie making technology greatly surpassing that just 10 years prior, it’s no wonder Hollywood is jumping at the chance to re-create some of history’s ground-breaking movies, utilizing their newly-found gadgets. However, many would say it’s best to move on and let the classics remain just as they were. How far is too far when it comes to modernizing films? Would a Casablanca remake starring Orlando Bloom and Charlize Theron bring big bucks or big disappointment. My personal prediction would have to be the latter. Let the classics remain classics, I say. Also, why turn TV shows of yester-year into the movies of today? Hopefully The Dukes of Hazzard Movie and Starsky and Hutch taught the big men in Hollywood that that may not be such a good idea. I mean, there were no astounding special effects they couldn’t have brought to the big screen thirty years ago. It wasn’t a good idea then, and it’s not a good idea now, apparently. Granted, the movie magic that originally appeared in Batman and Superman over a decade ago seems laughable by today’s standards, but that’s going to happen. It’s a given. It does not necessarily mean that they need to be endlessly re-created. I will give Warner Bros. their due respect, however, for being creative with Batman by avoiding sequels and creating prequels. At least then, there is a stopping point. Is it just me, or did you think they were finally done filming the Rocky series at number 5? Of course not, seventeen years later, along comes Rocky 6! Sylvester Stallone will be in his 60s by the time this movie reaches theatres. No joke! But all ranting aside, I know I’m not the only movie-goer who longs to see a summer line-up of original blockbusters. New heroes and villains, new concepts. Not a polished TV show that was barely good enough to keep an audience entertained for 30 minutes, let alone an hour and thirty minutes.

Today’s Hollywood seems to look past thorough scripts and instead looks at statistics to see which movies made the money in the past. They’ve even tried to make spin-offs of the blockbusters. Look at what a disaster Catwoman was a few years ago. There is a prime example of over-using special effects. The only thing Halle Berry actually did to make that movie was walk, it seems. Everything else was added in later. Badly, I might add. Don’t even get me started on Daredevil’s failed spin-off Elektra. Yikes.

The moral of this article is, if your as fed up with the proceeding as I am, let Hollywood know enough is enough. Before we shell out $8 for a movie ticket, we want to see that some work went into writing a decent script, not just someone assuming we’ll shell out the dough to see X-MEN for the third time even if they just stand there shooting beams from their eyes and sprouting claws. We as movie-goers demand QUALITY, Hollywood!

Hello. I’m James ‘Jimmy′ Cloward and I’m a freelance writer who lives in Rolla, Missouri. I am married to a wonderful woman named Kara and have a beautiful daughter named Kadence. I first gained an interest in movies and popular culture when I managed a major video store. I can still tell you where to find Total Recall on the shelf years later…sadly that’s no joke. I have been writing on and off for numerous years now, seeing as how I’m 23 now, I’d say it’s been a good six years or so, give or take. That’s right, seasoned professional here. I am an author with many interests. I have written articles ranging from weird news stories and sports to “The AVR15 Telescope 90-Day Warranty Manual.” It doesn’t get much more freelance than that! I hope you enjoy my work and I appreciate any support you’d like to toss my way, be it monetary or otherwise. Just kidding. No, I’m not.

More than forty years after it first flared up, one of the most famous feuds in Canadian Literature lives on. With a single harsh review, published in the Montreal Gazette in 1965, Mordecai Richler drew the ire of writer Gradey Alexander, and the two authors spent the next several decades trading figurative punches in the pages of newspapers, magazines, and even their own books.

After graduating from McGill University in 1958, Gradey Alexander began his career as a political journalist with the Ottawa Citizen. It was during this time that he completed his first novel, Kensington Market, which was published when he was only twenty-three. A semi-autobiographical story about a working-class family in Toronto’s ethnically diverse Kensington neighborhood, many critics compared the book to fellow McGill alum Richler’s novel The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, which was released the previous year. This was often done in an unfavourable light, as Alexander’s novel was widely thought to be inferior.

Many speculate that it was this, along with Richler’s less-than-enthusiastic review of Alexander’s second-novel, The Willow Reavers, that prompted Alexander’s career-long rivalry with Richler and harsh criticism of his work.

While Mordecai Richler, with the novels Cocksure and Joshua Then and Now, soon earned a reputation as one of Canada’s pre-eminent writers, Alexander languished in obscurity. Though his criticism was widely published, he was never able to achieve the commercial and critical success that came so easily to the affable Richler. Over the decades, Alexander continued to deride much of Richler’s writing, and many academics have accused Alexander of making a personal rivalry professional.

In the late 1970’s, while working as an editor at the Canadian fiction magazine Lies, With Occasional Truth, Alexander published a short story entitled, “Prosciutto of Desire,” which featured a character named Morton Levitz, who closely resembled writer Mordecai Richler.

Years later, after Alexander left the magazine, Richler answered with a short narrative that was essentially a sequel to Alexander’s piece, and featured the same Levitz character. Alexander, in a letter published in the Toronto Star, publicly cut his ties with LWOT, and threatened legal action against both Richler and the renowned magazine for copyright infringement.

The current Managing Editor of LWOT Magazine, Jared Young, says, “They started their careers around the same time, but Richler had far better luck finding an audience for his work. The Richler name has become sort of synonymous with Canadian writing, but today, if you ask someone on the street who Gradey Alexander is, they’ll have no idea.”

It was this inability to gain acceptance within circles of literary elite in Canada is often cited as the reason for Alexander’s resentment. He exacted some measure of revenge in his 1986 novel The Barnum Kid, which featured the return of the Richler-avatar Morton Levitz, who, in the book, is a leftist political thinker praised by fawning critics despite the fact that he is completely illiterate. In one scene, a publisher pays a thousand dollars for a napkin bearing a gibberish sentence he has scribbled. However, Richler would have the last laugh; when his novel Barney’s Version was awarded the Giller Prize, he sent Alexander an autographed copy inscribed with the same gibberish sentence.

In an essay later published in Midwest Review, Alexander said that the inscription was “the most readable part of the book.”

While bitter feelings are common throughout the history of Literature, from Gabriel García Márquez and Vargas Llosa, to Gore Vidal and Norman Mailer, the notoriously courteous Canadian literary scene has rarely seen a spat like the one between Alexander and Richler. When Richler passed away in 2001, many believed that the longstanding feud would be buried along with him, but in recent public appearances, Alexander has not shied away from sharing his feelings about his iconic rival.

During a stop on his ongoing speaking tour, Alexander used Richler as a reference when comparing Canadian and American literature. “It should be a source of great shame that Duddy Kravitz is considered one of the finest Canadian novels, and Richler one of its finest writers. You need look no further than that simple fact to see why Canadian culture, particular in matters of literature and art, occupies such a low place in the larger world.”

Though many accuse Alexander of being a small-time critic trying to make a name for himself by sullying the name of a literary legend, the breadth and depth of his published work speaks to the contrary. With a total of sixteen books, ranging from novels to short fiction to collections of his criticism, Alexander has enjoyed his minor successes north of the border. His hard feelings towards Richler, though, have not softened with age.

LWOT Magazine:
lwot.net lwot.net
lwot.blogspot.com lwot.blogspot.com

Darren Yeoman is a professor of literature at Eastern British Colombia College.

“If she was my child …” The judgmental approach of people will most probably never stop. Why is it that people always want to judge and condemn their fellow human beings? They get so crafty and cunning and evil about it. Anybody out there who have never heard the phrase “if so-and-so was my child? This generally is followed by a rendition of how he or she would have seen to the upbringing of the person that they are pulling apart with their tongues! It’s a Crying shame!
If Paris Hilton was my Child.

IF she was my child and IF I was living in Beverley Hills and IF her mother didn’t refuse to marry me and IF …
Let’s think about it: First of all she would probably not have had her same good looks and, being less privileged as I am, she would not have had the capital back-stops that she enjoys. She would not have had her talents either. She might have been more clever, but my brains did not make me a millionth as rich or as successful as she is. I can’t even say that she would have turned out a better Christian, because so often children get into a rebellious frenzy against their serious Christian preaching parents.

She would definitely not have been as unique as she is, if she was my child.
If she was my child, I would have been proud of her and I would have trusted her, as I would my upbringing and the examples I set, and she would (as is the case now) come into a position to make the best choices and present a chance for the Angels to rejoice in Heaven, on the day she decides to give her whole heart and life to God.

Why do I say this? Because, I am certain that with derailed people (not that I say she is) the Homecoming (to God) is greeted with much more joy and rejoicing, as is the case with the middle-of-the road Christian / Pharisee. The reason for this is because they were always ‘sort-of-at-Home’ and was eating of the table with the Good Food and always had the chance to share in their Father’s possessions.

I can back this belief of mine with the Story of the Lost Son. Not him, the lost son, but the other one who stayed behind. Let’s compare the qualities of the 2 sons:
(For this exercise I am going to call the one ‘Stayer’ and the other one ‘Goer’)

1. Stayer was the eldest of the two and because of that most probably had a much stricter upbringing than the youngest, because we all tend to make a good example of our first borns. Goer was the youngest and probably more spoilt (I know because I was the youngest of 5 sons).

2. Stayer was more of an introvert because we read of him saying to his Dad; “these many years I have served you, neither did I transgress your commandment at any time. And yet you never gave me a kid so that I might
make merry with my friends.” Goer was more of a party animal and a spender and much more of a adventurist than poor Stayer.

3. Stayer was very envious of his younger brother. He was also much more stingy. Remember that he and Goer decided in conjunction with their dad to let him distribute his will prematurely – so each received his own. Therefore it is understandable that Stayer got worked up when, on the return of Goer, the fattened calf was slaughtered, that his ring and his clothes were given to Goer. It took his Father to remind him that he (Stayer) had always been home to share in everything. Implicitly saying that he had his chance but he did not avail of it. He said to him that it is not the time now to be begrudged and that he had to be happy and that (implicitly again) later have a kid-barbeque with his friends (if he had any, nobody can say), but that now was a time to be merry and glad that his brother returned.

Enough motivation for my assumption?
Be as it may, I definitely know that to be judgmental is wrong and whether you do it in any form of deceit – it makes it even worse. Please stop saying; If such-and-such! We have an Afrikaans saying that, when translated, can be: “IF the heaven falls, we will all be wearing blue caps.”

Jan A Meyer is a Researcher into Bibles and Writer of Spiritual Books and articles. He holds a 4 year BA degree in Communications. Born outside Kroonstad in South Africa, he now resides on a farm in the Cullinan-district, near Pretoria, South Africa. Please visit his websites at anime4u.truewebs.info/ anime4u.truewebs.info/ or angellove.truewebs.info/ angellove.truewebs.info/ or parishilton.truewebs.info parishilton.truewebs.info

In this article, I will discuss what keyboard features you should expect for your money.

The actual keyboard is the thing to look at next. That is the keys that make up the keyboard. Most keyboards in our price range have 61 full size keys to make up the keyboard, some of the lower price ones maybe 49 full size keys, as a beginner this is not a problem because even with the 49-note keyboard you won’t need to play all the keys. Make sure however that the keys are full size and not half size. Even if you have young children that want to play. There is absolutely no advantage in choosing half size keys over full size keys. Full size keys are approximately the same size keys as piano keys and are also referred to as standard keys. Also some keyboards have a “touch sensitive keyboard” this means the harder you press the keys the louder the sound this is a great feature and can create expressive music however, for young children, they may not be able to press the keys hard enough to produce a respectable sound. Therefore, it would be advisable to check that the “touch sensitivity” can be turned off or adjusted.

Next, sounds and rhythms. Keyboards in this price range should have at least 128 sounds. These sounds are known as a “General MIDI” sound set. Most new keyboards made today of any price will include a “General MIDI” set of sounds and so it has become very easy and cheap for manufacturers to include these sounds.

The rhythm section should contain a minimum of 20 different rhythms and many keyboards in this price range contain a great deal more. Normally when using the rhythm section or drum machine as it is sometimes called it is used in conjunction with an “auto chord” feature. This means when you play a left hand chord, the computer inside recognises the chord being played and adds a bass line and maybe a rhythm guitar and possibly a brass section, which results in a great sound and makes the whole learning/playing experience a lot more interesting.

The “auto chord” feature is called different names on different keyboards, such as “fingered chord” or “magic chord”. There is also a feature sometimes referred to as “single finger chord” or “easy chord”. This feature is utterly useless if you want to learn to play the keyboard properly but it is included on most if not all keyboards and is a great selling point used by sales staff quite legitimately to create the initial interest in a keyboard. You can use this feature to show family and friends what a great player you are and simply switch back to “auto chord” to learn to play the keyboard properly.

Finally make sure the sound you are listening to is coming from the keyboards own speakers. Keyboards are sometimes connected to amplifiers, which can make then sound better. Make sure you know what your keyboard sounds like from its own speakers before taking it home.

In part three I will discuss keyboard features you might find useful and still stay within your budget.
Visit mikesmusicroom.co.uk mikesmusicroom.co.uk

Michael David Shaw (Mike to his friends) runs the website mikesmusicroom.co.uk mikesmusicroom.co.uk the place for organ and keyboard tuition and music news.

If you are constantly on the move and love to travel, then your best travel companion can be a mini digital camera. With its unique and easy to use features and its small and unique size, a mini digital camera is the most sought after thing in the present world for travelers and photographers. You don’t have to be a professional photographer to make use of this ultra compact camera. On the contrary, the enhanced resolution of the small sized camera can make you an extraordinary photographer by improving the quality of even the ordinary photographed items. While searching for a mini digital camera, there are a few features that you must make sure is present in the one you are purchasing.

Basic Features of Mini Digital Camera

Give due attention to the megapixel rating. This rating helps you to determine the amount of information that is stored with each and every photograph that you take. Megapixel rating is dependent on the resolution of the photograph that you take. Mini digital cameras may have a higher megapixel that can store more information. It also produces superior quality enlargements. Usually a minimum of 3 megapixels will suit your camera since most of the pictures taken are within 4X6.

Battery usage is another consideration to be made before purchasing a mini digital camera. Usually the bad cameras offer around 50 shots with a set of batteries. But make sure that your enhanced mini digital camera provides you with around 400-500 shots per set of battery. Also it is beneficial to use AA batteries since they are rechargeable and can be used for a longer duration of time. The AA batteries for a mini digital camera are economic in the long run.

It is best to select a mini digital camera that is fast. Time is taken by a digital camera to process an image after the pressing of the shutter. This time gap in between varies from camera to camera. There are some cameras that have a time gap of around 5 seconds where you have to wait for that long to take the second snap. Time can even be consumed by what is known as the shutter lag which is the time required for the autofocus mechanism to terminate and then trip the shutter to commence. Thus, while selecting your mini digital camera, make sure that it is really fast.

Another feature that you will have to keep in mind while buying a mini digital camera is the flexible optical zoom rate. Usually it is the zoom rate of 5X – 10X that provides you with better zoom in and also provides you with the necessary close-up shots.

There are a number of things that you can do with the help of your mini digital camera, all of which the film cameras will not allow you to do. In order to get the scanned images from the film cameras, you need to wait for the film to be processed and have to pay extra amount for this procedure. But with a digital camera, apart from being able to view it on the LCD screen immediately, all you need to do to scan the photographs is to store them on a reusable media chip. You can easily upload the photographs in your PC and edit them according to your own liking. You can print them anytime you want to with the help of a printer and store them easily in CDs and hard drive.

The mini digital cameras come with a built in LCD screen. It helps you to frame the shot before you click and view the picture immediately after you have clicked. Most of them are supplied with built in autofocus. Make sure that the autofocus mechanism is fast. If you are opting for a zoom factor of 10X and above for your mini digital camera, make sure that it has image stabilization to dismiss the shaking effect that can be caused during taking the pictures. Mini Digital cameras beautifully frames the moments of joy with the least effort.

Mostafa Shabban provides information on digital cameras and the founder of digital-camera-shop-guide.com Digital Camera Shop Guide

Is there such a thing anymore as free downloadable music? I know that with lawsuits and copyright plus royalty laws there is a real push to make sure that artists get their money when their music is downloaded, but what if you just want to put something together for marketing or a business website? It turns out that there is such thing as downloadable music that can be used for marketing at a cheap price. You simple need to get out there and look for royalty free music in a downloadable state.

If you are a web designer or marketer, you likely will from time to time want to use flash or video clips on a website or CD Rom. Likely there will come a time where such materials will need music, and avoiding the high fees of royalties on this downloadable music will be essential to keeping your costs down.

There are, surprisingly, tons of places to find royalty free downloadable music. There are so many sources, in fact, that choosing the right royalty downloadable music may be a real challenge. Your client will likely be requesting music from his favorite album or something he got inspired by on the radio on his way to the office this morning. However, the price tag that comes with those songs will quickly help him get over that. Royalty downloadable music sites use music that sounds up to date and timely, but you will have to sift through all of the canned 70’s sounding music. Take the time to check out all of the music you can, and you will be rewarded with modern sounding music at a good price for your client.

When you purchase a usage license from a royalty downloadable music site, it will likely be very flexible. You will be able to use the music on all of your sites and projects, but you cannot steal it. In other words, the license will entitle you, as the purchaser. It does not, however, allow your customer or anyone else to sell the CD with the music on it. You area also not allowed to transfer the license to anyone else by simply copying the CD and selling it to them. The truth is that you don’t own the music, you have simply purchased, from the original creators, the right to use it.

Music licensing can be very expensive. If your client wanted to hear the latest from Coldplay on his new website, he would have to spend more money than in is likely in his entire marketing budget. So what is the answer? Royalty free downloadable music can offer you the chance to put a hip sounding, newly produced piece of music on the site that may give you and your client the sound you are looking for without the high price tag. The only thing you have to be aware of is the limitations on the user license you will get with your royalty free trentontelegraph.com/category/computing-new downloadable music track. With that in mind, though, you have the solution you need in a world of high priced licensing and copyright laws.

If you would like the latest information on dlmdownloadablemusictips.info online music, or find more of my personal articles like the one you just read, visit my dmdownloadablemusictips.info computing site.

Photography blends science with art. The photographer is the artist who engraves his creation with light and shade. Science has gifted the artist a technically advanced digital camera for him to captivate life with it. But he must know to decipher the codes of light

And, Let There Be Light…

Natural light sources like the sun and the moon are considered the best light sources. These lights often invade indoors and make natural shots come alive. Men have created artificial lights like the ordinary bulb, the tungsten halogen lamp or the bright photoflood.

There are various types of lighting, the photographer can employ. The most common is the Directional lighting provided by flash, tungsten or several sources and can be used from the front, back or side.

Front lighting is the most in vogue but it reveals every detail. The light is at the back of the photographer beaming at the face of the subject highlighting every detail. This often results in an unexciting and flat look of your subjects. Another technique is to mystify your subject by lighting up from side. The main illumination from side adds interest and vigor with presence of dark shadows.

In Back lighting the source light remains in the rear of the subject shining in the face of the camera. So, you must be very careful while using this mode otherwise the subject will appear like a silhouette. The main advantage here is, you will be able to capture the natural expressions of your subject in an outdoor shoot, as he will not squint facing bright light.

You can employ Cross lighting where strong directional light comes from both sides. But this method is only suitable for studios with bright flash or tungsten lights.

Lighting For Digital Photography

Digital cameras may offer a wide range of easy lighting modes but there are challenges for the artist in his path to perfection. You must adopt the trial and error method and acquire the knowledge of lighting.

Most digital cameras have preset digital photography lighting modes or ’scenes’ for different lighting situation. There is the indoor mode to click without flash, which is particularly useful in art galleries or museums, the night and portrait mode allows you to take pictures of your subject with a gleaming backdrop at night using a slower shutter speed.

The digital cameras provide an automatic setting for white balancing .You can determine the baseline white in your image against which, other colors will be rendered. Your camera may have a histogram to evaluate exposure in different digital photography conditions. Most cameras have various options like daylight, cloudy, tungsten and more.

What Is Auxillary Lighting?

If you want to create art using light and shadow, the Flash unit alone is not enough. Here, auxiliary lighting comes in. If you decide to shoot portraits or product shots in a studio then auxiliary lighting is not optional but necessary.

For great results use head and kicker lights. Flashlights do not generate heat like floods and spots, so are more suited for portraits. Make sure the flash suits your digital camera. If you want to shoot still shots or product shots, continuous tungsten light is the cheapest and best. A range of wattage bulbs and reflectors will help you control the intensity and direction of light too.

If you don′t have money you can rent lights. Top studios have various assortments of flash units, flood and spotlights.

How to use light

Light is made up of all colors. If seen through a prism it bursts into different colors. You are free to experiment with the rainbow. Artificial lights have their own characteristics. The photographer can utilize different light sources. You can alter white setting for a different effect. Most digital cameras have color setting modes to achieve accuracy of the colors.

Direction of light is important in digital photography. People look best in diffused sidelights and backlight produces a halo effect while overhead lighting produces sharp contrast of light and shadows. Strength of light is also an essential factor. You can have placid effect from diffused lighting and sharpness from strong light.

Indoor lighting gives you ample scope to shoot nice pictures. You can assemble light as per your choice and can even harness sunlight when it enters your house to soften your image.

Outdoor shots are more challenging. It leaves you at the mercy of Mother Nature. While landscape looks good in soft light, the wildlife is captivating with fine details in bright light. So photographers try to capture wildlife just before dusk or before dawn.

In digital cameras, you do not need to worry about ISO film speed. Most digital cameras have preset ISO setting. However, experimentation is the perfect way to curb imperfection. So inflame your imagination and hone your skill. You are ready to enter the luminous empire of photography.

Summary of Author: Connie Fillmore is a successful writer and publisher of photography related issues, for more informative articles go to digitalphotographyguy.com digitalphotographyguy.com.

Malaquias Montoya’ paintings displayed at the Nelson Gallery, UC Davis, 2006 served as a visceral and angry denouncement of the futility and cruelty of a society bent on the use of capital punishment as a form of so-called justice.

The viewer is immediately impacted by the strong reoccurring theme of predominantly male portraits often silhouetted or profiled and either in the writhing throws of execution or in contemplation of their own impending doom.

Like the brightly colored hard edged street protest poster of the 60’s, Montoya uses primary colors to stencil in words of protest on strong horizontal and vertical banners of color, his subject is usually centered in profile or looking straight at the viewer and rendered in blacks and grey tones, harshly drawn, sketched, in the frantic hurry that feels like the nervous desperation of the last days of these men’s lives. Their lives are torn…their sketches are ripped and glued back on the canvas.

His subjects: The rope around a mans neck just as it is tightened with foam spewing out of his mouth, or the spasm and contortion of a full masked hooded figure in the electric chair, the deformed face of the recently executed, or a strong balanced symmetrical figure of a man with arms out-stretched forming a Christ like figure, pedestaled on deep primal blue footing in which injection needles are imprinted in a nice neat row. Montoya wants us to be spectators, or more properly, “to bare witness” at America’s inhumane executions. I have the eerie feeling that by standing in front of his painting I am here to watch the execution, sharing it with just as a few friends, guards, family members and fellow exhibit pilgrims as they might be there beside me, in the gas chambers, the electric chair, the hanging, the injection. That last breath, that hideous contortion. To feel Montoya’s rage at the injustice of capital punishment just look to the structure and movement of the lines in his drawings. Thick dark black, red, fast drawn, angular, heavy-handed frenetic movement.

One of the largest paintings called ” The Killing of the Innocent” is an approximately 4 by 4 foot full body sketch of a large man sitting head downcast gloomily. He is rendered in grey-tones, charcoals, acrylics, and pastels. He wears an expression of utter hopelessness, surrounded by the flattened colors of the unfocused vertical grey bars, the yellow brown muted tones of the dreariness of the dulled prison confines. The eye wonders around the painting. There are secondary forms… scraps of newspaper headlines glued on, the flashes of thrown splattered off white paint, torn paper a scrap of the last notes to loved one in poorly written pencil notes, a small portion of a calendar with a date circled in red…the effect is the dirt and grime of the hood…the streets, and the summation of a death row existence and the totality of a mans last days of despair. Through the tinted washed out colors and fragments of notations, and the utterly crumpled figure, Montoya creates a great sadness and melancholy in our minds.

Move from that to a smaller painting, a skeleton dashed off in hard scribbled jagged edges of black and red, the only white in the painting the hi-lights of the teeth to exaggerate the ghoulishness…as Montoya says “a society fed daily on acts of violence, bent on legalizing killing to satisfy our own violent impulses. This also is our America.”

After this show, it is nice to be able to walk out of the building… free… in sunlight, out of the confines of a gallery that just a few minutes prior…brought us into the dark reality of what goes on in another more sequestered haunted edge of our culture. Those images however linger far longer than is comfortable.

Phil Gross
artpickle.com/philgross artpickle.com/philgross
philgross.net philgross.net
cinnabarvideo.com cinnabarvideo.com

Oil painting is the method of painting with pigments that bound with means of drying oil, especially linseed oil in early modern Europe.

The oil, such as linseed was simmered with pine resin or even frankincense, these were in oil painting used as varnishes and were esteemed for their splendor and glossiness. Other oils occasionally used in oil painting include poppy seed oil, walnut oil, and safflower oil. These oils give a variety of properties to the oil paint, such as less staining or different drying times.

Certain differences are also visible in the luster of the paints depending on the oil. Painters often use different types of oils in the same painting depending on specific pigments and desired effects. The paints themselves also develop a particular feel depending on the media.

These techniques can be contemplated in the oil painting lessons in Florence.
Traditionally, painting was performed with paint brushes, but there are other methods, including the palette knife, the rag, and even directly from the paint tube. Oil paint remains wet longer than many other types of artists’ materials, so a reality in many painter’s studios is the removal of oil paint from the painting.

This can be done with a rag and some turpentine for a certain time while the paint is still wet, but after a while, the if the layer is hard it must be scraped. Oil paint dries by oxidation, not evaporation, and is usually dry to the touch in one to fifteen days

In the oil painting lessons in Italy, you will learn that the oil paint application is ‘fat over lean’ which means that each layer of paint must be oilier than the one underneath, to allow proper drying. There are many other painting media that can be used in oil painting, including cold wax, resins, and varnishes.

These additional media can help the painter to adjust the transparency of the paint, the luster of the paint, the density or ‘body’ of the paint, and the ability of the paint to hold or conceal the brushstroke. These variables are closely related to the expressive capacity of oil paint and can be learned in an oil painting art course.

It is generally dry enough to be varnished in six months to a year. But according to art conservators an oil painting is not totally dry until it is around 70 years old.
Netherlands painters in the 15th century were however the first to make oil the usual painting medium, followed by the rest of Northern Europe and Italy.

The recognition of oil spread through Italy from the North, starting in Venice in the late 15th century. By 1540 the previous technique for painting on panel, tempera had become all but extinct, although Italians kept using fresco for wall paintings, which was harder in Northern weather. But now, Italy reigns alone as the world’s top spot for oil painting course or oil painting lessons.

accademiaeuropeafirenze.it/ Accademia Europea di Firenze is an italianlanguageflorence.com/ Italian language, Music, Art and Culture School located in the very heart of Florence.