Montana Artworking by Cindy Betka

House Call 12" X 18" Oil This scene is from one of our journeys through England. I embellished it, of course. Turned the day into early evening after a rain, brought in the horse and turned a light on. The colors are predominately cool; greens and blues. I kept the warmest accents for contrast in the window light and the brown horse. Looking at it now, I am thinking of going back to darken the line of trees on the upper left. It seems that I am never done completely with a piece of art.

In the last MAC publication they mentioned this web site, CODAworx.  From their site: “ What is a collaborative project? A project demonstrates the successful integration of art into an interior or architectural space. It highlights the collaboration of the design + art team and may be submitted by any participant.” If you want to feast your eyes on some fabulous artwork integrated into architecture you will want to browse the projects. Here is the link;   https://www.codaworx.com/browse/projects I captured a very small sampling of photos below.

Going through 'Leonardo's Notebooks' , I came across this sketch of the nativity. In my search for a completed painting of the nativity by Leonardo Da Vinci, I found another sketch but no painting. Never-the-less, I found some wonderful nativity paintings by other master painters. So, all of that lead to this blog. Just thought of doing something to fit in with Christmas and what it is all about. Nativity by Caravaggio Holy Night by Correggio, 1528-1530 The Mystical Nativity by Sandro Botticelli, 1500 Nativity by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, 1732

Concept   1. A general notion or idea.   2. An idea of something formed by mentally combining all its characteristics or particulars; a construct.   3. A theme or image. The concept is the most important element in the art piece. Technique alone will not make the art piece. All of this was drilled into us in art school.   Sometime I begin a painting with what I think is a good idea/concept, only to get half way into it to find it is just not working. Is this because of the concept or the methods and procedure I am using to carry out the concept? The answer to that question varies which each piece. My technique is constantly evolving as I grow in art. Each artist is different in his or her methods and procedures in creating. Cheng-Khee Chee wrote in a recent article, (‘A Crinkle in The Works’, Artist’s Magazine, Nov 2013) “The differences between traditional Eastern and Western approaches to landscape painting go beyond materials and techniques. It’s been said...