Arty Farty Friday, Saturday & Sundry Painters Born in Mid-November.

Six painters of varying styles were born between 14 and 17 November - but in different centuries and decades. I have already written about all of these, over the years - here are links to my relevant posts, with an example of each of their styles.

Claude Monet 14 November 1840.
https://twilightstarsong.blogspot.com/2015/04/arty-farty-friday-monet-in-spring.html

 The Ice Floes - Claude Monet.

Manon Cleary 14 November 1942.
https://twilightstarsong.blogspot.com/2015/11/arty-farty-friday-manon-cleary.html

 Man in Plastic Bag #5 & #6 by Manon Cleary

Georgia O'Keeffe 15 November 1887.
https://twilightstarsong.blogspot.com/2011/12/arty-farty-friday-georgia-okeeffe.html

Wayne Thiebaud 15 November 1920.
https://twilightstarsong.blogspot.com/2013/11/two-artists-born-this-day.html

Arman 17 November 1928.
https://twilightstarsong.blogspot.com/2014/11/arty-farty-friday-arman.html

 Wheels of Fortune by Arman

Jack Vettriano 17 November 1951.
https://twilightstarsong.blogspot.com/2007/05/sun-scorpio-artist-jack-vettriano.html

 Billy Boys by Jack Vettriano

Summer Solstice ~ Hopper's and Vettriano's Summers

Today: Summer Solstice in the northern hemisphere, while winter begins in the southern half of the globe.

Oklahoma summers are not my cup o' tea by a long chalk. Why? The extreme heat, the insect bites, the allergies..... so excuse me if I don't celebrate with wild enthusiasm. To mark the day, though, I'll pull out half a dozen depictions of summer by a couple of favouite painters of mine. These two don't paint leafy glades and gardens filled with flowers, instead their summers are urbane in flavour rather than rural.....It comes as a surprise that I find a more evocative sense of summer in these works than from any rural or floral scene, even those painted by the best of the best. My two chosen painters: Edward Hopper and Jack Vettriano, the former is a well-loved American artist, the latter artist is sometimes - always even - derided by critics, but that only endears him to me the more!

There are archived posts on both artists with notes about their astrology HERE
and HERE.


Edward Hopper's summer ~~

Jack Vettriano's summer ~~

And a matching track: The Summer Knows - theme from the 1971 movie The Summer of '42. It was composed by multiple Oscar and Grammy Award winner, French composer Michel Legrand, with lyrics by Marilyn and Alan Bergman, sung here by Scott Walker, whose rendition has just the right "feel" to it to blend with these paintings.

Or...if a female vocalist is preferred, it'd be hard to top Ms Streisand's version -nice video with this one too:

Sun Scorpio artist Jack Vettriano

Some critics of art, literature, film...whatever, can be a pain in the butt, so entranced by their own egos are they. For many ordinary folk their opinions are irrelevant. A case in point: Jack Vettriano, Scottish artist derided by art critics, beloved by the public. One of his paintings sold for over $1 million, all command hundreds of thousands of dollars, not to mention sales of prints, cards and posters by the truckload.

Jack Vettriano was born on 17 November 1951 in Fife, Scotland. Sun in Scorpio, Moon in Cancer (exact degree uncertain), Venus, Saturn and Neptune in Libra, Jupiter opposing Venus from Aries. Mercury in Sagittarius. Any astrologer who studied Vettriano's paintings would not be surprised to find that the Sun was in Scorpio when he was born.

A quote from the man himself -
"The greater glory of art doesn't come into it, he confirms. "That's not why I paint," he said. "It's wall decoration for me, I don't regard it as this big meaningful thing. My subjects are men and women getting off, that's all. Mind you, some people don't think sex is serious, but I happen to think it's terribly serious."

Not all Vettriano's work oozes sexiness, but even when it doesn't, there's an air of mystery and "film noir" feel to it. Pluto, Scorpio's modern ruler is widely trine Mercury, which may add to the artist's penchant for the sexy and mysterious. All very Scorpio! Yet some pieces also indicate an artist who is sensitive to the intricacies of relationship - Cancer Moon at work? Almost every painting calls forth some kind of emotional response. The three planets in Libra, ruled by artistic Venus probably account for his innate skills. He's a self-taught artist who started by copying figures from art manuals, and has been hauled over the coals for it ever since. He has, over time, developed his own identifiable "trade marks" - beaches, umbrellas, people dressed in formal clothing, and male/female interaction.

For me, Vettriano falls into the same category as Norman Rockwell and Edward Hopper -all act as mirrors, reflecting small slices of life, though each from a different perspective. In order to be successful in this kind of illustrative art there needs to be insight and compassion, experience and understanding as well as drawing and painting skills. The combination of these qualities is rare, and I believe such artists deserve more appreciation from critics.
(Paintings from top (right to left) "The Singing Butler". "Devotion". "A Very Married Woman". "In Thoughts of You". "The Billy Boys". "Embracing". "Her Secret Life"."The Letter".)

More HERE, and via Google Image.