Thursday, December 31, 2009

Found this simply amazing artist, his currency pastels caught my eye and I could not help but share !

Bio from website :
Timothy John-Luke Smith
b.1966 Teaneck, New Jersey

Timothy studied in the classical tradition of drawing and painting from the early age of 15. He was accepted into the prestigious High School of Art & Design in New York City. There he studied with the watercolorist, Irwin Greenberg and illustrator and painter, Max Ginsberg. These both talented and well known artists instilled in him the values of diligent study from life and the study of the old masters.


"Currency #1" - Pastel on Wood - 24x30"




After graduation with a Regents Art Diploma, in June of 1985, he took art history classes at Long Island University, Southampton, NY. This year of intense study was crucial for his direction. He found the work of the French Neo-Classicists and the French Academic schools to be guiding lights for his technical study of painting and drawing.



"Procurement" - Pastel on Wood - 24x36"



With this direction, he headed back to New York City, that following September. He studied at the Art Students League under George Passantino and at the National Academy School of Fine Arts under Harvey Dinnerstein. Soon after, he received a full-tuition scholarship at the Academy. Harvey taught him pastels as a painting medium and they were immediately embraced by the Timothy. Having been in Harvey's classes for over three years, gave him the tools to be an artist and to work on his own.


"The Mexicana 1" -  Pastel and Graphite on Tinted Paper - 9x11"



His favorite artists are still the oil painters of the Neo-Classical and French Academic schools and his pastel paintings have the look and feel of an oil painting. Timothy is the founder of his own movement he calls, “Neo-Meso Americanism. This movement is affected by the recent discoveries of whole Mayan cities from the Late Classic Period, as well as , the deciphered glyphs from those same cities. These discoveries are all within the last 15 years! Just as the 18th century archaeologists discovered the ancient Roman Cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum from the volcanic ashes of Mount Vesuvius at 79 AD, the jungles of Central America had lifted their vail from the ancient Mayan cities of Palenque, Calakmul and Copan. The 19th century artists painted the ancient Roman world as Timothy, today paints the ancient Mayan world. He is able to read and write ancient Mayan glyphs and they are in his paintings. “This gives the work some of the mystery that is The Maya.” Timothy says.

Procurement #2" - Pastel on Wood - 24x36"



"Painted Maya" - Pastel on Wood  - 16x20"




You can see more of his amazing art at http://www.painted-glyphs.com/index.html

Till tomorrow .. keep creating !
Tina aka Daily Muse

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Woooow...gorgeous and a great new idea...in art class we had to design our own money...with micro details it was awesome...these are fabulous...thanks for this..Happy New Year..!

Marie Young (Marie Young Creative) said...

What an amazing sense of humor: inserting the modern into the historic. Very clever!

Unknown said...

I was struck last week by something that someone said. We were looking at a friend's work that was a small sculpture that was tropical in feel but with ionic columns throughout. The woman who was gazing at it said, "you don't see ionic columns in the tropics! This is ridiculous!" My response to her was, "it's art...you can do whatever you want! Think outside the norm!" Geesh. Timothy John-Luke Smith clearly epitomizes streching the boundries of what we see as conventional. I just LOVE his work. Thanks so much for introducing him to me, Muse!

EyeDesire said...

Wow! His pieces are amazing! The girl in the each piece is so realistic! I just can't stop looking at it! Thank you Tina for sharing his story and are work with us!

ClaudiaC said...

What beautiful paitings!!! What an inspiration, specially his mayan-themed pieces, the colors... just how different and refreshing his paintings are.

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