Keiko Tanabe: Capturing Light and Atmosphere in Watercolor
Keiko Tanabe
She was born in Kyoto, Japan.
Nationality: Japanese
Occupation: Watercolor artist, instructor, author
Unique distinction: Keiko Tanabe is known for her mastery of the loose and expressive style of vibrant plein-air watercolor painting, seamlessly blending traditional Japanese sumi-e ink techniques with Western watercolor methods. She is recognized for her unique ability to infuse her watercolor paintings with a sense of tranquillity and emotional depth
Influenced by: Alvaro Castagnet, American and Japanese watercolor masters
Movement: Impressionism, Realism.
Styles: Tanabe’s style can be in general described as impressionistic, with a focus on capturing light, color, and mood in her paintings. Her creative style can be best characterized as loose and expressive, with a focus on capturing the play of light and shadow, on conveying the atmosphere and mood of each subject.
Watercolor Painting. Tanabe is known for her mastery of the watercolor medium, utilizing techniques such as wet-on-wet and dry-brush. Her favourite is Wet-on-wet technique, which involves applying paint to wet paper, allowing the colors to blend and flow together organically.
Subjects: Landscapes, cityscapes, floral still lifes, showcasing her keen observational skills in capturing the beauty of both natural and urban environments. She finds beauty in ordinary moments and seeks to convey the emotions associated with these experiences through her artwork.
Achievements and main contribution to art:
Her main contribution to art lies in her ability to capture the beauty and spirit of various locations through her unique watercolor technique. She has held numerous solo exhibitions globally and has been featured in prestigious art publications.
Her paintings are held in private collections and have been exhibited in renowned art galleries and museums around the world. She also had her paintings published in leading art magazines in the U.S., Europe and Japan.
Her art has been enjoyed by many in nine self-published books as well as on four DVDs that have been produced to date. She published book “Journey Home Volume 1: My Watercolor Paintings of Japanese Landscapes 2005 – 2015”, a collection of selected watercolor works of Japanese landscapes that includes more than 180 paintings of the places she visited in the last 10 years
Additionally, Tanabe has also authored instructional books and conducted workshops and demonstrations, sharing her expertise and passion for watercolor painting with aspiring artists. Since 2011, she has been invited to and completed successfully hundreds of workshops and numerous live demonstrations around the world.
Family background:
Grew up in an art-loving family in Kyoto. Her father is a renowned scholar of French literature in Japan. Won numerous children’s art awards, fostering early artistic passion. As a young child, she enjoyed the arts including drawing and painting. She said, «My very first plein-air experience was when I was 6 years old (and I enjoyed it), and I participated in many outdoor painting events for children».
Education background:
She earned a B.A. in intercultural communication from International Christian University in Tokyo, Japan She came to the US to study at UCLA in 1990. Later Keiko earned an M.A. in international education from UCLA in California
She was mostly self-taught, focusing on developing her unique watercolor style. She learned basic drawing and watercolor painting skills at a local community school in San Diego.
Attended a workshop by Alvaro Castagnet in 2005, a pivotal moment in her artistic journey.
Professional work experience:
She worked in international relations positions in a Japanese government trade organization in Tokyo, at a large law firm in San Francisco and at a private consulting firm in San Diego. Keiko embarked on a professional art career in 2005 and started exhibiting publicly. Keiko Tanabe has had solo exhibitions in galleries and museums around the world, including the prestigious Salmagundi Club in New York City (2019). She has also served as a juror for international watercolor competitions.
In 2015 she was named an official Ambassador for Winsor & Newton.
In 2018, she was appointed to the advisory board of the American Watercolor Weekly.
In 2018 and 2019, she was invited to be a faculty member for the Plein Air Convention & Expo, the world’s largest plein-air painting event.
Personality traits: Keiko Tanabe is known for her humble and dedicated approach to her art. She is generous and dedicated to her craft. She is passionate about capturing the beauty of the world around her and expressing it through her paintings. Shares her knowledge and love of watercolor with enthusiasm. She said that passion, the joy of creating, being helpful and watching other people discover joy kept her engaged and committed to your craft over the years.
In her free time, she enjoys exploring nature, travelling, and immersing herself in different cultures, which further inspires her artistic endeavours.
Keiko currently lives in San Diego, California.
EDOUARD MANET -Most celebrated paintings
(23 January 1832, Paris, France – 30 April 1883, Paris, France) (aged 51)
Nationality: France
Category: Art workers
Occupation: Painter
Specification: Impressionism, Realism, leading artist in the transition from realism to impressionism., a crucial figure in the rise of the Impressionist movement
Gender: Male
Personal Life: He was short, handsome, witty kind and generous toward his friends
Spouse: Suzanne Leenhoff, a Dutch pianist (m. 1863).
Creative style: He was a revolutionary in art, pertly and courageously applied paradoxical elements in his art, implemented the brilliant alla prima painterly technique never cultivated pleinairism seriously and remained a studio painter.
Most celebrated paintings: The Luncheon on the Grass (Le déjeuner sur l’herbe) (1863), Olympia (1863), Young Flautist or The Fifer (Le Fifre)(1866), A portrait of Zola (1868), The Balcony (1869), Boating(1874), A Bar at the Folies-Bergère (Le Bar aux Folies-Bergère) (1882).
Biography
Edouard Mane. Argenteuil (1874)
Edouard Mane. Marguerite in the garden of Bellevue (1880)
Edouard Mane. Boating (1874)
Edouard Mane. Luncheon on the Grass (1863)
Edouard Mane. Olympia (1863)
Edouard Mane. Un bar aux Folies Bergere (1878)
Justyna Kopania – Contemporary Polish Artist
Justyna Anna Kopania
(born on June 11, Warszawa, Poland)
Nationality: Poland
Category: Art workers
Occupation: Painter
Gender: Female
Style: Impressionism, Expressionism
Genre: Wide variety of genres, from landscapes and cityscapes to portraits and still life pieces. Inspirational
Medium: Oil painting on huge canvases.
Subjects: Landscape, Seascape, sailing ships
Based: Warszawa, Mazowieckie – Poland
Creative vision:
In painting I try to show the “world”, which could beseen by looking at reality that surrounds us, from another perspective,unusual, remote, sometimes through the eyes of the child, sometimes music, composer, or someone wholooks lichen on the sea, the moon , the sky and the stars …, the river … looks out the window and looks out into the street.
“Perhaps the world that surrounds us is really quite different than we perceive it to be. Perhaps in every drop of rain, each grain of sand, and every snowflake there are millions of colors that you can see, if you look for them…this is the unique perspective I look for in my paintings.”
Main works:
Kopania exhibits 60 works of art in her personal gallery on Artist Become. Her works have been exhibited in galleries throughout Poland and Europe.
Inspirational Quotes from Famous Writers and Poets
If you strike upon a thought that baffles you, break off from that entanglement and try another, so shall your wits be fresh to start again.
Aristophanes (c. 446 – c. 386 BC), ancient Greeks playwright
True wisdom consists not in seeing what is immediately before our eyes, but in foreseeing what is to come
Terence (195/185–159 BC), Roman playwright
Fortune favors the brave.
Terence
Don’t be satisfied with stories, how things have gone with others. Unfold your own myth.
Rumi (September 30, 1207 –December 17, 1273), Persian poet and Sufi mystic
Inside you there’s an artist you don’t know about…Say yes quickly, if you know, if you’ve known it before the beginning of the universe.
Rumi
There is a community of the spirit. Join it, and feel the delight of walking in the noisy street and being the noise. Drink all your passion, and be a disgrace. Close both eyes to see with the other eye.
Rumi
Sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment.
Rumi
Let the beauty we love be what we do. There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.
Rumi
As one who sees in dreams and wakes to find the emotional impression of his vision still powerful while its parts fade from his mind – Just such am I, having lost nearly all the vision itself, while in my heart I feel the sweetness of it yet distill and fall.
Dante Alighieri (c. 1265–September 9, 1321), Italian poet (Paradiso)
The pen is the tongue of the mind.
Miguel de Cervantes (September 29,1547–April 22,1616), Spanish novelist
The earth has music for those who listen.
William Shakespeare (April 26, 1564–April 23, 1616), English poet and playwright
Personality is everything in art and poetry.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing that stands in the way. Some see nature all ridicule and deformity … and some scarce see nature at all. But to the eyes of the man of imagination, nature is imagination itself.
William Blake (November 28, 1757 –August 12, 1827), English poet and painter
To create a little flower is the labour of ages.
William Blake
The imagination is not a state: it is the human existence itself.
William Blake
Read more: Genvive
Peder Mørk Mønsted – Danish realist painter
Peder Mørk Mønsted
(10 December 1859, Grenå, Denmark – 20 June 1941, Fredensborg, Denmark)
Nationality: Danish
Category: Art workers
Occupation: Painter
Specification: Photorealistic approach to his subjects, romantic and poetic view of nature, meticulous attention to both detail and colour.
Art genre: landscape and portraite paintings.
Education: He receive painting lessons at the art school in Aarhus. In 1875, Mønsted moved to Copenhagen, where from 1875 to 1878 he studied at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts with Niels Simonsen and Julius Exner.
In 1878 Mønsted left the Academy to study under the artist Peder Severin Krøyer.
Personal life:
He was the son of Otto Christian Mønsted, a prosperous ship-builder, and Thora Johanne Petrea Jorgensen. He had an elder brother, Niels.
On March 14th, 1889, at Frederiksberg, Peder Mork Mønsted married Elna Mathilde Marie Sommer. Nine years later the couple had a son, Tage.
Traveling which Boosts Creativity:
Mønsted travelled extensively throughout his long career, being a frequent visitor to Italy, France, Greece, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, North Africa and the Middle East..
In 1882 -1883, he spent time in Rome and Capri then, the following year, visited Paris, where he worked in the studios of William Adolphe Bouguereau (1825-1905), the famous French academic painter.
In 1884, he first visited North Africa, in 1885 his journeys took him to Sicily and Taormina
and in 1889, he went to Algeria. After that, he visited Egypt and Spain.
During his later years, he spent a great deal of time in Switzerland and travelling throughout the Mediterranean.
His travels produced numerous sketches that became paintings.
He established himself in Copenhagen and most of his landscapes and coastlines were devoted to Scandinavia.
He was especially popular in Germany, where he held several shows at the Glaspalast in Munich. In 1995, a major retrospective, called “Light of the North”, was held in Frankfurt am Main.
The artist died in Fredensborg, Denmark on June 20, 1941, aged 81.
His works can be found in museums: Chi-Mei Museum in Taiwan and the Dahesh Museum in New York, in Aalborg and Bautzen.
Most of his works are in private collections.
Koukei Kojima – Modern Japanese Landscape Painter
Koukei Kojima
(bоrn in 1931)
Nationality: Japan
Category: Art workers
Occupation: Painter
Education: He graduated from Tama University of Arts.
Specification: Japanese style painting who draws the landscape painting. Japanese style painting method: Natural pigments on silk
Creative style: Sansui, landscape painting in Japan. The word san means yama (mountains), sui means mizu (river)
Awards: The Sougenkai association prize
Pino Daeni – Italian Impressionist Painter of Women’s Beauty
Pino Daeni
Giuseppe Dangelico
(November 8, 1939, Bari, Italy- May 25, 2010, New Jersey, USA), (aged 70)
Nationality: Italian
Category: Art Workers
Occupation: Painter, book illustrator
Specification: He is known for his style of feminine, romantic women. Noted for his ability to capture fleeting expressions and movement, his women are often lost in thought. The use of warm colours in a unique manner made his paintings exceptional.
The famous modern painter Vidan is his nephew
Influenced: Pre-Raphaelites and Macchiaaoli He found inspiration in the works of such artists as Sargeant, Sorolla, and Boldini.
Style: Impressionism, Expressionism
Subjects: Portraits, seascapes, the nude
Education: He was a self-taught artist. He enrolled at the Art Institute of Bari, then went on to Milan’s Academy of Brera in 1960
Contributions: He created over 3,000 book covers, movie posters and magazine illustrations. his style has dominated and influenced the market.
From 1960 to 1979, his work garnered several prizes and awards. He is one of the highest-paid book illustrators of his time.
Main works: “Remember When”, “Mystic Dreams”, “Morning Breeze”, “Love”, “First Glance”, “After Dinner” and “Anticipation”.
Career and personal life: Pino was born in Bari, Italy on November 8, 1939.
He began his studies at the city’s Art Institute. In 1960 he entered Milan’s Academy of Brera where he perfected his talent and skill for painting nudes.
His skills in painting were heavily influenced by the pre-Raphaelites and Macchiaaoli.
From 1960 to 1979 his work appeared in several major exhibitions throughout Italy and Europe.
At the same time, he was commissioned by Italy’s two largest publishers. Mondadori and Rizzoli, for book illustrations.
Pino also experimented with Expressionism in the late sixties during his stay in Milan.
In 1979, he emigrated to the United States under the sponsorship of Borghi Gallery where he held several shows in New York and Massachusetts. He brought with him his family—wife Chiara, seven-year-old daughter Paola, and five-year-old son Massimo.
In 1980 Zebra Books Publishers commissioned him to do his first book cover. His romance novel covers, painted for such authors as Danielle Steel, Sylvie Summerfield and Amanda Ashley, helped sell millions of books
In the United States be became fascinated with the works of Soralla, Sargent, Benson and William Merrit Chase.
In 1992 he contacted one of the major galleries in Scottsdale, Arizona, the May Gallery. Since then his paintings have appeared in Morris and Whiteside Gallery in Hilton Head and Stuart Johnson’s Settlers West Gallery in Tucson.
In 2001, Pino’s son, Massimo, more known as Max, began representing his artist-father, despite Pino’s initial reluctance.
On May 25, 2010, Pino died at the age of 70
Vidan – Contemporary Italian Impressionist and Figurative Painter
Vidan
Vittorio Dangelico
(born on 1965, Perugia , Italy)
Nationality: Italy
Category: Art workers
Occupation: Painter
Specification: His portraits reveal a spectrum of hues as well as a range of atmosphere and emotion.
Influenced: His art would be influenced by the Italian Renaissance arts, impressionist painters such as Claude Monet, Auguste Renoir and Paul Gauguin and his uncle Pino Daeni.
Style: Figurative, Neo-realism. Also his style has been compared to the early Impressionists.
Subjects: Portraits, seascapes, the nude,
Medium: Pastel, oil.
Education: Attending some of the finest art schools in Italy to include the Liceo Artistico diMilano and later the Accademia delle Belle Arti in Brera.
Personal Life: Vidan was born in the picturesque city of Perugia, which is nestled between the elegant cities of Rome and Florence. In his youth, Vidan realized his passion for the arts.
Vidan is the great Master Pino’s nephew and spent years painting side by side with his famous uncle until Pino’s death in 2010.
Career: Since moving to the U.S in 1988, at the age of 23, Vidan began a career in the book cover industry and quickly establishing himself as a top romance artist.
Like his uncle Pino, hwo moved to the US in 1979, Vidan for over fifteen years worked for such notable and prestigious publishers as Doubleday, Harper-Collins, Harlequin, Zebra, Berkeley, and Ballantine. At the same time, he created art for the Vogue Italia, TV Guide, Snapshots, and MaryKnoll greeting cards.
But Vidan has always pursued his love of fine art and his masterful work as a portrait artist.
In 2002 he began painting for galleries and finally, in 2004, major galleries began to display his work.
Now his work can be seen in galleries all over the USA as he continues to create beautiful and inspiring pieces of art.
Vidan began studying under his uncle, world renowned artist Pino (1939 – 2010). It is often said that Vidan’s potential and progress is reminiscent of Pino’s earlier work.
Vidan has amply proven to be extraordinarily talented in his own right and become one of America’s premier figurative and Expressive artists.
His original portraits and landscapes are found in many prestigious galleries worldwide
Vidan’s works are collected throughout the United States and Canada.
Vicente Romero Redondo – the Superb Spanish Painter of Beauty and Light
Vicente Romero Redondo
(born on 1956, Madrid, Spane)
Nationality: Spane
Category: Art workers
Occupation: Painter
Specification: He is known for amazing female pastel and oil paintings. “Superb Spanish painter of beauty and light”.
Gender: Male
Style: Figurative, Neo-realism, Impressionism
Subjects: Portraits, seascapes, the nude,
Medium: Pastel, oil.
Major topic: Female and her femininity.
Education: In 1982 he graduated from the art faculty of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando (Madrid).
Spouse: Silvina Gottero (married in 2008)
Personal Life: He is the eldest of four sons in family. Due to the work of his father, he grew up in many different towns all over Spain.
In 1971 he with his family moved back to Madrid.
He sdudied at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando. Francisco Goya was once one of the academy’s directors, and, its alumni include Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dalí, hwo studied there from 1922-1926. He started his early years in sculpture and later turned into painting.
Since 1987, he lives in the town of Calonge on the Mediterranean coast of Costa Brava (the birthplace of Salvador Dali).
Career: After graduating from the Academy he worked on the street for several years. Since the early 90s Romero’s paintings have been shown in individual expositions in Portugal, Spain France and the USA . In 2001 he moved to Madrid, but he still spends time in the Costa Brava. Since 2002, took part in the fifteen major art exhibitions.
Some galleries have permanent exhibitions of his work: the Euroarte (Lisbon), Masters Gallery (Denver), Masters Gallery (Vail), Aspen Grove Fine Art (Aspen), Galerie Züger (Dallas), Puerta de Alcalá (Madrid), The Little Gallery (Saint-Émilion). Some of his most recent exhibitions: Petleys (Londres,2010),Pizarro (Valencia, 2011), Benedito ( Málaga, 2012), Salon International du pastel en Périgord (2012).
Creative style: He used to work with the classical style, which allows to get most out of oil paints highlighting the colors and shapes. In recent years, he gives preference to the pastels, wich he more spontaneous. The artist himself states that pastel colors allow to have “unrivaled delicacy” and to compose elements with admirable light. Recently, he producing a mutually enriching dialogue between the two techniques.
Antonio Corradini – “Modesty” and other famous artworks
Veiled Truth (also called Modesty or Chastity) by Antonio Corradini (1749-52), Marble, Santa Maria della Pietà dei Sangro, Naples
Antonio Corradini was an brilliant Italian Rococo sculptor.
(19 October 1688 in Venice, Italy – 12 August 1752 in Naples, Italy). (aged 63)
Nationality: Italian
Occupation: Sculptor
Unique distinction: Corradini is renowned for his exceptional skill in sculpting marble, particularly for his mastery particularly for his mastery of the technique known as “transparency.” In 1723, Corradini reputedly became the first person to legally separate the art of sculptors from the profession of stonemasons.
Influenced: Corradini was influenced by the Venetian Baroque style of sculpture, as well as by the works of other Italian sculptors, such as Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Alessandro Algardi, two prominent Italian sculptors of the 17th century.
Style: Rococo. Corradini’s work embodies the elegance, playfulness, and intricate detailing characteristic of the Rococo period. His style can be also described as a blend of Baroque and Rococo, characterized by dynamic movement, elaborate details, and delicate features.
Subjects: Encompassing religious themes, mythological figures, allegorical representations and portraits.
The main contribution to Art: Corradini is best known for his illusory veiled depictions of the human body, where the contours of the face and body beneath the veil are discernible. One of his notable contributions is the creation of the sculpture “The Veiled Truth,” (1749-52) .
Corradini innovative techniques allowed him to play with the translucency of marble and simultaneously preserve transparency and opacity of veiled sculptures. The veils hinted at the hidden form beneath.He meticulously carved intricate patterns, folds, and creases into the veils, aiming for a sense of movement within the stillness of the sculpture.
Family background: Corradini was born 1688 in the parish of SS. Vito and Modesto in Venice. He was the son of Gerolamo Corradini, a professional veler or sail packer for ships and his wife Barbara.
Education background: Corradini was apprenticed to the sculptor Antonio Tarsia (1663 – 1739), for whom he worked probably for four or five years starting at the age of fourteen or fifteen. He later became Tarsia’s son-in-law.
Professional work experience:
In 1709 he began his career as a sculptor. At this time he was employed on work for the façade of the church of San Stae in Venice.
In 1716-17, he completed eighteen busts and two statues for the summer garden of the Russian czar Peter the Great in St. Petersburg, and the first of his famous veiled women; he would complete two more in the city in 1722.
During 1718–23, Corradini completed the outdoor marble statuary group, Nessus and Deianira , for the Grosser Garten and later in 1723-8 he created The Apollo Flaying Marsyas and Zephyrus and Flora for the gardens of the Hollandisches Palais in Dresden.
From 1724-1728 he worked in Venice on the restoration of the stairway and the sculptures of the Doge’s Palace and the facade of the clock tower in the Piazza San Marco. In the 1730s, he spent a decade in Vienna where he was court sculptor for Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor.
In the 1740s he moved first to Rome and later to Naples. He achieved recognition for his sculptures, receiving commissions from patrons and institutions. Notable achievements include his contributions to church decorations and private collections, showcasing his ability to convey emotion through stone. He died on August 12, 1752 in Naples.
Personal life: Corradini married Maria Tarsia, daughter of his teacher Antonio Tarsia.
Most celebrated artworks:
Bust of a Veiled Woman (Puritas), 1717-25, Marble, Museo del Settecento Veneziano, Ca’ Rezzonico, Venice;
Emperor Charles VI as “Hercules Musarum” (1735) in the Austrian National Library in Vienna;
The Vestal Virgin Tuccia (1743) in the Palazzo Barberini, Rome;
Veiled Truth (also called Modesty or Chastity), 1749-52, Marble, Santa Maria della Pietà dei Sangro, Naples.
Creative Vision 
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