A.R. Danziger, Art & Design

One last post before I take a long break.  Here is another book cover I designed for Cruachan Hill Press : " The Life of St Columba As Told by St. Adomnan , edited with an introduction by Phillip Campbell. Famous hagiography of the great Irish St. Columba who founded the renowned abbey of Iona from which he brought Christianity to Scotland. Contains the complete biography of Adomnán (updated with historical footnotes), an appendix of all the hymns attributed to St. Columba, and a thirty page original introductory essay."   Order here...

I can't seem to get a non-blurry photograph of this, but I'll post it anyway. Here is my painting of "The Woman Clothed with the Sun" from Revelation chapter 12. Happy Feast Day of Our Lady of Guadalupe!  Once I finish the borders I'll take a better photo of the finished piece. I've had to accept that the 3 required entries will not be complete in time for the Apocalypse Prize deadline.  Instead of being disappointed at not reaching my goal, I can be at peace because I know the circumstances are a blessing from God.  I'm very busy with the care of 3 small children, and I'm expecting a new little one to be born before the end of the year. Please pray for us for a safe and healthy delivery and recovery!

I'm still putting the finishing touches on the first painting which will take a while longer. In the meantime, I have very limited time to work on the next 2 paintings in the series, so I've jumped into the drawing for the second one while I wait for the border of the first one to dry. Here is an angel (with no wings yet) who will be blowing one of the trumpets from Revelation Chapter 8:

Some of my readers have asked me to draw a template for the All Hallow's Eve martyred saint shrines I created last year.  I quickly put this together while the baby was napping.  You'll still need to trace around the outside of your own box since cereal boxes vary between brands, but these are the essentials: PDF Template St. Peter St. Lucy St. Denis Original post with instructions Please make sure to use LED electric tea light candles and not real ones, and have a Happy Halloween, Catholic style!

After transferring my drawing to the panel, I used burnt umber to define the values. Next will come the metal leaf and colors.

I managed to cobble together a mock-up drawing and transfer it to my panel board which I had already painted a neutral color. Here I'm nearly done tracing it with a blue ball-point pen so I can tell which parts of the drawing I've already gone over. I used white Saral brand transfer paper  between the drawing and the panel board. I don't know what it's made of, but it doesn't make the surface dirty with hard to cover-up graphite (which I learned the hard way last time). It's a little hard to see with the glare but here's the finished drawing. Next I'll do the under-painting with burnt umber to establish the light and dark values.

I'm continuing to post my figure study drawings for my work-in-progress based on Revelation chapter 12 . What does the Woman clothed with the Sun represent?  From the Douay-Rheims commentary: " [1]   A woman : The church of God. It may also, by allusion, be applied to our blessed Lady. The church is clothed with the sun, that is, with Christ: she hath the moon, that is, the changeable things of the world, under her feet: and the twelve stars with which she is crowned, are the twelve apostles: she is in labour and pain, whilst she brings forth her children, and Christ in them, in the midst of afflictions and persecutions." Thankfully I have access to a baby (my son, A), and a pregnant friend who patiently allowed me to put a sheet and a tablecloth around her for a photo.  This isn't a likeness, but a good compromise between realism and the stylized woman and child from the Douce Apocalypse.  I'm convinced the artist dressed a model in robes and observe...

This is the third angel in the piece.  I didn't give him a shield because he'll be in the background. A bit of self-critique:  This is an example of why not to draw from photographs if you don't have to...it's difficult to get the proportions right when you're fighting against the lens distortion.  This angel is little stocky with a long arm. On the plus side, I'm getting better at handling the drapery, working from large forms down to smaller forms and letting the folds assist the sense of movement.  I managed to get a good contrapasto (weight on one leg) pose out of the model which makes the drawing just the right amount of dynamic.

I'll have 3 angels total in the piece I'm currently working on.  There are many different styles of angels in all the Apocalypse manuscripts I've looked at, but I continue to like the look of the angel from the Annunciation in the Westminster Psalter with his Classical tunic and toga combined with what appears to be a Byzantine influenced way of modeling the figure and drapery: Here's my second figure study. I haven't decided whether this one or the previous will be St. Michael standing at the front of the angel cluster:

I had some very kind assistants agree to pose for reference photos that I could use to base my figures on for my latest painting.  They won't bear a real likeness to the people I photographed...mostly I need help knowing what lots of folded and draped fabric looks like. You can't draw or paint anyone from the Bible without a lot of drapery, and I can always tell when drapery looks faked. Here's my first angel study:

I've been scouring the internet for medieval manuscripts of the subject matter I'm going to paint for the Apocalypse Prize .  My first painting will be of the Woman Clothed with the Sun from Revelation chapter 12 .  I want to include the battle between St. Michael and the Dragon as well.  Here are a few manuscripts that inspired me: St. Michael and his angels battling the Dragon by Pacino de Buonaguida, Florence, 1340 A.D. The Cloisters Apocalypse, Normandy, 1330 A.D. The Woman Clothed with the Sun, Cloisters Apocalypse, Normandy, 1330 A.D. The Woman Clothed with the Sun, MS Paris 403, France, 1250 A.D. Next, the way I begin to sketch out the layout involves dividing up the plane using the armature of the rectangle .  Basically, connecting the midpoint of each side with the opposite corner gives you a framework for building a harmonious composition based on proportional intervals. See how I've use the intersections to determine where the i...

I've been very busy working on a few projects that I couldn't show on my blog just yet. I can finally show you one of them now. I designed the front and back cover for this book: The Rending of Christendom: Readings and Questions by Phillip Campbell My friend Phillip Campbell, a history teacher for Homeschool Connections , has created an excellent high-school level course on the Reformation/Counter-Reformation era based on primary source documents. The book is designed to follow the online course, but it can certainly stand alone as it's own curriculum. The main book "The Rending of Christendom" has study questions after each reading, and there is a separate answer key available. There is currently a 15% off sale if you buy both together: http://cruachanhill.blogspot. com/p/history.html http://cruachanhill.blogspot. com/p/front-page.html I'm about halfway through, and I think the selection of readings provides a very broad and thorough ...

I've been asked by the director of the Apocalypse Prize contest to post this announcement: There will be a new competition this year, with a December 31st deadline. The 2013 contest was a wonderful learning experience. This is an excellent way for artists of all ages to develop a good working understanding of medieval art and how to use its conventions fluently in their own work. Along the way, they will learn to analyze the subject matter analogically and create their own piece by researching and sketching examples from medieval manuscripts. Sign up here:  http://www.apocalypseprize.com/

The Four Cardinal Virtues - Dirc van Delft, Walters Manuscript W.171, 1400 A.D. "What is the good for man? It must be the ultimate end or object of human life: something that is in itself completely satisfying. Happiness fits this description. But what is happiness? If we consider what the function of man is, we find that happiness is a virtuous activity of the soul." -Aristotle, The Nichomachean Ethics