Digitized Media

Digitized Media, Featured

Digital painting is a method of creating an art object (painting) digitally and/or a technique for making digital art in the computer.

As a technique, it refers to a computer graphics software program that uses a virtual canvas and virtual painting box of brushes, colors and other supplies. The virtual box contains many instruments that do not exist outside the computer, and which give a digital artworka different look and feel from an artwork that is made the traditional way.

"Mona Full"

From the original "Mona Lisa", a group of socialnetworking artists were asked to come up with a new concept of the "Mona Lisa." I am proud to add that I won first place. The experience was gratifying, but what was more gratifying was learning a little bit of debated history about who was the Mona Lisa.

The truly mysterious woman that was painted and immortalized by Leonardo da Vinci, a 16th century master, apparently had recently given birth to her second son when she sat for Leonardo's famous painting. A French art expert announced this finding. The discovery actuallycame about as a result of a team of Canadian scientists.

These experts utilized a special infrared as well as three dimensional technology to "look" through layers of painting. In doing so, it became obvious that Lisa Gherardini (aka "Mona Lisa") was attired by a thin, transparent gauze veil. This type of gauze garment was worn in the early 16th century by women who were pregnant or who had just given birth. Due to the dark coloration of the painting, the attire was not apparent until the recent discovery.

The French art expert believes that, apparently, Leonardo painted Dona Gherardini, long held to be the central subject of the painting, to commorate the birth of her second son and that it was painted in 1503. Dona Gherardini was to give birth to five children and was the wife of Francesco de Gioconda who was a Florentine merchant.

Di siguro.

However, there is another story; and it is based on a philosophical conversation Leonardo had with Lisa. He said to her, "For once you have tasted flight, you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skywards, for there you have been and there you will long to return."

The story line goes something like this:

LISA GHERARDINI: Leonardo, you have taken too long to finish this painting with my nursing garment. The longer you take, the chances of soiling it with my milk in your presence.

You have to finish this portrait. You know I know you have a terrible reputation for not finishing your works. Oh, Maestro Leonardo, what are we going to do with you?

LEONARDO DA VINCI: Mia Signora, ho promesso!

LISA GHERARDINI: Yes, I know.

LEONARDO DA VINCI: You know? You know I have tasted the flight and find it hard to not keep my eyes turned skywards?

LISA GHERARDINI: Now, then, with that thought, paint me as knowing about the taste of that you speak of, because I have tasted it, too.

LEONADRO DA VINCI: Ah, yes. I recognize it now.

LISA GHERARDINI: Maestro artista che si sono. This is our secret.

Show me with your final work how you portray me as knowing, too. Afterall, you are not the only one who reads and understands the message contained in the Corpus Hermeticum.

LEONARDO DA VINCI: Mi perdoname, la mia Signora, per la mia arroganza e ignoranza.

LISA GHERARDINI: Va bene. Accetto le vostre scuse.

FOR MORE FUN AND FLIGHT OF FANCY, visit Photoship Contest (31 digitized entries of the "Mona Lisa").

This page features artwork with background information on what inspired the artist to do what she did

"We dance for laughter, we dance for tears, we dance for madness, we dance for fears, dance for hopes, we dance for screams. We are the dancers. We create the dance." Albert Einstein

"Man with the Blue Guitar"

Inspired by the poem of the same title by Wallace Stevens

(exerpts)

I

The man bent over his guitar,
A shearsman of sorts. The day was green.

They said, "You have a blue guitar,
You do not play things as they are."

The man replied, "Things as they are
Are changed upon the blue guitar."

And they said then, "But play, you must,
A tune beyond us, yet ourselves,

A tune upon the blue guitar
Of things exactly as they are."

II

I cannot bring a world quite round,
Although I patch it as I can.

I sing a hero's head, large eye
And bearded bronze, but not a man,

Although I patch him as I can
And reach through him almost to man.

If to serenade almost to man
Is to miss, by that, things as they are,

Say it is the serenade
Of a man that plays a blue guitar.

Digitized Media, Featured

"Mona Full"​

This page features artwork with background information on what inspired the artist to do what she did

"Man with the Blue Guitar"﻿

Inspired by the poem of the same title by Wallace Stevens

(exerpts)

I

The man bent over his guitar, A shearsman of sorts. The day was green.

They said, "You have a blue guitar, You do not play things as they are."

The man replied, "Things as they are Are changed upon the blue guitar."

And they said then, "But play, you must, A tune beyond us, yet ourselves,

A tune upon the blue guitar Of things exactly as they are."

II

I cannot bring a world quite round, Although I patch it as I can.

I sing a hero's head, large eye And bearded bronze, but not a man,

Although I patch him as I can And reach through him almost to man.

If to serenade almost to man Is to miss, by that, things as they are,

Say it is the serenade Of a man that plays a blue guitar.

III

Ah, but to play man number one, To drive the dagger in his heart,

To lay his brain upon the board And pick the acrid colors out,

To nail his thought across the door, Its wings spread wide to rain and snow,

To strike his living hi and ho, To tick it, tock it, turn it true,

To bang from it a savage blue, Jangling the metal of the strings.

IV

So that's life, then: things as they are? It picks its way on the blue guitar.

A million people on one string? And all their manner in the thing,

And all their manner, right and wrong, And all their manner, weak and strong?

The feelings crazily, craftily call, Like a buzzing of flies in autumn air,

And that's life, then: things as they are, This buzzing of the blue guitar.

V

Do not speak to us of the greatness of poetry, Of the torches wisping in the underground,

Of the structure of vaults upon a point of light. There are no shadows in our sun,

Day is desire and night is sleep. There are no shadows anywhere.

The earth, for us, is flat and bare. There are no shadows. Poetry

Exceeding music must take the place Of empty heaven and its hymns,

Ourselves in poetry must take their place, Even in the chattering of your guitar.

VI

A tune beyond us as we are, Yet nothing changed by the blue guitar;

Ourselves in the tune as if in space, Yet nothing changed, except the place

Of things as they are and only the place As you play them, on the blue guitar,

Placed, so, beyond the compass of change, Perceived in a final atmosphere;

For a moment final, in the way The thinking of art seems final when

The thinking of god is smoky dew. The tune is space. The blue guitar

Becomes the place of things as they are, A composing of senses of the guitar.

VII

It is the sun that shares our works. The moon shares nothing. It is a sea.

When shall I come to say of the sun, It is a sea; it shares nothing;

The sun no longer shares our works And the earth is alive with creeping men,

Mechanical beetles never quite warm? And shall I then stand in the sun, as now

I stand in the moon, and call it good, The immaculate, the merciful good,

Detached from us, from things as they are? Not to be part of the sun? To stand

Remote and call it merciful? The strings are cold on the blue guitar.

VIII

The vivid, florid, turgid sky, The drenching thunder rolling by,

The morning deluged still by night, The clouds tumultuously bright

And the feeling heavy in cold chords Struggling toward impassioned choirs,

Crying among the clouds, enraged By gold antagonists in air--

I know my lazy, leaden twang Is like the reason in a storm;

And yet it brings the storm to bear. I twang it out and leave it there.....

"Mona Full"

"Man with the Blue Guitar"

The man bent over his guitar,
A shearsman of sorts. The day was green.

They said, "You have a blue guitar,
You do not play things as they are."

The man replied, "Things as they are
Are changed upon the blue guitar."

And they said then, "But play, you must,
A tune beyond us, yet ourselves,

A tune upon the blue guitar
Of things exactly as they are."

I cannot bring a world quite round,
Although I patch it as I can.

I sing a hero's head, large eye
And bearded bronze, but not a man,

Although I patch him as I can
And reach through him almost to man.

If to serenade almost to man
Is to miss, by that, things as they are,

Say it is the serenade
Of a man that plays a blue guitar.

Ah, but to play man number one,
To drive the dagger in his heart,

To lay his brain upon the board
And pick the acrid colors out,

To nail his thought across the door,
Its wings spread wide to rain and snow,

To strike his living hi and ho,
To tick it, tock it, turn it true,

To bang from it a savage blue,
Jangling the metal of the strings.

So that's life, then: things as they are?
It picks its way on the blue guitar.

A million people on one string?
And all their manner in the thing,

And all their manner, right and wrong,
And all their manner, weak and strong?

The feelings crazily, craftily call,
Like a buzzing of flies in autumn air,

And that's life, then: things as they are,
This buzzing of the blue guitar.

Do not speak to us of the greatness of poetry,
Of the torches wisping in the underground,

Of the structure of vaults upon a point of light.
There are no shadows in our sun,

Day is desire and night is sleep.
There are no shadows anywhere.

The earth, for us, is flat and bare.
There are no shadows. Poetry

Exceeding music must take the place
Of empty heaven and its hymns,

Ourselves in poetry must take their place,
Even in the chattering of your guitar.

A tune beyond us as we are,
Yet nothing changed by the blue guitar;

Ourselves in the tune as if in space,
Yet nothing changed, except the place

Of things as they are and only the place
As you play them, on the blue guitar,

Placed, so, beyond the compass of change,
Perceived in a final atmosphere;

For a moment final, in the way
The thinking of art seems final when

The thinking of god is smoky dew.
The tune is space. The blue guitar

Becomes the place of things as they are,
A composing of senses of the guitar.

It is the sun that shares our works.
The moon shares nothing. It is a sea.

When shall I come to say of the sun,
It is a sea; it shares nothing;

The sun no longer shares our works
And the earth is alive with creeping men,

Mechanical beetles never quite warm?
And shall I then stand in the sun, as now

I stand in the moon, and call it good,
The immaculate, the merciful good,

Detached from us, from things as they are?
Not to be part of the sun? To stand

Remote and call it merciful?
The strings are cold on the blue guitar.

The vivid, florid, turgid sky,
The drenching thunder rolling by,

The morning deluged still by night,
The clouds tumultuously bright

And the feeling heavy in cold chords
Struggling toward impassioned choirs,

Crying among the clouds, enraged
By gold antagonists in air--

I know my lazy, leaden twang
Is like the reason in a storm;

And yet it brings the storm to bear.
I twang it out and leave it there.....