My small contribution to the arts, once a week I’m showcasing a web site of an art gallery, museum, or other culturally significant entity. This weeks showcase:

AskArt.com

Self-proclaimed “The Artists Bluebook,” the site is geared toward buying and selling artwork but it’s Research Center is very useful for looking up information about individual artists (over 120,000 artists!), art terms, and includes a searchable database of art museums and galleries. Each artist’s page includes biographical information, examples of works, and resources for finding works for sale, to buy, and auction information. It’s also fun to go to the Popular Topics section and browse through the various groupings with examples by prominent artists. For more serious connosieurs there is subscription option available that provides access to more detailed biographies, auction information, etc. Overall it’s a fun site to browse around or use as reference if you need information about a specific artist.

My small contribution to the arts, once a week I’m showcasing a web site of an art gallery, museum, or other culturally significant entity. This weeks showcase:

The Weinstein Gallery

This art gallery is located in a main gallery and several smaller galleries up and down Geary Street in downtown San Francisco near Union Square. Evie and I visited the main gallery and several of the smaller galleries during one of our brief outings while Marilyn attended Blogher08. Several of the galleries are located right across the street and down from the Westin St. Francis so if you missed this gem you really missed something special.

The main gallery hosts a sampling of works from several artists but the highlights were paintings by Marc Chagall, Rolph Scarlett, and sculptures by Ruth Bloch. Many of the cubist oil paintings by Rolph Scarlett appealed to me and I felt some even crossed over ever so slightly to impressionism. Many of his paintings are just so-so but there were 4-5 really outstanding paintings including one urban landscape that blew me away.

Other notable artists in the smaller galleries were Robert Kipniss and Charles Becker, both of which should be hanging on my wall (and will be someday God willing). Robert Kipniss dabbles in a little bit of everything but his works are characterized by lack of color (but in a very good way). A few of his works were reminiscent of pointilism until you examine the work closely and see the paint was brushstroked on. There was not one of his works that I didn’t drool over which is highly unusual. Charles Becker is a realist painter and the really outstanding works in the gallery were his classical still lifes. You could practically reach out and eat the fruit and he makes it look good enough you want to do just that. Both of these artists are exceptional and a must see.

So if your in downtown San Francisco and have some time to spare check out the Weinstein Gallery. You’re sure to fnd something that speaks to you.