Where Urban Life Meets Natural Art

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The image above may look like a gardening project gone wrong, or a lot of effort to set up a unique photograph. However, neither of these options can explain the image.

Art can take on many forms and serve many purposes. The photograph above showcases the collaboration of art and nature. It serves as a medium for discussing the importance of growing awareness for both nature and art in urban areas.

This photograph is just a tiny piece of a larger project. The French village of Jaujae celebrated the 10^th year of its Arts and Nature Trail program by spreading 1,400 feet of living turf throughout the community.

In this urban city there is little room for art or nature. This extensive stretch of turf weaves its way throughout the city; up stairs, around corners and down streets calling one and all to experience both nature and art.

The 3.5 tons of natural, living turf grass is meant to bring both art and nature into an urban area that would otherwise be overwhelmed by its stone structures. The goal is to provide urban dwellers with a link to all things artistic and shine light on the beauty of the natural world. This winding band of grass serves as a connection for the individuals of Jaujae with the place where art and nature meet.

This endeavor forces individuals to take a moment away from their everyday activities and appreciate that which is creative. It urges the public to support both the arts and projects that bring the natural world into the city. This creative, artistic idea definitely calls for attention and support in a way that a simple garden never could.  It literally attempts to use art to connect man with the environment.

The grass path that runs throughout the city is only a temporary installation. However, it will be interesting to see how this artistic effort works to inspire not only the people of Jaujae, but also others who wish to discover artistic ways of bringing communities together through nature.

Image made available by Web Urbanist – Local Designs to Global Destinations

Be an Artist in 2 minutes with Segmation SegPlay® PC (see more details here)

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Related articles

• Green Carpet: Grass Trail Winds Through City Streets (weburbanist.com)
• The Slow Transformation of Growing Grass Sculptures (mymodernmet.com)
• Walk the Green Carpet (dirt.asla.org)

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Was the Model for the Mona Lisa a Male?

Who was the model for Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa?

Unfortunately, one of the mysteries of Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa is who was the model was a Male or Female? What age was the model? Where was the model from? Was it his wife? Did da Vinci know the model? We may never know who the model is and of course some may say why does this matter anyway right?

One thing we know for certain is that this portrait has led to many discussions. One discussion is about the Mona Lisa’s mysterious smile. I am sure you have thought about that part yourself. I often have wondered who was this model in such a wonderful piece of art? When I look at the different masterpieces myself that other Historical artists have painted, I often ask myself this same question being who was their model or models? Also, how do these famous artists select their models? Is it their wife, themselves, mistresses, children, lovers, worker, apprentice, grandparent, high school sweetheart, coworker, neighbors, people randomly picked off the street? When the artists select a model or models, what is the artist looking for in the models? What method are the looking in their selection for a model? Are they looking at some unique feature? Unique features such as their smiles, such that the smile is mysterious, sexy, sad or interesting?

When I go the the art museum, I like to look at the famous paintings from all different angles. Do you find yourself doing that as well? When I recently went to the Getty Museum in Los Angeles, California, one of the first things I did was to walk into a room and look at the paintings from a distance. This is sometimes a hard thing to do, especially when the room is large. When the room is large, how do you really know which masterpiece to look at first. I usually look around to see which one intrigues me the most. When I find the one that interests me the most, I then look at them straight on. I often like to talk to the docents to find out what they like about the certain pieces displayed at their art museum. The docent is the true expert as they should know which pieces are the most interesting and any unusual facts about the paintings. I wonder what was the artist thinking before they started to paint on their canvas. Is there a hidden agenda on their canvas that we may never know such as the hidden identity of who their model is?

Most scholars think that da Vinci’s Mona Lisa may be his wife but have you ever thought it could really be one of his apprentices? Perhaps da Vinci had a companion that was even a male and this was the person who da Vinci drew in this well known painting? Was the model Salai who had been a model for Leonardo in several of his other paintings? So the question really is then who was the model and was it a male?

Be a Artist in 2 minutes with Segmation SegPlay® PC Leonardo da Vinci (see more details here)

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United States President Caricature Art by www.segmation.com!

United States President Caricature Pattern Set for SegPlay® PC by Segmation (see more details here)

Here’s a fun and easy set of United States President Caricature patterns (thanks to our friends at Graphics Factory for providing this content) The set includes 17 nicely done portraits of the more familiar presidents including George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Dwight D. Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, Richard M. Nixon, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush.

When these patterns are completely colored, the resulting image has a very strong resemblance to the original artwork. These vibrant and colorful pieces of art are truly engaging and exciting for you to paint, and especially a joy to look at when completed.

With over 2800 available patterns from an ever growing collection of artistic themes, SegPlay® PC will provide you with hours upon hours of painting fun and entertainment. SegPlay® PC Splash Screen With SegPlay® PC as an Art Appreciation teaching tool, students can memorize famous works of art, color by color. Children can truly touch images related to a wide assortment of subjects. As a parent or educator, the learning possibilities stretch as far as your image-ination!

SegPlay® PC is in the computer software category known as “casual gaming”. While it provides a pleasurable and creative escape from mundane computer activities, the program is simple to use and new players can begin the painting function immediately, with just a few, intuitive tools. However, the program also offers rich features with challenging and engaging options, so it expands with each user, whether they seek an education in art appreciation or just want to enjoy a creative gaming challenge.

With a dynamic and clear user interface and fun sound effects, the program’s gaming features compliment the artistic benefits and engage users at all levels. For a gaming challenge, users can race against a timer to complete patterns in a given timeframe at levels from Easy to Experienced and Expert. Users can also employ speed-painting tools, monitor the mistake counter, and track the number of remaining pieces and colors to increase the program’s challenging and addictive potential.

United States President Caricature

Have fun and relax with beautiful online painting art. So fun and easy to use with no mess but just a mouse!

Be a Artist in 2 minutes with United States President Caricature from Segmation SegPlay® PC (see more details here)

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Be my Valentine by www.segmation.com

You’ll find in our SegPlayPC Be My Valentine pattern collection. This is a fun, off-beat set of great colorful digital patterns. We know you’ll enjoy coloring these great patterns! What a great stress reliever as well.

Gorgeous art painting patterns to color and relax with. You don’t have to be a professional artist to enjoy this. Join the fun today! Segmation.com

Valentine’s Day is celebrated around the world on February 14th. It’s a magical day where lovers express their love for one another in many traditional and untraditional ways. In today’s time, candy, chocolates, flowers, and heart filled cards are usually given as gifts in many cultures around the globe. Our set of Valentine themed patterns includes many illustrated graphics of the holiday including roses, candy, cupids with arrows, dragons and puppies in love, and couples in love. Happy Valentine’s Day to all!
This set contains 24 paintable patterns.

You can find a wide collection of Be my Valentine Scenes paint by number patterns and is available at the Segmation web site. These patterns may be viewed, painted, and printed using SegPlay™PC a fun, computerized paint-by-numbers program for Windows 7, 2000, XP, and Vista. Enjoy!

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Leonardo and Picasso: Artists of Their Times www.segmation.com

Leonardo da Vinci and Pablo Picasso are two of the most famous painters in history (if not the most famous); one a Renaissance genius renowned for his skillful realism, the other a modern legend and co-founder of Cubism.

Did you know that even though Leonardo’s Mona Lisa is the most famous painting in the world, he only produced less than 30 paintings in total? Even then, many of them were left unfinished. Picasso, on the other hand, created nearly 2000 paintings – plus sculptures, drawings, ceramics, and hand-pulled prints that combine to over 50,000 works of art! (To be fair though, Leonardo also left behind a substantial number of drawings, sketches, and pages full of notes.)

One reason for this vast difference in the number of paintings produced is that both artists were products of the times in which they lived. When Leonardo was alive, artists didn’t have the luxury of creating art for art’s sake. Instead they were commissioned by the church, guilds and wealthy patrons to create paintings and sculptures that were expected to depict certain themes. For this reason, Leonardo needed to find work where he could. During times of war, he had to work as a military architect and engineer, designing methods of defense. Making art took a backseat to the work necessary for survival.

By the time Picasso was born 362 years after Leonardo’s death, the world was a different place. Artists had more freedom than ever to paint what they wanted. Self-expression in art was more widely accepted and expected. Instead of being commission-based, most artwork was sold in galleries to private collectors, as money flowed more abundantly through society than it did during the Renaissance. By the 20th century, successful artists such as Picasso were able to sustain themselves from the sale of their artworks alone, and did not need to seek alternate forms of employment to make ends meet.

These factors may contribute to the reason why Picasso created so many more artworks than Leonardo, even though Leonardo is the creator of the most famous painting in the world. Who knows what more Leonardo could have accomplished if he’d been alive in modern times?

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Segmation Pattern Set for SegPlay® PC by Segmation (see more details here)

ChromaBlend Two and more Art Fun and Games by www.segmation.com!

ChromaBlend Pattern Set for SegPlay® PC by Segmation (see more details here)

Longtime Segmation SegPlay™ contributor, Susan Richardson, has created a second set of exciting set of multi-colored images for us to use with SegPlayPC™ These chromatic patterns are a joy to look at and utilize a vivid color palette. Have some psychedelic fun with the ChromaBlend collection! If you enjoyed coloring the first ChromaBlend set, you’ll enjoy these 20 abstract patterns as well. Crazy, Falling Leaves, Leaf Gear, Anger, Jazz 1, Hearts, Fuzz, Opaque, Jazz 2, Scratches, Fall, Nap Time, Tongue Tied, Faires and Fantasies, Forest Fire, Water Colour, Broken Heart, Storm, Blinds and Grid collections are included.
This set contains 20 paintable patterns.

When these patterns are completely colored, the resulting image has a very strong resemblance to the original artwork. These vibrant and colorful pieces of art are truly engaging and exciting for you to paint, and especially a joy to look at when completed.

With over 2800 available patterns from an ever growing collection of artistic themes, SegPlay® PC will provide you with hours upon hours of painting fun and entertainment. SegPlay® PC Splash Screen With SegPlay® PC as an Art Appreciation teaching tool, students can memorize famous works of art, color by color. Children can truly touch images related to a wide assortment of subjects. As a parent or educator, the learning possibilities stretch as far as your image-ination!

SegPlay® PC is in the computer software category known as “casual gaming”. While it provides a pleasurable and creative escape from mundane computer activities, the program is simple to use and new players can begin the painting function immediately, with just a few, intuitive tools. However, the program also offers rich features with challenging and engaging options, so it expands with each user, whether they seek an education in art appreciation or just want to enjoy a creative gaming challenge.

With a dynamic and clear user interface and fun sound effects, the program’s gaming features compliment the artistic benefits and engage users at all levels. For a gaming challenge, users can race against a timer to complete patterns in a given timeframe at levels from Easy to Experienced and Expert. Users can also employ speed-painting tools, monitor the mistake counter, and track the number of remaining pieces and colors to increase the program’s challenging and addictive potential.

ChromaBlend

Have fun and relax with beautiful online painting art. So fun and easy to use with no mess but just a mouse!

Be a Artist in 2 minutes with ChromaBlend from Segmation SegPlay® PC (see more details here)

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The Lingo of Color www.segmation.com

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It is said that the human eye can discern between 1 million and 7 million colors. Do you think you could name them all?

Most people can easily identify the 3 primary colors (red, yellow, blue), and the three secondary colors (orange, green and purple), plus white and black. It’s their many mixtures, variants, tints and shades that cause a stumbling block when it comes to identifying colors.

Because of their familiarity with pigments, artists have a slew of color names at their disposal when it comes to naming colors. (For instance, “I painted a Cerulean sky over an Ultramarine ocean, tinged with hints of Light Hansa.”) These terms may leave non-artists scratching their heads. Where do these color names originate?

As we discussed in a previous article, some artist pigments are named for the material that they are made from (cobalt blue, made from cobalt), or the place where they the pigments first came from (burnt sienna, from Sienna, Italy). Other colors are named for the person who first discovered the pigment that could be used to create the color (fuchsia, named for the German scientist Leonard Fuchs).

The complexity of color is difficult to pin down with the limitations of language – especially when one person claims to see lavender while another argues that the color is actually lilac. Aside from the necessity of naming pigments and hues for color-matching purposes, perhaps many color names are best left to the imagination, where poetic expressiveness can assign the most appropriate color name for that particular purpose and moment.

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Wacky and Wonderful Art Cars www.segmation.com

A dinosaur on wheels… a Cadillac covered in Legos… a tie-dyed school bus… if you see all of these rolling towards you, it doesn’t mean you’re stuck in a surrealistic dream – it probably means you’re watching an Art Car Parade!

An art car is a vehicle that has been transformed through the magic of paint or found objects, and a healthy dose of creativity, into a mobile objet d’art.  First originating during the hippie movement of the 60s, the art car phenomenon is still alive and well today.  Annual Art Car Parades take place in cities such as Houston, Minneapolis and San Francisco, and also feature prominently in festivals such as Burning Man.  Houston’s annual Art Car Parade draws nearly a quarter of a million attendees, testimony to the popularity of these wacky and wonderful automobiles.

“Mutant vehicles” are the more radically-transformed cousins of art cars (as shown above).  Mutant vehicles refer to cars that barely resemble our common conception of what a car should look like, because they have been transformed into whimsical mobile creations, like giant red wagons, hot dogs, monsters and even cathedrals.

Artist and non-artists alike have taken to decorating their cars.  Those who don’t consider themselves “traditional” artists embellish their cars by covering them entirely with bumper stickers, pennies, Astroturf, Legos, and Barbie Dolls.  Fine artists can show off their painting skills by creating detailed and elaborate murals on their cars, usually using enamel or airbrush.

For artists, an art car is an excellent way to show off your art because it becomes a mobile gallery, turning heads on the highway and in parking lots.  If you have an art car or decide to transform your car into one, make the most out of the free publicity by adding a bumper sticker with your website address, or by painting your name and website URL somewhere prominent.

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Paul Cezanne Post-Impressionist Colorful Historical Art by www.segmation.com!

Pattern Set for SegPlay® PC by Segmation (see more details here)

Segmation is a well organized collection of art patterns that brings to life the most recognized works of Paul Cézanne, a French post-impressionist painter. You’ll find landscapes, portraits, and still life’s of which Cézanne shows a mastery of design and an influence towards cubism. Twenty of his most famous works are included from his dark period (1861-1870), Impressionist period (1870-1878), Mature Period (1878-1890), and Final Period (1890-1905).
This set contains 20 paintable patterns.
Paul Cezanne

Have fun and relax with beautiful online painting art. So fun and easy to use with no mess but just a mouse!

Be a Artist in 2 minutes with Paul Cezanne from Segmation SegPlay® PC (see more details here)

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Birds of a Feather Art Fun Craft by www.segmation.com!

You will love the Birds of a Feather Pattern Set for SegPlay® PC by Segmation (see more details here)

Birds are amazing lightweight, winged animals that lay eggs and fly. Their characteristic features include feathers, beaks, and strong skeletons. Their colored feathers provide a number of important features including flight, insulation, camouflage, and signaling to others. The arrangement and appearance of feathers on the body, is referred to as plumage. In our carefully selected set of bird themed patterns, you’ll find an assortment of many species, colors and sizes. There are owls, eagles, seagulls, toucans, sparrows, finches, pigeons, pelicans, blackbirds, warblers, hummingbirds, and godwits.

This set contains 27 paintable patterns.

Birds of A Feather www.segmation.com

Have fun and relax with beautiful online painting art. So fun and easy to use with no mess but just a mouse!

Be a Artist in 2 minutes with Birds of a Feather Patterns from Segmation SegPlay® PC (see more details here)

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