Knives in Art

Mark Williams

Mark Williams

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Do you like/love your knives enough to have an artist paint a picture of one from your collection ? Which one would you have done?
 
What an interesting question!

If you go to art museums, you will very often see paintings commissioned by wealthy people. In the old days, wealthy people commissioned paintings of their houses, their horses, their family, themselves, etc. There's a big collection on display at the Portland Art Museum right now, the Rau Collection. Many of Dr. Rau's collection are paintings of people. And it's interesting to me to see what "props" people choose to be painted with. One is of a wealthy artistocrat who choose to be painted in his finest cloths with all of his jewlery standing in his parlor next to a table on which is sitting a fancy clock. Such a clock was a very expensive luxury in those days, the sure sign of a wealthy man. Another is of a scholar who elected to be painted sitting at his desk surrounded by books and his microscope. And another is of a lady who choose to be painted with her baby. These are the things that are important to these people, which they wanted associated with them. The people in those paintings passed away hundreds of years ago. But we know the first man was wealthy. He choose items for his painting that send us that message clearly. We know the second man was a scholar. The items he selected convey that message. And we know the woman was a mother. She wanted us to know that.

And there are a lot of paintings that were commissioned of houses, estates, horses, ships, etc. Whatever the prized posessions of the people who commissioned the paintings were. If you prized it, you commissioned a painting of it.

Very few people commission paintings anymore. The very wealthy do. But a painted portrait costs thousands of dollars.

Most of us, though, take or have taken professionally photograhic pictures. A professionally-painted portrait costs thousands of dollars, but you can have a professional take a very family photo of you for about a hundred bucks. And snap shots are dirt cheap.

It's great. In the past, only the babies of the uberwealthy had baby portraits. Now, every kid has a shoe box full of snapshots and probably some professional portraits too.

Every guy can be photographed standing next to his prized car (or whatever). Everyone can have pictures of their "estate"... or condo as the case may be.

So, maybe Mr. Williams will be so kind as to allow me to expand his question (though I'd encourage anyone who has had paintings of his knives done to share that too) to include photographs.

And in particular, have you ever had your own portrait taken (not a snap shot) with your knives?
 
i'm currently working on a still life painting of my balisong knife an some antique Filipino Moro weapons.

i'll try to post when i finish it.... :)
 
I'm going to be working on a drawing of a Victorinox for the Topsfield Fair, they pay about $20 per entry, so if I get in enough drawings I could make some good dough.

Edit: Here's the drawing, this thread inspired me to draw it today! :D

I decided to just draw the concept, and eventually I'll make a painting from this. I omitted the Victorinox logo because when you try to draw lines that thin it just looks complicated. Perhaps on the painting I'll have more luck.

sakdraw.jpg


BTW: It's an Explorer :D
 
Moving to Blade Discussion Forum.
 
This thread reminds me of a series of illustrations I did to show knives as works of art.
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NeedleRemorse said:
I'm going to be working on a drawing of a Victorinox for the Topsfield Fair, they pay about $20 per entry, so if I get in enough drawings I could make some good dough.

Edit: Here's the drawing, this thread inspired me to draw it today! :D

I decided to just draw the concept, and eventually I'll make a painting from this. I omitted the Victorinox logo because when you try to draw lines that thin it just looks complicated. Perhaps on the painting I'll have more luck.

sakdraw.jpg


BTW: It's an Explorer :D
Click to expand...
NeedleRemorse, you are quite excellent!!! That is awesome. :cool: Want to come to work with us? You will have to grow a beard and learn to like grits...alot. Cavelady
 
I've known lots of artists who painted WITH a knife - a palette knife !!....When the Guggenheim Museum opened in Bilbao Spain the first exhibit included a giant sized Swiss Army knife IIRC about 12' long !!
 
Thanks guys :D The deadline for the fair is too soon to finish and enter the painting, so I'll work on the concept some more and submit that.
 
yes i would. My 1 of 3 Microtech Brend prototype DA Socom's. Paul
 
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