giuseppe arcimboldo, earth€¦ · giuseppe arcimboldo, vertumnus, 1591, skokloster castle, sweden...

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The Arcimboldo Challenge Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Earth, circa 1566, Private collection Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Vertumnus, 1591, Skokloster Castle, Sweden

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Page 1: Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Earth€¦ · Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Vertumnus, 1591, Skokloster Castle, Sweden One wouldn’t normally describe Gari Melchers as a common garden-variety portrait

The Arcimboldo Challenge

Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Earth, circa 1566, Private collection

Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Vertumnus, 1591, Skokloster Castle, Sweden

Page 2: Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Earth€¦ · Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Vertumnus, 1591, Skokloster Castle, Sweden One wouldn’t normally describe Gari Melchers as a common garden-variety portrait

One wouldn’t normally describe Gari Melchers as a common garden-variety portrait painter, but compared to the portraits of the 16th century Italian portrait painter Giuseppe Arcimboldo (1526-1593), most modern portrait paintings are exceedingly dull. For those who have always loved pictorial puzzles and curiosities, Arcimboldo is appreciated for his witty and original grotesques. The mannerist painter possessed a singular imagination, churning out fantastical likenesses of his patrons from carefully orchestrated composite heads based on vegetal, fruit, animate and inanimate themes. Today his celebrated reputation is based entirely on only a dozen or so bizarre pictures. They serve as much more than just painted jokes or illusionism. While he may not have been in the same league as the master painters of his day, his art is a tour de force of the imagination, and his oil paintings are the highly accurate records of a consummate naturalist, incorporating an impressive range of identifiable sea life, botanicals and plants.

We thought it might be great fun to see how inspiring his work might be for artists today, especially while we are already looking for something to do during the COVID-19 emergency.

Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Spring, Royal Academy, Madrid

Gari Melchers Home and Studio is issuing an Arcimboldo Challenge! Artists of all ages are invited to create and submit digital images of their own.

Page 3: Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Earth€¦ · Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Vertumnus, 1591, Skokloster Castle, Sweden One wouldn’t normally describe Gari Melchers as a common garden-variety portrait

Painted Arcimboldo-Style Portrait Or

Arcimboldo-Style Portrait Constructed Out of Three-Dimensional Objects

Here is what you need to do:

Paint or construct your 2-D portrait out of any media, watercolor, acrylic, magazine clippings, etc. For the 3-D constructions, use anything that creates the illusion of a person’s face, shells, fruit, veggies, macaroni, buttons, let your imagination go wild.

Submit your images to [email protected] by April 30. Please title them and provide the media used, name of artist, and age.

Curator Joanna Catron will serve as juror. The best in each of two categories, school age and adult, will be posted on Facebook. Please do not submit landscapes or still lifes. So get going!

Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Summer, 1563, Kunsthistorisches, Vienna