Classic Works Of Art

The Academy Awards take place on Sunday February 27 and once again Architectural Digest is hosting a well-appointed "greenroom" for the celebrity attendees. Fine art dealer Questroyal Fine Art of New York City has announced that six of its painting are part of the Architectural Digest greenroom at the Oscars. Designer Michael S. Smith, who was tapped by the Obamas to create the look for their family quarters at the White House, went for a classic American look inspired by luxe, tailored 1940s Hollywood style. He used furnishings from his personal line with Baker Furniture and handpicked six paintings from the Questroyal collection to decorate the room.

Maybe one of the fundamental functions of the human faculty is to imitate nature, to fashion a beautiful work of art. Or as Pablo Picasso would put it, “Every child is born artist; the problem is how to keep him an artist the rest of his life.” If the legendary artist from Spain would be given his way, then, art must really be innate to anyone; and when the impulse of it haunts a true artist would simply be hard to resist, giving rise to many works that have become subjects of wonderment and praise.

The six paintings are: Thomas Hart Benton, Swing Your Partner; Arthur B. Carles, Calla Lilies; Childe Hassam, Hollyhocks, Isle of Shoals, 1902; Rockwell Kent, Alpes-Maritimes; Reginald Marsh, New York City Women and Paul Sawyier, Lower New York. After the event paintings will be on view at Questroyal Fine Art starting March 10, 2011. In the rendering above you can see Benton's Swing Your Partner placed over the bar area. The painting was done in 1945 and shows a celebration of exuberant dancers.

But as life would have it, controversies and scandals have also taken their way into the world of arts and of artists. As follows are some of the most controversial pieces that have disturbed the mind of mankind. The Lunch of the Grass is one of the most controversial paintings by the French Painter Edouard Manet. The nude woman in company with fully dressed men during a lunch out was utter shock to the viewers when Manet exhibited his work in 1863. Quite more astonishing is the familiarity of the woman.