The Society of Tempera Painters http://www.eggtempera.com You can’t really work fast with egg tempera, you build paintings slowly, with small strokes and multiple layers. As a consequence ET paintings tend to be well thought out, and the painters thoughtful. The work on display is beautiful, inspirational, and frankly, intimidating.
Egg Tempera http://www.eggtempera.org Inspired by the medium, and his welcome at the Society of Tempera Painters forum, Alex Omar Garcia launched this site. He scours the web to find interesting tempera painters and sets up links to them. He does the work so I don’t have to.
Dennis Harper http://www.dennisharper.com What can I say about Dennis. He makes me laugh, and think. He opens his site with paintings of fighting robots, whose bad behavior, you can control. Inside, his paintings, executed mostly in egg tempera, are touched with grace and humor. He brings the same attributes to his postings at the on-line forum of the Society of Tempera Painters. Many of his paintings could be described as narrative, but you’re just not sure what the story is. They keep me looking, and coming back to look again.
Alyssa Monks http://www.alyssamonks.com Besides her stunning compositions. Alyssa displays a wonderful combination of convincing realism and forms simplified to the needs of practical painting. Sensuality and sexuality are explored from a refreshing female perspective.
Niagara http://www.niagaradetroit.com When Iggy went solo, The Stooges needed a new name and singer. They hired Niagara and became Destroy All Monsters. She's become a painter, and reigns as Detroit's pop art diva. Her most valuable painting tip: "It's all in the eyebrows."
Phil Schirmer http://www.philschirmer.com I can just imagine Phil, on sunny days, while every one is out cavorting, painting in his studio, but when the clouds roll in, he grabs his camera and hunts for material. The gray skies, and soft shadows suit his egg tempera medium, and remove all harshness from the stark rocky land and seascapes he images. In this light local color can be subtle and muted yet pop. My favorite is
Lauren T. The stained white boat, resting on calm steel water, make a beautiful setting for three enigmatic red spheres on deck.
Fred Wessel http://www.fredwessel.com Precious is a word kicked around a lot in regard to egg tempera practitioners. Usually it is used pejoratively. The method is by nature slow and it takes a long time to cover a given area. Thus the paintings tend to be smaller than in other disciplines. Also, each brush stroke is distinct, so one tends work up details. Add to this the tradition of carving decoration into the gesso ground and applying gold leaf, and well, things tend to get a little special. Fred uses it all. Elaborate framing, carving and gold, yet it seems done not for it’s own sake, or worse yet, to the aggrandizement of the painter, but in service to his gorgeous subject material. The images seem lovingly formed, as though Fred could care less what the public thinks but is a slave to his subjects. They demand perfection. Fred doesn’t keep his secrets to himself. He has an excellent demonstration section that shows how he builds these traditionally structured images. Especially the sumptuous skin tones. With Fred, precious is a mistress’s command, not a dirty word.
