Jesus is…

13-jesus

I want to try something a little bit different for this blog. Instead of writing my thoughts and insight, I simply wanted to post this picture of Jesus that Chris painted, and ask the viewers to answer this “simple” question.

“What is Jesus to you?”

Answer below in the comments. I can’t wait to see the responses.

Chris Cook is a premier southern artist and owner of Madison Studios, a web design, maintenance, and e-commerce and marketing company. For his artist biography, contact information, or to view more of his work, click HERE .

Circle of Life:

life

 

 

I am not much of an artist in the sense of “paint brushes, strokes on canvas, and acrylic color palates”. My art tends to come with the way that I am able to use my words to talk about or describe something. (I studied culinary arts in college, therefore, I have a decent ability to put good looking food on a plate, but that is neither here nor there). That being said, I am one who appreciates art, though I may not always have the best idea of what exactly is happening on the canvas, or what was going through the artist’s mind as he/she created the piece.

Chris titled this painting “Circle of Life”. After singing Sir Elton John’s hit from the opener of Disney’s The Lion King in my head, I began to contemplate life as a circle/cycle, and to contemplate this painting as a representation of it.

I feel like the black and white, almost starry field that constructs the majority of the background helps to represent the vastness that is the expanse of a universe much larger than we’re able to experience in our lifetime. The figure in the top left of the picture seems to represent birth/beginning. The colored element is an adult male, (I assume that is Chris). There are other figures within the painting, and a definite wheel, reminding me of the cycles of our life.

Lent is a time when we are to be reminded of our human mortality. During the Imposition of Ashes, pastors typically speak words like “remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return”. It’s a stark reminder that our creator works things out in seasons and cycles. This big ol’ wheel keeps on turning, and God has a forever plan in motion for it all.

Chris Cook is a premier southern artist and owner of Madison Studios, a web design, maintenance, and e-commerce and marketing company. For his artist biography, contact information, or to view more of his work, click HERE. 

Life on Earth When Jesus Was Here.

What was life like when Jesus was on the earth?

12-jesus-on-earth

We do have the Bible and other historic writings chronicling the times in the middle east at the time of Jesus.

I have thought about this enough to draw my own opinions. I am not an old world history expert but I think the following of the time:

  • there was knowledge that “this was the time” of the coming Messiah and it was well know (see Daniel 9:24-27)
  • there were probably lots of men claiming that they were the Messiah and knew the prophesies – thus could imitate the signs and actions
  • there was an accelerated number of demons present on earth, demons being cast out… I am open to anyone out there that knows more on the subject to correct me
  • it seems that the demons also knew quite well who Jesus was upon encountering him – while the “religious leaders” of the time seemed to have more trouble in acknowledging him
  • lots of confusion, violence, evil, power hunger, pride, repression…

The religious establishment seemed to be expecting Him too, but from all that I read of their interactions with Jesus – they assumed that he would “come to them” and “work with them” and that they would be in the center of his work here. That did not happen. Jesus found himself in conflict with them throughout his ministry. There is way too much here to write about here and to show you on a canvas…

This painting is made of six equal sized little paintings all on one canvas. You can draw what you want from each or of the totality of the painting as a whole.

Enjoy,

Chris Cook

____________

Chris Cook is a premier southern artist and owner of Madison Studios, a web design, maintenance, and e-commerce and marketing company. For his artist biography, contact information, or to view more of his work, click HERE. 

 

Barns, Barns, Barns…

Tennessee Barns: 1 through 5.

13-tenn-barn1

13-tenn-barn213-tenn-barn4

 

 

 

 

 

 

13-tenn-barn313-tenn-barn5

Why paint the same picture 5 times? Good Question. As I was about the finish Tennessee Barn #1, I was really liking the way it looked compositionally and the color scheme as well, but, I had an idea for another color pallet that I “could have used”. I pulled out a second blank canvas the same size and roughed in the same composition and left it there while finishing the first.

I thought about Monet, and how he painted the hay stack picture over and over again – using roughly the same composition, point of view… but at different times of day to get different light. What a marvelous idea… but he painted those paintings “En plein air” that is a French expression that means “in the open air,” and is particularly used to describe the act of painting outdoors (on the spot).

Unfortunately, I was painting this in my art studio in Madison, Georgia while that barn is sitting in a sharp curve in the road just outside of Gatlinburg, Tennessee. I had made a quick photo on my iPhone from the side of the road years ago, so I could not observe the barn at different times of day – I abandoned that idea and went with “I could have painted this in a different color pallet idea” that I had originally.

I repeated this idea until I had exhausted color pallets I felt were appropriate for this subject. Now I have a wonderful set of five paintings of the same subject if someone wanted to make a grouping on their wall, or a nice set of different color paintings of the same subject to suit someone’s idea of “I like those colors”.

I went on to paint another barn from Blowing Rock, North Carolina two times with two different color pallets. You will just have to go to my website to see those.

Enjoy,

Chris Cook

_________________

Chris Cook is a premier southern artist and owner of Madison Studios, a web design, maintenance, and e-commerce and marketing company. For his artist biography, contact information, or to view more of his work, click HERE. 

 

 

 

 

Night Noise

Night Noise.

noise

This painting is from the distant past, but I still have it hanging in view of my desk here at my office so that I can see it daily.

This work started with some small pencil sketches to work out the composition. My concept was to visually create that feeling we all get when we hear an unusual noise at night. We would like to ignore them and think to ourselves, “it was probably just the wind”… but more often than not, we feel compelled to investigate the noise.  I don’t know about you, but I am usually a little anxious… walk slowly and quietly looking around… opening doors slowly… sound familiar?

In this composition, I used a second person to increase the drama. A noise outside that gets you and your spouse out of bed must be more than something to write off as the wind. The second person stays cautiously back a little peering out as well. The outside is dark and unknown, a little creepy, while the interior is bright, warm and safe. They are both venturing out… will they go out or just say all is well and go back inside where they can go back to watching TV or back to sleep?

That is all up to your imagination. I just like to create works that give you a chance to think, or to create your own story with. Either way, hope you enjoyed my story.

Chris Cook

 

Chris Cook is a premier southern artist and owner of Madison Studios, a web design, maintenance, and e-commerce and marketing company. For his artist biography, contact information, or to view more of his work, click HERE. 

Paul

Paul In Thought.

12-paul2

This painting idea came to me through a Bible verse –

 

New International Version: Romans 9:3 “For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people, those of my own race…”

But also through starting with a blank canvas and using a method I learned about through my favorite Abstract Expressionist – Robert Motherwell’s method of starting a painting with no pre-conceived ideas… which he learned from the Surrealists Max Ernst, Yves Tanguy, and Roberto Matta. From them, he learned the concept of “psychic automatism”, a form of doodling in which the artist allows an unconscious, spontaneous impulse to lead the way.

Wow, how we can learn and pass down ideas from the past into the future.

Anyway, all that said, I started doodling without conscious thought and had a basic structure in place. After first passes of paint, I felt I saw John The Baptist, but just his head… I painted a quick “platter” underneath to depict the story of when his head was presented.  I reconsidered as that is a nasty subject matter for a painting, so with more washes and paint slinging, I started thinking of the verse above that really reveals Paul’s love for others.

Look close at the painting and you may see the process described above.

Enjoy,

Chris Cook

 

Chris Cook is a premier southern artist and owner of Madison Studios, a web design, maintenance, and e-commerce and marketing company. For his artist biography, contact information, or to view more of his work, click HERE.

Landscape in the evening

landscape_evening

I find this picture captivating. Moreover, I love that it was created using a computer program. Art is a beautiful thing, and technology is a wonderful tool that we can use to create words, ideas, tools, images, and items that help us in our daily lives.

If there’s one thing that I have learned in my time working for Madison Studios is that, when it comes to the internet, nothing is really what it seems. The picture, font, slideshow, movie, etc. that we see and enjoy on our favorite website is really just the product of a series of characters assembled in a language called HTML that tells our computers to show us what we see. The “back end” of a website would be very much like looking at the back side of a woven or stitched tapestry; the seemingly chaotic stream of randomness and disarray, all pointing to the bigger picture on the other side.

This painting, for example, is the sum of countless clicks, swipes, and passes over a digital pad that communicated a vision from Chris’ mind through his hands into a computer, that took that information and assembled it into a visual signal that we are able to interpret as this beautiful work of art. I realize that this is quite possibly an over-complication of the creative process, but I can not help but to be in awe of everything that goes into the creative process of so much that we enjoy these days.

Chris is a master craftsman of both visual images and websites. He has an eye for creativity and development unlike many of his peers. What a blessing it is for us to be able to sit back and enjoy the fruits of his labor.

Chris Cook is a premier southern artist and owner of Madison Studios, a web design, maintenance, and e-commerce and marketing company. For his artist biography, contact information, or to view more of his work, click HERE.

Train in Landscape

print_train

 

Trains have always fascinated me. There is just something magical and captivating about tons and tons of steel, cargo, and motor, chugging along two iron rails all across the country. The familiar whine of the horn as it plows through crossings, the hisses, clacks, and thumps as it moves on down the line. There is also something special to think that there is typically only 2-3 people on board, responsible for moving, and more importantly stopping, all of that cargo across the country.

I’m sure that technology has changed a lot about the how, why, and when trains move their cargo from place to place, but little can be done to decrease the fascination and grandeur factor that come with seeing trains go by…

This painting is a print of an original that Chris made. I love that artists are able to create prints of beautiful works that they are sure many people would love and appreciate, rather than limiting us to single copies of their creations. This painting is sure to appeal to lovers of trains, landscape paintings, and fine art alike. I really like it.

Chris Cook is a premier southern artist and owner of Madison Studios, a web design, maintenance, and e-commerce and marketing company. For his artist biography, contact information, or to view more of his work, click HERE.

 

Cotton – Chris Cook – Southern Artist

cotton

 

After the “Snowpacolypse 2014”, I drove by a cotton field that had recently been combined and had bales of the white stuff lying on the field’s edges. The funny thing was, because of the snow, the field looked like it was ripe for the picking all over agin. It’s funny how two very different “white and fluffy” substances can both make such a tremendous impact on the southern landscape.

Cotton has been a staple crop of southern states, and the source of numerous resources for textile, paper, farming, cooking, and livestock production for years and years. Bostwick, GA houses a working cotton gin that most local students are fortunate enough to tour at least once during their tenure in Morgan County Schools. In doing so, they are able to pay an homage to the crop that helped to pave the way for the prosperity that many people in this area enjoy today.

I feel like this painting does a good job of capturing several characteristics of cotton. The dimensions and textures of the paint strokes in white help to give reference to the fluffiness of cotton. Chris also uses very dark earth tones juxtaposed against the bright white of the cotton balls. This is a stark reminder of what it looks like to ride by a field of cotton in the late fall. The fields are full of white fluffy pillows of cotton, right for the picking.

Cotton can be quite a controversial topic for discussion here in these parts, but there is no denying that it has made, and continues to make a tremendous impact on our world, as it is truly is “the fabric of our lives”.

Chris Cook is a premier southern artist and owner of Madison Studios, a web design, maintenance, and e-commerce and marketing company. For his artist biography, contact information, or to view more of his work, click HERE.

Ice Storm

0004

Ice, Ice, Baby….Old Jack frost is nipping at us again this week…

Chris classifies himself as a “Southern Christian Artist”. Those three words say a great deal. Here in the South, winters are typically brief, mild times of cool and cloudy days, dotted with occasional bitter cold days and the ever elusive flurry of snow. If we get “winter weather” here in Georgia, it is typically in the form of ice and/or sleet. Seldom do we really get any accumulation of snow.

In this painting, Chris depicts a field of land that has been “impacted” by the ice storm. He shows us the sparse patches of snow left on the ground. I can almost imagine the water-logged ground squishing beneath my feet as I look at this painting.

Its funny how most of our “damage” from winter storms comes from the fact that it rains, things get wet, and then it’ll get cold enough for things to ice over and get really nasty. It’s a curse of living in such a mild and temperate part of the country. It’s also interesting to assess the dynamic of how our society is impacted by the presence of snow, ice, or any other “winter weather”.

What do your and yours do to prepare for/endure winter weather? What are your memories of snow and ice storms here in the south? Share them in the comments below.

Chris Cook is a premier southern artist and owner of Madison Studios, a web design, maintenance, and e-commerce and marketing company. For his artist biography, contact information, or to view more of his work, click HERE.

Facebook
Twitter
Pinterest
Instagram