Margret E. Short Fine Arts

Portland, Oregon artist Margret Short - a modern day master of 17th Century Dutch art using the chiaroscuro technique to create still life and floral paintings.

Vandalism Along the Nile

by

This stunning figure depicts King Tut on the back of a leopard. It is one of the priceless artifacts damaged by vandals in the recent unrest in Egypt. The figure seems to have been connected with incidents of the passage of the king through the underworld. The leopard is black, the color of darkness, but it would have been inappropriate to depict the king in black because he was associated with the sun god, who brought a brief spell of light to the underworld as he passed through it each night.

In 1976 this figure was part of the King Tut collection that traveled the US including the Seattle Art Museum where I saw the exhibit. Once again in 2009, in Cairo at the Egyptian Museum of Antiquities, I saw this artifact, one of the most prized objects in the museum.

King Tut 100@5
King Tut with Leopard. Courtesy:

Metropolitan Museum of Art, Treasures of Tutankhamun, Copyright 1976 Library of Congress Catalogue Card 76-49920 www. http://www.metmuseum.org/ Cat. no. 38

Chiaroscuro Painting

Oil painting with the chiaroscuro technique illuminates the focus area with a strong light. All other areas are painted with less detail, lower values, and intensity of color giving a mysterious appearance. By putting one or two objects in the important focus area, a strong but simple composition will emerge. Combining these oil painting techniques with a selection of superior natural pigments and oil paints result in the beautiful and evocative quality known as Chiaroscuro Painting.