I’ve never mentioned my artwork before as I used to keep my paintings and music separate. I’ve painted professionally for many years and have the same passion for art as I do for music. I’ve painted and drawn all my life simultaneously with music, so please don’t think I’m now abandoning the guitar! Nor am I trying to sell you my artwork; I just thought it would be cool to let you all know what I’m up to and to introduce you to my other side…
Some of my paintings have been sold in established art galleries around the world and a few of my paintings hang in several notable homes; I also painted all the murals in a famous historic Hall built in the year 1260 AD in England. One of my paintings was exhibited at the Pall Mall Gallery in London, and one of my Old Master copies (Bouguereau) was auctioned by world renowned fine art auctioneers Bonham’s of London in the mid ’90’s. Although I sign my artwork with my real name of ‘Mario Parga’, galleries and collectors have had until very recently little or no knowledge of my musical career.
Isle of Skye, Scotland (oil on canvas on panel, 30″ x 24″, 2010, in private collection)
I think that the time has come for me to show my music fans my artwork as I have an art-specific website coming soon and I hope you’ll visit it :-)
Rather than post a bunch of older paintings and drawings in the blog, I’m only going to focus on recent work, and will show works in progress for those of you interested in oil painting:
I paint in the traditional way using paint in opaque and glazed layers and specialize in landscapes, portraits and figurative works. My style of art is known as ‘realism’, and I paint in both the classical and contemporary styles. I use the finest commercially made paints, and I sometimes make my own paint when clients specifically request rare pigments such as lapis lazuli, malachite, etc.
I prepare my canvases and panels from scratch in the ancient and time-tested way using rabbit skin glue as a size, followed by a ground of earth pigments with a toned lead based oil primer on top for good paint adhesion. I never use acrylic primers. I use Belgian and Irish linen canvases and fine quality interlocking chungking bristle brushes and mongoose brushes for fine detail. I also make my own painting medium based on a 17th century recipe using amber varnish for a jewel-like effect.
I know it’s not guitar related, but I hope you enjoyed this blog entry all the same. I’m not going to over-post my art on this blog, I’ll keep it to a minimum and use the art-specific website for that purpose. If you’d like more information about my artwork, please email contact@marioparga-art.com
Thanks for visiting :-)
