21st Century Visionary & Mystic Art after the tradition of the Symbolists

Non-Profit Millennial Surrealist Art Gallery

" I've often thought that some of the most fantastic creatures and visions in all of the literature of mankind were found in the sacred texts of active religions. Sensitive subject matter to say the least. Few artists in history have even dared to attempt to paint these symbolic visions because of the controversies surrounding them...        While I've been studying legends, myths, and traditions of the ancient Orient for new illustration projects I've also been studying William Blake, Moreau, Rochegrosse, Delville, and the Symbolic artistic tradition. In my paintings, I have endeavored to realize decadent mythology and sacred religious texts in my photo-realistic paintings with the same style of vision and reverence they showed in their works ." ~HDJ  *****

Apocalypse ; Apokalypsis - ( Greek  )  1.) literal -  an uncovering or unveiling ; to appear. 2.) An act of communicating or revealing divine truth. 3.) Something that is revealed ; especially of an enlightening or astonishing nature. Syn. Revelation - an incredible or enlightening disclosure.

~ The American Heritage College Dictionary of the English Language

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     The Apocalypse, or Revelation of the Bible is that Jesus is THE LORD (John 1: 1-14 ) and that he will return for the great harvest of souls at the end of this age. The Koran also names Jesus Christ as the judge at the last judgement of mankind. One popular translation of the prophecy from the original Greek to English in 1611 called it "the end of the world" instead of "the end of this age" (Matthew 24: 3-38 ) For centuries, this mistake has caused confusion between the Apocalypse & Armageddon. There are two great battles, one before the return of the king and one after that and the thousand year reign. God promised to curse the Earth no more with water but with fire this time. Many Bible prophecies seem to involve use of nuclear weapons. The prophet Zechariah and most other prophets mention war involving the nation Israel and fire raining down from the skies. After the Romans destroyed the temple in Jerusalem in 70 A.D. the Israelis were without a country- exiled from their homeland for almost 2,000 years.

as well as listing the confederations of nations and military powers that exist today. For instance; the land of Magog is where Noah's grandson Magog settled & is called Russia today. It also seemed impossible that China would be a major superpower.

"Fallen! Fallen! is Babylon the Great!!"

Where is the United States in this end time scenario? The prophets Isaiah ( ch.13)  (& Daniel- the sister book to Revelation ) talk about one of the signs of the nearness of the day of THE LORD is the rebirth of the Babylonian world governing empire with it's distinctive economic and religious Systems. What made Babylon unique among world governing empires was their use of superpower military force to impose their Chaldean belief system.

      The sign by which we shall know this latter day revival of Babylon is that their military will raise a banner upon a high mountain. Sounds like the flag raising by the U.S. Marines at Iwo Jima that was seen by the eyes of the entire world and future generations as well to me. 

Modern America has certainly embraced the ancient Babylonian religious system. American President Ronald Reagan of the religious right did nothing major without consulting his Horoscope. Astrology is based upon the premise that the Earth is the center of the universe, but many modern push button Americans, with their microwave ovens and computers also believe in Astrology and Magic. Anything goes- except Judeo- Christianity. Is it America that dwells carelessly in the "isles" or"outer lands" that is predicted to have fire showered down on them? The consensus among Bible scholars is that the European Union will be eventually be the fourth world governing empire with roots in the Roman Empire predicted in Daniel and Revelation.

Throughout history people have read the book of Revelation and tried to fathom it's mysteries. It's predictions of totalitarian world government in the spirit and pattern of Imperial Rome and Babylon the Great are yet to come true. Every generation seems to have candidates that people wonder about - like Adolf Hitler for instance. During World War Two he was marking the Jews and some Christians with a number. People said: "Oh! He's the Anti-Christ!"but the Biblical Anti-Christ will kill those without the Mark of the Beast which it says will be a number- 666...Hitler was not THE AntiChrist with a capitol "A" but an antichrist with a small "a". Hitler declared a "New Age" in 1945 during the first television broadcast. The Book of Revelation is getting easier and easier to understand from today's headlines. ( The keys to understanding the book are given in chapter 1:19. )

  A great example is a story in the news recently about a new microchip being implanted in pets that gives them a personal ID number that can be scanned or traced. Now this is possibly the technology that will power the Anti-Christ money system and totalitarian world government and it is here - now!

Consider this classic prophecy about "The Beast "

"And he causeth all, both small and great, both rich and poor, free and bond to receive a mark in their right hand, or their foreheads:  17 And that no man can buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the the name of the beast, or the number of his name. 18 Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast : for it is the number of a man ; and his number is six hundred threescore and six." ( 666 ) from Revelation 13: 16- 18

Sounds like electronic funds transfer doesn't it?

Revelation 17:3  "...And I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. 17:4  ...And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet color, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication : 17:5 ...and upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABY-LON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH ... 17:6 ...And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus..."

Revelation 17:7   "I will tell thee the mystery of the woman, and of the beast that carrieth her, which hath the seven heads and ten horns. 17:9   And here is the mind which hath wisdom. The Seven heads are seven mountains, on which the woman sitteth. 17:18   And the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the Earth."

18: 4: ... And I heard another voice from heaven saying, Come out of her my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and ye receive not of her plagues. 18:5:...For her sins have reached unto heaven and God hath remembered her iniquities.

To call Rome the city of seven hills is as proper as to call her by name."the lofty city of seven hills, which governs the whole world. Propertius, Virgil, Horace, and many other pagan poets refer to it by this name alone.

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JUST A FEW OF THE FULFILLED PROPHECIES OF THE END OF THIS AGE:

   * The rebirth of the nation Israel in May 1948

* The Jew's recapture of Jerusalem in 1967

* The rise of Russia ( Magog ) as a powerful enemy of Israel.

* The Arab confederation against Israel.

*  The rise of a military power in China that can field hundreds of Millions of soldiers.

* The revival of the dark occultic practices of ancient Babylon.

* The revival of the old Roman empire in the form of a mult- nation confederacy. ( The E.U. )

* The unprcedented turn to drugs.

* Open homosexuality as a political force.

* The coming of plagues.

* The increase in internal revolutions.

* The increase of wars.

* The increase of famines.

* The increase in pollution.

* The increase in earthquakes.

* The increase in lawlessness.

* The decline of the family unit.

* The open departure of many Christian Churches policies from the Bible's teachings.

* The move toward a one world government.

* The move toward a one world religion. *

Many of these seemed absolutely IMPOSSIBLE a generation ago... believe it - or not!

    So the question remains: What shall we do to be saved? It was to Peter that this question about salvation was asked and to whom Jesus gave the keys of the kingdom to and he said:

"...Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and ye shall recieve the gift of the Holy Ghost.

For the promise is for you , and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as our Lord our God shall call." Acts 2: 38, 39 

Fairy Paintings

The Seven Wonders

Symbolist Art

Art Numérique

Studio Photography

Fantasy Art II

Painting in Stages

     The various galleries linked to by the icons above show many examples of His Realistic Art, and are grouped by theme rather than media. There are also sample illustrations from his  upcoming books on Celtic Myth and Legend and World Myth & Legend. Since boyhood he has passionately copied the old masters. To create his work, he usually starts with a thematic concept  followed by a rough realistic pencil sketch, then followed by his photography, often traveling to find suitable scenes and locations and then working in his Photography studio with live models from his sketches. He then assembles a variety of elements which are realistic and original. As a boy he dedicated his life to art in 1960. From 1965- 1999 he used xeroxes and tracings to make his preliminary photo montages. This is patterned after  the manner used by Maxfield Parrish and other 19th century notables. Beginning with a tracing, he then draws or paints from these complex original Computer Photo Montages. Many of these are on display on this web and slated for future completion in a variety of realistic traditional art media. As this happens, the finished work is substituted in the exhibit. Recently he shot hundreds of aerial photos of clouds at marvelous angles and perspectives and also looking down on the mighty mountains, rivers, and deserts of the American west while flying from Texas to Oregon and back for dynamic source material for realistic flying scenes in upcoming paintings , drawings, and pictures. 

    His favourite medium for realistic art is colored pencil because of the high speed and low expense, and people began expressing difficulty in telling his colored pencil drawing from photographs in the early 1980's.  In the last 35 plus years he has also mastered Oils, Pastels, Acrylics, Watercolors, Inks, Scratchboard, Gouache, Photography, and the highly controversial digital media ( Art Numérique ) . As a commercial illustrator Johnson has not only used the computer to create art but has been involved in the development of computer imaging software. Working in a realistic style inspired by classic illustrators HDJ is deeply rooted and grounded in the Greco-Roman artistic tradition, Feeling that with realistic art, the human form is the ultimate arena for artistic expression. His lifelong dream came true when his Traditional Realistic Art was exhibited in the British Museum in London England in 1996. His mixed media has also been displayed in numerous other ones since such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Having achieved international acclaim as a traditional visual artist he discovered digital media ( Art Numérique ) in 1999. Because of his passion for realistic art and photography he elected to embrace it and joyfully be a part of this historic era in the visual arts as a 21st century realistic visual artist.

     Since 1972 when he began his career as a scientific illustrator for the University of Texas he has earned his living illustrating all kinds of books, magazines, CD covers, and all sorts of games, greeting cards, calendars, portraits, murals and the like with his contemporary realistic art... HDJ's Realistic Art has appeared in every major bookstore chain and fantasy gaming shop in The United States and has been used in educational texts and magazines all over the world. This site features realistic paintings & pictures for the twenty-first Century including some oil paintings, as well as lots of other exciting media such as colored pencil drawings, pastel paintings, acrylic paintings, gouache paintings, watercolor paintings, and pencil drawings, and also featuring studio,  field, & aerial photography,  digital painting and photo-montage and all these media mixed in an assortment of experimental combinations...Working in a wide variety of media to create his realistic art he offers his customers a host of payment and product options. He delivers the rights to these custom made copyright free illustrations and old fashioned customer service when he does work-for-hire. He loves to paint custom oil paintings and accepts commissions with down payments starting at five thousand dollars. On his existing works his low cost license offers start at only 100 dollars.

All  paintings, pictures, & text  (c) 1993- 2002 Howard David Johnson All rights reserved

Thank You for Visiting the Apocalyptic Art Gallery of Howard David Johnson...

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Bonus Section:

Philosophy, Art, & Art Philosophy

Personal Opinion Essays on spirituality, and realistic art yesterday and today by the artist.

H.D. Johnson worked as a scientific research consultant for the University of Texas at San Antonio through the 1970's under the guidance of top Texas Scientists illustrating reconstructions of Palentology and Anthropology, oddly enough, he then worked under the guidance of the world's foremost Biblical Scholars for the Center for Judeo-Christian Studies. The two dramatically different experiences back to back caused him to wonder...

Essay One: "THE MORE THINGS CHANGE, THE MORE THEY STAY THE SAME..."

(A Brief essay dealing with attitudes toward Traditional Realistic Paintings, Pastels, Colored Pencils and Art Numérique )

Pastel, Acrylics, and Colored Pencils combined

     Snobbism in the arts is nothing new. Some people will tell you that oils are the only valid medium for realistic paintings. That Colored Pencil, Digital, and other Realistic Painting and Drawing Media are not valid  for "real" art. Young artists, Don't let them bother you. Their forerunners used to condemn Pastels before they gained acceptance and called them "crayons" when Johann Alexander Thiele (1685-1752) invented them.  Mercilessly disrespectful  art critics of the time could not stop the Experimentalists no matter how viciously they attacked and derided them. "Crayon-painting" as it was called in England was practiced early on by persecuted pioneers in Switzerland and many other nations. What a debt we owe to these master artists who refused to knuckle under to the pressure of those short-sighted critics during those historic and experimental times. It took until 1870 with the founding of the "Societe` Des Pastellistes" in France that respect came  at last to these heroic & immortal visual artists.

        In England the liberation of the Pastellists from slight regard and undeserved disrespect came with the first exhibition of "The Pastel Society" at the Grosvenor Gallery in 1880. Pastel Painters like Mary Cassat and others from America and other nations forever silenced  the snobs with their masterworks and gained recognition at long last for Thiele's invention as a valid art medium. I am persuaded that history will repeat itself.  Like Pastels, I believe these wonderful new colored pencils and even Digital Realistic Art Media will one day receive the recognition they deserve as powerful mediums of artistic expression just as pastel paintings did. What is your definition of art? Have you thought about it?

Mine is: "anything that makes you feel or think."

     Consider dancing... it can be a little skip in the step or rise to the level of the incomparable Russian Ballet. Did you know that just the materials alone for a single oil painting cost up to a thousand dollars these days? Even paying the artist less than minimum wage no one but the super rich can afford them anymore. Something's got to give. Realistic paintings in oil have been highly prized for centuries and the appeal and following of realistic art is undiminished to this day. Oil paintings featuring Abstract Art and Realistic Art are generally the most treasured form of all the visual art media and with good reason. But snobbish art critics  favoring abstract art have declared  that realistic paintings, or illustrations are not art for a century. With so many representationalist  paintings by so many immortal master artists hanging in the Louvre, the Hermitage, and the British Museum and others I think the disrespect for realistic illustrators that dominated the 20th century is academically ridiculous as well as vain and intolerant, insisting theirs is the only valid opinion. What is your definition of Art? I believe almost any form of human expression can be raised to the level of "high art" especially  visual art and Realistic illustration...

The detail reveals Realistic art and abstract art combined

       By my own definition of art, which is: "anything that makes you feel or think" most abstract paintings are not "real art" to me personally, because abstract paintings usually neither make me feel or think,  usually focusing obsessively on technique and avoiding any coherent content. I usually draw a complete blank mentally and emotionally when I look at them. In 1979 the Houston Metropolitan Museum of Art displayed a triptych of 3 giant   paintings they paid fifty thousand dollars for-  three blank white canvasses entitled "untitled". Then there was "The incredible new artistic Genius" with an I.Q. of 62 ...Coco the chimpanzee with his gala New York art exhibition...an elaborate prank played on the Snobbish American Art critics about a generation ago by research scientists in the field of primatology. Imagine how upset they were when he created one of his "ingenious masterpieces" right before their eyes.

( My Source for this is the Time Life Science Library volume entitled "The Primates". )

      Art education has been almost completely removed from American Schools as a result of generations of this kind of  fabulous nonsense contributing to America's cultural illiteracy crisis. Now, the works of Leonardo Da Vinci, Michaelangelo, and other notables are being removed from school libraries.  After generations of this, most American college graduates today cannot name even one living visual artist, abstract or realistic.

There is no way that mandating more math, requiring more reading, or scheduling more science will replace what we have lost as a culture.    

What is your definition of Art?

~HDJ

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    Photography, Drawing, Painting and Art Numérique combined

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