The Best Photography on Etsy


The Etsy Fine Art Photography team discusses photographic artworks for sale on Etsy.com. Team members use their experience to make positive critiques of individual fine art photo prints for sale in Etsy shops other than their own.

Opinions about individual artworks are solely those of the team members and are not to be construed as endorsements of other items in the artwork's shop, or of the shop as a whole. There is no editing of team members' commentary by the team captain unless requested.

Saturday, June 1, 2013


Artwork is from Etsy shop SenARTPhotography.

Suspended in air....as if it had been part of the plan all along. 

...In agreement with the photographer...... who stands yards away..... positioned and ready. 

Will that person behind the shutter be ready? Be alert? Have that motion of finger on shutter timed just exactly?

The diver executes his part of the agreement. A take off with perfect angle that echos the inclined plane of the bull's back. Arms bent in right angles that reflect the horns at the top of a head which is aimed down to find it's mark.

Both subjects depicted as graphic forms that show little else than their basic shapes.
All against a stark overcast sky that shows only as much detail as is allowed to the subjects.

A well planned and executed agreement? .....Or just chance?


EFAP Team Member Name: Pat Migliore
Team Member Shop: RoselightStudio

Tuesday, May 28, 2013


Artwork is from Etsy shop ArtPhotosDiana.

Angles in this image create its dynamism. A pastiche can be a confused jumble, or a medley of compatible elements. Here, striking blue against bright white and grey are colors that compliment, and straight lines and sharp geometry emphasize architecture as art. Of course, architecture is art (or it can be), and art of art can be artful indeed. The offset left panel eliminates what otherwise could be a dull symmetry in this image.

Windows take many forms and are a basic quality of any photograph. Whether a rectangle, circle, or square (which this image is), a photograph is a window, or an eye, peering into a realm. Here we're peering into eyes which return the gaze, sort of. These eyes are a bit superior, staring not directly at us but a bit above us.

EFAP Team Member Name: Murray Bolesta
Team Member Shop: MurrayBolesta

Sunday, May 19, 2013



Artwork is from Etsy shop Anna Muhhina.

It happens all the time; the countless hours of the day that we travel through our activities with a mind that is absorbed and our attention turned inward. What is there to see, any way? It's a path traveled every day. There is nothing new in this physical space that is particularly noteworthy. It is an ordinary landscape that contains nothing that would remotely be considered a feast for the eyes. 

But there it is. How did it go unnoticed on every other day? Was it the different light? Or an angle that hid this incredible juxtaposition of elements?

No matter. It is here now and that is all that matters. An incredible contrast of rounded edges and straight lines, dark tones next to light, perpendicular lines share space with angles. The strength of concrete sits in front of the fluidity of water. And the composition within this real estate is cut into spaces that range from pencil thin to block like rectangles. 

It is still ordinary.....and yet is it so very interesting now that it's been found.


EFAP Team Member Name: Pat Migliore
Team Member Shop: RoselightStudio


Artwork is from Etsy shop Diana Pappas.

Madrid is the capital of Spain, but the capital of style may very well be Barcelona, where this image was captured. 

People and fashion offer some of the finest opportunities for true fine art photography. This image has both. Composition and its sibling, balance, are intuited by the artist, as seen here in fine form.

The evocative quality of an artful 'people' image such as this speaks volumes; it piques the imagination; it raises questions. Who is this man? Where is he going, or, where has he been, and why is he alone? What's the occasion for what appears to be a tuxedo? Why is such a stylish gentleman taking the Barcelona "metro" instead of a taxi or limousine?

The fedora hat is classical 1940s style (unless I am over my hatless head, it's not part of the 'Mad Men' era which the Etsy item description mentions: the 1960s witnessed narrower brims. A mere technicality!). Definitely, the hat is classical in any age, on the right man, and it's dressing up this artwork. 

The hat is covering the subject's eyes.

Why cover the eyes? Because the eyes speak other volumes which you may not want to have in this story. You want the imagination to wander. You want the gentleman to be perhaps more of an allegory than an individual. You want him to be mysterious. The eyes reveal too much, sometimes.

EFAP Team Member Name: Murray Bolesta
Team Member Shop: MurrayBolesta

Sunday, March 17, 2013

"Verona Daydream"


Artwork is from Etsy shop: aaronthompsonphoto.


Travel takes not just the body but the mind to other places outside of it's daily routine and, at times, can give an other-worldliness, dream-like quality to the senses. No more so than in those minutes of awakening when the mind becomes aware of the sights and sounds that are reminding it that the physical presence is in a place that is new and unique.

A photograph can convey that sense of sleepy wonder that comes in those early minutes of a travel day when your eyes open to a darkened room giving just the smallest hint that the day ahead is going to be different than all the others that have come before it. And as the eyes focus to the diffused view filtering through curtains, the excitement begins to jolt the body out in to a new adventure.

EFAP Team Member Name: Pat Migliore
Team Member Shop: RoselightStudio
"Lupus"
Artwork is from Etsy shop: Wildnisphotography.

The academic in me might say "the profundity of wild nature justifies a latinate nomenclature"...! Lupus, as you may know, means "wolf" in Latin. Wild nature, you might agree, lives profoundly as the mother of us all.

And so the photographer attempts to share more than decoration with, perhaps, an implied message. The wolf symbolizes the planet's wildness that now struggles to survive even as a fragmented remnant. The essence of nature's artful creations is often found in the eyes. And in this image, the fierce open mouth, the blurred motion, the frantic partial composition, and the natural color of the coat, define this beast, a work of natural art.


EFAP Team Member Name: Murray Bolesta
Team Member Shop: MurrayBolesta