Researching paintings and photography

While researching into paintings that might help to inspire my film and also have a similar look to the style I want to recreate I came across and American artist called Terrell Gates.

http://fineartamerica.com/featured/dantons-death-terrell-gates.html
http://fineartamerica.com/featured/burl-terrell-gates.html

These two paintings in particular use the colour red contrasted with black in a way that I want to emulate using light gels.

The painting called "Danton's Death" also seems to have two spotlights shining on the two main figures in the painting. This sort of theatrical lighting is which puts the focus specifically on an individual using lights is something I am also exploring and this painting has inspired me to try and combine this lighting with the use of red gels to see what effects I can create in my film.

While investigating images which use over exposure I found a photograph by a photographer called Andrew C. Kovalev.

http://ckovalev.com/one-minute-portfolio#overexposure

This photograph is overexposed mainly on the wall either side of the subject in the photo. Personally when I see this it draws my focus more to the woman in the photo as the areas of overexposure don't have much detail and aren't very interesting or pleasing to look at.

I will experiment to see if I can use a similar effect in my film to draw the viewers focus to a particular part of the image.