Help an artist with his style?

• PortfolioWebsiteFilter: I need some examples of aesthetically pleasing websites! Ok Hivemind, so despite being an artist (and therefore, apparently, creative) I want to build a website to document my art portfolio for colleges and future job opportunities and I just can't figure out what basic layout would work the best for ease-of use and generally looking nice. I have a solid knowledge of HTML (archaic, I know,) and am learning CSS quickly and without any issues. So, sidebar, header bar, or no over-all structure, instead individual pages? Anyone have any good examples of a good-looking website (particularly ones with a large amount of graphics and style) ? Also, any resources on building a sturdy (for lack of a better word) and easily-maintainable sites? Thanks in advance! Oh, and if any sites are given that require slightly more than what I know, let me know if you can! I'm in no way opposed to learning more about design, development, or programming!

• Answer:

  The http://cssvault.com/gallery.php has a nice collection of sites that show off a variety of styles. You can also check out the http://www.csszengarden.com/ for a variety of styles applied to the same page. You could have something similar - build up the portfolio pages (if there are a few different media you're working with, you might want to have subpages for each, with a navigation bar horizontally laid out at the top, or vertically along the side depending on what dimension you need to maximize.) Then, come up with a good-looking default CSS style for the page, and a few nice alternates, and somewhere unobtrusive, allow users to change them around. As for tools, I like Dreamweaver for its ability to get out of the way when I'm working with the code, but in my experience the built-in renderer is iffy and you're best off previewing in external browsers.