(via 5000 Years of Gems and Jewelry) Frances Rogers and Alice Beard writes:
There is a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, so runs the ancient legend. More likely it is a pot of gems.
Those resplendent fragments of pure color—rubies, emeralds, sapphires, opals, diamonds—might well be bits of the rainbow itself, pure color, no longer ethereal and out of reach but color frozen into tangible and everlasting beauty for the delight (or downfall) of mortal man.
‘A pot of gold’ means wealth, but jewels—the very word is a storm-center for romance, adventure and superstition. Science, history and religion have at various times been deeply preoccupied with little colored stones. Why?
From the standpoint of practical usefulness these stones do, to be sure, serve a few special purposes: they are used in certain drills, in instruments of precision, and as bearings in watch works. But such uses were not factors considered by man when he first stooped to pick up a pretty pebble that glowed dully like imprisoned fire. From a time far beyond the backward reach of history man has loved jewels. They seem to have possessed for him a glamor deeper than cold reason can account for. Even the desire for riches does not fully explain the mysterious attraction these tiny crystals have always had for the human race. In fact, we cannot find any one supreme and central reason why we should have given them such varied and leading roles as they have played in our lives.
If now, at this very moment, all the famous and magnificent gems on earth were suddenly to dissolve into thin air, most of us would go about our affairs and find nothing at all different from usual. But if jewels had never existed...then indeed there would be confusion. Many pages from recorded history would have to be scrapped and rewritten according to different pattern. More than one war has been waged and won because the king’s gems could so readily be converted into funds, could be pawned and later redeemed.
Jewels not only have played an important part in the temporal affairs of nations but, because of the supernatural powers ascribed to them, they have also been closely linked with religions and superstitions. No doubt jewelry was always used for ornament, but so deep-rooted has been the belief that a precious stone could affect the fortunes of its wearer, that for centuries jewelry was made in accordance with that conviction. Unless this fact is borne in mind it is impossible to gain any true understanding of the history of precious stones and jewelry.
Taken all in all, the tiny gemstone, silent as the Sphinx, has made a great noise in the affairs of men.
1. How old is a diamond?
Countless ages before there were any human beings, or even so much as a soft, shell-less form of living matter destined in time to develop into a creature that moved at will over the face of the earth, certain precious stones were already ancient. Possibly the very diamond in the ring on your finger came into being with the first rocks.
In the beginning the world was a place without soil or sea, a molten mass that cooled and solidified only to remelt and recrystallize again and again, until finally the fiery earth stuff was allowed to cool enough to form its first rocks. And from the inconceivably distant period to the present restless one, Time, like a master-chemist working in a mighty laboratory, has been breaking up and rearranging the mineral matter of which the world and its rocks are composed. Water, heat, pressure, and atmospheric weathering are his tools. In the Middle Ages these world forces were known as the Four Elements: Water, Fire, Air and Earth.
The ‘first’ rocks—those which were formed under terrific heat and pressure—are called igneous rocks; and diamonds, the most interesting of all precious stones, originated, says the scientist, as constituents of igneous rocks, formed in the midst of the molten mass under terrific pressure.
Sometimes a gemstone—a diamond, emerald, ruby or sapphire—is found still imbedded in this primary rock mass, or mother rock; or on the other hand it may be discovered at a great distance from the place where it first took form, in what are called gem gravels or gem sands.
When rock, perhaps torn by violent volcanic disturbances, is forced upward through layers of sediment toward the surface of the earth and there exposed to the action of rain and frost, it breaks down and its hidden treasure is released. If the weathered fragments of gem bearing rock are not carried far afield by flowing water the gemstones continue to retain the sharp edges and original form into which they crystallized. But the majority of stones do not escape the wear and tear of travel in flowing water. The diamond, when forced to roll about in some river bed, rubbed and crowded by other stones, even the diamond—hardest of all known substances, natural or artificial—does not emerge free from scars, transparent and glittering like a drop of dew in the sun. On the contrary, under such conditions the stone becomes as dull and cloudy in appearance as a lump of frosted ice. And not until it has passed through the skilled hands of the gem cutter does the diamond shine with a dazzling blaze of rainbow colors.
Although in a few cases the organic world does supply gem materials, a true gemstone is a mineral. And a mineral is a definite combination of certain chemical elements. At one time it was believed that since gemstones were themselves remarkable specimens of the mineral family, they must likewise be examples of rare and precious minerals. But the chemist does not arrive at his conclusions by deduction, as did the alchemist, and modern investigations have proved that, with few exceptions, the minerals of which gemstones are composed are quite common.
For instance, carbon exists in large quantities. And the diamond is crystallized carbon and nothing more. Two elements combine to give us the ruby. One of them is as common as air, since it is oxygen; while the other—aluminum—is so lavishly distributed over the earth that it provides material for kitchen utensils.
More than a thousand different minerals are now known to science and the list is constantly being lengthened, but comparatively few minerals produce flawless specimens we call gemstones.
The word ‘precious’ is more or less elastic, depending on the manner and also the period in which it is used. The precious stones of ancient history are, more often than not, stones which are now classified as semi-precious stones; and today it is customary to list, without reservation, only four precious stones: diamond, the ruby, the emerald, and the blue sapphire. A discussion of the characteristics by which gems are judged will be found in part two.
Among the treasures of the Pharaohs, jasper, turquoise, lapis lazuli, carnelian, and rock crystal were far more likely to be found than were emeralds, rubies and sapphires. And as for the diamond, it was quite unknown in the earliest days of history. Certain gemstones, however, were known to man long before any day recorded by history.
Thursday, January 03, 2008
The Mughal Cut
(via Diamond Cuts in Historic Jewelry:1381-1910) Herbert Tillander writes:
I have never had the chance to see and analyze a diamond of this historical Indian cut but reliable information is supplied by Griffin Grant Waite, who is also responsible for suggesting the name. There is also a spectacular report by V B Meen and A D Tushingham. Grant Waite writes that ‘the Moghul cut can perhaps best be defined as a form into which diamonds were fashioned in early times by the native cutters of India, characterized by a large flat back (normally known as the ‘base’ or ‘bottom’), a large table, and many strip facets descending from the table towards the back (there are no fewer than fifteen in the Orloff). Infrequently the table is replaced by a small number of facets at a low angle—usually four. The outline is quite variable, and usually asymmetrical. In most cases the thickness is substantial, giving the stone a lumpy appearance’.
In private correspondence with the three authors, I proposed that the term should be universally recognized, and suggested the following definition, which was incorporated in the 1977 Diamond Dictionary of the Gemological Institute of America: ‘An older style of cutting which is a rather lumpy form with a broad, often asymmetrical base, an upper termination consisting of a set of usually four shallow facets or a table, and two or more zones of strip facets parallel to the base and oriented vertically. It is derived from cleavage pieces.’
Even modern authors such as Basil Watermeyer accept the commonly held view that the modern Baroque Rose Cut was inspired by the Mughal Cut, and by an updated version developed by cutters in the Netherlands. Perhaps the explanation is that one can detect, in those Mughal Cuts which have several rows of triangular facets, a hexagonal symmetry very like that of the crown of a Full-Cut Rose. My own feeling is that the rapidly growing tendency in the late sixteenth century to achieve, by means of numerous small, correctly inclined facets, not only symmetry but also pleasing light effects, led cutters automatically to the modern Full Rose.
I have never had the chance to see and analyze a diamond of this historical Indian cut but reliable information is supplied by Griffin Grant Waite, who is also responsible for suggesting the name. There is also a spectacular report by V B Meen and A D Tushingham. Grant Waite writes that ‘the Moghul cut can perhaps best be defined as a form into which diamonds were fashioned in early times by the native cutters of India, characterized by a large flat back (normally known as the ‘base’ or ‘bottom’), a large table, and many strip facets descending from the table towards the back (there are no fewer than fifteen in the Orloff). Infrequently the table is replaced by a small number of facets at a low angle—usually four. The outline is quite variable, and usually asymmetrical. In most cases the thickness is substantial, giving the stone a lumpy appearance’.
In private correspondence with the three authors, I proposed that the term should be universally recognized, and suggested the following definition, which was incorporated in the 1977 Diamond Dictionary of the Gemological Institute of America: ‘An older style of cutting which is a rather lumpy form with a broad, often asymmetrical base, an upper termination consisting of a set of usually four shallow facets or a table, and two or more zones of strip facets parallel to the base and oriented vertically. It is derived from cleavage pieces.’
Even modern authors such as Basil Watermeyer accept the commonly held view that the modern Baroque Rose Cut was inspired by the Mughal Cut, and by an updated version developed by cutters in the Netherlands. Perhaps the explanation is that one can detect, in those Mughal Cuts which have several rows of triangular facets, a hexagonal symmetry very like that of the crown of a Full-Cut Rose. My own feeling is that the rapidly growing tendency in the late sixteenth century to achieve, by means of numerous small, correctly inclined facets, not only symmetry but also pleasing light effects, led cutters automatically to the modern Full Rose.
Picasso's Party Line
Hugh Eakin writes about Picasso's political activism + the impact + other viewpoints @ http://www.artnewsonline.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=809
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
3
Contemporary with Velazquez, but influenced in his style of painting not so much by him as by Caravaggio, was the monastic painter Francisco Zurbaran (1598-1662), who, though born in the province of Estremadura, came to Seville when he was only sixteen and is generally regarded as a member of the School of Seville. He is chiefly famous for his religious pictures, and particularly for his monastic visions, among which ‘The Apotheosis of St Thomas’ in the Museum of Seville ranks as his masterpiece. His monks in white sheets often appear to be carved owing to the effect of high relief obtained by strong contrasts of light and shade, and the feeling of austerity and grandeur they display makes the paintings of Zurbaran illuminating documents of monastic life in Spain during the seventeenth century.
Among the immediate pupils of Velazquez were Juan Battista del Mazo (1600-67), who (in 1634) became his son-in-law and imitated his portraiture so cleverly that some of his paintings were at one time confounded with those by his master; and one who became still more famous, Bartolome Esteban Murillo (1617-82). Also born at Seville, Murillo passed through a whole gamut of influences before he developed a distinct style of his own. When he was twenty four he came to Madrid for a couple of years and when he returned he did not forget the lessons of Velazquez. From this period date those popular pictures of beggar boys and low life subjects which were the first to bring him fame. ‘The Melon Eaters’ is a fine example of this side of Murillo’s art. It charms the layman by its warm and graceful sympathy with life; it delights the artist by the skill and taste shown in the painting of the accessories. The rind of the melon, the bloom of the grapes, the wicker of the woven baskets, all are depicted not only with great beauty of color but with rare fidelity to the textures of the different objects.
Later in life Murillo altered his methods and employed a softer and more suave style, in which outlines are lost in the delicate fusion of graduated colors. The mysterious vaporous effect thus obtained was a variant of Correggio’s famous ‘smoky’ style but has been distinguished from his by being technically described as vaporoso. Among the multitude of Murillo’s religious paintings in this style the most famous is ‘The Immaculate Conception’, now in Louvre, which the French Government acquired in 1852 for the sum of £23440. The change in the type of religious presentation is market if we compare this painting with the frenzy of El Greco or the dramatic action displayed in a Titian or a Tintoretto. The storm and strife of the Reformation and counter-Reformation is passing away, and the enervation of the once combative Spain finds expression in a soft serenity that dreams of an ideal world. Not tragedy nor power, but innocence and sweetness characterize this vision of Mary, whose eyes, as a modern critic has pointed out, are not filled with inspiration and longing, but ‘astonished as those of a child gazing upon the splendor of the candles of a Christmas tree.’
Murillo was very famous in his lifetime, and the sweet sentimentality of his paintings appealed so strongly to the eighteenth and nineteenth century that for nearly two hundred years after his death he was considered the foremost of Spanish painters. Today at least three Spanish painters, Velazquez, Goya, and El Greco are rated more highly. Senhor A. de Beruete y Moret, the learned director of the Prado Museum at Madrid, has stated that:
The art of Murillo is of less interest than formerly, owing to present day preferences, which seek spirituality in art, a force, and even a restlessness which we do not find in the work of this artist....His conceptions are beautiful, but superficial. There is in them no more skillful groundwork, dramatic impulse, nor exaltation than appears at first sight. To comprehend and enjoy them it is not necessary to think; their contemplation leaves the beholder tranquil, they do not possess the power to distract, they have no warmth, nor that distinction which makes a work unique.
Historically the art of Murillo must be regarded as a sign of the decadence of Spain, and it was not till a century later that the country gave birth to another great artist; then the agony of the Wars of Succession found expression through the grim, satirical powers of Goya, whose work will be considered when we come to the art of the Napoleonic period.
The political power and prosperity of Spain rose to its zenith between the reigns of Philip II and Philip IV, and flowered in the paintings of El Greco and Velazquez. But as the power of Spain weakened and her prosperity dwindled, so also did the glory of her art begin to wane. It is not without significance that all the great painters of Spain, Murillo included, were born before 1648, the year in which the humbled Spanish empire was compelled to recognize the independence of the Netherlands by the Peace of Munster. Immediately after Velazquez we must look for the great masters of the seventeenth century, not in decaying Spain, but in Holland, victorious and independent, the country of Hals and Rembrandt.
3
Contemporary with Velazquez, but influenced in his style of painting not so much by him as by Caravaggio, was the monastic painter Francisco Zurbaran (1598-1662), who, though born in the province of Estremadura, came to Seville when he was only sixteen and is generally regarded as a member of the School of Seville. He is chiefly famous for his religious pictures, and particularly for his monastic visions, among which ‘The Apotheosis of St Thomas’ in the Museum of Seville ranks as his masterpiece. His monks in white sheets often appear to be carved owing to the effect of high relief obtained by strong contrasts of light and shade, and the feeling of austerity and grandeur they display makes the paintings of Zurbaran illuminating documents of monastic life in Spain during the seventeenth century.
Among the immediate pupils of Velazquez were Juan Battista del Mazo (1600-67), who (in 1634) became his son-in-law and imitated his portraiture so cleverly that some of his paintings were at one time confounded with those by his master; and one who became still more famous, Bartolome Esteban Murillo (1617-82). Also born at Seville, Murillo passed through a whole gamut of influences before he developed a distinct style of his own. When he was twenty four he came to Madrid for a couple of years and when he returned he did not forget the lessons of Velazquez. From this period date those popular pictures of beggar boys and low life subjects which were the first to bring him fame. ‘The Melon Eaters’ is a fine example of this side of Murillo’s art. It charms the layman by its warm and graceful sympathy with life; it delights the artist by the skill and taste shown in the painting of the accessories. The rind of the melon, the bloom of the grapes, the wicker of the woven baskets, all are depicted not only with great beauty of color but with rare fidelity to the textures of the different objects.
Later in life Murillo altered his methods and employed a softer and more suave style, in which outlines are lost in the delicate fusion of graduated colors. The mysterious vaporous effect thus obtained was a variant of Correggio’s famous ‘smoky’ style but has been distinguished from his by being technically described as vaporoso. Among the multitude of Murillo’s religious paintings in this style the most famous is ‘The Immaculate Conception’, now in Louvre, which the French Government acquired in 1852 for the sum of £23440. The change in the type of religious presentation is market if we compare this painting with the frenzy of El Greco or the dramatic action displayed in a Titian or a Tintoretto. The storm and strife of the Reformation and counter-Reformation is passing away, and the enervation of the once combative Spain finds expression in a soft serenity that dreams of an ideal world. Not tragedy nor power, but innocence and sweetness characterize this vision of Mary, whose eyes, as a modern critic has pointed out, are not filled with inspiration and longing, but ‘astonished as those of a child gazing upon the splendor of the candles of a Christmas tree.’
Murillo was very famous in his lifetime, and the sweet sentimentality of his paintings appealed so strongly to the eighteenth and nineteenth century that for nearly two hundred years after his death he was considered the foremost of Spanish painters. Today at least three Spanish painters, Velazquez, Goya, and El Greco are rated more highly. Senhor A. de Beruete y Moret, the learned director of the Prado Museum at Madrid, has stated that:
The art of Murillo is of less interest than formerly, owing to present day preferences, which seek spirituality in art, a force, and even a restlessness which we do not find in the work of this artist....His conceptions are beautiful, but superficial. There is in them no more skillful groundwork, dramatic impulse, nor exaltation than appears at first sight. To comprehend and enjoy them it is not necessary to think; their contemplation leaves the beholder tranquil, they do not possess the power to distract, they have no warmth, nor that distinction which makes a work unique.
Historically the art of Murillo must be regarded as a sign of the decadence of Spain, and it was not till a century later that the country gave birth to another great artist; then the agony of the Wars of Succession found expression through the grim, satirical powers of Goya, whose work will be considered when we come to the art of the Napoleonic period.
The political power and prosperity of Spain rose to its zenith between the reigns of Philip II and Philip IV, and flowered in the paintings of El Greco and Velazquez. But as the power of Spain weakened and her prosperity dwindled, so also did the glory of her art begin to wane. It is not without significance that all the great painters of Spain, Murillo included, were born before 1648, the year in which the humbled Spanish empire was compelled to recognize the independence of the Netherlands by the Peace of Munster. Immediately after Velazquez we must look for the great masters of the seventeenth century, not in decaying Spain, but in Holland, victorious and independent, the country of Hals and Rembrandt.
I Go A – Pearling
Louis Kornitzer's book, Gem Trader, is partly autobiographical and partly woven round the lore of pearls. It's educational + explains the distribution chain of gems, as they pass from hand to hand, from miner to cutter, from merchant to millionaire, from courtesan to receiver of stolen goods, shaping human lives as they go + the unique characters in the gem industry.
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
He told me the story (obviously there was one). It was in the days of his grandfather, when a great pestilence had followed a war with the Sultan and killed off the people. Even the fish had perished in that plague and had floated on the sea in their thousands.
‘Now the people became stupid because they thought that soon they would all be dead. The rice paddies were neglected, the caraboas were allowed to run wild, the fishing nets were in holes, the sails of the boats stayed unmended and the fishermen did not put to sea. My grandfather was very sad. He had taught them all they knew, a better way of planting, a better way of making their sails. He judged them and led them in battle. When the prayers of the Imam and the fastings he ordered availed nothing, then my grandfather knew that a strong magic was working against them all.
‘One day he went down to the seashore along. As he was walking along, looking at the ground, he saw in the middle of a heap of dying seaweed a single green eye. Then he saw it was not an eye, but a coconut pearl, so he picked it up. He knew that the pearl did not want to be picked up, for it fought against him, but he wrapped it up in his headcloth and took it home. After that the pestilence stopped. And so my father kept the coconut pearl as a hostage, and it gave him good counsel. It will be an evil day for us when it is lost to us.’
That was my memory of Palawan as I read the letter of a man from Brooklyn. Had he in truth obtained the lucky pearl of Palawan? And what had happened to Panglima Hassan and his people since its loss? I have not found out.
I had a sort of second-hand interest in the historic Hapsburg pearls—a far cry, these, from the humble mascot of a savage tribe. They were a magnificent collection. The Empress Maria Theresa and the other ladies who wore them had to swathe them in many loops around their necks and bosoms. But no longer are they in the possession of the fallen Hapsburgs. They are now owned by a multimillionaire who lives in the South of France.
These gems passed through the hands of an old partner of mine, a Paris dealer, the most sporting and enterprising of his kind, who deserved the profit that he made. It was at the the time the ex-Emperor Charles, last of the Austrian emperors, needed funds urgently for the purchase of the aeroplane and the provision of many other items necessary to his plan, that spectacular re-entry into Hungary to regain his throne. He sold the pearls for what he could get for them, and yet in the end the sacrifice got him nowhere. The Hapsburg star had set.
Speaking of royal pearls, there are the famous Hanoverian pearls. They are long ropes of magnificent gems, ‘cascading to the knees’, as one writer has put it. They belonged originally to Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia, and a very unhappy lady, despite the fact that her pearls went treble-stranded round her waist and bosom. Other royal wearers after her were Queen Victoria and then Queen Alexandra.
One day when the latter queen was stepping into the state coach which was to take her to the opening of Parliament this rope of pearls broke on the woodwork of the coach. Some of the pearls were scattered and rolled everywhere. Whether they were all counted over on the spot as they were found it not recorded; presumably, in spite of the urgent need of royalty to be punctual, and particularly on such occasion, they were, for not a pearl (it is said) was missing when the state coach moved on.
This is not a book of elegant literary quotations, but I read a great deal and whenever I see anything on the subject of pearls it sticks. As often as not the author is misinformed—after all, no expert thinks much of the layman’s knowledge—though I think few who ought to know better knew as little as Benvenuto Cellini, the Florentine goldsmith, who in an amusing anecdote referred to pearls as ‘fishes’ bones’.
They have, of course, nothing to do with fishes, but are the product of successive coats of nacre on some irritating object inside an oyster’s shell. The core of a pearl may be a grain of sand, a tiny shell or a minute marine animal which was penetrated inside the oyster. If many coats are deposited evenly over a long space of time, the result may be a perfectly round fine pearl. Usually it is nothing of the sort, and round pearls are the rarest of all. There are also oval, drop-shaped, button-shaped and common baroque (irregular) pearls. Their color and luster tell the expert exactly what part of the world they come from. The true Oriental pearl comes from the Persian Gulf, where it has been fished by Arabs since early times in primitive fashion. It is only quite recently that the Australian pearling grounds were discovered, perhaps fifty of sixty years ago, but the pearls found there, though often very fine, are quite different from the Oriental pearls, and the oysters out of which they come are of another kind. The Japanese pearl oyster is different again, and not a producer of good pearls or good shell. But the Japanese pearl oyster has the distinction of being the stepmother of the cultured pearl.
Nowadays, almost the first question a pearl merchant is asked is: ‘What is a cultured pearl?’ and next: ‘Can you tell the difference?’ A cultured pearl is made by introducing, in a special way, a foreign body into a living oyster’s shell. If the foreign body is very minute, it stands the same chance of being covered evenly and well with nacre so as to produce a fine pearl just as any other foreign body, accidentally introduced. That is, perhaps a ten thousand to one chance. In such a case it would be as a ‘real pearl’, indistinguishable from any natural pearl, although tending to be second class, as most Japanese pearls are. In any case, its sheen and luster would show where it had come from. But cultured pearls started on very tiny cores are not a commercial proposition, and it is the rule to insert a core of some size and spherical in shape so that a largish round pearl can be produced in a reasonable time, for it takes years for the oyster obligingly to deposit the thin layers of nacre on the pearl. Thus the expert can always tell the cultured pearl from others because it usually consists of a small bead coated more or less lavishly with mother of pearl. This gives it a different look from pearls which are pearly right through.
Nevertheless, the cult of the cultured pearl has given many a lady what she longs for—a real pearl necklace of handsome appearance. For cultured pearls, even if they are not true aristocrats, are at least not imitations, and thus are fitted to give satisfaction to the feminine heart. A doctor in one of Anatole France’s novels deals satirically with that longing. ‘I often see children with strawberry marks,’ he says, ‘whose mothers say that they desired strawberries before their birth. I am waiting to see a baby marked with a pearl necklace.’
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
He told me the story (obviously there was one). It was in the days of his grandfather, when a great pestilence had followed a war with the Sultan and killed off the people. Even the fish had perished in that plague and had floated on the sea in their thousands.
‘Now the people became stupid because they thought that soon they would all be dead. The rice paddies were neglected, the caraboas were allowed to run wild, the fishing nets were in holes, the sails of the boats stayed unmended and the fishermen did not put to sea. My grandfather was very sad. He had taught them all they knew, a better way of planting, a better way of making their sails. He judged them and led them in battle. When the prayers of the Imam and the fastings he ordered availed nothing, then my grandfather knew that a strong magic was working against them all.
‘One day he went down to the seashore along. As he was walking along, looking at the ground, he saw in the middle of a heap of dying seaweed a single green eye. Then he saw it was not an eye, but a coconut pearl, so he picked it up. He knew that the pearl did not want to be picked up, for it fought against him, but he wrapped it up in his headcloth and took it home. After that the pestilence stopped. And so my father kept the coconut pearl as a hostage, and it gave him good counsel. It will be an evil day for us when it is lost to us.’
That was my memory of Palawan as I read the letter of a man from Brooklyn. Had he in truth obtained the lucky pearl of Palawan? And what had happened to Panglima Hassan and his people since its loss? I have not found out.
I had a sort of second-hand interest in the historic Hapsburg pearls—a far cry, these, from the humble mascot of a savage tribe. They were a magnificent collection. The Empress Maria Theresa and the other ladies who wore them had to swathe them in many loops around their necks and bosoms. But no longer are they in the possession of the fallen Hapsburgs. They are now owned by a multimillionaire who lives in the South of France.
These gems passed through the hands of an old partner of mine, a Paris dealer, the most sporting and enterprising of his kind, who deserved the profit that he made. It was at the the time the ex-Emperor Charles, last of the Austrian emperors, needed funds urgently for the purchase of the aeroplane and the provision of many other items necessary to his plan, that spectacular re-entry into Hungary to regain his throne. He sold the pearls for what he could get for them, and yet in the end the sacrifice got him nowhere. The Hapsburg star had set.
Speaking of royal pearls, there are the famous Hanoverian pearls. They are long ropes of magnificent gems, ‘cascading to the knees’, as one writer has put it. They belonged originally to Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia, and a very unhappy lady, despite the fact that her pearls went treble-stranded round her waist and bosom. Other royal wearers after her were Queen Victoria and then Queen Alexandra.
One day when the latter queen was stepping into the state coach which was to take her to the opening of Parliament this rope of pearls broke on the woodwork of the coach. Some of the pearls were scattered and rolled everywhere. Whether they were all counted over on the spot as they were found it not recorded; presumably, in spite of the urgent need of royalty to be punctual, and particularly on such occasion, they were, for not a pearl (it is said) was missing when the state coach moved on.
This is not a book of elegant literary quotations, but I read a great deal and whenever I see anything on the subject of pearls it sticks. As often as not the author is misinformed—after all, no expert thinks much of the layman’s knowledge—though I think few who ought to know better knew as little as Benvenuto Cellini, the Florentine goldsmith, who in an amusing anecdote referred to pearls as ‘fishes’ bones’.
They have, of course, nothing to do with fishes, but are the product of successive coats of nacre on some irritating object inside an oyster’s shell. The core of a pearl may be a grain of sand, a tiny shell or a minute marine animal which was penetrated inside the oyster. If many coats are deposited evenly over a long space of time, the result may be a perfectly round fine pearl. Usually it is nothing of the sort, and round pearls are the rarest of all. There are also oval, drop-shaped, button-shaped and common baroque (irregular) pearls. Their color and luster tell the expert exactly what part of the world they come from. The true Oriental pearl comes from the Persian Gulf, where it has been fished by Arabs since early times in primitive fashion. It is only quite recently that the Australian pearling grounds were discovered, perhaps fifty of sixty years ago, but the pearls found there, though often very fine, are quite different from the Oriental pearls, and the oysters out of which they come are of another kind. The Japanese pearl oyster is different again, and not a producer of good pearls or good shell. But the Japanese pearl oyster has the distinction of being the stepmother of the cultured pearl.
Nowadays, almost the first question a pearl merchant is asked is: ‘What is a cultured pearl?’ and next: ‘Can you tell the difference?’ A cultured pearl is made by introducing, in a special way, a foreign body into a living oyster’s shell. If the foreign body is very minute, it stands the same chance of being covered evenly and well with nacre so as to produce a fine pearl just as any other foreign body, accidentally introduced. That is, perhaps a ten thousand to one chance. In such a case it would be as a ‘real pearl’, indistinguishable from any natural pearl, although tending to be second class, as most Japanese pearls are. In any case, its sheen and luster would show where it had come from. But cultured pearls started on very tiny cores are not a commercial proposition, and it is the rule to insert a core of some size and spherical in shape so that a largish round pearl can be produced in a reasonable time, for it takes years for the oyster obligingly to deposit the thin layers of nacre on the pearl. Thus the expert can always tell the cultured pearl from others because it usually consists of a small bead coated more or less lavishly with mother of pearl. This gives it a different look from pearls which are pearly right through.
Nevertheless, the cult of the cultured pearl has given many a lady what she longs for—a real pearl necklace of handsome appearance. For cultured pearls, even if they are not true aristocrats, are at least not imitations, and thus are fitted to give satisfaction to the feminine heart. A doctor in one of Anatole France’s novels deals satirically with that longing. ‘I often see children with strawberry marks,’ he says, ‘whose mothers say that they desired strawberries before their birth. I am waiting to see a baby marked with a pearl necklace.’
Wednesday, January 02, 2008
Happy New Year 2008
Wish You All A Happy + Prosperous New Year!
(via YouTube): Happy New Year (ABBA)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcLMH8pwusw&feature=related
(via YouTube): Happy New Year (ABBA)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcLMH8pwusw&feature=related
Tuesday, January 01, 2008
The Naville Cut
(via Diamond Cuts in Historic Jewelry:1381-1910) Herbert Tillander writes:
This cut existed as early as the end of the sixteenth century, when it was applied above all to drop-shaped diamonds. With its sixfold symmetry and its pavilion, it resembles both the Rose Cut and the Taille en Seize and must therefore be considered a hybrid. In a Swiss nomenclature published by H Stranner (1953), drop-shaped Roses are termed Navilles, from the Latin navalis, meaning boat-shaped. This seems a reasonable description so I, too, have adopted it, although only for the hybrid cuts.
This cut existed as early as the end of the sixteenth century, when it was applied above all to drop-shaped diamonds. With its sixfold symmetry and its pavilion, it resembles both the Rose Cut and the Taille en Seize and must therefore be considered a hybrid. In a Swiss nomenclature published by H Stranner (1953), drop-shaped Roses are termed Navilles, from the Latin navalis, meaning boat-shaped. This seems a reasonable description so I, too, have adopted it, although only for the hybrid cuts.
Pinocchio
Pinocchio (1940)
Directed by: Hamilton Luske, Ben Sharpsteen
Screenplay: Aurelius Battaglia (story); Carlo Collodi (novel) William Cottrell, Otto Englander, Erdman Penner, Joseph Sabo, Ted Sears, Webb Smith (story adaptation)
Cast: Mel Blanc, Christian Rub, Dickie Jones
(via YouTube): The Making Of' Pinocchio (1940) Disney Classic
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEZgW-uurBs
When You Wish Upon A Star - Pinocchio (1940)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miBJLIFO0ds
I think Pinocchio tops for its unique blending of the animator's craft and a theme. I enjoyed it.
Directed by: Hamilton Luske, Ben Sharpsteen
Screenplay: Aurelius Battaglia (story); Carlo Collodi (novel) William Cottrell, Otto Englander, Erdman Penner, Joseph Sabo, Ted Sears, Webb Smith (story adaptation)
Cast: Mel Blanc, Christian Rub, Dickie Jones
(via YouTube): The Making Of' Pinocchio (1940) Disney Classic
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEZgW-uurBs
When You Wish Upon A Star - Pinocchio (1940)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miBJLIFO0ds
I think Pinocchio tops for its unique blending of the animator's craft and a theme. I enjoyed it.
George & Ira Gershwin
Ira Gershwin was an American lyricist who collaborated with his younger brother, composer George Gershwin, to create some of the most memorable songs of the 20th century + I think they made a positive effect on the world’s culture + I like the tone and luster of their traditional orchestral blend with jazz + their musical stylings will remain a precious gem forever.
Useful links:
http://www.gershwin.com
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ira_Gershwin
Useful links:
http://www.gershwin.com
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ira_Gershwin
Lighting
Michelle Falkenstein writes about proper steps to protect the art works from harmful lighting + the challenge for museums and collectors + other viewpoints @ http://www.artnewsonline.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=806
Useful links:
www.chubb.com
www.nyu.edu/gsas/dept/fineart
www.hunterdouglas.com
Useful links:
www.chubb.com
www.nyu.edu/gsas/dept/fineart
www.hunterdouglas.com
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
Here, indeed, we have ‘the complete expression of the Velazquez eyesight,’ and great and glorious as ‘The Surrender of Breda’ is, we are bound to confess that R A M Stevenson was right in maintaining that his historical picture is not—like ‘The Maids of Honor’—‘an absolutely unique thing in the history of art.’ Like so many of the great pictures in the world, ‘The Maids of Honor’ originated in a spontaneous and unpremeditated flash of intense vision. The story generally accepted is that Velazquez was painting the king, who sat in the spot from which the spectator is supposed to see the picture of ‘Las Meninas’. During a moment’s rest the ‘Infanta’ came in with her attendants, and the king was struck with the group which fell together before his eyes. Near him he saw the princess, her maids of honor Maria Sarmiento and Isabel de Velasco (who is offering her water), her dog, and her dwarfs Mari Barbola and Nicolasito Pertusato; a little farther on the left, Velazquez, who had stepped back to look at his picture; farther back on the right, a duenna and courtier talking; while at the distant end of the gallery the king saw his queen and himself reflected in a mirror, and through the open door, Don Joseph Nieto drawing back a curtain. The canvas shown in the picture would naturally be, as Stevenson maintains, the one on which Velazquez was painting the king’s portrait. Some, however, will have it to be the very canvas of ‘Las Meninas,’ which Velazquez was painting from a reflection in a mirror placed near to where the king had been sitting. R A M Stevenson has justly pointed out that the perspective in the picture hardly seems to agree with this view, but rather makes Velazquez to have been working on the king’s right hand. It is not a matter of importance, and the story of the conception of the picture may easily have got mixed in the telling. It is just possible that Velazquez was painting, or was about to paint, a portrait of the Infanta only, when the idea of the large picture suddenly occurred to him or to the king. The canvas of ‘Las Meninas’ is made of separate pieces sewn together, and one of these just contains the Infanta, with room for accessories or a subordinate figure. However it originated, the picture was immediately recognized as a brilliant triumph, and tradition says the Red Cross of Santiago on the painter’s breast was painted there by the king’s own hand, as a promise of the honor that was to be conferred on him afterwards.
It is hard to conceive of a more beautiful piece of painting than this—so free and yet firm and so revealing. When one stands before this canvas one is not concerned with any consideration of who it was painted by; it fills the mind and suffices. Like all of the great artists, Velazquez takes something out of life and sets it free. The men and women in his finest pictures are released from what some one has called ‘mankind’s little daily cage’; and we are startled at the representation. In this portrait group we have life stated so intensely that the ordinary life around us seems almost unreal.
The same intense and startling impression of life is given us by the paintings of single figures executed by Velazquez during his last years. If we compare the shabby but dignified philosopher ‘Aesop—a fine example of his late style—with ‘Philip IV as a Sportsman’, which is admittedly one of the best full lengths of his middle period, we shall begin to realize how far Velazquez traveled during the intervening years, not merely in the rendering of form but in the painting of light and air.
In 1659 Cardinal Mazarin sealed the reconciliation between France and Spain by arranging a marriage between the young Louis XIV and Maria Teresa of Spain. The meeting of the two courts on the frontier and the organizing of the imposing ceremonies required, burdened the Marshal of the Palace with a multiplicity of work and anxiety. The wedding took place on June 7, but it was the last function Velazquez was able to perform. At sixty years of age the strain was too much for him, and a few weeks after he had returned to Madrid he collapsed and died on August 6, 1660.
In a sense if may be said that the most surprising adventures of Velazquez occurred after his death. By birth a hidalgo (i.e a member if the lesser nobility), Velazquez was buried like a grandee. The entire court attended his funeral, and knights of all orders took part in the ceremonies. But after the generation that knew the man had passed away, the glory of the painter was strangely an unaccountably forgotten. For two hundred years, during which picture lovers flocked to Italy and Italian artists became daily more famous, the name of Velazquez was seldom mentioned. Then, about fifty years ago, the sympathy of two or three great artists, notably Whistler in England and Manet in France, broke the spell of silence, and supported by a galaxy of writers, among whom was R A M Stevenson—from whose great book The Art of Velazquez we have freely quoted—these enthusiasts made the light of Velazquez to shine before all men, so that today he is and evermore will be a star of the first magnitude in the firmament of Art.
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain (continued)
Here, indeed, we have ‘the complete expression of the Velazquez eyesight,’ and great and glorious as ‘The Surrender of Breda’ is, we are bound to confess that R A M Stevenson was right in maintaining that his historical picture is not—like ‘The Maids of Honor’—‘an absolutely unique thing in the history of art.’ Like so many of the great pictures in the world, ‘The Maids of Honor’ originated in a spontaneous and unpremeditated flash of intense vision. The story generally accepted is that Velazquez was painting the king, who sat in the spot from which the spectator is supposed to see the picture of ‘Las Meninas’. During a moment’s rest the ‘Infanta’ came in with her attendants, and the king was struck with the group which fell together before his eyes. Near him he saw the princess, her maids of honor Maria Sarmiento and Isabel de Velasco (who is offering her water), her dog, and her dwarfs Mari Barbola and Nicolasito Pertusato; a little farther on the left, Velazquez, who had stepped back to look at his picture; farther back on the right, a duenna and courtier talking; while at the distant end of the gallery the king saw his queen and himself reflected in a mirror, and through the open door, Don Joseph Nieto drawing back a curtain. The canvas shown in the picture would naturally be, as Stevenson maintains, the one on which Velazquez was painting the king’s portrait. Some, however, will have it to be the very canvas of ‘Las Meninas,’ which Velazquez was painting from a reflection in a mirror placed near to where the king had been sitting. R A M Stevenson has justly pointed out that the perspective in the picture hardly seems to agree with this view, but rather makes Velazquez to have been working on the king’s right hand. It is not a matter of importance, and the story of the conception of the picture may easily have got mixed in the telling. It is just possible that Velazquez was painting, or was about to paint, a portrait of the Infanta only, when the idea of the large picture suddenly occurred to him or to the king. The canvas of ‘Las Meninas’ is made of separate pieces sewn together, and one of these just contains the Infanta, with room for accessories or a subordinate figure. However it originated, the picture was immediately recognized as a brilliant triumph, and tradition says the Red Cross of Santiago on the painter’s breast was painted there by the king’s own hand, as a promise of the honor that was to be conferred on him afterwards.
It is hard to conceive of a more beautiful piece of painting than this—so free and yet firm and so revealing. When one stands before this canvas one is not concerned with any consideration of who it was painted by; it fills the mind and suffices. Like all of the great artists, Velazquez takes something out of life and sets it free. The men and women in his finest pictures are released from what some one has called ‘mankind’s little daily cage’; and we are startled at the representation. In this portrait group we have life stated so intensely that the ordinary life around us seems almost unreal.
The same intense and startling impression of life is given us by the paintings of single figures executed by Velazquez during his last years. If we compare the shabby but dignified philosopher ‘Aesop—a fine example of his late style—with ‘Philip IV as a Sportsman’, which is admittedly one of the best full lengths of his middle period, we shall begin to realize how far Velazquez traveled during the intervening years, not merely in the rendering of form but in the painting of light and air.
In 1659 Cardinal Mazarin sealed the reconciliation between France and Spain by arranging a marriage between the young Louis XIV and Maria Teresa of Spain. The meeting of the two courts on the frontier and the organizing of the imposing ceremonies required, burdened the Marshal of the Palace with a multiplicity of work and anxiety. The wedding took place on June 7, but it was the last function Velazquez was able to perform. At sixty years of age the strain was too much for him, and a few weeks after he had returned to Madrid he collapsed and died on August 6, 1660.
In a sense if may be said that the most surprising adventures of Velazquez occurred after his death. By birth a hidalgo (i.e a member if the lesser nobility), Velazquez was buried like a grandee. The entire court attended his funeral, and knights of all orders took part in the ceremonies. But after the generation that knew the man had passed away, the glory of the painter was strangely an unaccountably forgotten. For two hundred years, during which picture lovers flocked to Italy and Italian artists became daily more famous, the name of Velazquez was seldom mentioned. Then, about fifty years ago, the sympathy of two or three great artists, notably Whistler in England and Manet in France, broke the spell of silence, and supported by a galaxy of writers, among whom was R A M Stevenson—from whose great book The Art of Velazquez we have freely quoted—these enthusiasts made the light of Velazquez to shine before all men, so that today he is and evermore will be a star of the first magnitude in the firmament of Art.
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain (continued)
I Go A – Pearling
Louis Kornitzer's book, Gem Trader, is partly autobiographical and partly woven round the lore of pearls. It's educational + explains the distribution chain of gems, as they pass from hand to hand, from miner to cutter, from merchant to millionaire, from courtesan to receiver of stolen goods, shaping human lives as they go + the unique characters in the gem industry.
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
Earlier in the day he had been talking to Yakoob, the Malay cook. Now, coming up close behind him, Yakoob said, loudly enough for all to hear: ‘Angkau takot-kah? (Are you afraid?)’
Without raising his eyes Ohtami said to the boss: ‘Let the master give orders to head the vessel straight for the Tuli Bataba Bank.’
‘And get the bottom ripped out of the Idmu? Are you crazy?’
‘The hand of Toyo pointed there,’ muttered Ohtami.
‘And last night he spoke to me as I slept. The shell is there in plenty.’
The master was tough and superstitious. He cursed Ohtami up and down. Then he upped anchor, hoisted sail and made for the narrow channel by the banks. Once through, taking soundings all the way, the master let the sails drop and put out the stern anchor.
‘If there is shell here, you scoundrel,’ he swore, ‘you shall have a third of all comes up this trip. But if you find no shell, then you shall work for me for the rest of the voyage for nothing.’ For that was the bargain the crafty skipper had made before venturing on the diver’s advice.
Twenty minutes after he had gone down Ohtami came up with a bag full of shell. It was well matured, sound shell, silver lipped, wonderfully free from worm-holes. For three days they worked below (it was an easy ground, no more than five fathoms deep). It was a wonderful spot. The oysters grew as close together as bundles of bills in a banker’s strongroom. The lugger cleaned up for a month. Ohtami’s share of the haul was more than seven thousand dollars, an enormous fortune for him.
Now he grew ambitious. He would have a lugger of his own. Two Moro shipwrights built it for him on the Tulai beach, with the help of half a score of Samals and within sight of Jolo marketplace. By that time I had appeared on the scene and saw her launched. I saw, too, the whole run of Ohtami’s luck. It lasted six years.
It is a strange thing that whereas the Chinese coolie who becomes rich rarely is overbearing, the newly prosperous Japanese often grows insolent. Ohtami had no use for white men in the days of his prosperity. On principle he would never go to see a white pearl buyer. The buyer had to come to him as a petitioner for goods on which the owner would fix no price. ‘How much you give this?’ he would say, and whatever price was offered he would refuse ti with a sneer.
His distrust of the white man became a mania. It was impossible to deal with him. Finally one trader began to go into his office, look over Ohtami’s collection, select the best piece and put a tip-top price on it—a price he knew would not be accepted, because Ohtami would certainly expect it to be bettered elsewhere. His conviction that all the white dealers were rogues was confirmed when, naturally, no other dealer would offer him anything like the first dealer’s price. Pearl after pearl, parcel after parcel, did he put by, hoping in vain for better prices than the best. In the end he had to sell in order to pay his Chino creditors. He consigned his whole collection to London for sale. Then did his belief in white creation suffer final damage. He received less for his whole consignment than once, if he had been quick to close, he could have got for two or three of his best pearls.
The last I saw of Ohtami was when he was deckhand on my own pearling lugger, the Betty Pickle. ‘Ohtami,’ I said to him once in jest, ‘you for one know that I pay bigger prices for pearls than any dealer in the world, even in London!’
‘Sudah, Tuan,’ he acquiesced with an expressionless face. For I was the trader who had offered him the extravagant prices on which he had gambled his pride and hate in luckier days.
The other day I had a letter from a correspondent who had ready my earlier books. He wanted to sell me a coconut pearl. Now coconut pearls do not come from coconuts, but from conch shells, and some are handsome in their way, though lusterless, and unlike the real pearl. The best of them are large and well-shaped and of a fine pink color, and have a certain value. But they are not interesting to the pearl dealer, even if, as in this case, they have an interesting history, have belonged for generations to an East Indian chieftain and are supposed to bring good luck. But in the course of his letter my correspondent mentioned the island of Palawan, and that name sent my mind wandering back over the years until it came to rest on a certain island in the South Seas at a time when I was still rash and young. For on Palawan I, too, had held a coconut pearl of supernatural fame and great size.
It was Sayid, my number one pearl tout, who inveigled me to Palawan, where the vegetation is as lush as anywhere on earth. There the ferocious natives, the deadly anopheles mosquito, the crocodiles in the creeks and the fever-hung swamps offer a warm welcome to the white man who ventures thither. Sayid, son of Abu Bakur by a first wife, had his own reasons for making me want to go to Palawan. He wanted to take a wife and badly needed money. Any time is a bad time for needing money, but things were particularly bad at that time, for the pearling fleets had been having bad weather and Sayid’s livelihood depended on the business he brought me. Moreover, as he naïvely told me, he was afraid for the future, too, for he thought I would soon get disgruntled and leave the islands forever.
‘Never mind,’ I rallied him. ‘There are other white men.’
‘But I shall never have a better master,’ he said diplomatically.
‘How so?’ I demanded. ‘I pay no more than other masters.’
He reflected a moment. ‘Lord,’ he said, ‘you have never yet called me a son of a bitch.’
When I laughed he seized the propitious moment. For he was full of guile. With great suavity he recommended his expedition to Palawan.
‘Are you mad?’ said I. ‘Why, it is three days sail in an open vinta!’
‘There are many wonderful pearls in Palawan,’ said Sayid, ‘and the natives will sell cheaply, because the white men do not go there.’
‘How do you know all these?’ I demanded.
He averted his eyes and said negligently: ‘Some fishermen told me!’
I demanded to be shown these Samal fishermen. But the tale had been told to him at third hand. Nevertheless, I went to Palawan. Perhaps I was hypnotised, perhaps crazy. And so, because Sayid wanted to take a second wife, presently I found myself tossing in a frail-bottomed craft on sharky waters. I was seasick and wanted to die.
But one moonlit night we came quietly into San Antonio Bay and I stepped ashore amidst the exotic tropical beauty of Palawan, looking for bargains.
Well, I got what I went for. In an hour at Panglima Hassan’s bamboo shack I exchanged a large bundle of dirty notes for pearls which were enough to compensate me for four days of seasickness. After which the Panglima entertained me as well as he knew how, and there was a great gathering in my honor in the cool of the evening. Finally he showed me his greatest treasure. In my palm I found a coconut pearl, walnut size and perfectly spherical, like a big ball of camphor. I turned it in my hand, trying to think of a compliment, and there came uppermost a large circular spot of green, and in the midst of the green a large black dot, the whole looking like an eyeball in my hand. In a sudden nausea I thought I saw the ‘pupil’ dilate and contract. Shuddering, I handed the object back with a polite murmur.
I Go A – Pearling (continued)
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
Earlier in the day he had been talking to Yakoob, the Malay cook. Now, coming up close behind him, Yakoob said, loudly enough for all to hear: ‘Angkau takot-kah? (Are you afraid?)’
Without raising his eyes Ohtami said to the boss: ‘Let the master give orders to head the vessel straight for the Tuli Bataba Bank.’
‘And get the bottom ripped out of the Idmu? Are you crazy?’
‘The hand of Toyo pointed there,’ muttered Ohtami.
‘And last night he spoke to me as I slept. The shell is there in plenty.’
The master was tough and superstitious. He cursed Ohtami up and down. Then he upped anchor, hoisted sail and made for the narrow channel by the banks. Once through, taking soundings all the way, the master let the sails drop and put out the stern anchor.
‘If there is shell here, you scoundrel,’ he swore, ‘you shall have a third of all comes up this trip. But if you find no shell, then you shall work for me for the rest of the voyage for nothing.’ For that was the bargain the crafty skipper had made before venturing on the diver’s advice.
Twenty minutes after he had gone down Ohtami came up with a bag full of shell. It was well matured, sound shell, silver lipped, wonderfully free from worm-holes. For three days they worked below (it was an easy ground, no more than five fathoms deep). It was a wonderful spot. The oysters grew as close together as bundles of bills in a banker’s strongroom. The lugger cleaned up for a month. Ohtami’s share of the haul was more than seven thousand dollars, an enormous fortune for him.
Now he grew ambitious. He would have a lugger of his own. Two Moro shipwrights built it for him on the Tulai beach, with the help of half a score of Samals and within sight of Jolo marketplace. By that time I had appeared on the scene and saw her launched. I saw, too, the whole run of Ohtami’s luck. It lasted six years.
It is a strange thing that whereas the Chinese coolie who becomes rich rarely is overbearing, the newly prosperous Japanese often grows insolent. Ohtami had no use for white men in the days of his prosperity. On principle he would never go to see a white pearl buyer. The buyer had to come to him as a petitioner for goods on which the owner would fix no price. ‘How much you give this?’ he would say, and whatever price was offered he would refuse ti with a sneer.
His distrust of the white man became a mania. It was impossible to deal with him. Finally one trader began to go into his office, look over Ohtami’s collection, select the best piece and put a tip-top price on it—a price he knew would not be accepted, because Ohtami would certainly expect it to be bettered elsewhere. His conviction that all the white dealers were rogues was confirmed when, naturally, no other dealer would offer him anything like the first dealer’s price. Pearl after pearl, parcel after parcel, did he put by, hoping in vain for better prices than the best. In the end he had to sell in order to pay his Chino creditors. He consigned his whole collection to London for sale. Then did his belief in white creation suffer final damage. He received less for his whole consignment than once, if he had been quick to close, he could have got for two or three of his best pearls.
The last I saw of Ohtami was when he was deckhand on my own pearling lugger, the Betty Pickle. ‘Ohtami,’ I said to him once in jest, ‘you for one know that I pay bigger prices for pearls than any dealer in the world, even in London!’
‘Sudah, Tuan,’ he acquiesced with an expressionless face. For I was the trader who had offered him the extravagant prices on which he had gambled his pride and hate in luckier days.
The other day I had a letter from a correspondent who had ready my earlier books. He wanted to sell me a coconut pearl. Now coconut pearls do not come from coconuts, but from conch shells, and some are handsome in their way, though lusterless, and unlike the real pearl. The best of them are large and well-shaped and of a fine pink color, and have a certain value. But they are not interesting to the pearl dealer, even if, as in this case, they have an interesting history, have belonged for generations to an East Indian chieftain and are supposed to bring good luck. But in the course of his letter my correspondent mentioned the island of Palawan, and that name sent my mind wandering back over the years until it came to rest on a certain island in the South Seas at a time when I was still rash and young. For on Palawan I, too, had held a coconut pearl of supernatural fame and great size.
It was Sayid, my number one pearl tout, who inveigled me to Palawan, where the vegetation is as lush as anywhere on earth. There the ferocious natives, the deadly anopheles mosquito, the crocodiles in the creeks and the fever-hung swamps offer a warm welcome to the white man who ventures thither. Sayid, son of Abu Bakur by a first wife, had his own reasons for making me want to go to Palawan. He wanted to take a wife and badly needed money. Any time is a bad time for needing money, but things were particularly bad at that time, for the pearling fleets had been having bad weather and Sayid’s livelihood depended on the business he brought me. Moreover, as he naïvely told me, he was afraid for the future, too, for he thought I would soon get disgruntled and leave the islands forever.
‘Never mind,’ I rallied him. ‘There are other white men.’
‘But I shall never have a better master,’ he said diplomatically.
‘How so?’ I demanded. ‘I pay no more than other masters.’
He reflected a moment. ‘Lord,’ he said, ‘you have never yet called me a son of a bitch.’
When I laughed he seized the propitious moment. For he was full of guile. With great suavity he recommended his expedition to Palawan.
‘Are you mad?’ said I. ‘Why, it is three days sail in an open vinta!’
‘There are many wonderful pearls in Palawan,’ said Sayid, ‘and the natives will sell cheaply, because the white men do not go there.’
‘How do you know all these?’ I demanded.
He averted his eyes and said negligently: ‘Some fishermen told me!’
I demanded to be shown these Samal fishermen. But the tale had been told to him at third hand. Nevertheless, I went to Palawan. Perhaps I was hypnotised, perhaps crazy. And so, because Sayid wanted to take a second wife, presently I found myself tossing in a frail-bottomed craft on sharky waters. I was seasick and wanted to die.
But one moonlit night we came quietly into San Antonio Bay and I stepped ashore amidst the exotic tropical beauty of Palawan, looking for bargains.
Well, I got what I went for. In an hour at Panglima Hassan’s bamboo shack I exchanged a large bundle of dirty notes for pearls which were enough to compensate me for four days of seasickness. After which the Panglima entertained me as well as he knew how, and there was a great gathering in my honor in the cool of the evening. Finally he showed me his greatest treasure. In my palm I found a coconut pearl, walnut size and perfectly spherical, like a big ball of camphor. I turned it in my hand, trying to think of a compliment, and there came uppermost a large circular spot of green, and in the midst of the green a large black dot, the whole looking like an eyeball in my hand. In a sudden nausea I thought I saw the ‘pupil’ dilate and contract. Shuddering, I handed the object back with a polite murmur.
I Go A – Pearling (continued)
Monday, December 31, 2007
Heard On The Street
There are many types of intelligence: academic + creative + practical intelligence. Practical intelligence is the best + a dose of good manners, honesty, integrity, and social skills are good inclusions of a sure winner.
Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein was an American conductor, composer, author, music lecturer and pianist + he energized the Philharmonic and American classical music in a way no other director had done + he brought classical music to thousands of people from diverse backgrounds + I love his music.
Useful links:
www.leonardbernstein.com
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Bernstein
Useful links:
www.leonardbernstein.com
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Bernstein
Notorious
Notorious (1946)
Directed by: Alfred Hitchcock
Screenplay: John Taintor Foote (story The Song of the Dragon); Ben Hecht (written by), Alfred Hitchcock (screenplay contributor); Clifford Odets
Cast: Cary Grant, Ingrid Bergman, Claude Rains
(via YouTube): Notorious Full Film PT 1/12
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKexssiWVw8&feature=related
A Alfred Hitchcock masterpiece + dark romance/comedy. I enjoyed it.
Directed by: Alfred Hitchcock
Screenplay: John Taintor Foote (story The Song of the Dragon); Ben Hecht (written by), Alfred Hitchcock (screenplay contributor); Clifford Odets
Cast: Cary Grant, Ingrid Bergman, Claude Rains
(via YouTube): Notorious Full Film PT 1/12
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKexssiWVw8&feature=related
A Alfred Hitchcock masterpiece + dark romance/comedy. I enjoyed it.
Framing
Michelle Falkenstein writes about the importance of archival–quality framing + enhancing the look of a piece + its longevity + other viewpoints @ http://www.artnewsonline.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=805
Useful links:
www.barkframeworks.com
www.larsonjuhl.com
www.lowyonline.com
Useful links:
www.barkframeworks.com
www.larsonjuhl.com
www.lowyonline.com
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
While admitting that ‘The Surrender of Breda’ challenges the greatest masters on their own ground, rivalling the highest achievements of Titian, Tintoretto, and Veronese both in its dignity as illustration and in its beauty as decoration, yet Mr Stevenson has affirmed that ‘it is not the complete expression of the Velazquez eyesight.’ In a sense it is not; it has not the amazing actuality of some of the painter’s later works, but it may be questioned whether it is desirable that it should have this quality. This painting, we must remember, was first and foremost a decoration painted to adorn a certain wall in a given apartment, and the experience of centuries has shown that ultra-realism does not produce the most effective forms of decoration, which need a certain deliberate convention to emphasize their beauty as patterns. In ‘The Surrender of Breda’ Velazquez gives us the greatest amount of realism compatible with the success of the picture as a decoration: it fulfills its purpose to perfection, and than this no higher praise can be given.
Just about the time of this painting, Velazquez was introduced to a new sitter, the king’s little son Balthasar Carlos. Of the many portraits he made of this prince none is more delightful than the one which shows him on horseback. This quaint and rather pathetic little figure on his prancing steed, with the whole of Spain seemingly summed up and expressed in the landscape behind him, is the most adorable picture ever painted of a small boy. For all his pomp and importance (emphasized by the marshal’s baton in his hand), the stern, set face—so like his father’s—makes us feel sorry for him. He is very human; we feel that he is a lonely child, and somehow the painter with prophetic insight seems to suggest that he has not long to live. Poor little Balthasar Carlos, born in 1629, did not live to be twenty. In 1646 he caught a cold at Saragossa and died. Thereafter Velazquez had no royal prince to paint, and Philip IV had to lavish all his domestic affection on a little princess, the Infanta Maria Teresa, who had been born in 1638. Soon after her arrival troubles came thick upon Spain. Olivarez mismanaged matters badly and was disgraced in 1643; and the same year those lances of Spain, hitherto invincible, which we see in ‘The Surrender of Breda,’ themselves suffered the agony of defeat and were utterly crumpled up and crushed at Rocroi by the great French commander Condé. Domestic griefs accompanied these public misfortunes, for two years before he lost his son, Philip lost his wife, the Queen Isabella.
In 1649 Velazquez again visited Italy, no longer the follower of an all conquering army but the agent of a monarch whose power was waning. He landed at Genoa on January 2, and passing through Milan made for Venice, where he purchased several pictures for the King. This indeed, was the principal object of his journey. From Venice he went to Rome, where he painted the splendid portrait of Innocent X which now hangs in the Doria Palace, Rome, and met several artists of note—among them being Salvator Rosa (1615-73), the Neapolitan painter of brigands and wild scenery, and Nicolas Poussin (1594-1665), the polished Frenchman, who in his classical subjects carried on the tradition of the great Renaissance and in his landscapes was a real pioneer.
In the summer of 1651 Velazquez returned to Madrid, where still further honors awaited him. He was made Marshal of the Palace, and as Philip IV had married again during his absence—married his own niece Mariana of Austria, a girl of fourteen—the new Marshal was kept busy organizing festivities and tournaments for the amusement of the young Queen. By this second wife Philip had the Princess Margaret, born 1651, who is the central figure in the world famous ‘Las Meninas’. This picture in English ‘The Maids of Honor,’ marks the culmination of the third period of Velazquez and is the supreme achievement of his life.
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain (continued)
While admitting that ‘The Surrender of Breda’ challenges the greatest masters on their own ground, rivalling the highest achievements of Titian, Tintoretto, and Veronese both in its dignity as illustration and in its beauty as decoration, yet Mr Stevenson has affirmed that ‘it is not the complete expression of the Velazquez eyesight.’ In a sense it is not; it has not the amazing actuality of some of the painter’s later works, but it may be questioned whether it is desirable that it should have this quality. This painting, we must remember, was first and foremost a decoration painted to adorn a certain wall in a given apartment, and the experience of centuries has shown that ultra-realism does not produce the most effective forms of decoration, which need a certain deliberate convention to emphasize their beauty as patterns. In ‘The Surrender of Breda’ Velazquez gives us the greatest amount of realism compatible with the success of the picture as a decoration: it fulfills its purpose to perfection, and than this no higher praise can be given.
Just about the time of this painting, Velazquez was introduced to a new sitter, the king’s little son Balthasar Carlos. Of the many portraits he made of this prince none is more delightful than the one which shows him on horseback. This quaint and rather pathetic little figure on his prancing steed, with the whole of Spain seemingly summed up and expressed in the landscape behind him, is the most adorable picture ever painted of a small boy. For all his pomp and importance (emphasized by the marshal’s baton in his hand), the stern, set face—so like his father’s—makes us feel sorry for him. He is very human; we feel that he is a lonely child, and somehow the painter with prophetic insight seems to suggest that he has not long to live. Poor little Balthasar Carlos, born in 1629, did not live to be twenty. In 1646 he caught a cold at Saragossa and died. Thereafter Velazquez had no royal prince to paint, and Philip IV had to lavish all his domestic affection on a little princess, the Infanta Maria Teresa, who had been born in 1638. Soon after her arrival troubles came thick upon Spain. Olivarez mismanaged matters badly and was disgraced in 1643; and the same year those lances of Spain, hitherto invincible, which we see in ‘The Surrender of Breda,’ themselves suffered the agony of defeat and were utterly crumpled up and crushed at Rocroi by the great French commander Condé. Domestic griefs accompanied these public misfortunes, for two years before he lost his son, Philip lost his wife, the Queen Isabella.
In 1649 Velazquez again visited Italy, no longer the follower of an all conquering army but the agent of a monarch whose power was waning. He landed at Genoa on January 2, and passing through Milan made for Venice, where he purchased several pictures for the King. This indeed, was the principal object of his journey. From Venice he went to Rome, where he painted the splendid portrait of Innocent X which now hangs in the Doria Palace, Rome, and met several artists of note—among them being Salvator Rosa (1615-73), the Neapolitan painter of brigands and wild scenery, and Nicolas Poussin (1594-1665), the polished Frenchman, who in his classical subjects carried on the tradition of the great Renaissance and in his landscapes was a real pioneer.
In the summer of 1651 Velazquez returned to Madrid, where still further honors awaited him. He was made Marshal of the Palace, and as Philip IV had married again during his absence—married his own niece Mariana of Austria, a girl of fourteen—the new Marshal was kept busy organizing festivities and tournaments for the amusement of the young Queen. By this second wife Philip had the Princess Margaret, born 1651, who is the central figure in the world famous ‘Las Meninas’. This picture in English ‘The Maids of Honor,’ marks the culmination of the third period of Velazquez and is the supreme achievement of his life.
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain (continued)
I Go A – Pearling
Louis Kornitzer's book, Gem Trader, is partly autobiographical and partly woven round the lore of pearls. It's educational + explains the distribution chain of gems, as they pass from hand to hand, from miner to cutter, from merchant to millionaire, from courtesan to receiver of stolen goods, shaping human lives as they go + the unique characters in the gem industry.
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
Now, I have already written two books about pearls and the men who live on the rare fruits of the oyster. And yet no book of gems, and certainly no book of mine, should leave out all mention of the pearl. Luckily for me, pearl-lore would fill half a dozen books and not then be exhausted, so I need not repeat myself.
It was a humble young dealer in Hatton Garden that the urge to adventure came to me, that strong, compelling urge like a kick in the pants, which is produced by the fact that one’s family is hungry and growing. I had a chance to go pearl-hunting in the tough pearling grounds in North-Western Australia, and I took it. From Australia the chase for pearls led me in half a lifetime all around the world, but I was a stone that rolled slowly enough to gather a minute quantity of moss. At any rate, I have never regretted it. One looks back with a strange satisfaction on the lonely and risky periods of one’s life.
As I was the first white trader ever to penetrate into the pearl fisheries of the Sulu Seas, I still have a proprietary feeling about that part of the world. An irrational feeling, for after all, the Chinese, the Arabs and the Japanese had discovered Jolo—as it was then called—long before I had ever heard of that interesting neighbor of Borneo. The crews of pearling luggers are usually mixed crews from half the colored races of the world; and whatever the rest may be, black men, Arabs, Indians, Malayans, Chinese, half-castes, the divers are pretty sure to be sons of Nippon.
Like Ohtami, a diver I knew, these men are from the hardy fisher stock of Northern Japan, which wrests a miserable existence from the storm-ridden Pacific. The diver’s job, better paid, is no less precarious. Ohtami, for instance, stepped into the lead-weighted boots of his predecessor, who had been swimming off the beach and had met a shark. The Idmu was two day’s sail from port at the time, and as there was nothing left of Toyo to commit to the deep, the only formality that remained was to choose a new diver. The choice fell on Ohtami, which meant he was to work in alternate shifts with principal diver at a rate of pay plus cumsha (rake-off) better than anything he had ever seen before.
Ohtami looked as though he had been cut with a clasp-knife out of a block of wood. He was short and very thick, with enormous lung development and extraordinarily long and mobile arms. With the assistance of his tender, who would look after the air pump and the end of his lifeline while he was below, he got into the thick woollens that the diver wears beneath his rubber cuirass, into the felt front-piece and back and shoulder pads, into the suit itself. The boss ran an eye over him. The things fitted. Ohtami took them off again, and squatted to chow with the others, for it was sundown.
Each man helped himself from a bowl full of rice, broke the rice paper seal around a pair of chopsticks, rinsed his mouth with tepid water and spewed a libation to the jealous demons of the deep. Around them on platters stood the delicacies of their diet, boiled purple seaweed, cubes of pickled cabbage, chopped onions, pearl oyster mince. Sea and air were still. A thin blue haze hung over the water. The fifteen-ton lugger, under bare poles, drifted quietly round its stern anchor chain. The men were silent, for the death of their shipmate had depressed them. Who could say what Ohtami felt? Toyo had come from the same storm-swept village and they had been friends.
In those latitudes there is no sunset, and the sun plunges into the sea. At the precise moment of its departing Ohtami thought he saw something. He thought he saw a great arm sticking up out of the sea, pointing with one finger at a couple of islands not more than a mile away. Ohtami was greatly excited, but no one else would believe he had seen anything, and they laughed all the more because they were so relived to have something to laugh about that night. Ohtami relapsed into sullen silence.
The next day he went down to the seabed after the shell. But it was an unlucky trial trip, for he found nothing. When the number one diver went down he had no better fortune, and so it went on the whole day. It was a prospecting trip after new grounds, and the pearling master was glum. He made up his mind to hoist anchor and make for a place he knew that would give him at least his three or four piculs of shell night and morning. Then Ohtami, whose voice was hardly ever heard, opened his mouth—and close it again.
I Go A – Pearling (continued)
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
Now, I have already written two books about pearls and the men who live on the rare fruits of the oyster. And yet no book of gems, and certainly no book of mine, should leave out all mention of the pearl. Luckily for me, pearl-lore would fill half a dozen books and not then be exhausted, so I need not repeat myself.
It was a humble young dealer in Hatton Garden that the urge to adventure came to me, that strong, compelling urge like a kick in the pants, which is produced by the fact that one’s family is hungry and growing. I had a chance to go pearl-hunting in the tough pearling grounds in North-Western Australia, and I took it. From Australia the chase for pearls led me in half a lifetime all around the world, but I was a stone that rolled slowly enough to gather a minute quantity of moss. At any rate, I have never regretted it. One looks back with a strange satisfaction on the lonely and risky periods of one’s life.
As I was the first white trader ever to penetrate into the pearl fisheries of the Sulu Seas, I still have a proprietary feeling about that part of the world. An irrational feeling, for after all, the Chinese, the Arabs and the Japanese had discovered Jolo—as it was then called—long before I had ever heard of that interesting neighbor of Borneo. The crews of pearling luggers are usually mixed crews from half the colored races of the world; and whatever the rest may be, black men, Arabs, Indians, Malayans, Chinese, half-castes, the divers are pretty sure to be sons of Nippon.
Like Ohtami, a diver I knew, these men are from the hardy fisher stock of Northern Japan, which wrests a miserable existence from the storm-ridden Pacific. The diver’s job, better paid, is no less precarious. Ohtami, for instance, stepped into the lead-weighted boots of his predecessor, who had been swimming off the beach and had met a shark. The Idmu was two day’s sail from port at the time, and as there was nothing left of Toyo to commit to the deep, the only formality that remained was to choose a new diver. The choice fell on Ohtami, which meant he was to work in alternate shifts with principal diver at a rate of pay plus cumsha (rake-off) better than anything he had ever seen before.
Ohtami looked as though he had been cut with a clasp-knife out of a block of wood. He was short and very thick, with enormous lung development and extraordinarily long and mobile arms. With the assistance of his tender, who would look after the air pump and the end of his lifeline while he was below, he got into the thick woollens that the diver wears beneath his rubber cuirass, into the felt front-piece and back and shoulder pads, into the suit itself. The boss ran an eye over him. The things fitted. Ohtami took them off again, and squatted to chow with the others, for it was sundown.
Each man helped himself from a bowl full of rice, broke the rice paper seal around a pair of chopsticks, rinsed his mouth with tepid water and spewed a libation to the jealous demons of the deep. Around them on platters stood the delicacies of their diet, boiled purple seaweed, cubes of pickled cabbage, chopped onions, pearl oyster mince. Sea and air were still. A thin blue haze hung over the water. The fifteen-ton lugger, under bare poles, drifted quietly round its stern anchor chain. The men were silent, for the death of their shipmate had depressed them. Who could say what Ohtami felt? Toyo had come from the same storm-swept village and they had been friends.
In those latitudes there is no sunset, and the sun plunges into the sea. At the precise moment of its departing Ohtami thought he saw something. He thought he saw a great arm sticking up out of the sea, pointing with one finger at a couple of islands not more than a mile away. Ohtami was greatly excited, but no one else would believe he had seen anything, and they laughed all the more because they were so relived to have something to laugh about that night. Ohtami relapsed into sullen silence.
The next day he went down to the seabed after the shell. But it was an unlucky trial trip, for he found nothing. When the number one diver went down he had no better fortune, and so it went on the whole day. It was a prospecting trip after new grounds, and the pearling master was glum. He made up his mind to hoist anchor and make for a place he knew that would give him at least his three or four piculs of shell night and morning. Then Ohtami, whose voice was hardly ever heard, opened his mouth—and close it again.
I Go A – Pearling (continued)
Sunday, December 30, 2007
The Manhattan Transfer
The Manhattan Transfer’s name comes from John Dos Passos' 1925 novel Manhattan Transfer and reflects their New York origins + it is famous for mixing jazz, big band, and popular music styles + I love the music.
Useful links:
www.manhattantransfer.org
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Manhattan_Transfer
Useful links:
www.manhattantransfer.org
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Manhattan_Transfer
Heard On The Street
Identifying certain losers is a skill in itself and takes time to develop. Work hard at identifying new, inexperienced gem/art dealers who will be certain losers, and fade. We take a lifetime to unlearn easy mistakes. Past performance is no assurance of future success.
Out Of The Past
Out Of The Past (1947)
Directed by: Jacques Tourneur
Screenplay: Daniel Mainwaring (novel Build My Gallows High) (as Geoffrey Homes); Daniel Mainwaring (as Geoffrey Homes), Frank Fenton (uncredited), James M. Cain (uncredited)
Cast: Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer, Kirk Douglas
(via YouTube): Out of the Past
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNuORUFx81g
Robert Mitchum + Jane Greer were great. I enjoyed it.
Directed by: Jacques Tourneur
Screenplay: Daniel Mainwaring (novel Build My Gallows High) (as Geoffrey Homes); Daniel Mainwaring (as Geoffrey Homes), Frank Fenton (uncredited), James M. Cain (uncredited)
Cast: Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer, Kirk Douglas
(via YouTube): Out of the Past
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNuORUFx81g
Robert Mitchum + Jane Greer were great. I enjoyed it.
The Match King
Economist writes about Ivar Kreuger, the world's greatest swindler + his operating system (s) + other viewpoints @ http://www.economist.com/finance/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10278667
A lesson for all (rootless world).
A lesson for all (rootless world).
Insurance
Michelle Falkenstein writes about issues related to insurance, lighting, and framing of fine art + periodic evaluation and reappraisal of art + inventory management softwares for serious collectors + other viewpoints @ http://www.artnewsonline.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=804
Useful links:
www.chubb.com
www.aig.com
www.worldartantiques.com
www.artsystems.com
www.artloss.com
www.firemansfund.com
www.museumsusa.org
www.lloyds.com
www.ace-ina.com
www.axa-art.com
www.cunninghamlindsey.com
www.mmc.com
Useful links:
www.chubb.com
www.aig.com
www.worldartantiques.com
www.artsystems.com
www.artloss.com
www.firemansfund.com
www.museumsusa.org
www.lloyds.com
www.ace-ina.com
www.axa-art.com
www.cunninghamlindsey.com
www.mmc.com
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
The time between his return to Madrid and his departure in 1649 for a second visit to Italy was the happiest period in the life both of Velazquez and of Philip. Daily the artist advanced in the mastery of his art and in the esteem of his sovereign. R A M Stevenson has pointed out that:
Like Rembrandt, who never ceased to paint his own portrait, Velazquez studied one model, from youth to age, with unalterable patience and and ever-fresh inspiration. He could look at the king’s well-known head with a renewed interest, as he went deeper into the mystery of eyesight, and became better informed as to the effects of real light.
Owing to fires and other accidents many of these portraits of Philip have been lost, but twenty six exist to this day: and they are all different. If we follow the development of the painter’s art in these portraits of Philip IV—and nearly a dozen are in England—we shall see the slow transformation of a face, through a hard realism of feature and detail, to the soft, atmospheric impressionism of the final portraits. The bust portrait of ‘Philip IV: Old’ in the National Gallery, London, is a superb example of the painter’s last manner and of the way in which he could steep a whole canvas equally in a soft envelope of light.
What this continual painting of the same model did for Velazquez we can see from the portraits: it helped him to realize what every painter in the end must realize if he intends to excel, that is not the subject but the treatment that makes the masterpiece. Velazquez found his fundamental inspiration, not in the novelty of a new subject, but in the ceaseless pursuit of seeing better and painting better something he had already seen. It is by the ultimate perfection of his rendering of the normal vision of man that Velazquez holds his supreme place among the very greatest masters of art. Other painters have expressed character, ideas, and beauty more poignantly, but nobody before or since has expressed vision so splendidly.
What this constant intercourse with a great artist did for Philip IV we can only imagine, but R A M Stevenson again comes to our rescue by picturing in words how lonely is the lot of a king, and particularly in this period of a king of Spain:
To be a king of Spain, to preside at religious execution, to have a wife whom no man, even to save her life, might touch on pain of death, was to be a creature sorely in need of private liberty, and the solace of confidential intercourse. Philip IV seems to have been naturally kind, genial, and affable, and to have divided his leisure between the hunting-field and Velazquez’s studio. The two, artist and king, grew old together, with like interests in horses, dogs, and paintings; thawing when alone into that easy familiarity between master and old servant, freezing instantly in public into the stiff positions that their parts in life required. Painter to the king, when he was scarce twenty five years old, Velazquez escaped most of the dangers and humiliations of professional portrait-painting, without losing its useful discipline of the eye, its rigorous test of the ever-present and exacting model.
It was when Velazquez was about forty that he was called upon to execute what proved to be one of the two supreme achievements of his art. Olivarez had presented the King with a new palace, Buen Retiro, on the heights above the Prado, and the Court Painters, with Velazquez at their head, were commanded to set about its decoration. For the decoration of this palace Velazquez produced his great historical picture ‘The Surrender of Breda’ which is not only superb as a decoration but as moving in its sentiment as any picture artist ever painted.
The surrender of Breda, a fortified town twenty miles south-east of Dordrecht, was an incident in the memorable, and at first apparently hopeless, struggle which, beginning in 1568, lasted for eighty years and ended in the haughty Spaniards being compelled to recognize the independence of the Dutch Republic. The capture of Breda was one of the last triumph of Spanish arms before the tide turned against them. This was the subject Velazquez chose for his contribution towards the decoration of Buen Retiro. Notwithstanding the armed crowd and multitude of uniforms, the noble bearing of the principal figures is the first thing that arrests attention. The gestures of Spinola, the Spanish Commander, and of Justin, chief representative of the defeated Dutchmen and bearer of the key to the city, are poignant in expression, and what moves us most of all is the incomparable humanity of the scene. There is no arrogance in the Spanish conqueror, who lays his hand consolingly, almost affectionately, on the shoulder of Justin; in the Dutchman there is all the tragedy of defeat, but he is still dignified and does not cringe to the victor. It is an ennobling presentment of a historic scene.
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain (continued)
The time between his return to Madrid and his departure in 1649 for a second visit to Italy was the happiest period in the life both of Velazquez and of Philip. Daily the artist advanced in the mastery of his art and in the esteem of his sovereign. R A M Stevenson has pointed out that:
Like Rembrandt, who never ceased to paint his own portrait, Velazquez studied one model, from youth to age, with unalterable patience and and ever-fresh inspiration. He could look at the king’s well-known head with a renewed interest, as he went deeper into the mystery of eyesight, and became better informed as to the effects of real light.
Owing to fires and other accidents many of these portraits of Philip have been lost, but twenty six exist to this day: and they are all different. If we follow the development of the painter’s art in these portraits of Philip IV—and nearly a dozen are in England—we shall see the slow transformation of a face, through a hard realism of feature and detail, to the soft, atmospheric impressionism of the final portraits. The bust portrait of ‘Philip IV: Old’ in the National Gallery, London, is a superb example of the painter’s last manner and of the way in which he could steep a whole canvas equally in a soft envelope of light.
What this continual painting of the same model did for Velazquez we can see from the portraits: it helped him to realize what every painter in the end must realize if he intends to excel, that is not the subject but the treatment that makes the masterpiece. Velazquez found his fundamental inspiration, not in the novelty of a new subject, but in the ceaseless pursuit of seeing better and painting better something he had already seen. It is by the ultimate perfection of his rendering of the normal vision of man that Velazquez holds his supreme place among the very greatest masters of art. Other painters have expressed character, ideas, and beauty more poignantly, but nobody before or since has expressed vision so splendidly.
What this constant intercourse with a great artist did for Philip IV we can only imagine, but R A M Stevenson again comes to our rescue by picturing in words how lonely is the lot of a king, and particularly in this period of a king of Spain:
To be a king of Spain, to preside at religious execution, to have a wife whom no man, even to save her life, might touch on pain of death, was to be a creature sorely in need of private liberty, and the solace of confidential intercourse. Philip IV seems to have been naturally kind, genial, and affable, and to have divided his leisure between the hunting-field and Velazquez’s studio. The two, artist and king, grew old together, with like interests in horses, dogs, and paintings; thawing when alone into that easy familiarity between master and old servant, freezing instantly in public into the stiff positions that their parts in life required. Painter to the king, when he was scarce twenty five years old, Velazquez escaped most of the dangers and humiliations of professional portrait-painting, without losing its useful discipline of the eye, its rigorous test of the ever-present and exacting model.
It was when Velazquez was about forty that he was called upon to execute what proved to be one of the two supreme achievements of his art. Olivarez had presented the King with a new palace, Buen Retiro, on the heights above the Prado, and the Court Painters, with Velazquez at their head, were commanded to set about its decoration. For the decoration of this palace Velazquez produced his great historical picture ‘The Surrender of Breda’ which is not only superb as a decoration but as moving in its sentiment as any picture artist ever painted.
The surrender of Breda, a fortified town twenty miles south-east of Dordrecht, was an incident in the memorable, and at first apparently hopeless, struggle which, beginning in 1568, lasted for eighty years and ended in the haughty Spaniards being compelled to recognize the independence of the Dutch Republic. The capture of Breda was one of the last triumph of Spanish arms before the tide turned against them. This was the subject Velazquez chose for his contribution towards the decoration of Buen Retiro. Notwithstanding the armed crowd and multitude of uniforms, the noble bearing of the principal figures is the first thing that arrests attention. The gestures of Spinola, the Spanish Commander, and of Justin, chief representative of the defeated Dutchmen and bearer of the key to the city, are poignant in expression, and what moves us most of all is the incomparable humanity of the scene. There is no arrogance in the Spanish conqueror, who lays his hand consolingly, almost affectionately, on the shoulder of Justin; in the Dutchman there is all the tragedy of defeat, but he is still dignified and does not cringe to the victor. It is an ennobling presentment of a historic scene.
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain (continued)
The Chequer-Cut, Or V-Cut, Citty Diamond
(via Diamond Cuts in Historic Jewelry:1381-1910) Herbert Tillander writes:
The oval, flat-bottomed Citty was a well-known diamond in its time. According to Cletscher, it had a richly faceted crown, was of beautiful water, weighed 24 ct and cost die van Londen (the Londoners) £12000 when it was purchased and offered to King Charles I. It is generally assumed that the diamond was named after the City of London, which presented it to the King.
The Citty is mentioned in the Correspondance Politique as one of the jewels which Queen Henrietta Maria pawned and finally sold in order to finance the Cavaliers who fought for her husband against Oliver Cromwell’s Roundheads. It was eventually purchased by the French queen, Anne of Austria, who left it and twenty one other large diamonds to her son, the Duke of Orleans, brother to Louis XIV. In the duke’s inventory (1701) it is described as ‘un autre diamant de forme ovalle brilliant long taillé par dessus en petits lozenges de trés belle eau et nette appélé Le Cité, prise la somme de cent vingt mil livreś.
Here, the word brilliant obviously does not mean the type of cut, but merely indicates sparkling light effects. Taillé par dessus means simply that the crown was faceted. With its weight of 24 ct and dimensions of 26 x 21 mm (gauged from the size of the Briolette which was attached to it and which is now reproduced in Louis XV’s crown), the Citty Rose Cut diamond was fairly flat.
One of the earliest V-Cut diamonds is to be found in Munich, on a statuette of St George. The stone, a reasonably large one, is fixed to the horse’s head, behind the plume. The statuette is thought to date from somewhere between 1586 and 1597.
The oval, flat-bottomed Citty was a well-known diamond in its time. According to Cletscher, it had a richly faceted crown, was of beautiful water, weighed 24 ct and cost die van Londen (the Londoners) £12000 when it was purchased and offered to King Charles I. It is generally assumed that the diamond was named after the City of London, which presented it to the King.
The Citty is mentioned in the Correspondance Politique as one of the jewels which Queen Henrietta Maria pawned and finally sold in order to finance the Cavaliers who fought for her husband against Oliver Cromwell’s Roundheads. It was eventually purchased by the French queen, Anne of Austria, who left it and twenty one other large diamonds to her son, the Duke of Orleans, brother to Louis XIV. In the duke’s inventory (1701) it is described as ‘un autre diamant de forme ovalle brilliant long taillé par dessus en petits lozenges de trés belle eau et nette appélé Le Cité, prise la somme de cent vingt mil livreś.
Here, the word brilliant obviously does not mean the type of cut, but merely indicates sparkling light effects. Taillé par dessus means simply that the crown was faceted. With its weight of 24 ct and dimensions of 26 x 21 mm (gauged from the size of the Briolette which was attached to it and which is now reproduced in Louis XV’s crown), the Citty Rose Cut diamond was fairly flat.
One of the earliest V-Cut diamonds is to be found in Munich, on a statuette of St George. The stone, a reasonably large one, is fixed to the horse’s head, behind the plume. The statuette is thought to date from somewhere between 1586 and 1597.
London, And So On: Low Company!
Louis Kornitzer's book, Gem Trader, is partly autobiographical and partly woven round the lore of pearls. It's educational + explains the distribution chain of gems, as they pass from hand to hand, from miner to cutter, from merchant to millionaire, from courtesan to receiver of stolen goods, shaping human lives as they go + the unique characters in the gem industry.
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
To have been actively engaged over a period of years in the gem trade and yet never to have met with tourmalines is something not to be proud of. It was in this period of my life that I dealt for once in tourmalines, jargoons, marcasite and the other lesser fry of the gem world. Perhaps if I had stuck to them I should have made more money out of them than I ever did out of pearls and that noble three, emeralds, rubies and sapphires.
Tourmalines, a composition of silica with varying quantities of oxides of magnesium and aluminum, present such a variety of beautiful colors and shades that they come as a revelation to the tyro. The crystals are translucent, take on a good polish and are often of surprising luster. The colorless variety is known as achroite and the green as andalusite, from its occurrence in Andalusian Spain.
Tourmalines remind me of a little hunchbacked German, a working jeweler in the West End, who had been persuaded by a patron to start trading in gems on his own. Despite all the credit this patron gave him, the little man was soon in deep water, for the pitfalls in the game are many and various. Instead of telling his benefactor (who was his biggest creditor) of his troubles, for the man really had intended to befriend him, he finally ran away to Paris. It was there and not in London that I met him again.
Handicapped by his fear of the police (unfounded, as it happened), he asked me to market his goods for him, but I had no clients for tourmalines in Paris, although I was able to recommend him to a broker who in the end did help him to part with his stones at a ruinous discount. For he was in a hurry to realize; the man in a hurry always bargains to sell. So far he was on the right side of the fence. But he now took it into his head to justify himself in the eyes of his benefactor, to which end he bought a large number of beautifully engraved but worthless mining shares from a bucket-shop keeper on the run, and sent them back to London under cover of a piteous note to say that he had been speculating not wisely but too well.
The big man in London, unfortunately for him, saw through the trick at once and was justly incensed. He put Scotland Yard on the track and that was the end of another little man.
There is a semi-precious stone, attractive in its own right, much fancied by those who value its resemblance to diamonds. This is the jargoon, or more properly the zircon. The zircon occurs in a greater variety of colors than any other gem. Besides the white kind, it is found brown, yellow, blue, pink, red and green. The red variety is called jacinth or hyacinth. There is a much esteemed peacock-blue zircon which is very rare indeed. Examples of it are called ‘specimen stones’ and command a good price in the market.
As for the white zircons, the jargoons, they have a very fair resemblance to diamonds, for this is a hard stone and often of a good brilliance. Very often it is called the Matura diamond, after the district in Ceylon where it is obtained. But one peculiarity of the stone is that when exposed to heat, or even to strong sunlight, it is apt to deteriorate in color, and may indeed fade badly.
To simulate diamonds, jargoons have been cut ‘full cut’ like diamonds; that is, with fifty-eight facets. Another mineral which ‘more in the past than today’ has been used in jewelry of the cheaper sort to obtain the diamond effect is that called marcasite (pyrites). Like the rose-cut diamonds they were intended to represent, they also were cut rose fashion; that is, with triangular facets. For there is an absolute system and logic in the way stones are faceted. Types and individuals demand special cutting, whether it be in the number of facets, the shape of the facets or their arrangement.
In my journeyings to and fro from Scotland I saw many jeweler’s shop windows crammed with trinkets in which were set stones of even lower status than those name above, by some considered so common that they should not be mentioned in the same breath as the distinguished company of gems. But they suited my state and status at that time of my life, and this is the place if anywhere for them in my private cavalcade of gems.
One, the cairngorm, however, does make most attractive settings and can look very effective. It is one of the several crystalline forms of silica. Other prominent members of the family of crystalline silicas are the rock crystal and the citrine. You will remember that the non-crystalline members of the family of silica are the opal and the chalcedony, which shows that very minute differences in the molecular structure of a substance make all the difference to its appearance and its value in the market. Of course, if the eyes of Cleopatra had been just the merest trifle crossed, that would have made all the difference in the world, too.
Cairngorms are found plentifully in Scotland and Cornwall. They are therefore, unlike many gems, native gems of Britain. They occur much to the benefit of local lapidaries and the delight of tourists, who are ever on the lookout for something that can be picked up ‘cheap’. Many a lady wears a cairngorm proudly because it reminds her of her honeymoon or some other sentimental occasion. It is quite pretty enough, too, to sustain an affection of that kind.
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
To have been actively engaged over a period of years in the gem trade and yet never to have met with tourmalines is something not to be proud of. It was in this period of my life that I dealt for once in tourmalines, jargoons, marcasite and the other lesser fry of the gem world. Perhaps if I had stuck to them I should have made more money out of them than I ever did out of pearls and that noble three, emeralds, rubies and sapphires.
Tourmalines, a composition of silica with varying quantities of oxides of magnesium and aluminum, present such a variety of beautiful colors and shades that they come as a revelation to the tyro. The crystals are translucent, take on a good polish and are often of surprising luster. The colorless variety is known as achroite and the green as andalusite, from its occurrence in Andalusian Spain.
Tourmalines remind me of a little hunchbacked German, a working jeweler in the West End, who had been persuaded by a patron to start trading in gems on his own. Despite all the credit this patron gave him, the little man was soon in deep water, for the pitfalls in the game are many and various. Instead of telling his benefactor (who was his biggest creditor) of his troubles, for the man really had intended to befriend him, he finally ran away to Paris. It was there and not in London that I met him again.
Handicapped by his fear of the police (unfounded, as it happened), he asked me to market his goods for him, but I had no clients for tourmalines in Paris, although I was able to recommend him to a broker who in the end did help him to part with his stones at a ruinous discount. For he was in a hurry to realize; the man in a hurry always bargains to sell. So far he was on the right side of the fence. But he now took it into his head to justify himself in the eyes of his benefactor, to which end he bought a large number of beautifully engraved but worthless mining shares from a bucket-shop keeper on the run, and sent them back to London under cover of a piteous note to say that he had been speculating not wisely but too well.
The big man in London, unfortunately for him, saw through the trick at once and was justly incensed. He put Scotland Yard on the track and that was the end of another little man.
There is a semi-precious stone, attractive in its own right, much fancied by those who value its resemblance to diamonds. This is the jargoon, or more properly the zircon. The zircon occurs in a greater variety of colors than any other gem. Besides the white kind, it is found brown, yellow, blue, pink, red and green. The red variety is called jacinth or hyacinth. There is a much esteemed peacock-blue zircon which is very rare indeed. Examples of it are called ‘specimen stones’ and command a good price in the market.
As for the white zircons, the jargoons, they have a very fair resemblance to diamonds, for this is a hard stone and often of a good brilliance. Very often it is called the Matura diamond, after the district in Ceylon where it is obtained. But one peculiarity of the stone is that when exposed to heat, or even to strong sunlight, it is apt to deteriorate in color, and may indeed fade badly.
To simulate diamonds, jargoons have been cut ‘full cut’ like diamonds; that is, with fifty-eight facets. Another mineral which ‘more in the past than today’ has been used in jewelry of the cheaper sort to obtain the diamond effect is that called marcasite (pyrites). Like the rose-cut diamonds they were intended to represent, they also were cut rose fashion; that is, with triangular facets. For there is an absolute system and logic in the way stones are faceted. Types and individuals demand special cutting, whether it be in the number of facets, the shape of the facets or their arrangement.
In my journeyings to and fro from Scotland I saw many jeweler’s shop windows crammed with trinkets in which were set stones of even lower status than those name above, by some considered so common that they should not be mentioned in the same breath as the distinguished company of gems. But they suited my state and status at that time of my life, and this is the place if anywhere for them in my private cavalcade of gems.
One, the cairngorm, however, does make most attractive settings and can look very effective. It is one of the several crystalline forms of silica. Other prominent members of the family of crystalline silicas are the rock crystal and the citrine. You will remember that the non-crystalline members of the family of silica are the opal and the chalcedony, which shows that very minute differences in the molecular structure of a substance make all the difference to its appearance and its value in the market. Of course, if the eyes of Cleopatra had been just the merest trifle crossed, that would have made all the difference in the world, too.
Cairngorms are found plentifully in Scotland and Cornwall. They are therefore, unlike many gems, native gems of Britain. They occur much to the benefit of local lapidaries and the delight of tourists, who are ever on the lookout for something that can be picked up ‘cheap’. Many a lady wears a cairngorm proudly because it reminds her of her honeymoon or some other sentimental occasion. It is quite pretty enough, too, to sustain an affection of that kind.
Heard On The Street
Nervous Market: Gem/Art analysts call it contagion + spillover + volatility + controlled confusion. The fear level rises with each dose of bad news, while at the same time market participants keep looking for reassurance (s). The experts say keep the turmoil in perspective and move on. The market needs a correction. Why should 2007 be any different?
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Birth, Death And Shopping
Economist writes about the shopping mall's story + the gradual decline of the concept in the country (America) that pioneered them + changing suburbs + ethnic drift + the new amateur shopping-mall history + the mix-and-match appearance of the 'lifestyle centres' + other viewpoints @ http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10278717
There is a lesson for all. I wonder what may happen to the gem and jewelry stores in the shopping malls + the impact. If you look at the emerging markets in Asia, Middle-East, South America, and Africa today shopping malls continue to multiply in amazing numbers + they want to follow the American business model. I don't think the concept is going work in all regions. I hope business leaders will learn from their mistakes.
Useful links:
www.icsc.org
http://deadmalls.com
http://labelscar.com
www.lakehurstmall.net
www.carusoaffiliated.com
There is a lesson for all. I wonder what may happen to the gem and jewelry stores in the shopping malls + the impact. If you look at the emerging markets in Asia, Middle-East, South America, and Africa today shopping malls continue to multiply in amazing numbers + they want to follow the American business model. I don't think the concept is going work in all regions. I hope business leaders will learn from their mistakes.
Useful links:
www.icsc.org
http://deadmalls.com
http://labelscar.com
www.lakehurstmall.net
www.carusoaffiliated.com
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
2
These, then, were the principal influences alive in Spanish art when Diego de Silva y Velazquez was born at Seville in 1599. His family was not of Sevillian or even of Spanish origin, for his grandfather Diego Rodriguez de Silva came from Oporto, the home of the Silva family. The name which he made world famous he took from his mother, Gernima Velazquez, who belonged to an old Seville family. His father Juan de Silva raised no objections when his son desired to study art, and when he was thirteen or fourteen Velazquez was placed in the studio of Francisco de Herrera (1576-1654), who showed something of the fanaticism of El Greco in the flashing eyes and majestic gestures of the saints in his religious pictures. Herrera is said to have been bad-tempered, and after enduring his roughness for about a year Velazquez changed masters and entered the studio of Francisco Pacheco (1571-1654). There he remained five years, and though his master had no great originality or power, he was probably a good teacher, for he was himself a careful draughtsman, a scholar, and the author of a book on painting. Presumably there was also another attraction, for on April 23, 1618, Velazquez married Pacheco’s daughter Juana de Miranda. Henceforward Pacheco did everything he could to advance the interests of his son-in-law.
Within three years occurred the opportunity of a lifetime. Philip III died on March 31, 1621, and the young king Philip IV dismissed the Duke of Lerma and made Count Olivarez his prime minister. Now Olivarez, a son of the Governor of Seville, had lived in that city till 1615 and had made himself popular there as a patron of painters and poets. Several of his protégés at Seville united to praise to the new minister the extraordinary talent of their young fellow townsman. Velazquez went to Madrid and, after some vexations delays, in 1623 Olivarez persuaded the young king to give Velazquez a sitting. He conquered at his first brush stroke. The equestrian portrait he painted is now lost, but it pleased Philip so much that forthwith the painter of twenty four was appointed Court Painter to a king of eighteen.
From the beginning Philip treated Velazquez in the most friendly manner. The king is said by a contemporary to have come to his studio ‘almost every day,’ by ‘those secret passages, hung with pictures, which led from the king’s rooms to every part of the old Alcazar.’ The monotony of the stiff routine of the Court was broken in the autumn of 1628 by the arrival of Rubens, who, as stated in the last chapter, came to Madrid on a diplomatic mission, and for nine months was constantly with the king and Velazquez. According to Pacheco and others, Rubens thought highly of Velazquez, and delighted in his society, while his views of the king appears in a letter Rubens wrote to a friend:
He evidently takes quite a special pleasure in painting, and, in my opinion, this prince is endowed with the finest qualities. I already know him from personal intercourse, as I have a room in the palace, so that he almost daily visits me.
Philip IV appears to have been genuinely interested in painting, a result probably of his intimacy with Velazquez, and after Ruben’s visit, and undoubtedly on his advice, the King permitted Velazquez to go to Italy with the great soldier and statesman Spinola, who was to be the Spanish governor of Milan and commander-in-chief in Italy. Velazquez arrived at Milan in the early autumn of 1629 and soon went to Venice, where he made a special study of the work of Tintoretto, who died, it will be remembered, five years before Velazquez was born. From Venice he went to Rome—missing Florence—and after some months there passed on to Naples, where he met Ribera, and returned to Madrid early in 1631. At Naples he painted Philip’s sister, Mary of Hungary, and this portrait he brought back with him together with his painting ‘The Forge of Vulcan.’
It is customary to divide the art of Velazquez into three periods, of which the first ends with this visit to Italy. Most critics agree that the finest and most typical painting of his first period is the bacchanalian scene known as ‘The Topers’. In the strongly laid shadows of this painting we see the influence of Caravaggio, and while we admire the virile rendering of form and the well-balanced grouping of the figures, yet we feel that the scene, as R A M Stevenson, the cousin of ‘R.L.S’ wrote in his classic book on Velazquez, ‘was never beheld as a whole vision in the mind’s eye.’ The painter’s complete mastery of his art was yet to come.
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain (continued)
2
These, then, were the principal influences alive in Spanish art when Diego de Silva y Velazquez was born at Seville in 1599. His family was not of Sevillian or even of Spanish origin, for his grandfather Diego Rodriguez de Silva came from Oporto, the home of the Silva family. The name which he made world famous he took from his mother, Gernima Velazquez, who belonged to an old Seville family. His father Juan de Silva raised no objections when his son desired to study art, and when he was thirteen or fourteen Velazquez was placed in the studio of Francisco de Herrera (1576-1654), who showed something of the fanaticism of El Greco in the flashing eyes and majestic gestures of the saints in his religious pictures. Herrera is said to have been bad-tempered, and after enduring his roughness for about a year Velazquez changed masters and entered the studio of Francisco Pacheco (1571-1654). There he remained five years, and though his master had no great originality or power, he was probably a good teacher, for he was himself a careful draughtsman, a scholar, and the author of a book on painting. Presumably there was also another attraction, for on April 23, 1618, Velazquez married Pacheco’s daughter Juana de Miranda. Henceforward Pacheco did everything he could to advance the interests of his son-in-law.
Within three years occurred the opportunity of a lifetime. Philip III died on March 31, 1621, and the young king Philip IV dismissed the Duke of Lerma and made Count Olivarez his prime minister. Now Olivarez, a son of the Governor of Seville, had lived in that city till 1615 and had made himself popular there as a patron of painters and poets. Several of his protégés at Seville united to praise to the new minister the extraordinary talent of their young fellow townsman. Velazquez went to Madrid and, after some vexations delays, in 1623 Olivarez persuaded the young king to give Velazquez a sitting. He conquered at his first brush stroke. The equestrian portrait he painted is now lost, but it pleased Philip so much that forthwith the painter of twenty four was appointed Court Painter to a king of eighteen.
From the beginning Philip treated Velazquez in the most friendly manner. The king is said by a contemporary to have come to his studio ‘almost every day,’ by ‘those secret passages, hung with pictures, which led from the king’s rooms to every part of the old Alcazar.’ The monotony of the stiff routine of the Court was broken in the autumn of 1628 by the arrival of Rubens, who, as stated in the last chapter, came to Madrid on a diplomatic mission, and for nine months was constantly with the king and Velazquez. According to Pacheco and others, Rubens thought highly of Velazquez, and delighted in his society, while his views of the king appears in a letter Rubens wrote to a friend:
He evidently takes quite a special pleasure in painting, and, in my opinion, this prince is endowed with the finest qualities. I already know him from personal intercourse, as I have a room in the palace, so that he almost daily visits me.
Philip IV appears to have been genuinely interested in painting, a result probably of his intimacy with Velazquez, and after Ruben’s visit, and undoubtedly on his advice, the King permitted Velazquez to go to Italy with the great soldier and statesman Spinola, who was to be the Spanish governor of Milan and commander-in-chief in Italy. Velazquez arrived at Milan in the early autumn of 1629 and soon went to Venice, where he made a special study of the work of Tintoretto, who died, it will be remembered, five years before Velazquez was born. From Venice he went to Rome—missing Florence—and after some months there passed on to Naples, where he met Ribera, and returned to Madrid early in 1631. At Naples he painted Philip’s sister, Mary of Hungary, and this portrait he brought back with him together with his painting ‘The Forge of Vulcan.’
It is customary to divide the art of Velazquez into three periods, of which the first ends with this visit to Italy. Most critics agree that the finest and most typical painting of his first period is the bacchanalian scene known as ‘The Topers’. In the strongly laid shadows of this painting we see the influence of Caravaggio, and while we admire the virile rendering of form and the well-balanced grouping of the figures, yet we feel that the scene, as R A M Stevenson, the cousin of ‘R.L.S’ wrote in his classic book on Velazquez, ‘was never beheld as a whole vision in the mind’s eye.’ The painter’s complete mastery of his art was yet to come.
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain (continued)
London, And So On: Low Company!
Louis Kornitzer's book, Gem Trader, is partly autobiographical and partly woven round the lore of pearls. It's educational + explains the distribution chain of gems, as they pass from hand to hand, from miner to cutter, from merchant to millionaire, from courtesan to receiver of stolen goods, shaping human lives as they go + the unique characters in the gem industry.
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
I always think it is a pity that whereas men of such lax morals frequently prove as sympathetic and generous as H F when appealed to on behalf of their distressed fellows, many upright men in affluent circumstances show themselves as hard as flint whenever an attempt is made to lay them under contribution in a case of genuine hard luck. Not long ago one who considers himself an ornament to the trade to which I have been privileged to belong for at least twenty years longer than he, reproached me for speaking to a one-time respected dealer who a few days before had come out of gaol after serving a short sentence for having brought stolen jewelry.
‘If I had been younger man,’ I said, ‘with an unformed character and the need to proclaim my business virtue, perhaps I should have hesitated to go near him. But at my age and enjoying the reputation I do, I felt that I could risk my morals if, by talking to a man for a few minutes, I could help to re-establish him in his self-respect. Besides, wasn’t it John Wesley who said, when he saw some malefactor led to executions: ‘There but for the grace of God goes John Wesley? That was how I felt today.’
But to return to my beginnings.
I soon found my money getting low. Then came the old story, new to me, looking for a job. Numberless calls, scores of unanswered letters posted at the expense of many square meals, clean shirt and collar and a pressed suit at all costs. I gave up my boarding-house and found a room under the roof in Great Russell Street at five shillings a week. What qualifications must a man have, I asked myself in bewilderment, that would give him a living wage in this strange and mighty city of London? I was master of three languages, a fluent correspondent, a good bookkeeper, a graduate of the University of Vienna, an expert in metals, and knew as much about gems as any ordinary dealer did. And yet nobody could use my services.
Luckily, however, I had kept in with Mrs Francis my first landlady. She was a motherly person and a lady who had come down in the world. One day I called in to see her and she said: ‘I have good news for you. Father Reilly has lost his job with Pitman’s.’
Father Reilly was the unfrocked Catholic priest who was one of her boarders. His job had been teaching English to foreigners. Mrs Francis, who knew that I was a foreigner who could speak English, thought I would fit the bill. In point of fact, I got the job at a salary of two pounds fifteen shillings a week.
Most of my pupils were older than I was. I remember one, Herr Meltner, mainly because I got him into a continental new service, my intuition having enabled him to qualify as a translator of news items translated from the London dailies. He showed his appreciation by making me free of the bachelor establishment of his new boss. There his chief lived in perfect amity with his paste-and-scissors men in a kind of Bohemian communism which knew no boundary between meum and tuum. Neckties, hats, coats, umbrellas and handkerchiefs were interchangeable property in that queer house of bachelors, but you could always be sure of a good meal there if your tastes included an unvarying passion for herrings doused, herrings fried, herrings marinated, pickled herrings, or herrings stewed with potatoes boiled in their jackets. When funds were ample one feasted on jellied eels, oyster patties, liver sausages, Pomeranian goose breast and iced Munich lager fetched by the pail from a nearby German hotel. It was no uncommon thing for Herr Meltner, long after he had ceased to be my student, to send me a scribbled message by hand saying: ‘Come tonight, great eats.’
Another of my pupils was a German doctor with a liquil ozone treatment as a cure for cancer. I used to translate his lectures and pamphlets for him and on several occasions stood on a platform for him translating his message word for word before the assembled medicos. One of these doctors had a father who ran a scholastic agency in the West End, and this old gentleman was the cause of my leaving London. He got me a job as manager of a language school in Newcastle-on-Tyne.
I spent five years on Tyneside as a professional man, and they were happy years. I made friends, I studied, I met and married the mother of my children (who made an honest Britisher of me) and I discovered as few aliens discover that London is not England. To this day my English has a touch of North Country burr about it, so that I am sometimes flattered to be thought a Scot.
But gems were calling me back. I sold my language schools and was cheated of my money. Now I was a married man and had to start life all over again. Well, back to London and into the trade to which I belonged by early training and natural taste. A hundred pounds was not much money, but it furnished me an office and bought me a safe. It so happened that I made, this time, an extremely lucky start and within a matter of weeks had found my bearings.
London, And So On: Low Company! (continued)
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
I always think it is a pity that whereas men of such lax morals frequently prove as sympathetic and generous as H F when appealed to on behalf of their distressed fellows, many upright men in affluent circumstances show themselves as hard as flint whenever an attempt is made to lay them under contribution in a case of genuine hard luck. Not long ago one who considers himself an ornament to the trade to which I have been privileged to belong for at least twenty years longer than he, reproached me for speaking to a one-time respected dealer who a few days before had come out of gaol after serving a short sentence for having brought stolen jewelry.
‘If I had been younger man,’ I said, ‘with an unformed character and the need to proclaim my business virtue, perhaps I should have hesitated to go near him. But at my age and enjoying the reputation I do, I felt that I could risk my morals if, by talking to a man for a few minutes, I could help to re-establish him in his self-respect. Besides, wasn’t it John Wesley who said, when he saw some malefactor led to executions: ‘There but for the grace of God goes John Wesley? That was how I felt today.’
But to return to my beginnings.
I soon found my money getting low. Then came the old story, new to me, looking for a job. Numberless calls, scores of unanswered letters posted at the expense of many square meals, clean shirt and collar and a pressed suit at all costs. I gave up my boarding-house and found a room under the roof in Great Russell Street at five shillings a week. What qualifications must a man have, I asked myself in bewilderment, that would give him a living wage in this strange and mighty city of London? I was master of three languages, a fluent correspondent, a good bookkeeper, a graduate of the University of Vienna, an expert in metals, and knew as much about gems as any ordinary dealer did. And yet nobody could use my services.
Luckily, however, I had kept in with Mrs Francis my first landlady. She was a motherly person and a lady who had come down in the world. One day I called in to see her and she said: ‘I have good news for you. Father Reilly has lost his job with Pitman’s.’
Father Reilly was the unfrocked Catholic priest who was one of her boarders. His job had been teaching English to foreigners. Mrs Francis, who knew that I was a foreigner who could speak English, thought I would fit the bill. In point of fact, I got the job at a salary of two pounds fifteen shillings a week.
Most of my pupils were older than I was. I remember one, Herr Meltner, mainly because I got him into a continental new service, my intuition having enabled him to qualify as a translator of news items translated from the London dailies. He showed his appreciation by making me free of the bachelor establishment of his new boss. There his chief lived in perfect amity with his paste-and-scissors men in a kind of Bohemian communism which knew no boundary between meum and tuum. Neckties, hats, coats, umbrellas and handkerchiefs were interchangeable property in that queer house of bachelors, but you could always be sure of a good meal there if your tastes included an unvarying passion for herrings doused, herrings fried, herrings marinated, pickled herrings, or herrings stewed with potatoes boiled in their jackets. When funds were ample one feasted on jellied eels, oyster patties, liver sausages, Pomeranian goose breast and iced Munich lager fetched by the pail from a nearby German hotel. It was no uncommon thing for Herr Meltner, long after he had ceased to be my student, to send me a scribbled message by hand saying: ‘Come tonight, great eats.’
Another of my pupils was a German doctor with a liquil ozone treatment as a cure for cancer. I used to translate his lectures and pamphlets for him and on several occasions stood on a platform for him translating his message word for word before the assembled medicos. One of these doctors had a father who ran a scholastic agency in the West End, and this old gentleman was the cause of my leaving London. He got me a job as manager of a language school in Newcastle-on-Tyne.
I spent five years on Tyneside as a professional man, and they were happy years. I made friends, I studied, I met and married the mother of my children (who made an honest Britisher of me) and I discovered as few aliens discover that London is not England. To this day my English has a touch of North Country burr about it, so that I am sometimes flattered to be thought a Scot.
But gems were calling me back. I sold my language schools and was cheated of my money. Now I was a married man and had to start life all over again. Well, back to London and into the trade to which I belonged by early training and natural taste. A hundred pounds was not much money, but it furnished me an office and bought me a safe. It so happened that I made, this time, an extremely lucky start and within a matter of weeks had found my bearings.
London, And So On: Low Company! (continued)
On The Waterfront
On The Waterfront (1954)
Directed by: Elia Kazan
Screenplay: Malcolm Johnson (suggested by articles); Budd Schulberg
Cast: Marlon Brando, Karl Malden, Lee J. Cobb, Eva Marie Saint
(via YouTube): On the Waterfront
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BflTajAbf6M
Marlon Brando's Famous ‘On the Waterfront’ Speech
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prXXOxCPNek
On The Waterfront
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0aNo5IqF4U
I think it was a powerfully realistic film + Marlon Brando gave one of his best performances. I enjoyed it.
Directed by: Elia Kazan
Screenplay: Malcolm Johnson (suggested by articles); Budd Schulberg
Cast: Marlon Brando, Karl Malden, Lee J. Cobb, Eva Marie Saint
(via YouTube): On the Waterfront
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BflTajAbf6M
Marlon Brando's Famous ‘On the Waterfront’ Speech
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prXXOxCPNek
On The Waterfront
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0aNo5IqF4U
I think it was a powerfully realistic film + Marlon Brando gave one of his best performances. I enjoyed it.
Marilynmania
David Kirby writes about Marilyn Monroe's personal property (approximately 1,000 items) + the investment concept along with the Beatles and Babe Ruth + her historical significance + other viewpoints @ http://www.artnewsonline.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=787
Heard On The Street
Nothing bad ever happens. The lesson (s) finally being learned by participants in the gem/art markets is that even though there may be short-term problems, in the end everything will be OK.
Friday, December 28, 2007
DTC Flight 79 – Not Final
Chaim Even-Zohar writes about the 79 Diamond Trading Company (DTC) Sightholders + Best Practice Principles (BPP) issues + setting the standards + other viewpoints @ http://www.idexonline.com/portal_FullEditorial.asp
Useful link:
www.kroll.com
Useful link:
www.kroll.com
King Kong
King Kong (1933)
Directed by: Merian C. Cooper, Ernest B. Schoedsack
Screenplay: Merian C. Cooper, Edgar Wallace (story); James Ashmore Creelman, Ruth Rose
Cast: Fay Wray, Robert Armstrong, Bruce Cabot
(via YouTube): King Kong 1933 movie part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlVZxzvRB-U
King Kong (1933) – colorized
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jz77RxYhtoQ
Ray Harryhausen in 1995 talks about King Kong (1933)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkHJ0Yp5IJU
A great movie + the look in his eyes as the planes shoot him off the Empire State building remains the greatest single special effects shot ever made. I enjoyed it.
Directed by: Merian C. Cooper, Ernest B. Schoedsack
Screenplay: Merian C. Cooper, Edgar Wallace (story); James Ashmore Creelman, Ruth Rose
Cast: Fay Wray, Robert Armstrong, Bruce Cabot
(via YouTube): King Kong 1933 movie part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlVZxzvRB-U
King Kong (1933) – colorized
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jz77RxYhtoQ
Ray Harryhausen in 1995 talks about King Kong (1933)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkHJ0Yp5IJU
A great movie + the look in his eyes as the planes shoot him off the Empire State building remains the greatest single special effects shot ever made. I enjoyed it.
George W. Bush
Seth Gitell writes about George W. Bush's taste for American Western art + other viewpoints @ http://www.artnewsonline.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=792
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
Art is the mirror of life, and a great part of the fascination of old pictures is that in them are reflected the great upheavals of history. We have seen how Florentine art was affected by the preaching first of St Francis of Assisi and afterwards of Savonarola. Now the most formidable antagonists that the Lutheran Reformers had to face, alike in action and in thought, were the Spaniards. The movement of the counter-Reformation originated and flourished in Spain. As the Spaniards in the Middle Ages had battled against the Moors till they won their land for Christianity, so they fought against the paganism of the Roman Church during the sixteenth century and strove with equal determination later against the Reformers, whom they regarded as heretics. The herald of this last battle was Ignatius Loyola, and he and his creation, the Order of the Jesuits, proved to be the most dangerous and powerful adversary of Protestantism.
El Greco’s picture ‘Christ driving the Traders from the Temple,’ in the National Gallery, may be regarded as symbolizing the purification of the Church by Loyola, but it is by his treatment infinitely more than by his choice of subject that El Greco expresses that vein of ‘convulsed mysticism which was the peculiar attribute of Spanish Catholicism. El Greco as he grew older seemed to take delight in distorting natural forms. There is something savage, brutal even, in his art, and his deep earnestness gives grandeur to terrible things. The generally acknowledged masterpiece and most characteristic work by El Greco is his picture in the church of San Tomé in Toledo, in which the members of a knightly order solemnly attend the funeral of Count Orgaz. The corpse is lowered into the ground by two saints, while Christ, Mary, martyrs, and angels hover in the air, and this ‘abrupt union of actual with transcendental’—as Dr Muther puts it—together with the uncanny, slightly exaggerated forms found in parts of the picture, confess a touch of hysteria.
By a curious coincidence the tercentenary of El Greco was celebrated in 1914, at a moment when the whole of Europe was again in a turmoil and minds were full of hatred and thoughts of violence. To a generation excited by war and rumors of war the suppressed violence in El Greco’s pictures was irresistibly attractive. Some very advanced critics and ultra progressive painters found in his neurotic temperament their ideal Old Master. El Greco was reputed to have held that color was of far more importance than form of drawing, and if this belief was once regarded as ‘curious anticipation of modern ideas,’ these ‘modern ideas’ are themselves now out of date, drawing and design being now generally accepted as the foundation of all good art. El Greco’s pictures are far from being formless. Historically and psychologically the paintings of El Greco are of the highest interest; but they are a dangerous model for the art student.
Another foreign artist, who if he did not succeed in expressing the spirit of the time nevertheless influenced Spanish painting considerably, was Sir Anthony More, who, visited Spain, and during his stay there, about 1551-2, set a style of portraiture which served as a model for Coello (1515-90) and other Spanish court-painters.
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain (continued)
Art is the mirror of life, and a great part of the fascination of old pictures is that in them are reflected the great upheavals of history. We have seen how Florentine art was affected by the preaching first of St Francis of Assisi and afterwards of Savonarola. Now the most formidable antagonists that the Lutheran Reformers had to face, alike in action and in thought, were the Spaniards. The movement of the counter-Reformation originated and flourished in Spain. As the Spaniards in the Middle Ages had battled against the Moors till they won their land for Christianity, so they fought against the paganism of the Roman Church during the sixteenth century and strove with equal determination later against the Reformers, whom they regarded as heretics. The herald of this last battle was Ignatius Loyola, and he and his creation, the Order of the Jesuits, proved to be the most dangerous and powerful adversary of Protestantism.
El Greco’s picture ‘Christ driving the Traders from the Temple,’ in the National Gallery, may be regarded as symbolizing the purification of the Church by Loyola, but it is by his treatment infinitely more than by his choice of subject that El Greco expresses that vein of ‘convulsed mysticism which was the peculiar attribute of Spanish Catholicism. El Greco as he grew older seemed to take delight in distorting natural forms. There is something savage, brutal even, in his art, and his deep earnestness gives grandeur to terrible things. The generally acknowledged masterpiece and most characteristic work by El Greco is his picture in the church of San Tomé in Toledo, in which the members of a knightly order solemnly attend the funeral of Count Orgaz. The corpse is lowered into the ground by two saints, while Christ, Mary, martyrs, and angels hover in the air, and this ‘abrupt union of actual with transcendental’—as Dr Muther puts it—together with the uncanny, slightly exaggerated forms found in parts of the picture, confess a touch of hysteria.
By a curious coincidence the tercentenary of El Greco was celebrated in 1914, at a moment when the whole of Europe was again in a turmoil and minds were full of hatred and thoughts of violence. To a generation excited by war and rumors of war the suppressed violence in El Greco’s pictures was irresistibly attractive. Some very advanced critics and ultra progressive painters found in his neurotic temperament their ideal Old Master. El Greco was reputed to have held that color was of far more importance than form of drawing, and if this belief was once regarded as ‘curious anticipation of modern ideas,’ these ‘modern ideas’ are themselves now out of date, drawing and design being now generally accepted as the foundation of all good art. El Greco’s pictures are far from being formless. Historically and psychologically the paintings of El Greco are of the highest interest; but they are a dangerous model for the art student.
Another foreign artist, who if he did not succeed in expressing the spirit of the time nevertheless influenced Spanish painting considerably, was Sir Anthony More, who, visited Spain, and during his stay there, about 1551-2, set a style of portraiture which served as a model for Coello (1515-90) and other Spanish court-painters.
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain (continued)
London, And So On: Low Company!
Louis Kornitzer's book, Gem Trader, is partly autobiographical and partly woven round the lore of pearls. It's educational + explains the distribution chain of gems, as they pass from hand to hand, from miner to cutter, from merchant to millionaire, from courtesan to receiver of stolen goods, shaping human lives as they go + the unique characters in the gem industry.
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
But it must not be thought that the London police, with their widespread net of ‘information received’ and who are famed for their astuteness, did not from time to time gather in the fish whose predatory boldness had outgrown their caution. It is in the public interest that the police should often tolerate the existence of meeting places frequented by known ‘bad hats’. For where men walk in the twilight of the law, valuable information is liable to leak out from within, and what is more, many a suspect is steadily kept under observation until his cup of iniquity is full and he is duly gathered in.
But it is only the unthinking man who draws a thick line between the criminal and the honest classes, or who imagines that even a notorious breaker of the law is devoid of all good qualities, or per contra that he who is known as a good man and a law-abiding citizen has no criminal tendencies whatsoever. Just as we all carry millions of germs waiting for their opportunity in our moments of physical weakness, so do criminal tendencies lurk in the best of men. I have discovered from my own experience )and I am a more or less normal type) that nothing short of constant vigilance will keep a man from succumbing to temptations of one kind or another. Unchecked passions, the gradual and almost unperceived acquisition of expensive habits or tastes, the desire to shine or to go one better than one’s neighbor, any of those factors may bring an otherwise well-intentioned man into conflict with the law and so to social ruin. Half the impulses of mankind are honest and law-abiding; that is why we have police. But half are concerned with short cuts to getting what one wants; that is why we need police.
There occurs to me the case of I B (the initials were misleading. He was mild-mannered, quiet-living teacher in an elementary school whose only diversion was the study of the classics and who denied himself the smallest luxury in order to assist those poorer than himself. He had come to the notice of a diamond merchant who took him into his employ. Eventually he set up in business on his own account, and his industry, marked ability and reputation for straightforwardness gained him unlimited credit in the trade.
Then after twenty years of unremitting labor he one day called his creditors and informed them that whilst on a journey he had been robbed of the wallets containing his whole valuable stock, which was only partly insured. Some of the creditors, knowing his reputation, were ready to believe this story and were prepared to accept a composition of two shillings and sixpence in the pound to save him from bankruptcy. They were even willing to help give him a fresh start. But there were others less prepared to forgo their just claims without further probing. They applied for a search-warrant, as a consequence of which the whole of the missing stock was discovered hidden beneath the brick floor of his wine cellar. It was a clumsy bit of work, and the penalty, though not a gaol sentence, since his creditors refused to prosecute, was an ostracism so severe that the offender dared never again show his face amongst reputable traders in any of the great gem centers of the world.
When many years after I ran up against him in San Francisco, I asked him point-blank what had possessed him to do such a thing, as he had been perfectly solvent at the time. He said simply, and I believe truthfully, that having devoted so many years to business, he thought the time had come for him to retire on a sufficient competency in order to devote the rest of his life to social and charitable works.
Another public benefactor was H F (again the initials betray nothing of the man), whose genius for organization was so great that had he been in the army he might have risen to be quartermaster-general. Instead, having started as a mere working jeweler with practically no means of his own, his peculiar gift only began to shine forth when he first made contact with a master criminal for whom the police of two continents had lain in wait for years. He was the reality of which the writer of ‘thrillers’ dreams, the human spider in the midst of a worldwide web of crime.
Master thief and organizing genius together, they built up a perfect organization in which every international jewel thief had membership and drew his pay in accordance with services rendered. So much for the member who furnished valuable information or who carefully prepared diagrams of chosen localities. So much for the snatch-thief, the car-burglar, the safe-breaker, terms more generous than the average ‘fence’ would pay; a liberal allowance to those who could be trusted to follow a dealer in gems half-way round the world before, at an opportune moment, relieving him of his goods without violence. H F disliked violence, and was prejudiced against murder.
To cover their tracks the astute heads of this gang had in their pay in every important center experts who could rapidly remove gems from their settings, smelt down the precious metal into bars, alter the size of stones by recutting them and of pearls by reducing their weights. Everywhere there were others, too, brokers who were not squeamish about handling ‘cheap’ goods and asked no questions. ‘Ask no questions and you will be told no lies’ was a saying as constantly on the lips of H F as on those of a nursemaid. It was a motto that appeared to pay him as well as honesty in another wise saw, for H F died in his own bed and left a handsome estate to his children. It might have been even larger but for the fact that H F was a known philanthropist, whose hand was as often in his pocket as the hands of his underlings were in the pockets of other men.
London, And So On: Low Company! (continued)
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
But it must not be thought that the London police, with their widespread net of ‘information received’ and who are famed for their astuteness, did not from time to time gather in the fish whose predatory boldness had outgrown their caution. It is in the public interest that the police should often tolerate the existence of meeting places frequented by known ‘bad hats’. For where men walk in the twilight of the law, valuable information is liable to leak out from within, and what is more, many a suspect is steadily kept under observation until his cup of iniquity is full and he is duly gathered in.
But it is only the unthinking man who draws a thick line between the criminal and the honest classes, or who imagines that even a notorious breaker of the law is devoid of all good qualities, or per contra that he who is known as a good man and a law-abiding citizen has no criminal tendencies whatsoever. Just as we all carry millions of germs waiting for their opportunity in our moments of physical weakness, so do criminal tendencies lurk in the best of men. I have discovered from my own experience )and I am a more or less normal type) that nothing short of constant vigilance will keep a man from succumbing to temptations of one kind or another. Unchecked passions, the gradual and almost unperceived acquisition of expensive habits or tastes, the desire to shine or to go one better than one’s neighbor, any of those factors may bring an otherwise well-intentioned man into conflict with the law and so to social ruin. Half the impulses of mankind are honest and law-abiding; that is why we have police. But half are concerned with short cuts to getting what one wants; that is why we need police.
There occurs to me the case of I B (the initials were misleading. He was mild-mannered, quiet-living teacher in an elementary school whose only diversion was the study of the classics and who denied himself the smallest luxury in order to assist those poorer than himself. He had come to the notice of a diamond merchant who took him into his employ. Eventually he set up in business on his own account, and his industry, marked ability and reputation for straightforwardness gained him unlimited credit in the trade.
Then after twenty years of unremitting labor he one day called his creditors and informed them that whilst on a journey he had been robbed of the wallets containing his whole valuable stock, which was only partly insured. Some of the creditors, knowing his reputation, were ready to believe this story and were prepared to accept a composition of two shillings and sixpence in the pound to save him from bankruptcy. They were even willing to help give him a fresh start. But there were others less prepared to forgo their just claims without further probing. They applied for a search-warrant, as a consequence of which the whole of the missing stock was discovered hidden beneath the brick floor of his wine cellar. It was a clumsy bit of work, and the penalty, though not a gaol sentence, since his creditors refused to prosecute, was an ostracism so severe that the offender dared never again show his face amongst reputable traders in any of the great gem centers of the world.
When many years after I ran up against him in San Francisco, I asked him point-blank what had possessed him to do such a thing, as he had been perfectly solvent at the time. He said simply, and I believe truthfully, that having devoted so many years to business, he thought the time had come for him to retire on a sufficient competency in order to devote the rest of his life to social and charitable works.
Another public benefactor was H F (again the initials betray nothing of the man), whose genius for organization was so great that had he been in the army he might have risen to be quartermaster-general. Instead, having started as a mere working jeweler with practically no means of his own, his peculiar gift only began to shine forth when he first made contact with a master criminal for whom the police of two continents had lain in wait for years. He was the reality of which the writer of ‘thrillers’ dreams, the human spider in the midst of a worldwide web of crime.
Master thief and organizing genius together, they built up a perfect organization in which every international jewel thief had membership and drew his pay in accordance with services rendered. So much for the member who furnished valuable information or who carefully prepared diagrams of chosen localities. So much for the snatch-thief, the car-burglar, the safe-breaker, terms more generous than the average ‘fence’ would pay; a liberal allowance to those who could be trusted to follow a dealer in gems half-way round the world before, at an opportune moment, relieving him of his goods without violence. H F disliked violence, and was prejudiced against murder.
To cover their tracks the astute heads of this gang had in their pay in every important center experts who could rapidly remove gems from their settings, smelt down the precious metal into bars, alter the size of stones by recutting them and of pearls by reducing their weights. Everywhere there were others, too, brokers who were not squeamish about handling ‘cheap’ goods and asked no questions. ‘Ask no questions and you will be told no lies’ was a saying as constantly on the lips of H F as on those of a nursemaid. It was a motto that appeared to pay him as well as honesty in another wise saw, for H F died in his own bed and left a handsome estate to his children. It might have been even larger but for the fact that H F was a known philanthropist, whose hand was as often in his pocket as the hands of his underlings were in the pockets of other men.
London, And So On: Low Company! (continued)
Gold
According to the World Gold Council gold offers good protection against exchange rate fluctuations, particularly the US dollar + industry analysts believe gold will break the magical figure of US$1000 an ounce in 2008 due to uncertainities in the financial markets + India and China is also playing its role putting upward pressure on gold.
Thursday, December 27, 2007
London, And So On: Low Company!
Louis Kornitzer's book, Gem Trader, is partly autobiographical and partly woven round the lore of pearls. It's educational + explains the distribution chain of gems, as they pass from hand to hand, from miner to cutter, from merchant to millionaire, from courtesan to receiver of stolen goods, shaping human lives as they go + the unique characters in the gem industry.
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
I had not provided myself with letter of introduction to influential people as I might well have done. Being young, foolish and self-reliant, I thought these were superfluous. I know now that it was a mistake, for a single letter might well have saved me, as it turned out, years of drudgery, heartache and futile groping for that first rung of ladder which is most elusive of all.
As in Paris, the legitimate gem trade was a closed circle jealously guarded, but there was in London then no Diamond Club such as I had known on the Continent, where the dealers in gems could forgather daily and govern the trade for the good of them all. True, there was a meeting place of sorts for traders in gems in Hatton Garden which occupied the site facing the present sub post office in that thoroughfare. But this place was frequented by many shady characters and was as much visited by Scotland Yard men as by the ‘merchants’ themselves.
I visited the ‘African Café’ perhaps once or twice out of curiosity in all the years I knew of it before it was summarily closed down. It was a cramped basement parlor which let no sunlight in, and the traders who went there had to come up from the depths to inspect goods in the narrow entrance.
On the second occasion on which curiosity drew me there, I stood hesitating for a brief moment with one foot on the pavement and the other on the first worn flag of the steps, uncertain whether to venture down into those unsavory depths. Two foreign-looking bearded men scrutinized me closely and shouted out a warning to those below, but at that moment two gentlewomen came along the street, stopped close by me, and one of them said: ‘Is this the place where the diamond merchants meet?’
I said rather dubiously that it was. ‘Are you a diamond merchant, then?’ queried the other lady.
I hesitated in my answer, but before I could speak her companion save me from the temptation to lie and said smilingly: ‘Of course he is, dear, or he wouldn’t be here.’
Heaven knew that I was in sore need of turning an honest shilling. I did not deny the statement. I was not long left in doubt of the kind of service the ladies expected. They wished to dispose of some odds and ends of old-fashioned jewelry which had been left to them by a relative. Being somewhat strong-minded and not desiring to hawk the things about, they had come straight to Hatton Garden. I did not let them down. The next day I called on them in company of a well-to-do kerb merchant of good reputation who paid them a hundred and fifty pounds. I got a very welcome five pounds out of the transaction. But I had no illusions. Five pound notes do not fall out of the sky every day, even in London, city of marvels.
Although I never chose to have much to do with the habitués of the African Café, I nevertheless learned much of their doings and had pointed out to me many a fellow whom the Paris Service de Sûreté and London Scotland Yard would have given much to get into their hands. But they were such cunning devils that for many years they managed to evade the clutches of the law while living in great luxury on the proceeds of their interesting activities. Although most of these men have since gone to their long reckoning, it would be doing a disservice to their families to mention them by name. I know several professional men of good repute and sterling character who owed their first chances in life to a father with a mistaken idea of taking ‘desperate chances’ for the sake of his offspring.
London, And So On: Low Company! (continued)
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
I had not provided myself with letter of introduction to influential people as I might well have done. Being young, foolish and self-reliant, I thought these were superfluous. I know now that it was a mistake, for a single letter might well have saved me, as it turned out, years of drudgery, heartache and futile groping for that first rung of ladder which is most elusive of all.
As in Paris, the legitimate gem trade was a closed circle jealously guarded, but there was in London then no Diamond Club such as I had known on the Continent, where the dealers in gems could forgather daily and govern the trade for the good of them all. True, there was a meeting place of sorts for traders in gems in Hatton Garden which occupied the site facing the present sub post office in that thoroughfare. But this place was frequented by many shady characters and was as much visited by Scotland Yard men as by the ‘merchants’ themselves.
I visited the ‘African Café’ perhaps once or twice out of curiosity in all the years I knew of it before it was summarily closed down. It was a cramped basement parlor which let no sunlight in, and the traders who went there had to come up from the depths to inspect goods in the narrow entrance.
On the second occasion on which curiosity drew me there, I stood hesitating for a brief moment with one foot on the pavement and the other on the first worn flag of the steps, uncertain whether to venture down into those unsavory depths. Two foreign-looking bearded men scrutinized me closely and shouted out a warning to those below, but at that moment two gentlewomen came along the street, stopped close by me, and one of them said: ‘Is this the place where the diamond merchants meet?’
I said rather dubiously that it was. ‘Are you a diamond merchant, then?’ queried the other lady.
I hesitated in my answer, but before I could speak her companion save me from the temptation to lie and said smilingly: ‘Of course he is, dear, or he wouldn’t be here.’
Heaven knew that I was in sore need of turning an honest shilling. I did not deny the statement. I was not long left in doubt of the kind of service the ladies expected. They wished to dispose of some odds and ends of old-fashioned jewelry which had been left to them by a relative. Being somewhat strong-minded and not desiring to hawk the things about, they had come straight to Hatton Garden. I did not let them down. The next day I called on them in company of a well-to-do kerb merchant of good reputation who paid them a hundred and fifty pounds. I got a very welcome five pounds out of the transaction. But I had no illusions. Five pound notes do not fall out of the sky every day, even in London, city of marvels.
Although I never chose to have much to do with the habitués of the African Café, I nevertheless learned much of their doings and had pointed out to me many a fellow whom the Paris Service de Sûreté and London Scotland Yard would have given much to get into their hands. But they were such cunning devils that for many years they managed to evade the clutches of the law while living in great luxury on the proceeds of their interesting activities. Although most of these men have since gone to their long reckoning, it would be doing a disservice to their families to mention them by name. I know several professional men of good repute and sterling character who owed their first chances in life to a father with a mistaken idea of taking ‘desperate chances’ for the sake of his offspring.
London, And So On: Low Company! (continued)
Heard On The Street
The experienced gem/art dealer understands that in order to be successful they need to learn to respond to the markets and not react. There is no quick fix to anything. It’s an interesting journey + work each day with total internal reflection and clarity, and the year will take care of itself.
The Man With A Camera
The Man With A Camera (1929)
Directed by: Dziga Vertov
Screenplay: Dziga Vertov
(via YouTube): The Man with a Movie Camera (silent - 1929)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00ZciIC4JPw
It's a fine innovative film + it's interesting to see the old Russia. I enjoyed it.
Directed by: Dziga Vertov
Screenplay: Dziga Vertov
(via YouTube): The Man with a Movie Camera (silent - 1929)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00ZciIC4JPw
It's a fine innovative film + it's interesting to see the old Russia. I enjoyed it.
Personal Gallery From Kitaj's Kitchen Wall Goes On Sale
(via The Guardian) Maev Kennedy writes about the art collection of the late RB Kitaj + other viewpoints @ http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/news/story/0,,2230853,00.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/gallery/2007/dec/21/1?picture=331873654
http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/gallery/2007/dec/21/1?picture=331873654
Al Gore
Total internal reflections of Albert Gore, Jr on art + other viewpoints @ http://www.artnewsonline.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=791
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
The Art Of El Greco, Veazquez, And Murillo
1
When one thinks of Spain and art, the name of Velazquez jumps into the mind at once. Indeed, to most people, his is the only name in Spanish painting of outstanding importance. Looking back over the whole history of art in Spain, Velazquez’s figure overshadows that of everyone who went before him and of all who have come after him. In a sense, he is the only great painter Spain has produced. He interpreted the life of his time in terms that appeal universally, and no art has had more influence than his on modern painters.
How art came to Spain must now briefly be related. Until the fifteenth century there was little painting in Spain, and then, owing to the political connection of Spain with the Netherlands, the influence was markedly Flemish. It will be remembered that Jan van Eyck visited Spain in 1428, and the brilliant reception he received there induced other Flemish artists to visit the peninsula. Later, when Naples and the Sicily's came under the dominion of the Spanish crown, Italian art set the fashion to Spanish painters and particularly, as we might expect, the art of Naples. The Neapolitan School owed its origin to Michael Angelo Amerigi, called Caravaggio (1569-1609) from his birthplace near Milan. Undaunted by the great achievements of the Italian painters who immediately preceded him, Caravaggio sought to form an independent style of his own based on a bold imitation of Nature. While he was working in Venice and Rome, this astute student of Nature saw his contemporaries falling into decadence because they were artists imitating art. The seventeenth century painters of Rome, Florence, and Venice degenerated into mere copyists of Titian, Tintoretto, Raphael, and Michael Angelo. Caravaggio saw their error, and perceiving that art based on art leads to decadence, he gave his whole attention to Nature and so became a pioneer of realism. By choice he elected to paint scenes taken from the ordinary life of his day, and ‘The Card Cheaters’ is an admirable example of the novelty both of his subject and of his treatment. The novelty in his treatment chiefly consisted of the use Caravaggio made of light and shade (technically known as chiaroscuro) to enforce the dramatic intensity of his pictures. He exaggerated his shadows, which were far too black to be scrupulously faithful to Nature, but by the emphasis he thus gave to his lights he produced original and arresting effects which undoubtedly had a powerful influence on the two greatest painters of the next generation. How widespread was his authority is proved by the extent to which he prepared the way for both Velazquez and Rembrandt.
After working in Milan, Venice, and Rome, Caravaggio settled in Naples, where among those influenced by his realism was the Spanish painter Josef Ribera (1588-1650). ‘The Dead Christ’ in the National Gallery, London, is an example of Ribera’s stern naturalism.
Through Ribera the influence of Caravaggio penetrated to Spain, but already that country had had its art sense profoundly stirred by a foreign artist who not merely visited Spain, as other artists had done, but made it his home. This was Dominico Theotocopuli, who from having been born at Candia, Crete, was universally called El Greco, that is to say ‘The Greek’. El Greco (1545-1614), as we shall call him, went to Venice as a young man of twenty five and worked there for a time under Titian. About 1575 he migrated to Spain and settled at Toledo, where he became affected by the great religious fervor which was then agitating the peninsula.
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain (continued)
The Art Of El Greco, Veazquez, And Murillo
1
When one thinks of Spain and art, the name of Velazquez jumps into the mind at once. Indeed, to most people, his is the only name in Spanish painting of outstanding importance. Looking back over the whole history of art in Spain, Velazquez’s figure overshadows that of everyone who went before him and of all who have come after him. In a sense, he is the only great painter Spain has produced. He interpreted the life of his time in terms that appeal universally, and no art has had more influence than his on modern painters.
How art came to Spain must now briefly be related. Until the fifteenth century there was little painting in Spain, and then, owing to the political connection of Spain with the Netherlands, the influence was markedly Flemish. It will be remembered that Jan van Eyck visited Spain in 1428, and the brilliant reception he received there induced other Flemish artists to visit the peninsula. Later, when Naples and the Sicily's came under the dominion of the Spanish crown, Italian art set the fashion to Spanish painters and particularly, as we might expect, the art of Naples. The Neapolitan School owed its origin to Michael Angelo Amerigi, called Caravaggio (1569-1609) from his birthplace near Milan. Undaunted by the great achievements of the Italian painters who immediately preceded him, Caravaggio sought to form an independent style of his own based on a bold imitation of Nature. While he was working in Venice and Rome, this astute student of Nature saw his contemporaries falling into decadence because they were artists imitating art. The seventeenth century painters of Rome, Florence, and Venice degenerated into mere copyists of Titian, Tintoretto, Raphael, and Michael Angelo. Caravaggio saw their error, and perceiving that art based on art leads to decadence, he gave his whole attention to Nature and so became a pioneer of realism. By choice he elected to paint scenes taken from the ordinary life of his day, and ‘The Card Cheaters’ is an admirable example of the novelty both of his subject and of his treatment. The novelty in his treatment chiefly consisted of the use Caravaggio made of light and shade (technically known as chiaroscuro) to enforce the dramatic intensity of his pictures. He exaggerated his shadows, which were far too black to be scrupulously faithful to Nature, but by the emphasis he thus gave to his lights he produced original and arresting effects which undoubtedly had a powerful influence on the two greatest painters of the next generation. How widespread was his authority is proved by the extent to which he prepared the way for both Velazquez and Rembrandt.
After working in Milan, Venice, and Rome, Caravaggio settled in Naples, where among those influenced by his realism was the Spanish painter Josef Ribera (1588-1650). ‘The Dead Christ’ in the National Gallery, London, is an example of Ribera’s stern naturalism.
Through Ribera the influence of Caravaggio penetrated to Spain, but already that country had had its art sense profoundly stirred by a foreign artist who not merely visited Spain, as other artists had done, but made it his home. This was Dominico Theotocopuli, who from having been born at Candia, Crete, was universally called El Greco, that is to say ‘The Greek’. El Greco (1545-1614), as we shall call him, went to Venice as a young man of twenty five and worked there for a time under Titian. About 1575 he migrated to Spain and settled at Toledo, where he became affected by the great religious fervor which was then agitating the peninsula.
Sunshine And Shadow In Spain (continued)
Louis XVI’s Ceremonial Sword
(via Diamond Cuts in Historic Jewelry:1381-1910) Herbert Tillander writes:
Perhaps the most detailed reference to the existence and use of large V-Cut Roses is in the description of the ceremonial sword which Louis XVI of France commissioned in 1784. The sword itself disappeared in 1792, when the Crown Jewels were stolen, and illustration of it, other than of the original design, have survived. However, a great deal of information can be gleaned from the French Crown inventories and other official records.
The six largest V-Cut Roses weighed an average of 10 ct each. The gems came into the possession of the Treasury in the mid-seventeenth century, and in 1691 were described as ‘spread’ and ‘overspread’ (a facettes d’étendue and de toute étendue). They were not considered worth recutting when the rest of the obsolete cuts in the Treasury were sent to Antwerp to be refashioned. There was also an enormous number of small Roses. Two thousand of these were specially ordered.
The V-Cut Roses were removed by thieves, but were eventually recovered and returned to the Treasury. They were used again during the reign of Napoleon I in a pair of opulent jewels but, sadly, no illustrations were ever made of them and they disappeared completely when the remaining French Crown Jewels were sold in 1887.
Perhaps the most detailed reference to the existence and use of large V-Cut Roses is in the description of the ceremonial sword which Louis XVI of France commissioned in 1784. The sword itself disappeared in 1792, when the Crown Jewels were stolen, and illustration of it, other than of the original design, have survived. However, a great deal of information can be gleaned from the French Crown inventories and other official records.
The six largest V-Cut Roses weighed an average of 10 ct each. The gems came into the possession of the Treasury in the mid-seventeenth century, and in 1691 were described as ‘spread’ and ‘overspread’ (a facettes d’étendue and de toute étendue). They were not considered worth recutting when the rest of the obsolete cuts in the Treasury were sent to Antwerp to be refashioned. There was also an enormous number of small Roses. Two thousand of these were specially ordered.
The V-Cut Roses were removed by thieves, but were eventually recovered and returned to the Treasury. They were used again during the reign of Napoleon I in a pair of opulent jewels but, sadly, no illustrations were ever made of them and they disappeared completely when the remaining French Crown Jewels were sold in 1887.
Zaveri Bazaar
Anil Patil writes about Zaveri Bazaar or the Gold Market in Mumbai, India, the best place to deal in gold + other viewpoints @ http://www.commodityonline.com/news/specials/newsdetails.php?id=4304
I love this place + it's chaotic + I think it's the place to learn the ropes of the trade.
I love this place + it's chaotic + I think it's the place to learn the ropes of the trade.
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
The Lady Eve
The Lady Eve (1941)
Directed by: Preston Sturges
Screenplay: Monckton Hoffe (story); Preston Sturges
Cast: Barbara Stanwyck, Henry Fonda
(via YouTube): The Lady Eve (1941) Full Film - Part 1/9
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFV3TMRu8fw
I think the movie is great with the right tone + energy + performances. I enjoyed it.
Directed by: Preston Sturges
Screenplay: Monckton Hoffe (story); Preston Sturges
Cast: Barbara Stanwyck, Henry Fonda
(via YouTube): The Lady Eve (1941) Full Film - Part 1/9
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFV3TMRu8fw
I think the movie is great with the right tone + energy + performances. I enjoyed it.
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