(via Diamond Cuts in Historic Jewelry:1381-1910) Herbert Tillander writes:
A masterpiece in gold and colored enamel, the crown was made for the coronation in 1596 of Christian IV of Denmark by Dirk Fyring and Corvinianus Sauer. It was set with pearls and with 294 diamonds—large Table Cuts, numerous Gothic Roses with both basic and trihedral faceting, and two diamond Rosettes.
Sauer, a well-known creative goldsmith, was born in Augsburg but learned his trade in France and Venice. He was employed by Fyring, a master goldsmith from north Germany, and came to Odense some time before 1581 to work for the Danish royal family. A number of his drawings are incorporated in a book of designs by Jacob Moore, now in the Hamburg City Library. Moore redesigned Sauer’s creations and therefore the diamonds may not all be correctly reproduced in his book.
Friday, December 21, 2007
Venom
(via New Yorker): In my view, the New Yorker magazine article titled 'Spider Woman' (March 5, 2007 issue, "A Reporter at Large" segment) provides a interesting 'blink' when you analyze the concept in the gem/art market perspective. I have heard gem/art dealers describing 'Venom Syndrome' with various interpretations. Then I came across the article + it makes sense. 'A single spider can inject its victims with as many as two hundred compounds: proteases that dissolve flesh, gelatinases that dissolve connective tissues, neurotoxins that short-circuit nerves, slow the heart, and freeze the limbs. A spider's venom offers a window onto its evolution, Bindford says — a chemical record of its most successful experiments at killing prey.'
The World's 10 Most Polluted Places 2007
(via Forbes): The World's 10 Most Polluted Places 2007
1. Summit, Azerbaijan
2. Lin-fen, China
3. Tianjin, China
4. Sukinda, India
5. Vapi, India
6. La Oroya, Peru
7. Dzerzinsk, Russia
8. Norilsk, Russia
9. Chernobyl, Ukraine
10. Kabwe, Zambia
1. Summit, Azerbaijan
2. Lin-fen, China
3. Tianjin, China
4. Sukinda, India
5. Vapi, India
6. La Oroya, Peru
7. Dzerzinsk, Russia
8. Norilsk, Russia
9. Chernobyl, Ukraine
10. Kabwe, Zambia
A Hard Day's Night
A Hard Day's Night (1964)
Directed by: Richard Lester
Screenplay: Alun Owen
Cast: John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Ringo Starr
(via YouTube): The Beatles - A Hard Days Night Trailer Film
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4XVCCiix7So
A Hard Day's Night Part One
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkKra3_pfBY
A Hard Day's Night Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42toNH3W_hA
A unique pop musical + funny + joyous + good songs. I enjoyed it.
Directed by: Richard Lester
Screenplay: Alun Owen
Cast: John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Ringo Starr
(via YouTube): The Beatles - A Hard Days Night Trailer Film
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4XVCCiix7So
A Hard Day's Night Part One
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkKra3_pfBY
A Hard Day's Night Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42toNH3W_hA
A unique pop musical + funny + joyous + good songs. I enjoyed it.
Great Paper
Economist writes about a Magna Carta, the most famous document in history, which was originally issued by Britain’s King John in 1215 + this comment (David Redden, a resident scholar at Sotheby's): 'This is a very deep market with very deep pockets. I'd say that the estimate of $20m-30m for Magna Carta is, if anything, conservative' + other viewpoints @ http://www.economist.com/daily/columns/artview/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10312722
(via BBC) Charting Out The Magna Carta
The latest chapter in the history of the Magna Carta is the sale of one example of it, sealed by King Edward I and dating from 1297, which has been sold at Sotheby's in New York for £10.6m ($21.3m).
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7150403.stm
(via BBC) Charting Out The Magna Carta
The latest chapter in the history of the Magna Carta is the sale of one example of it, sealed by King Edward I and dating from 1297, which has been sold at Sotheby's in New York for £10.6m ($21.3m).
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7150403.stm
Art 2.0: A Mashup Of Techniques
Art 2.0: A Mashup Of Techniques
http://fastcompany.com/multimedia/slideshows/content/alex-ostroy.html
Brilliant!
http://fastcompany.com/multimedia/slideshows/content/alex-ostroy.html
Brilliant!
Making Waves
Rosa Lowinger writes about Kcho, the quintessential Cuban artist of the 'special period' + the concept of travel and migration in the context of his country's recent history in his work + other viewpoints @ http://www.artnewsonline.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=725
The Dawn Of The Reformation
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
Never did that sovereign do a wiser or a better thing for himself than when he made Holbein his painter. Not only did the artist present that king to posterity in a manner that mitigates our judgement of his cruelties, but he has made the whole history of that period live for us, as no previous period in English history lives, by his series of portraits and portrait drawings of the English Court. Mr Ford Madox Hueffer has pointedly observed:
How comparatively cold we are left by the name, say of Edward III, a great king surrounded by great men in a stirring period. No visual image comes to the mind’s eye: at most we see, imaginatively, coins and the seals that depend from charters.
Mr Hueffer truly argues that Henry VIII and his men would be just as lifeless without Holbein, and the way he has made them live in our imagination is a tribute not only to Holbein but also to the preserving power of art.
While preparing the way for his advancement in England, Holbein did not neglect the connection he already had on the Continent, and three years before his appointment as Court Painter he sought to widen and enhance his foreign custom by painting another show piece: ‘The Ambassadors’ was painted deliberately to force an entry into diplomatic circles as the ‘George Gisze’ had been to secure him the custom of the men of commerce. This remarkable group of Jean de Dinteville, Lord of Polisy, on the left, wearing the French Order of S. Michel, and of Georges de Selve, Bishop of Lavaur, in doctor’s cap and gown, on the right, fascinates all beholders by the brilliance with which the accessories are painted, the globe, the turkey rug, the tiling, the mandoline, the astronomical instruments and in the foreground the anamorphosis (or distorted representation) of a human skull. Many keen imaginations have set their wits to work to find an inner meaning to this curiously elongated death’s-head, but the most plausible explanation is found in the fact that Holbein’s own name means ‘skull’ in his native language, and this devise may consequently be regarded as a fanciful way of putting his seal or cipher on his work. Another interpretation is that here, as in other portraits by Holbein, the skull is introduced to reinforce the lesson of the ‘Dance of Death’, that to this all must come. Whatever the painter’s original idea may have been, his work is a complete success; he painted it to create a sensation, and it has created a sensation for centuries. It may be added that this elongated skull completes the design, by paralleling the line from the one ambassador’s hand (holding the dagger) to the head of the other ambassador.
After the death of Jane Seymour, when Europe was searched for marriageable princesses to console the royal widower, Holbein in February 1538 was sent to Brussels to paint his matchless portrait of King Christian’s daughter ‘Christina of Denmark’, who, fortunately for herself, escaped Henry VIII and afterwards married the Duke of Lorraine as her second husband. One of Holbein’s last works, this is by many accounted his greatest. Here he has painted no show-piece, but set forth with divine simplicity the grace and dignity of meditative girlhood.
From Brussels Holbein went to Burgundy, where he painted other portraits, and in December of the same year he returned to London. Almost exactly five years later he caught the plague. In November 1543 Holbein died in London, a victim of the same disease that had already killed Giorgione in his youth and was destined, thirty-three years later, to carry off Titian in his old age.
Just as Durer and Holbein had no great forerunners, so they had no great successors, and Europe had to wait thirty-four years before another great master of art was born, outside Italy, in the person of Peter Paul Rubens.
Never did that sovereign do a wiser or a better thing for himself than when he made Holbein his painter. Not only did the artist present that king to posterity in a manner that mitigates our judgement of his cruelties, but he has made the whole history of that period live for us, as no previous period in English history lives, by his series of portraits and portrait drawings of the English Court. Mr Ford Madox Hueffer has pointedly observed:
How comparatively cold we are left by the name, say of Edward III, a great king surrounded by great men in a stirring period. No visual image comes to the mind’s eye: at most we see, imaginatively, coins and the seals that depend from charters.
Mr Hueffer truly argues that Henry VIII and his men would be just as lifeless without Holbein, and the way he has made them live in our imagination is a tribute not only to Holbein but also to the preserving power of art.
While preparing the way for his advancement in England, Holbein did not neglect the connection he already had on the Continent, and three years before his appointment as Court Painter he sought to widen and enhance his foreign custom by painting another show piece: ‘The Ambassadors’ was painted deliberately to force an entry into diplomatic circles as the ‘George Gisze’ had been to secure him the custom of the men of commerce. This remarkable group of Jean de Dinteville, Lord of Polisy, on the left, wearing the French Order of S. Michel, and of Georges de Selve, Bishop of Lavaur, in doctor’s cap and gown, on the right, fascinates all beholders by the brilliance with which the accessories are painted, the globe, the turkey rug, the tiling, the mandoline, the astronomical instruments and in the foreground the anamorphosis (or distorted representation) of a human skull. Many keen imaginations have set their wits to work to find an inner meaning to this curiously elongated death’s-head, but the most plausible explanation is found in the fact that Holbein’s own name means ‘skull’ in his native language, and this devise may consequently be regarded as a fanciful way of putting his seal or cipher on his work. Another interpretation is that here, as in other portraits by Holbein, the skull is introduced to reinforce the lesson of the ‘Dance of Death’, that to this all must come. Whatever the painter’s original idea may have been, his work is a complete success; he painted it to create a sensation, and it has created a sensation for centuries. It may be added that this elongated skull completes the design, by paralleling the line from the one ambassador’s hand (holding the dagger) to the head of the other ambassador.
After the death of Jane Seymour, when Europe was searched for marriageable princesses to console the royal widower, Holbein in February 1538 was sent to Brussels to paint his matchless portrait of King Christian’s daughter ‘Christina of Denmark’, who, fortunately for herself, escaped Henry VIII and afterwards married the Duke of Lorraine as her second husband. One of Holbein’s last works, this is by many accounted his greatest. Here he has painted no show-piece, but set forth with divine simplicity the grace and dignity of meditative girlhood.
From Brussels Holbein went to Burgundy, where he painted other portraits, and in December of the same year he returned to London. Almost exactly five years later he caught the plague. In November 1543 Holbein died in London, a victim of the same disease that had already killed Giorgione in his youth and was destined, thirty-three years later, to carry off Titian in his old age.
Just as Durer and Holbein had no great forerunners, so they had no great successors, and Europe had to wait thirty-four years before another great master of art was born, outside Italy, in the person of Peter Paul Rubens.
The Beautiful Blonde Liked Emeralds
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 industry.
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
I soon discovered that my employer had not been guided by altruism. For this office contained a safe, and the safe often contained gems worth many millions of francs. Such a fortune could not be left unattended for many hours at a time and so he had been constrained to stay at home in the evenings to look after it. This did not suit his natural habits. As my bed was placed flush with the thin partition separating me from the safe, once I was installed I became automatically the guardian of all his treasures, and my boss no doubt assumed that any attempt at tampering with the safe would awaken me and at once bring me rushing to its defence.
He was soon undeceived. One night he came home rather sick because of some exotic food he had eaten, and wanting either sympathy or help from me, he tried to wake me up. He found that short of breaking down my door he could not disturb my sweet slumbers. So another night he determined to give me a scare. He came home on tiptoe, went straight to the office and fumbled noisily with the combination of the safe. It woke me up and I called him by name. No answer. I called again. A raucous voice answered this time and told me to keep quiet if I valued my life. I did value my life.
Next morning my principal reproached me bitterly for not reacting to his trick. I retorted that his joke was in bad taste, and that if he wanted me to work by day and be on sentry go at night, he might at least provide me with an alarm bell and a pistol. He might even raise my salary, too. He merely sneered and invited me to feel his biceps.
A few weeks later he found fault with me again on another account. I woke up and heard him come in in the small of hours of the morning—with a lady. Instead of retiring quietly like respectable people, he and his companion carried on a lively conversation in the drawing room, and presently I heard the popping of champagne corks. Then I heard footsteps outside my door, followed by a loud insistent knock. I got out of bed and opened to him. There he stood, holding out a brimming glass of wine.
‘Drink that to my health,’ said he. ‘It’s my birthday. And get into your dressing gown and join us in the drawing room.’
Orders is orders. When I had splashed the sleep out of my eyes and put on a dressing gown, I went into the drawing room and found that my boss’s friend was Margot, of the Casino de Paris. She was a tactful girl in the ordinary way, and if she had not dined and wined a little too lavishly she would instinctively have sized up the situation and not let it be known that we had already met. Certainly she would not have followed her impulse. She would not have drawn me up tenderly to her and kissed me with a fervor which roused the anger of my boss.
But I will draw a veil over the scene that followed. There resulted one of those piquant little affairs, now that Margot knew where I lived, in which woman is all the huntress and man the hunted. She was not content to leave me alone. Somehow, because I was simply not interested in her, she became more and more determined. She wrote me little billets-doux and bribed the concierge to act as go-between. But it wasn’t any use, and to this day I marvel that such a charming creature should have bothered over a poor awkward cold youth like myself.
Yet, though I never became her customer, she was to be mine in the end. Some years after my Paris days, when all memory of her had faded from my mind, I met her again. No, not in rags in the gutter, but as radiantly beautiful as ever and ‘settle down’—that is, she was being kept by a wealthy and generous Argentinian and had quite make up her mind to be true to him, because she was tired of the gay life. She was after more emeralds and had heard that I had exceedingly fine Colombian emerald for sale. I sold it to her, and as we parted, I with a bow, she put on a hand and laid it on my arm. ‘You know, mon ami, that my grand passion was and is for one who scorned me. I should hate you for it. But no, I remain your friend. I will even pray for you when I come to my second childhood and take no religion.’
But if I had been Margot’s grand passion, I at least shared her heart with emeralds. When I think of that strange unruly woman I think of the green stones, and whether for this or another reason they are by far my favorites among gems. From the point of view of hardness it is inferior to the ruby (8.5) and the sapphire (9), being only 7.5. It is therefore much softer than either of the other two precious stones, but I do not consider that this in itself is sufficient to assign the emerald to third place. And if you consider beauty and rarity, it is second to none.
The emerald is a variety of beryl. All beryls have the approximate hardness of 8, but they vary somewhat, some being much softer than others. Both the aquamarine and the euclase belong to this family of stones. But whereas the aquamarine, as its name reveals, is sea-green and the euclase varies from yellow to something like sea-green, due to the presence of small quantities of oxide of iron, the color of the emerald is a bright lustrous green, derived from its chromium content.
Speaking historically, emeralds were already being mined in Upper Egypt in 1650 B.C and the Greeks, in the days of Alexander the Great, were still tapping the same source of supply. Cleopatra, extravagant queen and lover of the exquisite, reveled in the emeralds of Egypt, and some of her famous gems were dug from Egyptian soil.
The name for emerald in many languages is a mispronunciation of the Arab ‘Zummurud’. Spanish ‘Esmeralda,’ French ‘Emeraude’, German ‘Smargd’, English ‘Emerald,’ are all lovely variations on a name that is pure music. Emeralds have been loved and prized throughout medieval and modern times as much as in the ancient days, but it was only in 1817 that a Frenchman named Caillioud rediscovered the remains of the extensive emerald workings of Egypt in Northern Etbai. Cleopatra’s mines are located in Jebel Sikait and Jebel Zabra, near the Red Sea coast east of Aswan, and the emerald crystals found there were embedded in mica and talc schists. In nine cases out of ten all the beryls, emerald, aquamarine and euclase, are to be found in schists of this character.
The Beautiful Blonde Liked Emeralds (continued)
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
I soon discovered that my employer had not been guided by altruism. For this office contained a safe, and the safe often contained gems worth many millions of francs. Such a fortune could not be left unattended for many hours at a time and so he had been constrained to stay at home in the evenings to look after it. This did not suit his natural habits. As my bed was placed flush with the thin partition separating me from the safe, once I was installed I became automatically the guardian of all his treasures, and my boss no doubt assumed that any attempt at tampering with the safe would awaken me and at once bring me rushing to its defence.
He was soon undeceived. One night he came home rather sick because of some exotic food he had eaten, and wanting either sympathy or help from me, he tried to wake me up. He found that short of breaking down my door he could not disturb my sweet slumbers. So another night he determined to give me a scare. He came home on tiptoe, went straight to the office and fumbled noisily with the combination of the safe. It woke me up and I called him by name. No answer. I called again. A raucous voice answered this time and told me to keep quiet if I valued my life. I did value my life.
Next morning my principal reproached me bitterly for not reacting to his trick. I retorted that his joke was in bad taste, and that if he wanted me to work by day and be on sentry go at night, he might at least provide me with an alarm bell and a pistol. He might even raise my salary, too. He merely sneered and invited me to feel his biceps.
A few weeks later he found fault with me again on another account. I woke up and heard him come in in the small of hours of the morning—with a lady. Instead of retiring quietly like respectable people, he and his companion carried on a lively conversation in the drawing room, and presently I heard the popping of champagne corks. Then I heard footsteps outside my door, followed by a loud insistent knock. I got out of bed and opened to him. There he stood, holding out a brimming glass of wine.
‘Drink that to my health,’ said he. ‘It’s my birthday. And get into your dressing gown and join us in the drawing room.’
Orders is orders. When I had splashed the sleep out of my eyes and put on a dressing gown, I went into the drawing room and found that my boss’s friend was Margot, of the Casino de Paris. She was a tactful girl in the ordinary way, and if she had not dined and wined a little too lavishly she would instinctively have sized up the situation and not let it be known that we had already met. Certainly she would not have followed her impulse. She would not have drawn me up tenderly to her and kissed me with a fervor which roused the anger of my boss.
But I will draw a veil over the scene that followed. There resulted one of those piquant little affairs, now that Margot knew where I lived, in which woman is all the huntress and man the hunted. She was not content to leave me alone. Somehow, because I was simply not interested in her, she became more and more determined. She wrote me little billets-doux and bribed the concierge to act as go-between. But it wasn’t any use, and to this day I marvel that such a charming creature should have bothered over a poor awkward cold youth like myself.
Yet, though I never became her customer, she was to be mine in the end. Some years after my Paris days, when all memory of her had faded from my mind, I met her again. No, not in rags in the gutter, but as radiantly beautiful as ever and ‘settle down’—that is, she was being kept by a wealthy and generous Argentinian and had quite make up her mind to be true to him, because she was tired of the gay life. She was after more emeralds and had heard that I had exceedingly fine Colombian emerald for sale. I sold it to her, and as we parted, I with a bow, she put on a hand and laid it on my arm. ‘You know, mon ami, that my grand passion was and is for one who scorned me. I should hate you for it. But no, I remain your friend. I will even pray for you when I come to my second childhood and take no religion.’
But if I had been Margot’s grand passion, I at least shared her heart with emeralds. When I think of that strange unruly woman I think of the green stones, and whether for this or another reason they are by far my favorites among gems. From the point of view of hardness it is inferior to the ruby (8.5) and the sapphire (9), being only 7.5. It is therefore much softer than either of the other two precious stones, but I do not consider that this in itself is sufficient to assign the emerald to third place. And if you consider beauty and rarity, it is second to none.
The emerald is a variety of beryl. All beryls have the approximate hardness of 8, but they vary somewhat, some being much softer than others. Both the aquamarine and the euclase belong to this family of stones. But whereas the aquamarine, as its name reveals, is sea-green and the euclase varies from yellow to something like sea-green, due to the presence of small quantities of oxide of iron, the color of the emerald is a bright lustrous green, derived from its chromium content.
Speaking historically, emeralds were already being mined in Upper Egypt in 1650 B.C and the Greeks, in the days of Alexander the Great, were still tapping the same source of supply. Cleopatra, extravagant queen and lover of the exquisite, reveled in the emeralds of Egypt, and some of her famous gems were dug from Egyptian soil.
The name for emerald in many languages is a mispronunciation of the Arab ‘Zummurud’. Spanish ‘Esmeralda,’ French ‘Emeraude’, German ‘Smargd’, English ‘Emerald,’ are all lovely variations on a name that is pure music. Emeralds have been loved and prized throughout medieval and modern times as much as in the ancient days, but it was only in 1817 that a Frenchman named Caillioud rediscovered the remains of the extensive emerald workings of Egypt in Northern Etbai. Cleopatra’s mines are located in Jebel Sikait and Jebel Zabra, near the Red Sea coast east of Aswan, and the emerald crystals found there were embedded in mica and talc schists. In nine cases out of ten all the beryls, emerald, aquamarine and euclase, are to be found in schists of this character.
The Beautiful Blonde Liked Emeralds (continued)
Thursday, December 20, 2007
Heard On The Street
When it comes to buying gems/art, feeling counts every bit as much and often more than thought. Passions overwhelm reason time and again. Practice impulse control + persistence.
Italians Crack Open DNA Secrets Of Pinot Noir
Ben Hirschler writes about breakthrough in the genetic make-up of Pinot Noir by Italian scientists (hardier vines/cheaper fine wines) + other viewpoints @ http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071219/sc_nm/genetics_wine_dc
Useful link:
http://www.plosone.org/doi/pone.0001326
Useful link:
http://www.plosone.org/doi/pone.0001326
It's A Gift
It's A Gift (1934)
Directed by: Norman Z. McLeod
Cast: W.C. Fields, Kathleen Howard
(via YouTube): It's A Gift--Carl LaFong Part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBFLn8zvsjY
It's A Gift--Carl LaFong Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCg9Lr6G8VE
It's A Gift Clip 3
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5C8XnZ8qwI
A W C Fields classic + comic. I enjoyed it.
Directed by: Norman Z. McLeod
Cast: W.C. Fields, Kathleen Howard
(via YouTube): It's A Gift--Carl LaFong Part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBFLn8zvsjY
It's A Gift--Carl LaFong Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCg9Lr6G8VE
It's A Gift Clip 3
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5C8XnZ8qwI
A W C Fields classic + comic. I enjoyed it.
The 20 Most Earthquake-Vulnerable Cities 2007
(via Forbes) The 20 Most Earthquake-Vulnerable Cities 2007
1. Kathmandu, Nepal
2. Istanbul, Turkey
3. Delhi, India
4. Quito, Ecuador
5. Manila, Philippines
6. Islambad/Rawalpindi, Pakistan
7. San Salvador, El Salvador
8. Mexico City, Mexico
9. Izmir, Turkey
10. Jakarta, Indonesia
11. Tokyo, Japan
12. Mumbai, India
13. Guayaquil, Ecuador
14. Bandung, Indonesia
15. Santiago, Chile
16. Tashkent, Uzbekistan
17. Tijuana, Mexico
18. Nagoya, Japan
19. Antofagasta, Chile
20. Kobe, Japan
1. Kathmandu, Nepal
2. Istanbul, Turkey
3. Delhi, India
4. Quito, Ecuador
5. Manila, Philippines
6. Islambad/Rawalpindi, Pakistan
7. San Salvador, El Salvador
8. Mexico City, Mexico
9. Izmir, Turkey
10. Jakarta, Indonesia
11. Tokyo, Japan
12. Mumbai, India
13. Guayaquil, Ecuador
14. Bandung, Indonesia
15. Santiago, Chile
16. Tashkent, Uzbekistan
17. Tijuana, Mexico
18. Nagoya, Japan
19. Antofagasta, Chile
20. Kobe, Japan
Catch Some Rays
(via The Guardian) Anthony McCall's 'solid light' projections @ http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/visualart/story/0,,2226665,00.html
It's brilliant.
Useful link:
serpentinegallery.org
It's brilliant.
Useful link:
serpentinegallery.org
Beauty & The Bimbo
David Kirby writes about John Currin's style: a combination of Renaissance grace + kitsch quality + an emerging painter + other viewpoints @ http://www.artnewsonline.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=702
The Dawn Of The Reformation
(via The Outline of Art) William Orpen writes:
The careful reader will have observed that no paintings are given above for the years 1523 to 1525, and indeed these were bad years for all painters. When Guilio de’ Medici was elected Pope as Clement VII in 1523, he found, as a historian has said, ‘the world in confusion, a great movement going on in Germany, a great war just begun between the three most powerful Christian monarchs—a war to which he himself was pledged.’ Two months after he had signed the treaty of alliance, Francis I of France was defeated and taken prisoner at Pavia, and Emperor’s troops—thousands of Protestants among them—headed for Rome. All the diplomatic wiles of the Pontiff were unavailing, and in May 1527 a horrified world beheld Christian troops, Germans, Spaniards, and Italians, engaged in the sack of Rome.
Basle, then a city of the Empire, though not exposed to the full force of the currents of war, was not untouched by these events, and Holbein, like a shrewd man of the world, began to look out for a shelter from the storm that was convulsing Europe. His native Germany was out of the question, for there paintings already in existence were being destroyed by zealots desirous of ‘purifying’ Protestant churches. During this time of waiting, when commissions for pictures were scarce, Holbein began that series of wood-engravings which have done as much as any of his paintings to make his name illustrious.
No works of Holbein have held a more lasting place in the popular imagination than his little woodcuts illustrating ‘The Dance of Death’. As remote in its origin as the ‘morality play, this picturing of the fact that all living beings must die was probably in its beginning a monkish device to compel those who could not read to realize their inevitable fate. This lesson was driven home by the universality with which the theme was expounded. In the older prints of this subject the highest and lowest in the land were shown each dancing with a dead partner of the same rank and calling, a king dancing with a dead king, a bishop dancing with a dead bishop, a merchant with a dead merchant, a laborer with a dead laborer. Whoever you were you could not escape death, that was always dancing at your heels. This was the age-old theme to which Holbein gave new life, and if his versions of the Dance of Death has eclipsed all other versions it is because Holbein was the first to present Death as an abstraction, common to all prints in the series, and because no other treatment of the theme has excelled his in the pictorial elements of design. Each of these prints is itself a perfect little picture—see how beautiful is the landscape with the setting sun in ‘The Husbandman’. As for its value as preaching, Holbein’s series serves a double purpose, emphasizing by the skeleton that accompanies all alike, Pope, Cardinal, Miser, Husbandman, and what not, the equality as well as the universality of death. Holbein’s message is not only that ‘all flesh is grass’; but also that under their skin ‘the colonel’s lady and Judith O’Grady’ are very much alike.
In 1526 Holbein found the haven for which he had been looking in England, an isle remote from the European storm center. It is probable that he had become known through Erasmus to Sir Thomas Moore, and so was invited to come; his painting of ‘The Household of Sir Thomas Moore’ was one of the earliest and most important paintings executed by Holbein during his first stay in England. In 1528 he returned to Basle for three years, and having dispatched thence his gorgeous portrait of ‘George Gisze, Merchant of the Steelyard’ to show what he could do in portraiture, he returned to England in 1531.
This handsome and exceedingly ornate portrait of a young merchant in his counting-house was a deliberate showpiece which had exactly the effect the painter intended. In troublous and uncertain times princes and great nobles were unreliable patrons; at any moment they might be dethroned, killed or executed. Like a prudent man Holbein wished to establish a connection with a steadier, yet equally rich stratum of society, namely the great merchants. Therefore he cleverly set his cap at the wealthy German merchants settled in London, and showed them in this portrait that he could make a merchant look as splendid and imposing as any king or noblemen. He delivered his sample, and human vanity did the rest. The German ‘Merchants of the Steelyard’ as this Corporation was styled, flocked to his studio in London. Three years later his first English patron, Sir Thomas Moore, was sent to the scaffold by Henry VIII because he declined to declare the nullity of that royal reprobate’s first marriage with Catherine of Aragon.
To have been the friend of Moore was at this time no commendation to the favor of the Court; nevertheless, Holbein was not the man to miss any opportunity of ‘getting on’ for want of a little tact and diplomacy. Firmly based on the support of the German merchants, he tried another method of approach. Very soon we find him painting his splendid portrait of ‘Robert Cheseman, the King’s Falconer’, painting first the minor and then the great courtiers, till at last, in 1536, he achieved what no doubt had been his aim from the first, and was appointed Court Painter to King Henry VIII.
The Dawn Of The Reformation (continued)
The careful reader will have observed that no paintings are given above for the years 1523 to 1525, and indeed these were bad years for all painters. When Guilio de’ Medici was elected Pope as Clement VII in 1523, he found, as a historian has said, ‘the world in confusion, a great movement going on in Germany, a great war just begun between the three most powerful Christian monarchs—a war to which he himself was pledged.’ Two months after he had signed the treaty of alliance, Francis I of France was defeated and taken prisoner at Pavia, and Emperor’s troops—thousands of Protestants among them—headed for Rome. All the diplomatic wiles of the Pontiff were unavailing, and in May 1527 a horrified world beheld Christian troops, Germans, Spaniards, and Italians, engaged in the sack of Rome.
Basle, then a city of the Empire, though not exposed to the full force of the currents of war, was not untouched by these events, and Holbein, like a shrewd man of the world, began to look out for a shelter from the storm that was convulsing Europe. His native Germany was out of the question, for there paintings already in existence were being destroyed by zealots desirous of ‘purifying’ Protestant churches. During this time of waiting, when commissions for pictures were scarce, Holbein began that series of wood-engravings which have done as much as any of his paintings to make his name illustrious.
No works of Holbein have held a more lasting place in the popular imagination than his little woodcuts illustrating ‘The Dance of Death’. As remote in its origin as the ‘morality play, this picturing of the fact that all living beings must die was probably in its beginning a monkish device to compel those who could not read to realize their inevitable fate. This lesson was driven home by the universality with which the theme was expounded. In the older prints of this subject the highest and lowest in the land were shown each dancing with a dead partner of the same rank and calling, a king dancing with a dead king, a bishop dancing with a dead bishop, a merchant with a dead merchant, a laborer with a dead laborer. Whoever you were you could not escape death, that was always dancing at your heels. This was the age-old theme to which Holbein gave new life, and if his versions of the Dance of Death has eclipsed all other versions it is because Holbein was the first to present Death as an abstraction, common to all prints in the series, and because no other treatment of the theme has excelled his in the pictorial elements of design. Each of these prints is itself a perfect little picture—see how beautiful is the landscape with the setting sun in ‘The Husbandman’. As for its value as preaching, Holbein’s series serves a double purpose, emphasizing by the skeleton that accompanies all alike, Pope, Cardinal, Miser, Husbandman, and what not, the equality as well as the universality of death. Holbein’s message is not only that ‘all flesh is grass’; but also that under their skin ‘the colonel’s lady and Judith O’Grady’ are very much alike.
In 1526 Holbein found the haven for which he had been looking in England, an isle remote from the European storm center. It is probable that he had become known through Erasmus to Sir Thomas Moore, and so was invited to come; his painting of ‘The Household of Sir Thomas Moore’ was one of the earliest and most important paintings executed by Holbein during his first stay in England. In 1528 he returned to Basle for three years, and having dispatched thence his gorgeous portrait of ‘George Gisze, Merchant of the Steelyard’ to show what he could do in portraiture, he returned to England in 1531.
This handsome and exceedingly ornate portrait of a young merchant in his counting-house was a deliberate showpiece which had exactly the effect the painter intended. In troublous and uncertain times princes and great nobles were unreliable patrons; at any moment they might be dethroned, killed or executed. Like a prudent man Holbein wished to establish a connection with a steadier, yet equally rich stratum of society, namely the great merchants. Therefore he cleverly set his cap at the wealthy German merchants settled in London, and showed them in this portrait that he could make a merchant look as splendid and imposing as any king or noblemen. He delivered his sample, and human vanity did the rest. The German ‘Merchants of the Steelyard’ as this Corporation was styled, flocked to his studio in London. Three years later his first English patron, Sir Thomas Moore, was sent to the scaffold by Henry VIII because he declined to declare the nullity of that royal reprobate’s first marriage with Catherine of Aragon.
To have been the friend of Moore was at this time no commendation to the favor of the Court; nevertheless, Holbein was not the man to miss any opportunity of ‘getting on’ for want of a little tact and diplomacy. Firmly based on the support of the German merchants, he tried another method of approach. Very soon we find him painting his splendid portrait of ‘Robert Cheseman, the King’s Falconer’, painting first the minor and then the great courtiers, till at last, in 1536, he achieved what no doubt had been his aim from the first, and was appointed Court Painter to King Henry VIII.
The Dawn Of The Reformation (continued)
The Beautiful Blonde Liked Emeralds
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 industry.
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
Presently a tall graceful blonde, radiantly beautiful, exquisitely gowned, completely sure of herself, tapped Monsieur Gotin with her fan. ‘Comment vas-tu, Coco?’ she said, addressing him familiarly.
‘Ah, Margot, te voici,’ he replied, ‘I thought you were in the South of France with your sugar millionaire. Is he tired of you or you of him?
‘Six of one and half a dozen of the other,’ said she calmly. ‘Both of us like variety. You know I tire of any man after a month. Tiens, who is your young friend? I like the look of him. Why don’t you introduce him to me? You know my weakness for unspoiled youngsters.’
With no very good grace he introduced us. I bowed. She took my hand in hers. ‘I hope we shall be very good friends,’ she said.
‘Not if I can help it,’ said Monsieur Gotin decidedly. ‘I am in charge of this young man’s morals. Besides, Margot, I must reveal to you that he has no money to speak of and cannot pay for luxuries you are accustomed to. He has to work for his living.’
She pouted her lips and acted like a child to whom a favor has been denied. ‘With your permission,’ she said, and seated herself at our table. It was then that I noticed more closely the jewels she was wearing, a fine emerald ring, a fine golden chain round her neck which supported a piece of filigree with another large emerald in the center, two emeralds in her ears. No other jewelry.
‘Coffee?’ asked Monsieur Gotin.
‘A bottle of champagne,’ she said without hesitation.
‘You shall have what you want, Margot,’ he shrugged, ‘particularly as nothing could have been more calculated to put my young friend off you than that?’
‘How is that?’ she said, powdering her nose, and looking at me out of her great eyes, her large rather prominent eyes that looked so strangely childlike.
‘A friendship based upon champagne cannot be an alluring prospect for a young man who has just arrived in Paris with his way to make,’ said Monsieur Gotin smugly.
‘But I only make those pay who have the money,’ she replied, ‘and whose only attraction is a well-stuffed pocket book. You know, Coco, that when it suits me I can be generous, and for the time being I have no amant.’
Whereupon she started to talk to me in great good humor, asking me about myself and drawing me out marvelously. ‘You speak very good French,’ she said graciously.
‘You flatter me, mademoiselle,’ I said. ‘My French is school French and I am not fluent, I fear.’
‘That is just why you should at once adopt the only method of acquiring real fluency in our beautiful language,’ she said slyly.
‘What method is that?’ asked I, thinking of Ollendorf.
‘To sleep with your teacher,’ she said.
‘That will do,’ said Monsieur Gotin severely.
‘It will indeed,’ said Margot, ‘since you are determined to frustrate me, Coco. But all the same, I tell you that your young friend shall become my friend. But now I must leave you, messieurs,’ she said, rising. ‘I must go and find someone willing to part with ten louis for the pleasure of my company from now until breakfast time. I’m absolutely broke.’ She pressed into my hand her ivory card and disappeared with a wave of the hand among the milling crowd.
‘A delightful woman,’ said Monsieur Gotin, leaning over and taking the card out of my hand before I knew what he was doing. ‘Not the ordinary putain. She comes of excellent family and had a convent education. But,’ he added dispassionately, ‘she is passionate’—he tapped the table—‘unaccountable’—another tap—‘restless’—tap—‘and fearfully extravagant. She has ruined at least two fils de famille and will doubtless ruin more. I am not going to have her play with you, my young friend.’
‘But you introduced me to her?’ I said, bewildered.
‘Precisely. Hence it is my responsibility that you should go no farther with her.’ He tore the little card into tiny pieces.
‘The emeralds,’ I stammered, for their luster had been more on my mind than the beauty of their wearer. ‘They are lovely. And she says she is broke.’
‘Ah, the emeralds,’ he said. ‘They are Margot’s true passion. She would not part with one of them if she were starving, I believe. And she never wears anything but emeralds. She is a good judge and makes her admirers buy her the best.’
However, I was less interested in the handsome Margot than in her emeralds, and less interested in emeralds than, at the moment, finding my feet in Paris and holding down my job. My principal occupied a six room bachelor apartment in the vicinity of the Grand Opera. One room served him as an office, and when I entered upon my new duties another was assigned to me as a bedroom. It was really no more than a boxroom and I could scarcely turn round in it, but as the arrangement save me at least fifty francs a month, I was not dissatisfied.
The Beautiful Blonde Liked Emeralds (continued)
(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:
Presently a tall graceful blonde, radiantly beautiful, exquisitely gowned, completely sure of herself, tapped Monsieur Gotin with her fan. ‘Comment vas-tu, Coco?’ she said, addressing him familiarly.
‘Ah, Margot, te voici,’ he replied, ‘I thought you were in the South of France with your sugar millionaire. Is he tired of you or you of him?
‘Six of one and half a dozen of the other,’ said she calmly. ‘Both of us like variety. You know I tire of any man after a month. Tiens, who is your young friend? I like the look of him. Why don’t you introduce him to me? You know my weakness for unspoiled youngsters.’
With no very good grace he introduced us. I bowed. She took my hand in hers. ‘I hope we shall be very good friends,’ she said.
‘Not if I can help it,’ said Monsieur Gotin decidedly. ‘I am in charge of this young man’s morals. Besides, Margot, I must reveal to you that he has no money to speak of and cannot pay for luxuries you are accustomed to. He has to work for his living.’
She pouted her lips and acted like a child to whom a favor has been denied. ‘With your permission,’ she said, and seated herself at our table. It was then that I noticed more closely the jewels she was wearing, a fine emerald ring, a fine golden chain round her neck which supported a piece of filigree with another large emerald in the center, two emeralds in her ears. No other jewelry.
‘Coffee?’ asked Monsieur Gotin.
‘A bottle of champagne,’ she said without hesitation.
‘You shall have what you want, Margot,’ he shrugged, ‘particularly as nothing could have been more calculated to put my young friend off you than that?’
‘How is that?’ she said, powdering her nose, and looking at me out of her great eyes, her large rather prominent eyes that looked so strangely childlike.
‘A friendship based upon champagne cannot be an alluring prospect for a young man who has just arrived in Paris with his way to make,’ said Monsieur Gotin smugly.
‘But I only make those pay who have the money,’ she replied, ‘and whose only attraction is a well-stuffed pocket book. You know, Coco, that when it suits me I can be generous, and for the time being I have no amant.’
Whereupon she started to talk to me in great good humor, asking me about myself and drawing me out marvelously. ‘You speak very good French,’ she said graciously.
‘You flatter me, mademoiselle,’ I said. ‘My French is school French and I am not fluent, I fear.’
‘That is just why you should at once adopt the only method of acquiring real fluency in our beautiful language,’ she said slyly.
‘What method is that?’ asked I, thinking of Ollendorf.
‘To sleep with your teacher,’ she said.
‘That will do,’ said Monsieur Gotin severely.
‘It will indeed,’ said Margot, ‘since you are determined to frustrate me, Coco. But all the same, I tell you that your young friend shall become my friend. But now I must leave you, messieurs,’ she said, rising. ‘I must go and find someone willing to part with ten louis for the pleasure of my company from now until breakfast time. I’m absolutely broke.’ She pressed into my hand her ivory card and disappeared with a wave of the hand among the milling crowd.
‘A delightful woman,’ said Monsieur Gotin, leaning over and taking the card out of my hand before I knew what he was doing. ‘Not the ordinary putain. She comes of excellent family and had a convent education. But,’ he added dispassionately, ‘she is passionate’—he tapped the table—‘unaccountable’—another tap—‘restless’—tap—‘and fearfully extravagant. She has ruined at least two fils de famille and will doubtless ruin more. I am not going to have her play with you, my young friend.’
‘But you introduced me to her?’ I said, bewildered.
‘Precisely. Hence it is my responsibility that you should go no farther with her.’ He tore the little card into tiny pieces.
‘The emeralds,’ I stammered, for their luster had been more on my mind than the beauty of their wearer. ‘They are lovely. And she says she is broke.’
‘Ah, the emeralds,’ he said. ‘They are Margot’s true passion. She would not part with one of them if she were starving, I believe. And she never wears anything but emeralds. She is a good judge and makes her admirers buy her the best.’
However, I was less interested in the handsome Margot than in her emeralds, and less interested in emeralds than, at the moment, finding my feet in Paris and holding down my job. My principal occupied a six room bachelor apartment in the vicinity of the Grand Opera. One room served him as an office, and when I entered upon my new duties another was assigned to me as a bedroom. It was really no more than a boxroom and I could scarcely turn round in it, but as the arrangement save me at least fifty francs a month, I was not dissatisfied.
The Beautiful Blonde Liked Emeralds (continued)
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Franschhoek
Franschhoek is considered the food and wine capital of South Africa + Le Quartier Français is one of the World's 50 Best Restaurants.
Useful links:
www.franschhoek.org.za
Cape Grace
12 Apostles
Ginja
Bukhara
Baia at the Waterfront
Useful links:
www.franschhoek.org.za
Cape Grace
12 Apostles
Ginja
Bukhara
Baia at the Waterfront
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