Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Living It Up
Living It Up : America's Love Affair with Luxury by James B. Twitchell is a revealing and entertaining book on consumer culture.
The Art Of Today
(via The Outline of Art) Frank Rutter writes:
6
While the painters mentioned above are far from exhausting the list of distinguished artists who received their training directly from Legros, his successor, Professor Brown, may be said to have been fortunate in having still more brilliant pupils. Of these first attention must be given to William Orpen and Augustus John, who, by common consent, are the most richly gifted of the many ex-students of the Slade School who have attained eminence in their profession.
Now and again in the history of art there are happy individuals who seem to escape the student stage altogether and appear as masters from the first. Lawrence was one; Millais was another; Orpen is a third, and he bids fair to go farther than either of the other two. Born on the 27th November 1878, William Orpen attracted the attention of London connoisseurs while he was still a student at the Dublic Metropolitan School of Art. The writer can remember the sensation caused at South Kensington more than twenty years ago by a drawing from the life with which this young Irishman won the gold medal at the National Competition for works by students at schools of art all over the country. Never before or since has there been so much unanimity of opinion about a prize winner. Everybody was talking then about ‘young Orpen’s’ drawing, for while it satisfied the academic mind by its flawless perfection and anatomical correctness, it roused enthusiasm among more independent critics because it was not a dead thing—as so many prize drawings are—but a real human figure in which every line pulsated with life. It was clear that a great draughtsman had come to town, and when Orpen left Ireland and came to the Slade School his drawings and paintings soon became conspicuous in the exhibitions of the New English Art Club, then held at the old Dudley Gallery in the Egyptian Hall, Piccadilly. In the first decade of the twentieth century this youth in his twenties was already ranked, not with other students, but with artists, like Wilson Steer, who were recognized as masters. What distinguished Orpen at once from other able draughtsmen of his age was his precocious facility in the manipulation of paint. Most students have to learn slowly how to handle pigment; the first paintings Orpen exhibited proved that he had a mastery of the brush. A beautiful example of his early fluency is the picture in the Tate Gallery, entitled ‘The Mirror’, painted in 1900. Even at this period Orpen showed a wide range; he painted portraits, still life, nudes, and subject pictures, while perhaps the most characteristic of these early works were interiors with figures, pictures which seemed to have the fullness of content of a Van Eyck, though painted with the exuberance of a Hals.
In ‘The Mirror’ traces of the influence of Whistler may still be seen; in his later works Orpen’s style has become broader and more vigorous, his color has grown lighter and more brilliant, and in portraits his penetration into character has gained in profundity. But the characterisation was keen in several early portraits, notably the ‘Charles Wertheimer’, the first and only picture the artist exhibited at the Royal Academy prior to his election as Associate in 1910.
Since his entry into the Royal Academy the art of Sir William Orpen has steadily grown in power and public favor, but his phenomenal success has never warped his sincerity as an artist. While he has contributed a generous measure of portraits to the exhibitions of Burlington House, he has remained loyal to the New English Art Club, and there he has again and again shown those inimitable pictures which an artist paints for his own delight and pleasure. Among them may be mentioned some notable scenes of vagrant and peasant life in Ireland, and playful allegories, like ‘Sowing the Seed’, in which a true Irish sense of humor has been blended with pictorial and decorative charm. It is characteristic of Sir William’s independence as an artist that of all the hundreds of portraits which he painted in Paris during and after the Peace Conference, the very best of them should be, not one of the famous statesmen and soldiers who sat to him, but a man who was a nonentity till his portrait was exhibited. The now famous ‘Chef de I’Hôtel Chatham’ was not only the ‘picture of the year’ at the 1921 Academy, it is a picture for all time which has and will have the wide human appeal of Moroni’s ‘Portrait of a Tailor’. In this portrait of the Chef (Mr Chester) in his immaculate white cap and jacket, standing beside his grill, we have Orpen at his very best, using all his amazing facility and dexterity in the handling of paint for the purpose of putting on canvas the rich, full humanity of a living being.
Sir William’s two great Peace picture in the Academy of 1920, ‘Signing of Peace in the Hall of Mirrors, Versailles,’ and ‘A Peace Conference at the Quai d’Orsay,’ were an expansion of the delightful little interiors which he had sent in earlier days to the New English Art Club, and in a way his allegory ‘Sowing the Seed’ may be regarded as a prelude to the very different and far more serious painting, ‘To the Unknown Soldier’, which was the center of interest in the Academy of 1923. For both these paintings show high powers of imagination, and warn us that in marveling at the quickness of his eye and at the unerring skill of his hand, we must not forget that Sir William Orpen is also an artist with a keenly intelligent brain and with a warm imaginative heart, a man who can see both the humor and tragedy of life, who can feel deeply and can express his emotions either in genial satire or in a majestic allegory of epic grandeur.
The Art Of Today (continued)
6
While the painters mentioned above are far from exhausting the list of distinguished artists who received their training directly from Legros, his successor, Professor Brown, may be said to have been fortunate in having still more brilliant pupils. Of these first attention must be given to William Orpen and Augustus John, who, by common consent, are the most richly gifted of the many ex-students of the Slade School who have attained eminence in their profession.
Now and again in the history of art there are happy individuals who seem to escape the student stage altogether and appear as masters from the first. Lawrence was one; Millais was another; Orpen is a third, and he bids fair to go farther than either of the other two. Born on the 27th November 1878, William Orpen attracted the attention of London connoisseurs while he was still a student at the Dublic Metropolitan School of Art. The writer can remember the sensation caused at South Kensington more than twenty years ago by a drawing from the life with which this young Irishman won the gold medal at the National Competition for works by students at schools of art all over the country. Never before or since has there been so much unanimity of opinion about a prize winner. Everybody was talking then about ‘young Orpen’s’ drawing, for while it satisfied the academic mind by its flawless perfection and anatomical correctness, it roused enthusiasm among more independent critics because it was not a dead thing—as so many prize drawings are—but a real human figure in which every line pulsated with life. It was clear that a great draughtsman had come to town, and when Orpen left Ireland and came to the Slade School his drawings and paintings soon became conspicuous in the exhibitions of the New English Art Club, then held at the old Dudley Gallery in the Egyptian Hall, Piccadilly. In the first decade of the twentieth century this youth in his twenties was already ranked, not with other students, but with artists, like Wilson Steer, who were recognized as masters. What distinguished Orpen at once from other able draughtsmen of his age was his precocious facility in the manipulation of paint. Most students have to learn slowly how to handle pigment; the first paintings Orpen exhibited proved that he had a mastery of the brush. A beautiful example of his early fluency is the picture in the Tate Gallery, entitled ‘The Mirror’, painted in 1900. Even at this period Orpen showed a wide range; he painted portraits, still life, nudes, and subject pictures, while perhaps the most characteristic of these early works were interiors with figures, pictures which seemed to have the fullness of content of a Van Eyck, though painted with the exuberance of a Hals.
In ‘The Mirror’ traces of the influence of Whistler may still be seen; in his later works Orpen’s style has become broader and more vigorous, his color has grown lighter and more brilliant, and in portraits his penetration into character has gained in profundity. But the characterisation was keen in several early portraits, notably the ‘Charles Wertheimer’, the first and only picture the artist exhibited at the Royal Academy prior to his election as Associate in 1910.
Since his entry into the Royal Academy the art of Sir William Orpen has steadily grown in power and public favor, but his phenomenal success has never warped his sincerity as an artist. While he has contributed a generous measure of portraits to the exhibitions of Burlington House, he has remained loyal to the New English Art Club, and there he has again and again shown those inimitable pictures which an artist paints for his own delight and pleasure. Among them may be mentioned some notable scenes of vagrant and peasant life in Ireland, and playful allegories, like ‘Sowing the Seed’, in which a true Irish sense of humor has been blended with pictorial and decorative charm. It is characteristic of Sir William’s independence as an artist that of all the hundreds of portraits which he painted in Paris during and after the Peace Conference, the very best of them should be, not one of the famous statesmen and soldiers who sat to him, but a man who was a nonentity till his portrait was exhibited. The now famous ‘Chef de I’Hôtel Chatham’ was not only the ‘picture of the year’ at the 1921 Academy, it is a picture for all time which has and will have the wide human appeal of Moroni’s ‘Portrait of a Tailor’. In this portrait of the Chef (Mr Chester) in his immaculate white cap and jacket, standing beside his grill, we have Orpen at his very best, using all his amazing facility and dexterity in the handling of paint for the purpose of putting on canvas the rich, full humanity of a living being.
Sir William’s two great Peace picture in the Academy of 1920, ‘Signing of Peace in the Hall of Mirrors, Versailles,’ and ‘A Peace Conference at the Quai d’Orsay,’ were an expansion of the delightful little interiors which he had sent in earlier days to the New English Art Club, and in a way his allegory ‘Sowing the Seed’ may be regarded as a prelude to the very different and far more serious painting, ‘To the Unknown Soldier’, which was the center of interest in the Academy of 1923. For both these paintings show high powers of imagination, and warn us that in marveling at the quickness of his eye and at the unerring skill of his hand, we must not forget that Sir William Orpen is also an artist with a keenly intelligent brain and with a warm imaginative heart, a man who can see both the humor and tragedy of life, who can feel deeply and can express his emotions either in genial satire or in a majestic allegory of epic grandeur.
The Art Of Today (continued)
Monday, May 12, 2008
Remember Who You Are
Remember Who You Are: Life Stories That Inspire the Heart and Mind by Daisy Wademan + Kim Clark + Rosabeth Moss Kanter is a great inspirational book.
Greendex 2008
The National Geographic Society + international polling firm GlobeScan have unveiled Greendex 2008: Consumer Choice and the Environment—A Worldwide Tracking Survey to look at how consumers across the globe are behaving.
Useful link:
www.nationalgeographic.com
I think the survey will definitely impact individual consumer behavior.
Useful link:
www.nationalgeographic.com
I think the survey will definitely impact individual consumer behavior.
Random Thoughts
(via fastcompany) Some people are drawn to movie stars and rock stars. To me, entrepreneurs are the interesting people in this time and our society because they drive the economy. They have whacked out marginal utilities for risk in the sense that they seem to value risk instead of trying to shy away from it. They tend to walk away from high-paying jobs to do things that are highly risky just because they want to change the world and hope to make some money even though it's very unlikely they will. That's what's drawn me to this particular beat. I love blogging just because it's a direct channel to your readers that's very raw and unfiltered.
- Michael Arrington
www.techcrunch.com
- Michael Arrington
www.techcrunch.com
Olympic Memorabilia
Olympic memorabilia are fetching high prices + Economist has an interesting update @ http://www.economist.com/opinion/displayStory.cfm?story_id=11355677
Useful links:
www.dnw.co.uk
http://ioneil.com
www.coubertin.com
www.goldmedalcollectibles.com
www.olympic.org
www.societyofolympiccollectors.org
www.olympinclub.com
www.bonhams.com
Useful links:
www.dnw.co.uk
http://ioneil.com
www.coubertin.com
www.goldmedalcollectibles.com
www.olympic.org
www.societyofolympiccollectors.org
www.olympinclub.com
www.bonhams.com
Mathieu Amalric
(via Wiki) Mathieu Amalric is a three-time César Award winning French actor and film director, perhaps best known for his lead role in the four-time Academy Award nominated 2007 film The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. He also has won the Étoile d'Or and the Lumiere Award, and is considered one of France's greatest contemporary actors.
Useful links:
http://film.guardian.co.uk/interview/interviewpages/0,,2279291,00.html
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0023832
I think he is brilliant!
Useful links:
http://film.guardian.co.uk/interview/interviewpages/0,,2279291,00.html
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0023832
I think he is brilliant!
The Art Of Today
(via The Outline of Art) Frank Rutter writes:
5
Returning to the pupils of Legros, first attention must be given to Charles Wellington Furse (1868-1904), who, but for his early death, would assuredly now be occupying a position in the art world rivalling that of Sargent and Orpen. Born at Staines, Furse was only sixteen when he began to study under Legros at the Slade School. Later he worked in Paris, and returning to London he soon made his mark at the New English Art Club, where his portraits especially attracted attention. He was only twenty-five when he began his heroic equestrian portrait of Lord Roberts—now in the Tate Gallery—a great work which, being interrupted by illness, he was never able to complete, for after his recovery he was too much occupied with other work to return to it at once.
Between 1899 and 1901 much of his time was taken up in painting the decorative spandrels for Liverpool Town Hall, and his remarkable capacity for executing imposing works on a large scale was clearly revealed to the world in 1903, when ‘The Return from the Ride’ was the ‘picture of the year’ at the Academy. In this magnificent portrait group of his friends Mr and Mrs Aubrey Waterfield, the figures are nearly life-size and the whole picture is painted with the assurance and exuberance of a master. In the following year, when he was elected A.R.A, he repeated his success at the Academy with an open air portraits of his wife, entitled ‘Diana of the Uplands’, another life-sized work full of breeziness and polished brilliance. For many years the artist had suffered from lung trouble; and this finally caused his death in the very year in which he had won his Associateship. The breadth and dignity of his outlook equalled the felicity of his execution, and while the great performances in which his art culminated may be said to have been based to some extent on the practice of Velazquez, his own personal gifts and his keen observations of Nature gave an individual distinction to his works which makes them essentially original.
Mr William Strang was born at Dumbarton in 1859, came to London in 1875, and developed remarkable powers as a draughtsman under Legros at the Slade School. The first works of his to attract notice were his portrait drawings and his etchings, which attained distinction in two very different fields. His portraits, whether drawn or etched were intensely realistic, of a Holbeinesque clarity and simplicity, strong in line and character; but in etchings of other subjects Strang displayed imaginative gifts of the highest order, and his illustrations to the Bible, Don Quixote, and to some of Mr Kipling’s stories revealed a mind as alert to think and philosophise as his eye to see and his hand to record.
As a painter Strang had two distinct styles: in the first his color was based on that of the great Venetians, in the second his palette became much brighter and lighter and the influence of Manet was apparent. The union of his incisive drawing with this pure clean color produced in his second manner pictures of arresting brilliance. ‘Bank Holiday’, painted in 1912 and now in the Tate Gallery, is a fine example of his later style and, while displaying the severity of his line and the emphatic realism with which he presents figures and objects, it also reveals his imaginative gifts in the subtle rendering of the embarrassment of a holiday couple used to the etiquette which prevails in restaurants.
The Art Of Today (continued)
5
Returning to the pupils of Legros, first attention must be given to Charles Wellington Furse (1868-1904), who, but for his early death, would assuredly now be occupying a position in the art world rivalling that of Sargent and Orpen. Born at Staines, Furse was only sixteen when he began to study under Legros at the Slade School. Later he worked in Paris, and returning to London he soon made his mark at the New English Art Club, where his portraits especially attracted attention. He was only twenty-five when he began his heroic equestrian portrait of Lord Roberts—now in the Tate Gallery—a great work which, being interrupted by illness, he was never able to complete, for after his recovery he was too much occupied with other work to return to it at once.
Between 1899 and 1901 much of his time was taken up in painting the decorative spandrels for Liverpool Town Hall, and his remarkable capacity for executing imposing works on a large scale was clearly revealed to the world in 1903, when ‘The Return from the Ride’ was the ‘picture of the year’ at the Academy. In this magnificent portrait group of his friends Mr and Mrs Aubrey Waterfield, the figures are nearly life-size and the whole picture is painted with the assurance and exuberance of a master. In the following year, when he was elected A.R.A, he repeated his success at the Academy with an open air portraits of his wife, entitled ‘Diana of the Uplands’, another life-sized work full of breeziness and polished brilliance. For many years the artist had suffered from lung trouble; and this finally caused his death in the very year in which he had won his Associateship. The breadth and dignity of his outlook equalled the felicity of his execution, and while the great performances in which his art culminated may be said to have been based to some extent on the practice of Velazquez, his own personal gifts and his keen observations of Nature gave an individual distinction to his works which makes them essentially original.
Mr William Strang was born at Dumbarton in 1859, came to London in 1875, and developed remarkable powers as a draughtsman under Legros at the Slade School. The first works of his to attract notice were his portrait drawings and his etchings, which attained distinction in two very different fields. His portraits, whether drawn or etched were intensely realistic, of a Holbeinesque clarity and simplicity, strong in line and character; but in etchings of other subjects Strang displayed imaginative gifts of the highest order, and his illustrations to the Bible, Don Quixote, and to some of Mr Kipling’s stories revealed a mind as alert to think and philosophise as his eye to see and his hand to record.
As a painter Strang had two distinct styles: in the first his color was based on that of the great Venetians, in the second his palette became much brighter and lighter and the influence of Manet was apparent. The union of his incisive drawing with this pure clean color produced in his second manner pictures of arresting brilliance. ‘Bank Holiday’, painted in 1912 and now in the Tate Gallery, is a fine example of his later style and, while displaying the severity of his line and the emphatic realism with which he presents figures and objects, it also reveals his imaginative gifts in the subtle rendering of the embarrassment of a holiday couple used to the etiquette which prevails in restaurants.
The Art Of Today (continued)
Sunday, May 11, 2008
Pangea Day
Pangea Day is a global event bringing the world together through film. In 2006, filmmaker Jehane Noujaim won the TED Prize, an annual award granted at the TED Conference. She was granted $100,000, and more important, a wish to change the world. Her wish was to create a day in which the world came together through film. Pangea Day grew out of that wish.
Useful link:
www.pangeaday.org
Brilliant!
Useful link:
www.pangeaday.org
Brilliant!
Riedel
Riedel products are unique + the designs are beautiful + they are oenophile's pleasure. I liked it.
Useful link:
www.riedel.com
Useful link:
www.riedel.com
Htein Lin
Htein Lin is a Burmese artist + his prison experiences are portrayed in his paintings + they are dense with unique visual information.
Useful link:
www.hteinlin.com
Useful link:
www.hteinlin.com
The Billionaire's Vinegar
The Billionaire's Vinegar: The Mystery of the World's Most Expensive Bottle of Wine by Benjamin Wallace is full of detail that will delight wine lovers + it's a great story well told.
Useful link:
www.benjaminwallace.net
Useful link:
www.benjaminwallace.net
The Art Of Today
(via The Outline of Art) Frank Rutter writes:
While Legros was responsible for the renewed attention paid to drawings, other artists gradually made England familiar with the new ideas about color which had originated in France. Conspicuous among the pioneers in this direction is Mr George Clausen, R.A. Born at London in 1852, Mr Clausen was an art student at South Kensington from 1867 to 1873, and then went to Paris, where he was at first chiefly influenced by J.F Millet and his follower, Jules Bastien-Lapage (1848-84). His well-known picture at the Tate Gallery, ‘The Girl at the Gate’, a comparatively early work painted in 1889, shows Mr Clausen still dominated by the art of Bastien-Lepage. Later the artist was profoundly influenced by the color of the Impressionists, especially by Monet and Pissarro, and in his second manner, while frequently adhering to pastoral and peasant subjects which recall Millet, Mr Clausen presented them in prismatic colors in which the illumination of real sunshine is rendered with exquisite truth and delicacy. Mr Clausen has painted both the life and the light of the fields, fusing the humanity of J F Millet with the Nature-worship of Claude Monet. Possessing a wide range, he has painted portraits and allegorical subjects as well as landscapes and pastorals. All his work is distinguished by its beauty of color, radiant illumination, and human tenderness.
Mr P Wilson Steer was born at Birkenhead in 1860. After studying at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, Paris, he returned to England full of enthusiasm for the Impressionists, and among his early works may be found experiments in the style of Manet, Degas, Monet, and Renoir. But while he has always preserved their keen interest in light, Mr Wilson Steer gradually broke away from the close imitation of the Impressionists and developed a style of his own in which the vivacity and broken touch of the French painters were mingled with elements derived from such British painters as Gainsborough, Constable, and Turner. The later art of Mr Steer may be described as a blend of English and French traditions. In the landscapes of his maturity he has used pinks, mauves, and blues very sparingly and concentrated on the varied greens and yellows of Nature, excelling in the rendering of wooded country with trees glittering in the sunshine after rain, and also in depicting the light and atmosphere in great vistas of spacious countrysides. Equally distinguished s a figure painter, Mr Steer is represented by an auto-portrait in the Pitti Gallery, Florence, by ‘The Music Room’ in the Tate Gallery, and by figure subjects as well as landscapes in many other public galleries. Apparently averse to Academical honors, Mr Steer has from the first remained the most loyal member of the New English Art Club, of which he is still the chief ornament. The grace and refinement of his portraiture ar beautifully exemplified in his ‘Portrait of Mrs Hammersley’, in which the background also reveals his powers as landscape painter.
Two other members of the New English Art Club who have helped to introduce Impressionism into England are Lucien Pissarro and Walter Sickert. The former is the eldest son of Camille Pissarro. He was born at Paris in 1863, and grew up among the Impressionist and neo-Impressionists, so that he may be said to have been impregnated with the science of color from his early boyhood. In 1893 he settled in London, where he came into touch with William Morris, and setting up a private press he made a European reputation as a wood engraver and printer of beautiful books. As a painter he made his way more slowly, but his landscapes have always aroused the enthusiasm of his brother artists by their just observation and masterly statement of the actual hues in Nature.
Mr Walter Sickert, born in 1860, was in his youth a pupil of Whistler, but the influence of this master was later superseded by that of the Impressionists, especially that of Degas, after the artist took up his residence in Paris, where he remained for several years. Making a speciality of painting low-life scenes, portraying humble interiors, the galleries of theatres and music halls, costers and flower girls, Mr Sickert does not rarely explore, even in his landscapes, scenes at Dieppe or Venice, the realm of full sunshine which was the happy hunting ground of the earlier Impressionists. In his interiors Mr Sickert is known chiefly as an exquisite interpreter of the subtle beauties of twilight, in his exteriors he usually prefers grey days or at least moments when direct sunshine is masked; but within his self-imposed limits he is a true Impressionist, always giving his first attention to the lighting, and making lights even in darkness sparkle and vibrate with the magic of his deft broken touches.
The Art Of Today (continued)
While Legros was responsible for the renewed attention paid to drawings, other artists gradually made England familiar with the new ideas about color which had originated in France. Conspicuous among the pioneers in this direction is Mr George Clausen, R.A. Born at London in 1852, Mr Clausen was an art student at South Kensington from 1867 to 1873, and then went to Paris, where he was at first chiefly influenced by J.F Millet and his follower, Jules Bastien-Lapage (1848-84). His well-known picture at the Tate Gallery, ‘The Girl at the Gate’, a comparatively early work painted in 1889, shows Mr Clausen still dominated by the art of Bastien-Lepage. Later the artist was profoundly influenced by the color of the Impressionists, especially by Monet and Pissarro, and in his second manner, while frequently adhering to pastoral and peasant subjects which recall Millet, Mr Clausen presented them in prismatic colors in which the illumination of real sunshine is rendered with exquisite truth and delicacy. Mr Clausen has painted both the life and the light of the fields, fusing the humanity of J F Millet with the Nature-worship of Claude Monet. Possessing a wide range, he has painted portraits and allegorical subjects as well as landscapes and pastorals. All his work is distinguished by its beauty of color, radiant illumination, and human tenderness.
Mr P Wilson Steer was born at Birkenhead in 1860. After studying at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, Paris, he returned to England full of enthusiasm for the Impressionists, and among his early works may be found experiments in the style of Manet, Degas, Monet, and Renoir. But while he has always preserved their keen interest in light, Mr Wilson Steer gradually broke away from the close imitation of the Impressionists and developed a style of his own in which the vivacity and broken touch of the French painters were mingled with elements derived from such British painters as Gainsborough, Constable, and Turner. The later art of Mr Steer may be described as a blend of English and French traditions. In the landscapes of his maturity he has used pinks, mauves, and blues very sparingly and concentrated on the varied greens and yellows of Nature, excelling in the rendering of wooded country with trees glittering in the sunshine after rain, and also in depicting the light and atmosphere in great vistas of spacious countrysides. Equally distinguished s a figure painter, Mr Steer is represented by an auto-portrait in the Pitti Gallery, Florence, by ‘The Music Room’ in the Tate Gallery, and by figure subjects as well as landscapes in many other public galleries. Apparently averse to Academical honors, Mr Steer has from the first remained the most loyal member of the New English Art Club, of which he is still the chief ornament. The grace and refinement of his portraiture ar beautifully exemplified in his ‘Portrait of Mrs Hammersley’, in which the background also reveals his powers as landscape painter.
Two other members of the New English Art Club who have helped to introduce Impressionism into England are Lucien Pissarro and Walter Sickert. The former is the eldest son of Camille Pissarro. He was born at Paris in 1863, and grew up among the Impressionist and neo-Impressionists, so that he may be said to have been impregnated with the science of color from his early boyhood. In 1893 he settled in London, where he came into touch with William Morris, and setting up a private press he made a European reputation as a wood engraver and printer of beautiful books. As a painter he made his way more slowly, but his landscapes have always aroused the enthusiasm of his brother artists by their just observation and masterly statement of the actual hues in Nature.
Mr Walter Sickert, born in 1860, was in his youth a pupil of Whistler, but the influence of this master was later superseded by that of the Impressionists, especially that of Degas, after the artist took up his residence in Paris, where he remained for several years. Making a speciality of painting low-life scenes, portraying humble interiors, the galleries of theatres and music halls, costers and flower girls, Mr Sickert does not rarely explore, even in his landscapes, scenes at Dieppe or Venice, the realm of full sunshine which was the happy hunting ground of the earlier Impressionists. In his interiors Mr Sickert is known chiefly as an exquisite interpreter of the subtle beauties of twilight, in his exteriors he usually prefers grey days or at least moments when direct sunshine is masked; but within his self-imposed limits he is a true Impressionist, always giving his first attention to the lighting, and making lights even in darkness sparkle and vibrate with the magic of his deft broken touches.
The Art Of Today (continued)
Saturday, May 10, 2008
The Venkateswara Temple
The Venkateswara Temple at Tirumala, Andhra Pradesh, in India is dedicated to Lord Vishnu as 'Venkateswara' (or Srinivasa) and attracts followers from a wide range of Hindu traditions. The temple is the world's richest in terms of the wealth of offerings (invaluable ornaments and precious jewels) and gifts given by visiting pilgrims. Gold and diamonds are the traditional choice (s) for offerings.
Useful link:
www.tirumala.org
A must-visit.
Useful link:
www.tirumala.org
A must-visit.
Subroto Bagchi
I think Saritha Rai's article on MindTree @ http://www.forbes.com/global/2008/0519/020.html was brilliant. I really liked the jargon (s) emotional infrastructure/gardener = an aggregate of the positive feelings employees have for their company + for one another; 95-95-95 = 95% of its employees have access to 95% of the information 95% of the time.
Useful links:
www.mindtree.com
www.bangalore.philips.com
'My work will be unending in the same way as a gardener is eternally connected to every tree and plant in his garden. A gardener's work is never finished.'
- Subroto Bagchi
He was spot on.
Useful links:
www.mindtree.com
www.bangalore.philips.com
'My work will be unending in the same way as a gardener is eternally connected to every tree and plant in his garden. A gardener's work is never finished.'
- Subroto Bagchi
He was spot on.
Rediscovering David Lean
I am a huge fan of David Lean + (The Guardian) David Thomson has written an interesting article about the most celebrated English movie director @ http://film.guardian.co.uk/features/featurepages/0,,2279185,00.html + David Lean's The Passionate Friends is in cinemas from June through July @ bfi.org.uk/lean
Mark Boston
Mark Boston is the Chairman of H. Goldie & Company Ltd, international diamond brokers and consultants + he has an interesting/insightful blog @ http://hgoldie.blogspot.com
Useful link:
www.hgoldie.com
Useful link:
www.hgoldie.com
Home-brew Biodiesel
I found the article on home-brew biodiesel @ http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/may/10/biofuels.alternativeenergy very interesting + insightful. It's really encouraging to see people going the extra mile to produce DIY diesel to save the environment. Bravo!
Useful link:
www.etruk.com
Useful link:
www.etruk.com
Estella Collection Update
Here is an interesting update on Estella Collections @ http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/05/08/arts/estella.php + the controversy. It's unfortuntate but it's a fact of life that art business is always prone to speculation + misinterpretation + there are always unexpected winners and losers + I think the specific gravity of the art market is moving towards China.
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