Greyhound

Greyhound
Still Life
Gray's Anatomy
Grey
Gris
Grizzly
Cardinal
Juan Gris

Prov.16:5
"Every one that is proud in heart is an abomination to the LORD: though hand join in hand, he shall not be unpunished."

"For he was great, ere fortune made him so"~~~Dryden

“questa mi porse tanto di gravezza
 con la paura ch'uscia di sua vista,
 ch'io perdei la speranza de l'altezza.

She brought upon me so much heaviness,
  With the affright that from her aspect came,
  That I the hope relinquished of the height.”~~~Dante: La Divina Commedia.

"Shoot if you must this old gray head"~~~Whittier

Justus Juncker (1703-1767),German.
Pear With Insects, 1765.
Oil on oakwood

  

 Greyhound

grizzly bear (Ursus arctos horribilis)

 Juan Gris, September 1916, Woman with Mandolin, after Corot (La femme à la mandoline, d'après Corot), oil on canvas, 92 x 60 cm, Kunstmuseum Basel

Chess: "Greyhound" "Still Life" "Gray's Anatomy" "Grey" "Gris" "Grizzly" "Cardinal" "Juan Gris"

Städel Museum
Städelsches Kunstinstitut
und Städtische Galerie
+ 069-605098-200
Dürerstrasse 2
Frankfurt
Städel Annex, Ground Floor
March 20-August 17, 2008

Dewdrops on dainty petals, light glancing off precious silverware, candied confectionery in blue and white Chinese porcelain bowls, the soft plumage of a dead songbird, the pale hue of a skull — still lifes have not ceased to exercise their spell upon us to this day with their close-up views of inanimate, yet by no means lifeless objects reproduced with painterly finesse.

However, still life painting was anything but a merely aesthetic affair, even if today’s viewer tends to perceive it as such. It reflects not only a feeling of transience and a longing for redemption, but also the pleasure of visually representing exotic trading goods with which Dutch and other merchants made their fortunes.

Assembling the superb holdings of the Städel Museum, the Hessisches Landesmuseum Darmstadt, and the Kunstmuseum Basel, the exhibitions unfolds a spectrum of still life painting in the Netherlands and Germany from the late fifteenth to the late eighteenth centuries with more than ninety masterpieces by Jan Brueghel the Elder, Jan Davidsz. de Heem, Willem Kalf, Rachel Ruysch, Abraham Mignon, Georg Flegel, Jan Soreau, Gottfried von Wedigh, and Sebastian Stosskopf.

This offers a panorama of the genre’s different varieties from prosaic pieces of the early seventeenth century to later works depicting things of splendor, from banquet still lifes to sumptuous bouquets and picturesque animal still lifes.

Since its emancipation from the religious painting of the late Middle Ages, when objects mainly served as symbols or attributes, still lifes initially provided a means of understanding and interpreting things from the viewer’s everyday world that were “lying still.” These objects reflected the order and structure of the Baroque era’s superior abstract world: the human senses or a certain temperament, the elements or the seasons informing the individual’s world, or impermanence and guilty mankind’s need of redemption.

Yet, both the painters’ and the collectors’ and clients’ economic reality and its specifics also manifested itself in the still lifes as early as in the seventeenth century. The same merchant princes and investors who, primarily in the Netherlands, strove to make their country the most powerful trading nation of the globe, importing exotic goods into Europe from all over the world, ordered still lifes for decorating their town palaces and country houses with pictures revealing the sources of their wealth such as foreign spices, Venetian glass, and Chinese porcelain.

With the artists’ concentration on a few, often the same objects, still life painting gradually also turned in an ideal field of experimentation for their possibilities of expression. Painterly issues of representation became more important than the originally so prominent contents many works were charged with without ever replacing them entirely.

It was above all in still life painting, which held a low position in the hierarchy of genre categories that the artist had to prove his specific skills and a work’s attraction and value depended on its composition and ingenious assemblage of objects, its convincing coloring and masterly brushstroke. The paintings also evidence the expertise in rendering the most different materials and surfaces in a manner that deceives the eye. The artists experimented with various kinds of lighting from the even brightness of daylight to the weak glow of a single candle, utilizing them for the mise-en-scène of manifold situations and moods.

The exhibition, structured to provide the visitor with a survey outlining the development of the genre between 1500 and 1800 and to convey an idea of the most important subjects and varieties of still life painting, commences with early still life forms from the dawn of the modern age.

The first section illustrates the process of the still life’s emancipation from a symbolically charged accessory of religious painting to a subject in its own right. The following chapter dedicated to the early autonomous still life around 1600 with Jan Brueghel and Georg Flegel as main representatives marks a first highlight of the exhibition thanks to the selection of particularly fabulous works on display.

The next group comprises banquet and vanitas still lifes introducing the visitor to the symbolism of Baroque imagery and its very peculiar oscillations between sensual appeal and admonitions about the transience of worldly existence. The vanitas, the vanity and futility, of all things becomes visible in distinctive symbols, such as a skull, a candle going out, or a clock symbolizing the passage of time.

The following sections presenting fish and hunting still lifes as well as cartouche pictures convey the 17th-century painters’ extreme specialization in certain varieties, offering a strategic advantage on the art market as monopolists in a certain field in their town. These still lifes represented primarily by a larger number of works by Jan Davidsz. de Heem and Willem van Aelst are not only aimed at a display of splendor but also show the artists’ painterly virtuosity in minute details.

The last chapter of the exhibition is dedicated to the 18th century: here, “the magic of things” becomes especially manifest in Justus Juncker’s works, who, for example, presents a huge pear like a monument on a pedestal.

The section comprises no fewer than three masterpieces by the great French still life painter Jean Siméon Chardin. He required just a few laconic brushstrokes to lend the objects of his still lifes, which constitute the final highlight of the exhibition, an incredible presence.

Artists in the exhibition include Willem van Aelst, Pieter Aertsen, Abraham van Beyeren, Peter Binoit, Jan Brueghel d. Ä., Jan Brueghel d. J., Jean Siméon Chardin, Adriaen Coorte, Georg Flegel, Jan Fyt, Willem Claesz. Heda, Jan Davidsz. de Heem, Cornelis de Heem, David Cornelisz. de Heem, Hans Holbein d. J., Jacob van Hulsdonck, Justus Juncker, Jan van Kessel, Jacob Marrel, Abraham Mignon, Pieter de Ring, Ludger tom Ring d. J., Rachel Ruysch, Isaak Soreau, Peter Soreau, Harmen Steenwijck, Sebastian Stoskopff, Jan van de Velde, Jacob van Walscapelle, Gottfried von Wedig, Jan Weenix, a.o.

The exhibition The Magic of Things has been prepared by the Städel Museum and the Kunstmuseum Basel in cooperation with the Hessisches Landesmuseum Darmstadt. After its presentation in the Städel, it will be shown in the Kunstmuseum Basel from 5 September 2008 to 4 January 2009.

Exhibition curator is Dr. Jochen Sander, Vice-Director and Curator of Flemish painting and Paintings of the Romance schools before 1800.

Northeaster

Northeaster
El Norte
Septentrion
pH
Arenal
Los Chiles
La Fortuna
Pagoda
Halcyon
Kingfisher

Prov.16:4
"The LORD hath made all things for himself: yea, even the wicked for the day of evil."

"And wars have that respect for his repose,

As winds for halcyons when they breed at sea."   ~~~John Dryden :  Heroic Stanzas :Oliver Cromwell  36

Sergeant: For brave Macbeth—well he deserves that name— 35
Disdaining fortune, with his brandish'd steel, 
Which smoked with bloody execution, 
Like valour's minion carved out his passage 
Till he faced the slave; 
Which ne'er shook hands, nor bade farewell to him, 40
Till he unseam'd him from the nave to the chaps, 
And fix'd his head upon our battlements.   SHAKESPEARE: Macbeth Act I, Scene 2 A camp near Forres.

Kingfisher in Flight, Romania
by Joe Petersburger /Corbis

"No menos ilustrativa es la narración How I Found the Superman. Chesterton habla con los padres del Superhombre; interrogados sobre la hermosura del hijo, que no sale de un cuarto oscuro, éstos le recuerdan que el Superhombre crea su propio canon y debe ser medido por él («En ese plano es más bello que Apolo. Desde nuestro plano inferior, por supuesto...»); después admiten que no es fácil estrecharle la mano («Usted comprende; la estructura es muy otra»); después, son incapaces de precisar si tiene pelo o plumas. Una corriente de aire lo mata y unos hombres retiran un ataúd que no es de forma humana. Chesterton refiere en tono de burla esa fantasía teratológica."~~~Borges: Otras Inquisiciones: Sobre Chesterton

DUNCAN	No more that thane of Cawdor shall deceive
	our bosom interest: go pronounce his present death,
	And with his former title greet Macbeth. ~~~SHAKESPEARE: Macbeth

Northeaster
Winslow Homer (American, Boston, Massachusetts 1836–1910 Prouts Neck, Maine)
 In the mid-1890s, Homer began a series of paintings showing only water, coast, and sky. Prouts Neck, Maine, was one of the most frequently represented sites in these works. This painting was sold by Homer to Thomas B. Clarke in 1895. In 1899, the painting was returned to the artist and he reworked it by eliminating the two men who were once on the rocks at the left, and by altering the intensity of the form.
Northeaster is one of several paintings on marine subjects by the late-19th-century American painter Winslow Homer. Like The Fog Warning and Breezing Up, he created it during his time in Maine. It is on display in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Viewers are presented a struggle of elements between the sea and the rocky shore. Winslow Homer excelled in painting landscape paintings that depicted seascapes and mountain scenery.

The park and church at La Fortuna, Costa Rica. This local town is a popular spot for tourists to explore the Arenal area, and the view of the volcano is always amazing

"Almost all normal people want to be rich without great effort"~~~F. Scott Fitzgerald

Volcán Arenal, La Fortuna de San Carlos 

Lemon juice tastes sour because it contains 5% to 6% citric acid and has a pH of 2.2. (high acidity)

 Foto de Los Chiles (Alajuela), Costa Rica .

 Five-story pagoda of Tō-ji with Moon - by Shibazo, Japan

Chesss: "El Norte" "Septentrion" "pH" "Arenal" "Los Chiles" "La Fortuna" "Pagoda" "Halcyon" "Kingfisher" "Northeaster"

 Sobre Chesterton 

Jorge Luis Borges 

http://www.librodot.com

 Because He does not take away The terror from the tree...

CHESTERTON: A Second Childhood 

Edgar Allan Poe escribió cuentos de puro horror fantástico o de pura bizarrerie; Edgar Allan Poe fue inventor del cuento policial. Ello no es menos indudable que el hecho de que no combinó los dos géneros. No impuso al caballero Auguste Dupin la tarea de fijar el antiguo crimen del Hombre de las Multitudes o de explicar el simulacro que fulminó, en la cámara negra y escarlata, al enmascarado príncipe Próspero. En cambio, Chesterton prodigó con pasión y felicidad esos tours de force. Cada una de las piezas de la Saga del Padre Brown presenta un misterio, propone explicaciones de tipo demoníaco o mágico y las reemplaza, al fin, con otras que son de este mundo. La maestría no agota la virtud de esas breves ficciones; en ellas creo percibir una cifra de la historia de Chesterton, un símbolo o espejo de Chesterton. La repetición de su esquema a través de los años y de los libros (The Man who Knew Too Much, The Poet and the Lunatics, The Paradoxes of Mr. Pond) parece confirmar que se trata de una forma esencial, no de un artificio retórico. Estos apuntes quieren interpretar esa forma. Antes, conviene reconsiderar unos hechos de excesiva notoriedad. Chesterton fue católico, Chesterton creyó en la Edad Media de los prerrafaelistas (Of London, small and white, and clean), Chesterton pensó, como Whitman, que el mero hecho de ser es tan prodigioso que ninguna desventura debe eximirnos de una suerte de cómica gratitud. Tales creencias pueden ser justas, pero el interés que promueven es limitado; suponer que agotan a Chesterton es olvidar que un credo es el último término de una serie de procesos mentales y emocionales y que un hombre es toda la serie. En este país, los católicos exaltan a Chesterton, los librepensadores lo niegan. Como todo escritor que profesa un credo, Chesterton es juzgado por él, es reprobado o aclamado por él. Su caso es parecido al de Kipling, a quien siempre lo juzgan en función del Imperio Británico. Poe y Baudelaire se propusieron, como elatormentado Urizen de Blake, la creación de un mundo de espanto; es natural que su obra sea pródiga de formas del horror. Chesterton, me parece, no hubiera tolerado la imputación de ser un tejedor de pesadillas, un monstrorum artifex (Plinio, XXVIII, 2), pero invenciblemente suele incurrir en atisbos atroces. Pregunta si acaso un hombre tiene tres ojos, o un pájaro tres alas; habla, contra los panteístas, de un muerto que descubre en el paraíso; que los espíritus de los coros angélicos tienen sin fin su misma cara1 ; habla de una cárcel de espejos; habla de un laberinto sin centro; habla de un hombre devorado por autómatas de metal; habla de un árbol que devora a los pájaros y que en lugar de hojas da plumas; imagina (The Man who was Thursday, VI) que en los confines orientales del mundo acaso existe un árbol que ya es más, y menos, que un árbol, y en los occidentales, algo, una torre, cuya sola arquitectura es malvada. Define lo cercano por lo lejano, y aun por lo atroz; si habla de sus ojos, los llama con palabras de Ezequiel (1: 22) un terrible cristal, si de la noche, perfecciona un antiguo horror (Apocalipsis, 4: 6) y la llama un monstruo hecho de ojos. No menos ilustrativa es la narración How I found the Superman. Chesterton habla con los padres del Superhombre; interrogados sobre la hermosura del hijo, que no sale de un cuarto oscuro, éstos le recuerdan que el Superhombre crea su propio canon y debe ser medido por él («En ese plano es más bello que Apolo. Desde nuestro plano inferior, por supuesto...»); después admiten que no es fácil estrecharle la mano («Usted comprende; la estructura es muy otra»); después, son incapaces de precisar si tiene pelo o plumas. Una corriente de aire lo mata y unos hombres retiran un ataúd que no es de forma humana. Chesterton refiere en tono de burla esa fantasía teratológica. Tales ejemplos, que sería fácil multiplicar, prueban que Chesterton se defendió de ser Edgar Allan Poe 1Amplificando un pensamiento de Attar («En todas partes sólo vemos Tu cara»), Jalal-uddin Rumi compuso unos versos que ha traducido Rückert ( Werke, IV, 222), donde se dice que en los cielos, en el mar y en los sueños hay Uno Solo y donde se alaba a ese Único por haber reducido a unidad los cuatro briosos animales que tiran del carro de los mundos: la tierra, el fuego, el aire y el agua. Sobre Chesterton Jorge Luis Borges http://www.librodot.com Página 3 o Franz Kafka, pero que algo en el barro de su yo propendía a la pesadilla, algo secreto, y ciego y central. No en vano dedicó sus primeras obras a la justificación de dos grandes artífices góticos, Browning y Dickens; no en vano repitió que el mejor libro salido de Alemania era el de los cuentos de Grimm. Denigró a Ibsen ydefendió (acaso indefendiblemente) a Rostand, pero los Trolls y el Fundidor de Peer Gynt eran de la madera de sus sueños, the stuff his dreams were made of Esa discordia, esa precaria sujeción de una voluntad demoníaca, definen la naturaleza de Chesterton. Emblemas de esa guerra son para mí las aventuras del Padre Brown, cada una de las cuales quiere explicar, mediante la sola razón, un hecho inexplicable2 . Por eso dije, en el párrafo inicial de esta nota, que esas ficciones eran cifras de la historia de Chesterton, símbolos y espejos de Chesterton. Eso es todo, salvo que la «razón» a la que Chesterton supeditó sus imaginaciones no era precisamente la razón, sino la fe católica, o sea, un conjunto de imaginaciones hebreas supeditadas a Platón y a Aristóteles. Recuerdo dos parábolas que se oponen. La primera consta en el primer tomo de las obras de Kafka. Es la historia del hombre que pide ser admitido a la ley. El guardián de la primera puerta le dice que adentro hay muchas otras3 y que no hay sala que no esté custodiada por un guardián, cada uno más fuerte que el anterior. El hombre se sienta a esperar. Pasan los días y los años, y el hombre muere. En la agonía pregunta: «Será posible que en los años que espero nadie haya querido entrar sino yo?». El guardián le responde: «Nadie ha querido entrar porque a ti sólo estaba destinada esta puerta. Ahora voy a cerrarla». (Kafka comenta esta parábola, complicándola aún más, en el noveno capítulo de El proceso.) La otra parábola está en el Pilgrim's Progress, de Bunyan. La gente mira codiciosa un castillo que custodian muchos guerreros; en la puerta hay un guardián con un libro para escribir el nombre de aquel que sea digno de entrar. Un hombre intrépido se allega a ese guardián y le dice: «Anote mi nombre, señor». Luego saca la espada y se arroja sobre los guerreros y recibe y devuelve heridas sangrientas, hasta abrirse camino entre el fragor y entrar en el castillo. Chesterton dedicó su vida a escribir la segunda de las parábolas, pero algo en él propendió siempre a escribir la primera.