The Culture Enthusiast

"Amish Barn" by Jack Jeffers, 1980

 A young hare by Albert Düurer, 1502

Albrecht Dürer was a German painter and printmaker from the 16th century. He is considered to be the most important artist of the Northern Renaissance  He produced several altarpieces, religious works, portraits and cooper engraving. He also wrote theoretical works on Art in German, rather than in Latin which was the norm. Here's some interesting information about him:

- He made several self portraits, as a way of preparing for other activities and not being idle.

- His beautiful engraving from 1514, Melencolia I, was and still is extensively discussed and interpreted. In it we see "an angel sitting in the middle of a construction site, surrounded by hammers, planes and geometrical devices. It wears a dark and withdrawn countenance while Saturn radiates nocturnal light over the ocean behind." Art historian Erwin Panofsky initiated the modern reinterpretation of this work with the publication of his work Saturn and Melancholy. He proposes that Durer's work shows Melancholy not as a negative, undesirable state but a state connected to genius and intellectual work. There's a great article about it in The Guardian.

Lastly, I'm a big believer in studying, experiencing and, dare I say?, living, art in person. Even though most of my art education comes from books, I check out new exhibits at local museums and try as much as I can to travel to New York and D. C. to visit the collections in bigger museums. If you'd like to check out when a Durer exhibit is coming near you, Artsy is a good resource for upcoming shows (they also offer Durer's works and articles about them in case you, like me, have to marvel at Durer's genius from home).

Autumn Rhythm (number 30) by Jackson Pollock, 1950

Waiting in the hotel room by James Hart Dyke

Meeting an agent by James Hart Dyke

This is why I was fascinated by James Hart Dyke's series of paintings entitled "A Year with the MI6". 

In 2009, the centenary year of MI6, Dyke was invited by the British Secret Intelligence Service to depict the secret world of espionage. According to Dyke, "the pictures represented an outsider’s unique interpretation of an existence that, for those who work in SIS [Secret Intelligence Service], can often be dangerous and surreal".

The paintings are incredible, because they seem to have a balance between the insider's and the outsider's point of view. 

The insider knows that an agent's job is more boring and less glamorous than what we see in movies (they have meetings, they exchange information etc).

The outsider thinks spies date a lot of gorgeous women, break the law all the time, get involved in car/airplane/boat chases because most of the information he has of spies comes from movies and books. And the paintings are, as Flavorwire described them, "shadowy". They are dark and blurry just like the world of espionage  is to us - we never really know what goes on there.

Espionage by James Hart Dyke

Maybe Daniel Craig's jaded eyes are closer to life than Pierce Brosnan's suave charm.

You can check all paintings in the artist's website.

What do you think of Dyke's paintings? (In a related topic: Are you excited by the new James Bond movie?)

These beautiful flower studies were drawn by Dutch painter Jan van Huysum from 1697 to 1749. He specialized in still lifes and he aimed for his paintings to be as realistic as possible. 

A little bit of history

Date: 1871

Located in the Gallery of Modern Art, Florence.

A little bit of technique

The use of light and shadow is amazing. Pilate's clothes are transparent and there's great contrast between the hot sun of the background and the cooling marble of the foreground.  

Many famous artists, like Caravaggio and Titian, portrayed this scene. What's unique about Ciseri's portrayal is that Jesus and Pilate are not facing the viewer. They have their backs to us and it is as if we are in the backstage of the scene. We are a character, maybe a servant or a centurion  who was just passing by, heard all the screaming and stopped to see what's happening. 

Because we can't see their faces, body posture is incredibly important.  Pilate bends his body and puts his foot towards the crowd to get closer to them, arms pointing to the "man of pains" as if saying: "Isn't this enough?". 

Christ's body posture is completely different. He looks down, motionless, patiently suffering. 

A little bit of enthusiasm

What calls my attention, other than the extreme beauty of the painting, are the two "supporting" characters: the faceless crowd standing in the balconies at the top of the painting and Pontius Pilate's wife in the right corner of the painting.2

We can't see the faces in the crowd, but some figures at the roof tops have their arms raised. In their euphoria wouldn't they be screaming "Crucify Him!"? 

Pilate's wife, on the other hand, is holding another woman for support. She can't even bear to look at what's happening. Before this all began she told her husband not to harm Jesus because she had dreamed about Him. 

Maybe these two characters, Pilate's wife and (part of) the crowd, weren't Jesus' followers. Not everybody knew and believed He is the Son of God. I've always wondered how non-believers would react being witnesses to the Passion.

The painting shows these different, opposite reactions of people that weren't Jesus' disciples. The crowd's reaction was excitement in face of cruelty. At best they were just going with the flow, with what the majority wanted. Pilate's wife' reaction was sadness and compassion.

The making of this film also appears in a fictionalized form, in Ed Harris' movie Pollock. In the movie we can also see what happened afterwards. It is said that the making of Namuth's film took its toll in Pollock and might have led him back to alcoholism.

  detail from the San Giobbe AltarPiece by Giovanni Bellini (1480)

He received his first lessons from Andrea Mantegna, his brother-in-law, which were decisive for the formation of his talent.

A self-made man, he maitained an independent studio and never received any honours. He was always imposing himself through his own merit.

Even when he was in his 80's he was still proposing new paths to aesthetic research.

In 1516, the german painter Albert Duher, wrote to a friend that he saw Bellini in Venice and that despite Bellini's old age he was still the most important painter there.

Images' sources: 1, 2, 3

What is your favorite painting from Bellini? Do you like his Madonnas?

I'd like to share my latest book purchases and maybe rationalize how on Earth I am supposed to finish all of them. I bought them on the same day and almost couldn't carry them home.

In my defense, they were bargains. (Isn't that always the defense?)

Paul Johnson's preface got me really excited: "It is therefore essential that society defend itself against cultural breakdown. The best way it can do this is by grasping the importance of art to the well-being of mankind: as many people as possible making it their business to examine art constantly, inform themselves about it and develop their faculties of understanding and loving it." 

Don't worry, Paul, I'm on it.

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I usually begin checking the summary and flipping through the chapters. It always gets me down to see the first chapter is always about cave paintings. I want to skip it but can't bring myself to do so. It looks too much like cheating.

Usually Egyptian and Greek art come after, then I get a little motivated. But most times I want to cheat big time and start backwards, beginning with modernism (usually the chapter that mentions Turner).

I'm extremely suspicious about modern art but I love reading about it. It's like a sick curiosity: I want to see it where it all fell apart. Just kidding. Sort of.

This is probably why I like reading art books, it's like a roller coaster ride. You start very slow and with  great anticipation, then there's a lot of excitement and that Renaissance high, and in the end you get slightly Andy Warhol nauseous.