Actually I think it's a blog devoted to jade. Such gorgeous pieces on there.
www.my.cnd.org
Monday, March 19, 2007
From the Orient
This site seems to be selling beautiful Oriental pieces of art. It's in Chinese type. These are such intricate pieces, one could look at them for a long time.
http://www.my.cnd.org
Jade
Today I had lunch at a Japanese restaurant. The waitress wore a beautiful jade pendant. Here is some jade and jadeite. The creamy colors of jade are so lovely.
http://www.culinarycultures.com
Vintage jewelry
This auction house had photos of some vintage jewelry that caught my eye. I love the fanciful, anthropomorphic ornamentation of this jewelry.
http://www.ragoarts.com
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Great recording
I heard this recording on the radio and had to buy it. It is gorgeous, magical. The voices are all perfect and the orchestra is sublime. Best version of this opera I've ever heard. It's available very cheaply (used) from Amazon. And yes, the CD cover is just awful!
Conductor: Jeffrey Tate
Performers: Barbara Bonney, Barbara Hendricks, Eva Lind, Andreas Schmidt, Anne Sofie von Otter, et al.
Orchestra: Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Bayerischen Rundfunkorchester
Audio CD (October 15, 1990). Angel Records.
National Library, Vienna Austria
Some people on flickr have photographs of this rococo masterpiece. I never knew about it.
Friday, March 09, 2007
A young pianist
This is Serg van Gennip. From his website:
Born in Kazan, Russia, in 1985. Serg van Gennip lived in St. Petersburg until the age of five. During this tender age, he always felt a certain attraction to the musical part of life, watching many great artists at work in theatres and concert halls. How can someone be attracted to this art so early? The answer could lie in the genes. Serg van Gennip is a far relative of Sergei Rachmaninov.
I'm listening to his playing and it's fantastic! And many pieces are available for free download. He supposedly has a podcast but it doesn't work. However there are pieces on his site that can be downloaded as MP3s.
http://www.serg.vangennip.com/www/home.html
Max Ernst
From MOMA website:
Max Ernst. (French, born Germany. 1891-1976). Two Children Are Threatened by a Nightingale. 1924.
Gallery label text
Dada, June 18–September 11, 2006
Made in 1924, the year of Surrealism’s founding, Ernst described this work as "the last consequence of his [sic] early collages—and a kind of farewell to a technique..." He later gave two possible autobiographical references for the nightingale: the death of his sister in 1897, and a fevered hallucination he recalled in which the wood grain of a panel near his bed took on "successively the aspect of an eye, a nose, a bird’s head, a menacing nightingale, a spinning top, and so on."
http://moma.org
Thursday, March 08, 2007
Chrysler building
Bottom: Fairchild Aerial Surveys, Inc. The Mount Everest of Manhattan: The Silvered Peak of the Chrysler Building. 1930. Gelatin silver print, 8 3/4 x 6 13/16" (22.3 x 17.3 cm). The New York Times Collection. http://moma.org
Top: Probably a famous photograph, I don't have the credits.
This building is a concrete manifestation of fantasy. Does it represent the power and masculinity of modern USA in the 1920s? I don't know. It's amazing that such an art deco masterpiece got made and is still there.
http://moma.org
Saturday, March 03, 2007
Charles Altamont Doyle
The artist Charles Altamont Doyle was the father of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. He was institutionalized in mental hospitals from middle age onward, although by today's standards he was not insane. Nor did he think he was insane, and tried to prove with his art that he wasn't. It didn't work. Basically, he was an alcoholic and depressed. He was a trained artist and his works are poignant and delicate. There's an interesting book called The Doyle Diary by Michael Baker (1978) that reproduces Charles Doyle's journal sketches from his time in Sunnyside mental institution in Scotland. If you think these works are strange, his brother Richard "Dicky" Doyle was a famous Victorian artist well known for his fairy illustrations. Years later, Arthur Conan Doyle publicized "fairy photographs" which he believed were real. By today's standards, these photographs are pretty fake looking. Even back then, they were debunked. My point being that the entire family (not just the one who was institutionalized) had a "thing" for fairies.
St. Giles His Bells (unknown location).
Meditation, Self Portrait (V&A Museum, London). This watercolour comes from one of the sketchbooks used by the artist during his stay in the Royal Montrose Lunatic Asylum in Scotland. His son, the writer Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, organised an exhibition of the artist's work in London in 1924. http://www.vam.ac.uk/images/image/16458-popup.html
Monday, February 19, 2007
Michelangelo Buonarotti
Michelangelo was so passionate and emotional. I love the mannerist style. The reaching of the two hands toward each other is a pinnacle of humanist iconograhy. This gorgeous photo was blogged from flickr.
Sunday, February 18, 2007
La Belle et la Bete
This movie has put me to sleep in the past, but not today. I finally appreciated its magic, romance, and enchantment. It is very beautiful, very simple.
Monday, February 12, 2007
Submarine Lagoon
It was a blast from the past to see this on flickr. I used to go on this ride and thought it was really under the ocean!
Friday, February 09, 2007
Psychiatry podcast
Welcome to the Intitute of Psychiatry audio feeds. We aim to bring to you all public lectures and events at the Institute of Psychiatry, this includes, the popular Maudsley Debates series. These are entertaining, interesting podcasts. The British speakers are so articulate and witty. Plus I'm interested in the subject.
http://www.iop.kcl.ac.uk/podcast/default.aspx?type=items
Lewis Chessman, British Museum
The Lewis Chessmen in the British Museum were probably made in Norway, about AD 1150-1200
Found on the Isle of Lewis, Outer Hebrides, Scotland
The chess pieces consist of elaborately worked walrus ivory and whales' teeth in the forms of seated kings and queens, mitred bishops, knights on their mounts, standing warders and pawns in the shape of obelisks.
(Written by RobRoyAus on Flickr)
Wednesday, February 07, 2007
Tuesday, February 06, 2007
Marilyn Horne
I downloaded a podcast from Premier Opera Podcast featuring the mezzo-soprano, Marilyn Horne. She is a showstopper! I absolutely adored her renditions of You're a Grand Old Flag and God Bless America. But the podcast mainly featured her coloratura work. Thanks, Marilyn!
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