Plate VI (of 16) from the series The Imaginary Prisons (Le Carceri d'Invenzione), Rome, 1761 edition (reworked from 1745).
Source
8/30/11
Giovanni Battista Piranesi, Untitled etching (called "The Smoking Fire")
Plate VI (of 16) from the series The Imaginary Prisons (Le Carceri d'Invenzione), Rome, 1761 edition (reworked from 1745).
Source
Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Lady Lilith
Delaware Art Museum, Wilmington
Date: 1868
Technique: Oil on canvas, 97.8 x 85.1 cm
This picture may have been designed simply as a toilette scene. Probably in 1866, Rossetti began to associate it with Lilith, the legendary first wife of Adam who deceived him before he met Eve.
The sonnet he wrote for the picture combines the two ideas by emphasizing the allure of Lilith's hair. Later this sonnet was called 'Body's Beauty', in opposition to 'Soul's Beauty', the sonnet associated with 'Sibylla Palmifera'.
'Body's Beauty'
Of Adam's first wife, Lilith, it is told
(The witch he loved before the gift of Eve,)
That, ere the snake's, her sweet tongue could deceive,
And her enchanted hair was the first gold.
And still she sits, young while the earth is old,
And, subtly of herself contemplative,
Draws men to watch the bright web she can weave,
Till heart and body and life are in its hold.
The rose and poppy are her flowers; for where
Is he not found, O Lilith, whom shed scent
And soft-shed kisses and soft sleep shall snare?
Lo! as that youth's eyes burned at thine, so went
Thy spell through him, and left his straight neck bent
And round his heart one strangling golden hair.
Source 1
Source 2
8/28/11
Giovanni Battista Piranesi, Untitled etching (called "The Drawbridge")
Plate VII (of 16) from the series The Imaginary Prisons (Le Carceri d'Invenzione), Rome, 1761 edition (reworked from 1745).
The Prisons (Carceri d'invenzione or 'Imaginary Prisons'), is a series of 16 prints produced in first and second states that show enormous subterranean vaults with stairs and mighty machines.
These in turn influenced Romanticism and Surrealism. While the Vedutisti (or "view makers") such as Canaletto and Bellotto, more often reveled in the beauty of the sunlit place, in Piranesi this vision takes on a Kafkaesque, Escher-like distortion, seemingly erecting fantastic labyrinthian structures, epic in volume, but empty of purpose. They are cappricci -whimsical aggregates of monumental architecture and ruin.
The series was started in 1745. The first state prints were published in 1750 and consisted of 14 etchings, untitled and unnumbered, with a sketch-like look. The original prints were 16” x 21”. For the second publishing in 1761, all the etchings were reworked and numbered I–XVI (1–16). Numbers II and V were new etchings to the series. Numbers I through IX were all done in portrait format (taller than they are wide), while X to XVI were landscape (wider than they are high).
Source
8/23/11
Gustav Klimt, Tragedy (Tragödie)
Historisches Museum der Stadt Wien
Date: 1897
Technique: Black chalk, pencil and gold, 41.9 x 30.8 cm
From "Allegorien" Neue Folge, Nr.66, 1897 published by the Vienna Publishing Company Gerlach & Schenk
Source
8/19/11
The Hangman (1964)
A cynical look at how humankind loves to feed others into the death machine, from a disturbing poem by Maurice Ogden, read by Herschel Bernardi. Shadows and shifting geometric planes lend a Chirico-like quality to Julian's animation. Great musical score by Serge Hovey.
Director: Paul Julian/Les Goldman
Source
Director: Paul Julian/Les Goldman
Source
Charles Raymond Macauley, The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - The Door. Frontispiece
Date: 1904
Artwork for The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson.
Source
Charles Raymond Macauley, The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - ''Mr. Utterson... was aware of an odd, light footstep drawing near''
Date: 1904
Artwork for The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson.
Source
Charles Raymond Macauley, The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - ''Clubbed him to the earth''
Date: 1904
Artwork for The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson.
Source
Charles Raymond Macauley, The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - ''They saw it but for a glimpse''
Date: 1904
Artwork for The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson.
Source
Charles Raymond Macauley, The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - ''He... gave a kind of cry, and whipped upstairs''
Date: 1904
Artwork for The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson.
Source
8/18/11
Charles Raymond Macauley, The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - ''Tossed the light of the candle to and fro about their steps''
Date: 1904
Artwork for The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson.
Source
Charles Raymond Macauley, The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - ''Will you suffer me to take this glass in my hand''
Date: 1904
Artwork for The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson.
Source
Charles Raymond Macauley, The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - ''I was once more Edward Hyde''
Date: 1904
Artwork for The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson.
Source
Charles Raymond Macauley, The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - ''Solely occupied by one thought - the horror of my other self''
Date: 1904
Artwork for The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson.
Source
8/17/11
Albert Gantner, La fin de la ''Fée Verte''; Absinthe Prohibition in Switzerland 1910 (Poster)
Date: 1910
Technique: Print, 67 x 48 cm
The famous 1910 "Messieurs...c'est l'heure" anti-prohibition poster by Gantner, lamenting the final banning of absinthe in Switzerland in 1910. It was originally published in the Swiss satirical revue, edited by Louis Bron, "Le Guguss". It shows a triumphant prohibitionist, dressed as a priest, trampling on the murdered figure of the Green Fairy, while in the background Helvetica mourns her lost liberties.
Source
8/16/11
Katsushika Hokusai, Ghost of Kohada Koheiji
Date: c. 1830
Technique: Woodblock print, 12 x 10 in.
From One Hundred Tales (Hyaku monogatari)
In this tale based on an actual event, Koheiji was killed by his wife and her lover. As revenge he returns to haunt the couple while they are in bed together inside mosquito netting. The writer Santô Kyôden, also known as the Ukiyo-e artist Kitao Masanobu, developed the Koheiji story in his 1803 novel, Bizarre Tale of Revenge at Asaka Marsh (Fukushû kidan Asaka-numa). In 1808, the story was told on the kabuki stage, where it was an immediate hit.
Source
8/15/11
Katsushika Hokusai, The Plate Mansion (Sara-yashiki) - A woman ghost appeared from a well
Date: c. 1830
Technique: Woodblock print, 12 x 10 in.
From One Hundred Tales (Hyaku monogatari)
The legend of Okiku tells the story of a maid who, after breaking one of a set of precious Korean plates, was bound and thrown down a well by her master. The tale was told throughout Japan in a great variety of forms, the most popular version established in 1795, when Japan suffered an infestation of a type of worm found in old wells that became known as the "Okiku bug" (Okiku mushi). This worm, covered with thin threads making it look as though it had been bound, was widely believed to be a reincarnation of Okiku.
Source 1
Source 2
8/11/11
Toby Edward Rosenthal, Elaine
The Art Institute of Chicago
Date: 1874
Technique: Oil on canvas, 97.9 x 158.8 cm
American expatriate Toby Rosenthal painted grand narrative pictures with historical, mythological, and romantic themes that gained him international fame. Perhaps his biggest hit was Elaine, a picture based on Alfred Tennyson’s Idylls of the King. In keeping with Tennyson’s epic poem about unrequited love, the painting depicts a grim boatman ferrying the body of Elaine to Camelot, a love letter to Lancelot clutched to her chest. The work struck a chord with its viewers, creating a frenzy nationwide. In 1875, more than a thousand people a day lined up in front of a San Francisco art gallery to pay a 25-cent admission charge to view the picture. Before long “Elaine clubs” had sprung up and even an Elaine waltz was created.
Source 1
Source 2
Toby Edward Rosenthal, The Trial of Constance de Beverly
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
Date: 1880-1883
Technique: Oil on canvas, 146.37 x 231.14 cm
American art achieved cosmopolitan status in the decades following the nation’s centennial with figure paintings such as The Trial of Constance de Beverly by Toby Rosenthal (1848-1917). Although a scene set in the time of Henry VIII (1491-1547) the large canvas resonates of the 19th century and serves as a barometer of cultural taste.
Rosenthal was one of the earliest American expatriate artists to achieve international fame. Prussian-born, he grew up in San Francisco but returned to Europe to enroll in the Royal Academy in Munich. There he was introduced to the academic belief in the superiority of history painting. Under Karl von Piloty, Rosenthal learned how to depict stories of an uplifting, moral character in dramatic, yet easily understood terms.
While he lived in Germany, Rosenthal received his most significant commissions from Americans. In 1879 the San Francisco industrialist Irving M. Scott requested a scene from Marmion (1808), a romantic narrative poem by Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832). The tale was a favorite of Rosenthal’s patron, whose enthusiasm reflected the popularity of the Scotsman’s writings with the middle-class reading public. Scotts’ influence on 19th-century pictorial arts was equally pervasive, for beginning in the 1820s, his novels revolutionized history painting in Europe and America by providing artists with stories of a human character that had mass appeal. The Trial of Constance de Beverly was a late example of such painting.
Marmion is a tale fraught with all the elements of a bestseller: romance, danger, abandonment, and death. The story concerns Constance de Beverly, a beautiful young novice who is seduced into leaving the convent by Lord Marmion, a handsome but eventually faithless suitor. Rosenthal chose not to delineate a romantic episode, but to focus on the tense courtroom drama as Constance awaits her fate at the hands of a clerical tribune. In quite operatic fashion befitting medieval revival novels and history paintings, Rosenthal depicted the moment when a monk plucks Constance’s cloak from her shoulders to reveal her clothed as Lord Marmion’s page: in the background two monks gleefully prepare the niche where she will be bricked-up alive for breaking her religious vows. Rosenthal brilliantly exploited the romantic elements of gothic literature by heightening the sinister, almost ghoulish character of the scene through a cavernous setting, brownish-black palette, tenebrous lighting, and theatrical facial expressions.
Rosenthal sought complete accuracy in the details of the setting and costume. He did depart dramatically from the story, however, by omitting Lord Marmion from the trial scene. By doing so, Constance becomes the main protagonist, standing center stage, a heroine despite the tragedy of her situation. Painted during a period when most women still had little control of their own lives, Rosenthal’s Constance was someone who determined her own destiny. After winning a gold medal at the 1883 Munich International Art Exhibition, the painting was exhibited in San Francisco to great acclaim. Saved from the city’s 1906 earthquake and fire through quick thinking, it has remained in California ever since. (Ilene Susan Fort, The Trial of Constance de Beverly)
Source 1
Source 2
8/8/11
John Byam Liston Shaw, Illustration for Poe's Ligeia in Selected Tales of Mystery
London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1909
The thing that was enshrouded advanced boldly and palpably into the middle of the apartment
Source
John Byam Liston Shaw, Illustration for Poe's The Masque of the Red Death in Selected Tales of Mystery
London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1909
Darkness and decay and the red death held illimitable dominion over all
Source
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)