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The Art of Utamaro
The text below is the excerpt from the book Utamaro (ASIN: B016XN18LC), written by Edmond de Goncourt, published by Parkstone International. To leaf through albums of Japanese prints is truly to experience a new awakening, during which one is struck in particular by the splendour of Utamaro. His sumptuous plates seize the imagination through his love of women, whom he wraps so voluptuously in grand Japanese fabrics, in folds, contours, cascades and colours so finely chosen that the heart grows faint looking at them, imagining what exquisite thrills they represented for the artist. For women’s clothing reveals a nation’s concept of love, and this love itself is but a form of lofty thought crystallised…
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Art of Vietnam
The text below is the excerpt from the book Art of Vietnam (ASIN: B07C2JLY7X), written by Catherine Noppe and Jean-François Hubert, published by Parkstone International. Situated on the eastern extremity of what is known as Southeast Asia, Vietnam finds itself at the confluence of two worlds. With China to the north and Laos and Combodia to the west, Vietnam has long been subject to a double-influence; one nicely captured by the French term, first introduced in the 1840s , “Indochine” (Indo—China). Endowed with a coastline more than two thousand kilometers long, Vietnam’s eastern seaboard gives it access not only to the Philippines and Indonesia, but also to China and Japan, commercial opportunities that were…
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Epiphany – Three Kings’ Day Celebration
The text below is the excerpt from the book Christ in Art, written by Ernest Renan, published by Parkstone International. Jesus was born in Nazareth, a small town in Galilee, which before him was unknown. All his life he was designated by the name of “Nazarene,” and it is only by an awkward detour that the legend succeeds in fixing his birth at Bethlehem. We shall further on see the motive of this supposition and how it was the necessary consequence of the Messianic character attributed to Jesus. The precise date of his birth is unknown. It occurred under the reign of Augustus, towards the year 750 of Rome, probably sometime in the…
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Shelley’s art Musings – Spotlight on William Blake
When I think about William Blake, I instantly think of the film “Red Dragon” – you know the one where the character Francis Dolarhyde is obsessed with the painting and kills his family to try and gain the same strength as the creature depicted. The film was inspired by the book “Red Dragon” by Thomas Harris and was a lead into the Hannibal Lector stories. While this is where the majority of us will recognise the work from, Blake was more than just a painter, he was also a poet and a printmaker, who turned his back on formalised religion and created his own personal complex mythology. Blake was largely…
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Spotlight on Marc Chagall
The text below is the excerpt from the book Marc Chagall, written by Victoria Charles, published by Parkstone International. Through one of those curious reversals of fate, one more exile has regained his native land. Since the exhibition of his work at the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow in 1987 and which gave rise to an extraordinary popular fervour, Marc Chagall has experienced a second birth. Here we have a painter, perhaps the most unusual painter of the twentieth century, who at last, attained the object of his inner quest: the love of his Russia. Thus, the hope expressed in the last lines of My Life, the autobiographical narrative which the…
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Shelley’s Art Musings – Spotlight on Auguste Rodin
There are many historical events that have happened in November, on the 12th November 1944, 32 British Lancaster bombers finally sank the German battleship, the Tirpitz after 2 years of trying. On the same day in 1946 the first drive through bank was opened in the USA. Also, on this day in 1840 Auguste Rodin was born and would change the face of sculpture for those who would be set to follow. The founder of modern sculpture was born in Paris and was largely self-educated until he attended the Petite Ecole at the 14. He had started to teach himself to draw at the age of 10, which held him…
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Spotlight on Chaïm Soutine
The text below is the excerpt from the book Chaïm Soutine, written by Klaus H. Carl, published by Parkstone International. Chaïm Soutine was born in 1893 (some biographies cite his year of birth as sometime after 1894) in Smilavichy, a village near the city of Minsk in the current state of Belarus, inhabited at that time by less than a thousand residents. Smilavichy lies in the former Principality of Polotsk, an urban area of the East Slavic Dregowitschi and Kriwitzen that had joined forces with other ethnic groups in the 9th century. This area formed the basis of the Old Russian state of Kievan Rus’, and belonged from the 14th-16th century to…
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Paul Gauguin and the Impressionists (part 2)
You can read part 1 here. The text below is the excerpt from the book Paul Gauguin, written by Anna Barskaya, published by Parkstone International. Gauguin’s deviation from Impressionism first manifested itself during his stay in Rouen. It is particularly evident in his plastic works, a case in point being the carving of a small wooden jewellery box. The decor of the external sides ornamented with theatrical masks and ballet dancers in tutus (a design borrowed from Degas) is in striking contrast with the corpse-like figure in the bottom of the box, which is reminiscent of a Peruvian mummy. This clash of motifs – worldly amusements and death – leaves no doubt as…
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For Memorial Day: The Art of War
The text below is the excerpt from the book The Art of War, written by Sun Tzu and Victoria Charles, published by Parkstone International. “The art of war” – the first association people have with this term, has, not surprisingly, nothing to do with art but everything to do with war: the ancient military treatise The Art of War. Generally attributed to Chinese general Sun Tzu (depending on transliteration also Sun Wu or Sunzi), the book was written in feudal China, roughly 400 to 200 years before Christ. On a side note, depending on the scholarly point of view, the writings – which already had garnered a certain reputation by the time of…
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English Painting
The text below is the excerpt from the book English Painting, written by Ernest Chesneau , published by Parkstone International. Is there an English school of painting at all? Strictly speaking, the word school applies only in a very imperfect manner to the growth of painting in England. Generally it is used to designate a special collection of traditions and processes, a particular method, a peculiar style in design, and an equally peculiar taste in colouring – all contributing to the representation of a national ideal existing in the minds of the artists of the same country at the same time. In this sense, we speak of the Flemish school, the Dutch school, the…
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