The Friday Evening Nudes

Back by the demand of one. But that one is well...a very cool one. :-)

Enjoy. And John Lee Hooker in the post below for you as well.

A good weekend to you,
Pagan Sphinx

 

Rodin

 Drawings of a Sculptor

Happy Hour Friday

Mind the gap out their, there people!

(I far prefer it to please watch your step as you exit onto the train platform. We Americans are soooooo wordy!)

Art in the Song

 I collect songs about art. Well, of course, as if you wouldn't have guessed.  This one's by the talented and adorable Rufus Wainwright.
 
pssst...to enjoy it, you have to pay attention to the words.  ;-)



If you're interested in the lyrics of the songs I post, let me know in comments and I will make every effort to include them from now on. 

Next episode will be a song by Joni Mitchell, which features her nod to Michelangelo.  Perhaps you know it...

Love and Peace,

Pagan Sphinx

ABC Wednesday - B is for Bouguereau

B is for Bouguereau (Adolphe-William)

(November 30, 1825 - August 19, 1905) was a French academic painter. Bouguereau was a staunch traditionalist whose realistic genre paintings and mythological themes were modern interpretations of Classical subjects with a heavy emphasis on the female human body.

Although he created an idealized world, his almost photo-realistic style was popular with rich art patrons. He was very famous in his time but today his subject matter and technique receive relatively little attention compared to the popularity of the Impressionists.

Self-Portrait

"Each day I go to my studio full of joy; in the evening when obliged to stop because of darkness I can scarcely wait for the morning to come... if I cannot give myself to my dear painting I am miserable."

In painting, I am an idealist. I see only the In painting, Ikkkk am an idealist. I see only the beautiful in art and, for me, art is the beautiful.  Why I

"One shouldn't believe in all those so-called innovations. There is only one nature and only one way to see it. Nowadays, they want to succeed too fast, this is how they go about inventing new aesthetics, pointillism, pipisme! All this is just to make noise."  ~ Adolfe-William Bouguereau

"In painting, I am an idealist. I see only the beautiful in art and, for me, art is the beautiful. Why reproduce what is ugly in nature?"

Note:  one of the reasons I am so fond of this painting is because it hangs at one of my favorite museums, The Clarke, in Williamstown, Massachusetts. It is a huge canvas that dwarfs everything else in the room, not only because of its size but also its beauty. I don't usually go for idealized depictions of beauty but this Bougeureau in particular, is an exception.

 

"First one has to love nature with all ones heart and soul, and be able to study and admire it for hours on end. Everything is in nature. A plant, a leaf, a blade of grass, should be the subjects of infinite and fruitful meditations; for the artist, a cloud floating in the sky has form, and the form affords him joy, helps him think."

"One is born an artist. The artist is a man endowed with a special nature, with a particular feeling for seeing form and color spontaneously, as a whole, in perfect harmony. If one lacks that feeling, one is not an artist and will never become an artist; and it is a waste of time to entertain the possibility."

 Sources

Bouguereau - The Complete Works
Art and Influence
Rehs Galleries, New York

ABC Wednesday - look it up!

Bob Dylan - I Want You

There are certain songs that make my pulse race. This is one of them. Enjoy, everything you can, every day.

Fondly,
Pagan Sphinx

Musique Noire - Fade to Black - Dire Straits

Music and lyrics by Mark Knopfler

Artist Birthdays in January

 There are a whole slew, in fact. This post features mini-tributes to Jackson Pollock, Robert Motherwell and Barbara Hepworth.


Robert Motherwell (January 24, 1915 – July 16, 1991) was an American abstract expressionist painter and printmaker

Motherwell in his studio

Robert Motherwell, 

Elegy to the Spanish Republic (Basque Elegy)

1967

Oil on canvas 82 ¼ x 138 inches, Private Collection.

Location: 2nd floor, JCMCA Portland Art Museum

portlandart.net

Dame Barbara Hepworth DBE (10 January 1903 – 20 May 1975) was an English sculptor.

Photo from NewArtCentre 

(see link below)

Jackson Pollock
(January 28, 1912 – August 11, 1956) 

American abstract expressionist

 Photo by Martha Holmes
1949

 Sources linked for this post:

NewArtCentre

the Artchive

Tate Britain

Artnet.com

My Own Robert Plant

 For WP with love

(albeit a bit dazed and confused)

You know it is coming true, Dearest. and it's not 1969 anymore.  :-)

Music for Sunday

 This is one goes out to Ginger, who recently referred to the T.S. Eliot poem.
With love.  

For I have known them all already, known them all:— Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,         50 I have measured out my life with coffee spoons; I know the voices dying with a dying fall Beneath the music from a farther room.   So how should I presume?

For the entire T.S. Eliot poem The Love Song of J.A. Prufrock, click here

What is it that makes me just a little bit queasy?

Theres a breeze that makes my breathing not so easy
Ive had my lungs checked out with X rays
Ive smelled the hospital hallways

Someday Ill have a disappearing hairline
Someday Ill wear pyjamas in the daytime

Times when the day is like a play by Sartre
When it seems a bookburnings in perfect order
I gave the doctor my description
Ive tried to stick my prescriptions

Someday Ill have a disappearing hairline
Someday Ill wear pyjamas in the daytime

Afternoons will be measured out
Measured out, measured with
Coffeespoons and T.S. Eliot

Maybe if I could do a play-by playback
I could change the test results that I will get back
Ive watched the summer evenings pass by
Ive heard the rattle in my bronchi...

Someday Ill have a disappearing hairline
Someday Ill wear pyjamas in the daytime

Afternoons will be measured out
Measured out, measured with
Coffeespoons and T.S. Eliot (2x)