About.com Art History

Wordless Wednesday - Pick Apart the Allegory

Wed, 10 Feb 2010 00:01:47 +0000

Agnolo Bronzino (Italian, 1503-1572)
An Allegory with Venus and Cupid, ca. 1545
Oil on wood
146.1 x 116.2 cm (57 1/2 x 45 3/4 in.)
Purchased 1860
NG651
National Gallery, London

Here is the single best example of Mannerism as is found in many an art history tome.

For your Word~~less~~y Wednesday assignment, please describe the "allegorical" aspects of this tortured, elongated-limbed Ode to Love composition in 250 words or less in the comments below, in honor of Valentines Day.

I already "know" who's supposed to be Time, Fraud, Jealousy, Pleasure and Play in here, but would love to hear your 21st-century interpretations of this 16th-century piece. My personal hopes lay less in, "Flowers! Scented candles! And a cheesy teddy bear! Oh, my Darling, could you not also afford a politically correct diamond?" than in hearing from one's long-wed Darling, "Thank you for laundering my tighty whities for the eleventy-billionth time, in case I didn't say it the other 10,999,999,999 times ... uh ... um ... Venus?" (Obviously, nobody hipped Bronzino that True Love = Doing the Laundry as he painted this panel.)

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Wordless Wednesday - Pick Apart the Allegory originally appeared on About.com Art History on Wednesday, February 10th, 2010 at 00:01:47.

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Kudos to LACMA's New "Reading Room"

Tue, 02 Feb 2010 18:47:45 +0000

Fellow art historians, can we ever get enough full and free access to sources? No. No, we cannot. In fact, I suspect that if we had our druthers, every text, dissertation, thesis, review, critical essay, exhibition and/or auction catalogue would live online in full (including footnotes) 24/7/365, forever and ever, amen.

Towards this is end, please join me in sending a collective namaste to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art on its recently-launched Art Reading Room. The Reading Room's initial offerings are comprised of ten exhibition catalogues, mostly from the 1960s, and each is a gem. As in: hard to find, probably long out of print, and good luck to you if you're attempting to borrow them through Inter-Library Loans.

I've spent several hours today happily engrossed in Maurice Tuchman's New York School: The First Generation, Paintings of the 1940s and 1950s (1965), which is overflowing with verbatim quotes and group statements from Motherwell, de Kooning, Gorky, Rothko, Kline, Hofmann, et. al., and contemporary critical essays from Greenberg, Rosenberg and Shapiro (amongst other titans). Folks, it just doesn't get any better than this if you, like me, feel your geeky heart rate accelerate over the thought of getting your grubby little mitts on art-historic research.

As a huge bonus, all of the ten catalogues are offered "to go," meaning that you can download and save each in .pdf form. I prefer this myself, because it means I can resize the page to fit my monitor and use the search function at my leisure. As a warning--and, no, I am not warning you, you good Netizen--all copyright restrictions still apply, just as if one were reading a physical copy in one's local library. I mention this only because a few bad apples out there continue to believe that everything s/he finds on the Internet exists to lazily appropriate at will, with nary a thought about Fair Use laws or citing sources.

Anyway, please enjoy, and huge thanks to LACMA. Paying technicians to accurately scan full texts and hosting bandwidth are both expensive, so it behooves us to stand and applaud ... and pray that other institutions will follow suit as time and funds permit.

Kudos to LACMA's New "Reading Room" originally appeared on About.com Art History on Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010 at 18:47:45.

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Do You Think Exhuming Leonardo's Corpse Is a Good Idea?

Tue, 26 Jan 2010 15:31:03 +0000

Have you heard that a group of scientists and historians from the Italian National Committee for Cultural Heritage are seeking permission to dig up Leonardo's corpse? Yes, as reported in The Telegraph yesterday, it's true. You, like me, may now be asking yourself, "But, why? Do Leonardo's remains hold the key to a cure for cancer?" Would that this was the case but, sadly, no. The merry band of diggers are hoping to find the Master's skull in order to recreate his face to see if it matches the face in La Gioconda, commonly known as Mona Lisa. Are you listening, Mr. Brown? Do you see the miracles you have wrought with your keen art-historic insights?

I won't lie, I'm having a hard time with this. The curiosity end doesn't seem to justify the expensive means. On the other hand, I doubt that Leonardo would have had a problem with this plan. He was a scientist, after all.

What do you think? Please take our poll and feel free to share your thoughts in the comments.

Do You Think Exhuming Leonardo's Corpse Is a Good Idea? originally appeared on About.com Art History on Tuesday, January 26th, 2010 at 15:31:03.

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Mike Mitchell Is With COCO

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 15:33:05 +0000

Many denizens of the scholarly art history crowd (if they even watch television) probably tune into Charlie Rose for late night entertainment. The rest of us have doubtless heard that NBC has stuck a fork into The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien after only seven months; it's done as of the Friday, January 22, 2010 taping.

For the past three weeks, the so-called Leno-O'Brien feud has (1) had a lot of comedic tongues wagging and (2) generated an enormous outpouring of popular support for O'Brien, his staff, his writers and the Tonight Show crew. And here is where I'd like to introduce you to Mike Mitchell, the artist who drew I'm With COCO, and whose Facebook page with the same title has over 607,000 fans as I type this. Mitchell does some interesting portraiture and illustration work in mixed-media/digital ... often sort of a mash-up of LowBrow, Steam Punk and old school video game art, combined with three cups of humor (my favorite: No Luck McGee), two tablespoons of pop culture references and a hefty dash of the macabre. Hard to describe, but you can see his gallery on Deviant Art for yourself.

Now, does I'm With COCO rank with Guernica or The Shootings of May Third, 1808 as powerful protest art? No, no one could make that claim with a straight face. It's worth noting, though, that a lot of great art was, is and will forever be generated out of protest and/or spontaneously, in reaction to some event. Five Internet dollars says that I'm With COCO will get its due in cultural sociology studies years from now but, in the meantime, it's always fun to meet a talented new (to me) artist like Mike Mitchell. Oh, and, for the record: I'm firmly in the pre-Gen X demographic that NBC seems to assume will tune in for Jay Leno's second stint as Tonight Show host. Please refer to the image above.

Mike Mitchell Is With COCO originally appeared on About.com Art History on Friday, January 22nd, 2010 at 15:33:05.

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Wordless Wednesday - Name that Animal

Wed, 20 Jan 2010 01:00:12 +0000

George Caleb Bingham (American, 1811-1879)
Fur Traders Descending the Missouri, 1845
Oil on canvas
29 x 36 1/2 in. (73.7 x 92.7 cm)
Morris K. Jesup Fund, 1933 (33.61)
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Okay, so. Not exactly wordless this week. My partner in crime and I were laughing over the fact that the animal tethered to the prow of the boat in this painting had been identified as a fox for years ... and years ... and years. Now it is officially identified as a bear cub. I have always maintained that it is a cat, due to its cat-like posture and the shape and placement of its ears. This has resulted in a raging debate at my house over bear cub ears v. cat ears v. the north and south ends of animals in silhouette, compounded by gasps of politically correct horror when I've brought up the fact that the original title of this painting was (brace yourself) French Trader - Half Breed Son. (No worries. This racist terminology flew way under the radar in 1845. Probably because radar had not yet been invented.)

The point I wish to make is that art history--as is the case with all of history--is malleable. We constantly reassess what we "know" based on new findings and re-evaluations. This is good and as it should be. However. What is this animal, really, in your opinion? Click on the image, then click again for a "super zoom" view. Please leave your thoughts in the comments, and bonus points for backing me up on "cat."

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Wordless Wednesday - Name that Animal originally appeared on About.com Art History on Wednesday, January 20th, 2010 at 01:00:12.

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So What Does 'AbEx' Mean?

Fri, 15 Jan 2010 19:39:19 +0000

Words fail to describe just how much fun it is to have Beth Gersh-Nesic covering Modern Art these days. For one thing, Professor Gersh-Nesic is not sporting a giant academic stick stuffed some place about which Polite Society coughs behind its numerous hands and neglects to specify. She is the Art History professor we all wish we had had (although I cannot complain in one memorable instance). For another thing, she is an easy person with which to converse. A third thing is that she keeps me on track without, so to speak, squeezing my shoes (read: making me feel ignorant--no one likes that). I give you the following example as evidence:

Beth: So, let's cover Abstract Expressionism this week.

Me: Okay! Rawk on, Beth! Um ... which facet of AbEx? Action Painting? Color Field Painting?

Beth: The umbrella facet, Darling. It's what we teach Those Kids, These Days.

Me: But ...

Me: It's not just one "movement." Is it? I mean, my understanding is that there were subsets. Right?

Beth: Of course there were. Lots of them. The "Color Field" subset even had a "Washington" subset of its own. But let's just fill in the overriding missing information on the About.com Art History website first.

Me: I take your point.

Beth: (gently) You know, don't you, that we could cover the New York School artists, alone, from here to breakfast on July 25th of 2017?

Me: I do. Indeed. Easily. Up to Robert DeNiro, Sr., even.

Me: May lightning strike me dead if I ever question your methodology again.

Beth: You are a good friend and a positive genius about lightning strikes.

Me: I stay away from aluminum masts during electrical storms, too, Professor. Just so you know. Also? I would have been sorely tempted to kill Gilligan with my bare hands every other episode.

Beth: Mary Ann was never done justice by those sitcom writers. Never!

See? Beth is the epitome of friendly art-historic advice and she can hang with the pop culture references. She is to be treasured. Please read her explanation of Abstract Expressionism here.

Image Credit:

Hans Hofmann (American, b. Germany, 1880-1966)
Provincetown House, 1940
Oil on panel
24 x 30 in. (61 x 76.2 cm)
Private Collection
� Renate, Hans & Maria Hofmann Trust / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

So What Does 'AbEx' Mean? originally appeared on About.com Art History on Friday, January 15th, 2010 at 19:39:19.

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In Appreciation of David Levine

Fri, 08 Jan 2010 17:17:41 +0000

By Beth Gersh-Nesic, Contributing Writer for Modern Art

On December 29, 2009, David Levine, one of the greatest caricaturists in art history, died of complications from prostate cancer and other ailments. He was 83. Born on December 20, 1926 in Brooklyn, New York, he continued the legacy of his leftist parents through his witty renderings of celebrities, politicos and artistes of every stripe - from pop to rock to Republican. His best known work appeared biweekly in the New York Review of Books from 1963 to 2007, in the form of huge heads with tiny bodies that visually described these academically astute articles.

Levine was not only a caricaturist, but also a serious painter. His landscapes of Coney Island reflect a deep affection for his hometown. The Brooklyn Museum served as Levine's artistic introduction, Philadelphia's Tyler School of Design nurtured his skill and Pratt Institute in Brooklyn furthered his art education. He also studied with the Abstract Expressionist Hans Hoffman.

As David Margolick wrote on a blog dedicated to David Levine memorials:

The very point of caricature, Levine told me, was to teach. He wanted whomever he drew--but particularly all those politicians and tyrants and scoundrels--to behold themselves anew, warts and all, and in Levine's lexicon "all" encompassed the full panoply of blemishes, physical and characterological. After that, he hoped, they'd repent, or at least pick up a hint of humility. All those thousands of portraits Levine created for the New York Review of Books and others, then, weren't only for fun. They were to heal the world.

Amen.

Related Reading and Viewing:

D. Levine Ink - official website
Video from the exhibition David Levine: American Presidents & Selected Paintings
Mr. Levine's work is represented by Forum Gallery
"David Levine, Biting Caricaturist, Dies at 83" - by Bruce Weber for The New York Times, December 29, 2009
"Levine, an Artist Who Drew in Yiddish" - by Menachem Wecker for Forward, December 31, 2009

Image Caption:

David Levine (American, 1926-2009)
Self-Caricature, 1968
Ink on paper
� David Levine, courtesy of Forum Gallery, New York

In Appreciation of David Levine originally appeared on About.com Art History on Friday, January 8th, 2010 at 17:17:41.

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Wordless Wednesday - Earthen Bound

Wed, 06 Jan 2010 12:37:13 +0000

Kenneth Noland (American, 1924-2010)
Earthen Bound, 1960
Acrylic on canvas
103 1/2 x 103 1/2 in. (262.9 x 262.9 cm)
Art � Ken Noland/Licensed by VAGA, New York, NY
Courtesy of the American Federation of Arts

Kenneth Noland passed away yesterday, January 5, 2010, at the age of 85. He will be sorely missed.

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Wordless Wednesday - Earthen Bound originally appeared on About.com Art History on Wednesday, January 6th, 2010 at 12:37:13.

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Happy New Year!

Fri, 01 Jan 2010 12:34:45 +0000

We're a whole 12 hours into 2010 in my time zone, and I am delighted to report that no major works of art have yet been reported stolen this year. Everyone with a stake in ownership negotiations or lawsuits is on holiday. No art museums have announced that they are closing forever so far, and no museum personnel have been pink slipped on this day. In other words, it's a great opportunity for us to catch our collective breath and believe, for a few, shining hours, that 2010 will be chock full of wonderful Art World news.

The image accompanying this, by Joan Mir�, is entitled The Birth of Day III (1964). It seemed an appropriately optimistic title, don't you think? And we can read whatever we want to into the painting itself--which also seems appropriate as we head into the unknown. For me, I'm choosing to believe that lucky red and wealthy yellow mean a very happy and prosperous New Year for us all.

Image Credit:

Joan Mir� (Spanish, 1893-1983)
The Birth of Day III, 1964
Oil on canvas
162 x 130 cm (63 3/4 x 51 1/8 in.)
Fondation Marguerite et Aim� Maeght, Saint-Paul / Photo � Galerie Maeght

Happy New Year! originally appeared on About.com Art History on Friday, January 1st, 2010 at 12:34:45.

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The Story of Judith

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 22:06:08 +0000

The first thing I noticed about Judith of Bethulia (or Betylua) was that her deuterocanonical Book came as a surprise to me when I joined the Roman Catholic Church as an adult. The second thing I noticed--over time--was that a lot of painters and sculptors had had their imaginations fired by Judith's fantastic story. We're talking serious Art Names here, too: Michelangelo, Donatello, Titian, Caravaggio, Botticelli, Cranach the Elder, Goya and Klimt to cite just a few. Mind you, Judith as an artistic theme will never see numbers anywhere close to those of Virgin and Child (with or without Saints), but, still. Impressive roster of artists.

Well, the third thing I now know about Judith came to me courtesy of Beth Gersh-Nesic, who is also a huge fan of putting art in context. "Hanukkah connection," said Beth. I craved more info. "Oh, yes," she said. "Cheese and dairy products on the fifth day ... kudos to Judith." This was rather stunning news to me, given the staggering amount of Roman Catholic artists who'd depicted the lovely Jewish widow with nary a reference to a Hanukkah menorah in sight. Here, I thought, was an educational tale begging to be told, so Beth has obliged us all with The Story of Judith. Whether or not this fable has any basis in historical fact--and evidence supporting this is sketchy, at best--it is a triumphant narrative of Good vs. Evil, and has undeniably inspired some eye-popping art over the centuries. Enjoy.

Image Credit:

Cristofano Allori (Italian, 1577-1621)
Judith with the Head of Holofernes, 1613
Oil on canvas
120.4 x 100.3 cm (47 3/8 x 39 1/2 in.)
Acquired by Charles I
RCIN 404989
The Royal Collection � 2008, Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II

The Story of Judith originally appeared on About.com Art History on Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009 at 22:06:08.

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