#TBT: Yellowstone Park

Does this vista look familiar?  Well, if it looks like it should be painted, it has, it's actually taken from "Artist Point" in Yellowstone National Park.  
 

Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, oil on canvas painting by Thomas Moran, 1904, Honolulu Museum of Art, commons.wikimedia.org

One artist who was greatly moved by the landscape of Yellowstone was Thomas Moran, see his image from the same vantage point above.  If you look through just the works in the collection of the American Art Museum, you'll see how many were done of that majestic park.  

When I was there in 2009, I specifically sought out this vista because I had seen it in a painting. 
It's truly a site worth seeing, the art and the park. 

Longing for Spring

With this winter dragging along and yet another snow storm forecast to come through tomorrow I've set about longing for Spring.  To try to get me in the mood I've been reading Clara and Mr. Tiffany by Susan Vreeland.  Louis Comfort Tiffany believed that nature was the best model and his windows reflect this reverence.

Landscape with a Greek Temple, stained glass window designed by Louis Comfort Tiffany, c. 1900, Cleveland Museum of Art.  commons.wikimedia.org

 See more works by Tiffany at the Metropolitan Museum website here.

Gardner's Tiffany (939).

Mondrian Under the Highway

Have you ever driven by the "Mondrian Tunnel" in Capitol Hill?  When I first started coming to the area on a regular basis I had no idea what it was.  I knew the work had to reference Piet Mondrian, but why?  Turns out the answer is "Because I was interested in Mondrian."

If you haven't seen it, it's a highway underpass at 6th and Eye Streets, SE that is covered with huge, geometric compositions in red, yellow, blue, black, and white.  There is no way they are like anything else but Mondrian. 

The first and only article to come up is a rather extensive Washington City Paper report from 2002 discussing how people were proposing to paint over the Mondrian murals with another, "something that would fit the space and make more sense to the community at large" said one proposal.  That obviously did not happen, since they're still there but the article talked about how the original idea in the 80's was conceived of by Warren M. Robbins, whose collection formed the core of the National Museum for African Art and who lived in the neighborhood.  He was the one who wrote Harry Holtzman, custodian of the Mondrian Estate, asked permission, hired G. Byron Peck to design the murals, and oversaw their installation.  It's amazing what one person can accomplish, although, compared to the NMAA and his 5,000 piece collection of African Art, I guess it's not as big of a deal.  But still, the Mondrian murals are a decades long mark on Robbins' neighborhood and one that I personally enjoy.

There is what seems to be a treasure trove of information in the Smithsonian Archives about the mural, it's inception, subsequent restoration, and even a picture of Kenneth Noland with it?  For a research lover like me, this is a challenge, I'll have to get there soon.  Since Mondrian’s birthday is March 7, I say it's my present to him!

Gardner's: Mondrian (1048-50)

Sacra Conversazione

My husband recently went down to Williamsburg, VA for a meeting and I decided to tag along and see some friends.  Always game to check out new museums, and with my friends galantly agreeing to go, we headed to William & Mary’s Muscarelle Museum of Art.  They had a small exhibition of works by Carvaggio, a notable Baroque painter, and to accompany it they had placed on exhibit a number of works from roughly the same time period from their collection and private collections.  As we walked around I came upon a small painting by Bonifazio de’ Pitati depicting the Virgin Mary holding an infant Jesus while an equally young Tobias (or Tobiah) stands in the arms of Archangel Raphael.  The label indicates that they are talking, possibly about the fish clutched in Tobias’ hand that will play a part in the restoration of his father’s eye sight.  The label then describes this as a sacra conversazione piece, literally “sacred conversation”.

Hold the phone, the sacra conversazione pieces I remember were large altarpieces with figures of saints lined up along the edge of the picture plane ready to intercede between God in Heaven and the devout petitioner assumed to be in prayer in front of them.  The work by Giovanni Bellini depicted here is what I had always pictured these works resembling.  I made a note to look into it.  After some preliminary reading I didn’t have a definitive answer, so I emailed an expert, one of my professors from my graduate program, and got a prompt response: “Sacra conversazione is a quite general term--generally refers to a group of saints who appear to be engaged in "holy conversation," usually, but not always, accompanying a central Virgin and Child. This originated in Fra Angelico compositions."

Ahh!  I stand corrected!  This work can be a sacra conversazione!  The term refers less to the size and arrangement of the figures in it and more to the saintly status of the participants in the conversation.

Don’t worry, I didn’t let this discourage me from questioning.  Over the weekend, I scooted over to the National Gallery of Art to see Heaven and Earth: Art of Byzantium from Greek Collections on it’s final day and while there I read a label describing the selected scenes from the Passion of the Christ depicted on an icon next to it.  The final scene is described as “Christ carrying the cross” but when I looked at the icon, what I perceived was a haloed Christ walking in front of a man carrying a cross.  My initial impression seemed to be strengthened by the relative large size of the man I thought was Jesus.  In the Stations of the Cross, this scene is known as “Simon of Cyrene helps Jesus to carry his cross.” 

Gardner's: Caravaggio (732-35)

Image: Giovanni Bellini, Madonna with the Child, Saints, and Angels, 1487.  Accademia de Venice.  Wikimedia Commons.