Grant Wood

Grant Wood was an American artist He was born in Anamosa, Iowa on February 13, 1891. His family moved to Cedar Rapids in 1901.After graduating high school he enrolled in art school in Minneapolis. He returned to Cedar Rapids a year later to teach. In 1913 he enrolled the School of Art Institute in Chicago and worked as a silversmith.
Between 1920 and 1924 he made four trips to Europe. He immersed himself in various styles of art, especially Impressionism and Post-Impressionism. But the artist who influenced him the most was Jan van Eyck. (see May 23 posting)
In 1932 Grant Wood helped found the Stone City Art Colony which was located near his hometown. The idea behind the colony was to help artists get through the Great Depression.He also began lecturing throughout the country on "regionalism in the arts"
Wood taught painting at the University of Iowa's School of Art from 1934 until he died. He supervised mural projects, mentored students, produced his own works, and become an important part of the University's cultural life. On February 12, 1942 he died of liver cancer.
Besides paintings, Grant Wood produced a large number of works in various other mediums, including charcoal, lithography, ceramics, metal, and wood. In order to have a steady source of income, he often did advertisements for many Iowa-based businesses. He designed the stained glass windows for the Veterans Memorial Building in Grand Rapids.

Regional was a movement that was primarily in the Midwest and advanced figurative painting of rural American themes in a rejection of European abstractism. There were three artists in the forefront of the movement: Grant Wood, John Steuart Curry, (right: Tornado Over Kansas) and Thomas Hart Benton. (left: Parks, the Circus, the Klan, and the Press)

Wood's best known painting is American Gothic (top)painted in 1930.It is probably the most famous painting in American art. A painting which has become a cultural icon like the Mona Lisa and The Scream (by Edvard Munch). It was first exhibited in 1930 at the Art Institute of Chicago where it still hangs. It brought Wood instant recognition (and a $300 prize). Since then it has been used in hundreds of advertisements, satires, and cartoons. Art critics who liked the painting (e.g Gertrude Stein, Christopher Morley) assumed that it was meant to satirize rural small-town life, portraying it as narrow-minded and repressive. The trend to criticize rural America (and Middle America) began in the early part of the 20th century with such works of literature as Winesburg, Ohio (1919) by Sherwood Anderson and Main Street (1920)by Sinclair Lewis. Wood denied this interpretation.

Wood was inspired by a cottage in Eldon, Iowa. The house's architecture was "Gothic Revival" thus the title of the painting.Wood decided to paint the house along with"the kind of people I fancied should live in that house." The painting depicts a farmer and his spinster daughter. The models were Wood's dentist, Dr. Byron McKeeby (1867-1950), and Wood's sister Nan (1900-1990).
The severity and detailed technique were inspired by Northern Renaissance paintings which Grant had seen on his trips to Europe. Eventually he became aware of the Midwest's own legacy which also plays a huge part in this painting.
Personally, I did not know much about Grant Wood nor his work until doing this posting. American Gothic is the only painting of his that I knew. I have discovered that I like some of his work a lot. I find his Paul Revere's Ride (right) particularly interesting. It appears three-dimensional, like a village in a miniature railroad scene. The other painting below is Young Corn

Link to the Cedar Rapids Museum www.crma.org/Content/Grant_Wood/Default.aspx

Caravagio

Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio was born on September 29, 1571 in Milan, Italy. He is considered the first great artist of the Baroque period. He is known for highly emotional paintings and his dramatic use of lighting. He is considered one of the greatest European artists.
Caravaggio's life was as dramatic and intense as his art. Contemporaries regarded him warily; his reputation was of a rebel - enigmatic and even dangerous. He never lacked for commissions and made a good living with his art. But he was always ready for a fight and others found him difficult to get along with. In 1606 he killed a young man in a brawl and had to leave Rome in exile. Over the next four years there were other brawls and possible attempts on his life.On July 18, 1610 he died, supposedly from a fever.
Caravaggio arrived in Rome in 1592 (after quarrels and a wounding of a policeman in Milan). He arrived with nothing but in a few short months he was working with
a successful painter, Giuseppe Cesari.His earliest known painting is Boy Peeling a Fruit .He was very particular and detailed in his work. The painting Boy with a Basket of Fruit (right)has been analyzed by a professor of horiculture who was able to identify individual cultivars right down to "... a large fig leaf with a prominent fungal scorch
lesion resembling anthracnose.*
In 1594 he went out on his known and met some highly influencial people. His painting The Cardsharps attracted the attention of Cardinaldel Monte, who was one of the leading connoisseurs in Rome. Caravaggio produced several music themed works at the request of the Cardinal and his friends.
He then began a series of religious works. While artists at that time painted the human figure in a sort of perfect or superhuman way, Caravaggio preferred to paint them realistically, as they would be seen walking down the street, flaws and all. His reputation as artist was on the rise.
Caravaggio was now just one step away from the success he was hoping for - public commissions. For that he he needed to be noticed by the Church. In 1599 he was contracted to decorated the Contarelli Chapel in the church of San Luigi del Francesi. Two works make up this commission: the Martyrdom of Saint Matthew and the Calling of Saint Matthew (see painting at top) which were finished in 1600. They were an immediate sensation.
Most other artists were taken with this new artist. Some faulted him for painting from life and not using drawings but for the most part he was now a star. He began receiving a stream of commissions. They were usually religious works but they featured violent scenes, decapitations, torture, and death. Some were rejected and had to be redone or find new buyers.
While his dramatic execution of a subject was admired, the realistic way he portrayed them was not. His first version of Saint Matthew and the Angel portrayed St.Matthew as a bald peasant in a torn shirt with dirty legs.This had to be redone and was renamed The Inspiration of St. Matthew.
After his exile from Rome in 1606, he traveled from place to place, often beiong forced to leave. In 1608 he spent time in prison for assault. He still received commissions though. His style began to change and more often than not his paintings depicted lonely, shadowy figures. They show the fraility of man while at the same time show the beauty of humility.

While the technique of chiaroscuro was used by painters for a long time before Caravaggio, it was he that perfected it. Chiaroscuro is a term meaning contrast between darkness and light. Caravaggio darkened the shadows and placed the subject in a blinding shaft of light. Somehow through this technique he was able to capture both the physical and the psychological reality of his subjects. For instance, the look on the face of St. Peter shows the guilt and pain of the denial, even before Peter has admitted it to himself. In the Calling of St. Matthew, St. Matthew points to himself as if saying "who me?" yet at the same time there is a look on his face that says he knows he is going with this man. Caravaggio somehow was able to capture this.
Above - The Conversion of St. Paul
Below: left - The Denial of Saint Peter; right - The Supper at Emmaus
























Below: Caravaggio's last painting The Martyrdom of St. Ursula












*Caravaggio's Fruit: A Mirror on Baroque Horiculture (Jules Janick, Department of Horiculture and Landscape Architecture, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana)

Art sites for children

When I got the idea to list these sites I had presumed that most museum websites had subsites for kids. Wrong. Here are four that I have come across.

Metropolitan Museum of Art (NYC) This is a really
cool site with a lot for kids to do. There's Degas'
ballerinas, knights in Central Park, Japanese
picture scroll,Marco Polo, about 18 different
subsites. The whole website is terrific



Museum of Modern Art (NYC) nicknamed MOMA.
I wasn't thrilled with this one. It's ok but takes
longer to load and it's kind of cutsie. This museum
has Van Gogh's Starry Night so that is one of the
pictures you can interact with.






National Gallery of Art (Washington D.C.)
I like it better than MOMA but not as much
as the Met. They go into detail about a few
paintings. Plus there is interactive art you
can make online.





The Hermitage Museum (St. Petersburg, Russia)
This has a couple of subsites - Virtual Academy
and Games Room. I couldn't really check these
out as it requires Internet Explorer 5 and I use
Firefox.

Bridget Riley

I am not a big abstract art fan. Occasionally there is something I like but generally not a big fan. But I do like Bridget Riley's work. I first her paintings while I was still in my teens -early 70s I guess. The Museum of Modern Art had a special exhibit. Some- thing about it just fascinated me. Since then, I have tried to do similar drawings (mostly through doodling.)
Bridget Riley was born on April 24, 1931 in London and grew up in Cornwall. She began doing semi-impressionistic paintings, then in the late 50s did her version of pointillism (see Seurat). It was through studying Seurat that she became interested in optical effects. In 1960 she began doing studies in black and white and had her first solo exhibit in 1962. Her style of work was dubbed "Op-Art".
Her works give the viewer sensations of movement or color. In the 1960s it is said people would experience varied sensations such as seasickness or sky diving.
In 1967 Riley began to experiment with color with her
first stripe painting. And in the early 1980s, after a trip
to Egypt, she was inspired by the hieroglyphics and began
to explore color and contrast. Some these paintings use lines of color to give a shimmering sensation; in others she uses tessellating patterns. (also used by M.C. Escher in many of his works) At right Shadow Play (1990) an example of tessellation.
Here is a link to an interview she gave last year.
There is the question though - is this great art or is Bridget Riley a decorative artist. Personally I wouldn't put her up there with the greats. I find her paintings fun but she is no Monet. Here is a link to a discussion on this


Paintings shown: Top: Movement in Squares (1961); Above left: Brittania (1961);
Above right: Orphean Elegy I (1978)

Bridget Riley does not do her own painting. Would you believe she has others do it for her!

"Brooklyn Bridge" by Joseph Stella

Joseph Stella (1877-1946) was born in a small village near Naples, Italy. He emigrated to New York at the age of 18 and anglicizing his name Giuseppe to Joseph. His older brother, a doctor, was already in New York and the plan was for Joseph to follow in his footsteps. After a year of medical school and another year of pharmacy school, Joseph gave up both and turned his sights to a career in art. He began attending classes at the Art Students League in New York where studied under William Merritt and, like Edward Hopper, Robert Henri, who had joined the Arts Students League in 1903.
Henri's philosophy that no subject was too mundane for the artist. Stella embraced this and began illustrating subjects of his fellow immigrants, becoming involved in immigration issues. He also began making a name for himself as a painter.
In 1909, homesick for Italy, he returned home for a visit. He also visited Paris where he saw, for the first time, Cubist and Futurist paintings. The Italian Futurists especially made an impression on him and he returned home to New York and completely changed his style of painting.
Italian Futurists believed that the modern artist should not look back to the past for his inspiration. The founder was Filippo Tommaso Marinetti. He published his Futurist Manifesto on February 5th, 1909 in an Italian newspaper. It was reprinted in France. Thus a movement began. Marinetti expressed a disdain for everything of the past, especially in politics and in the arts. Technology was the Futurists god. Speed, youth, violence, the car, the airplane, the industrial city, anything that represented technology's besting of nature. They were also passionate nationalists. I guess you could say that they were the opposites of the flower children of the sixties.
Stella returned to New York in 1912 and got to work. In 1913 he produced Battle of Lights, Coney Island, Mardi Gras. This is considered the first American Futurist painting.
Although Stella is considered the Father of the American Futurists, he did paintings many surrealistic paintings such as Flowers.






















When Joseph Stella arrived in New York the Brooklyn Bridge was only about 15 years old. Designed by John Roebling, it connected Manhattan Island and Brooklyn on Long Island (a fascinating book about the building of the bridge is The Great Bridge by David McCullough.) Of course, he had never seen anything like it. It fascinated him and gave him comfort. He would walk across the bridge late at night and stand in awe of it. He did several paintings of the bridge, all from the same viewpoint. His perspective captures the impression you get when you walk over the bridge. This particular version was painted in 1939 and hangs in the Whitney Museum in New York. Here are Joseph Stella's own words about the bridge: "Steel and electricity had created this new world. A new drama had surged from the unmerciful violations of darkness at night, by the violent blaze of electricity… The steel had leaped to hyperbolic altitudes and expanded to vast latitudes with the skyscrapers and with bridges made for the conjunction of worlds."
Other versions of the Brooklyn Bridge by Joseph Stella.

"Night Hawks" by Edward Hopper

Edward Hopper was born on July 22, 1882 in Nyack, New York. He is one of the most famous and greatest of the American artists. A realist painter, his works were were primarily of urban scenes and landscapes. An intensively private man, his paintings convey this sense of solitude.

He shown a talent for drawing at an early age and by 1899 decided to be artist. His parents persuaded him to study commercial art so he enrolled in the New York School of Illustration. In 1899 he transferred to the New York School of Art. It was here that studied under Robert Henri, one of the founders of the school of American Realism. Hopper himself said that Henri was the most influential teachers he had.
In 1906 he did what all artists want to do - study in France. But he was disappointed. The Modern Movement was in full force and Hopper could not relate to it. He himself claimed that it's effect on him was minimal. The one European artist to have influenced him a bit was Rembrandt,especially the painting The Night Watch. He travelled to other cities and made 2 more trips to Europe in 1909 and 1910. And although he often travelled during the rest of his life, he never went back to Europe again.
For a time he painted things he remembered from Europe but found little success so returned to what he was known for - American subjects. In 1913 he made his first sale but he was now 37 and began to doubt that he could make a living as an artist. He wanted to give up working as a commercial artist but couldn't. He discovered that prints were becoming popular so he began to make prints of his work which sold better than his paintings. He also began painting in watercolors for the same reason.
Hopper married at age 42 and this marked a turn in his fortunes. His paintings began selling. In 1924 his show at the Rehn Gallery was a sellout. In 1925 he painted what is considered his first fully mature picture, House by the Railroad. It is typical of the paintings he did from this point on. There is a modern bleakness and a sense of isolation here. At the same time there is a seemingly nostalgic regard for American puritan values of the past. There is also a theme of the loneliness of travel. (The Hoppers had begun to travel a great deal within the United States and Mexico.)
Hopper's star continued to rise and in 1929 and 1933 he had exhibits at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Both MOMA and the Whitney Museum bought his paintings for their permanent collections.
"Hopper became a pictorial poet who recorded the starkness and vastness of America. Sometimes he expressed aspects of this in traditional guise, as, for example, in his pictures of lighthouses and harsh New England landscapes; sometimes New York was his context, with eloquent cityscapes, often showing deserted streets at night. Some paintings, such as his celebrated image of a gas-station, Gas (1940), even have elements which anticipate Pop Art. Hopper once said: 'To me the most important thing is the sense of going on. You know how beautiful things are when you're travelling.'
"He painted hotels, motels,trains and highways, and also liked to paint the public and semi-public places where people gathered:restaurants, theatres,cinemas and offices. But even in these paintings he stressed the theme of loneliness - his theatres are often semi-deserted, with a few patrons waiting for the curtain to go up or the performers isolated in the fierce light of the stage. Hopper was a frequent movie-goer, and there is often a cinematic quality in his work. As the years went on, however, he found suitable subjects increasingly difficult to discover, and often felt blocked and unable to paint. His contemporary the painter Charles Burchfield wrote: 'With Hopper the whole fabric of his art seems to be interwoven with his personal character and manner of living.' When the link between the outer world he observed and the inner world of feeling and fantasy broke, Hopper found he was unable to create." (Lives of the Great 20th Century Artists by Edward Lucie- Smith)
Edward Hopper died May 15, 1967

Edward Hopper was my mother's favorite artist. She especially loved The Night Hawks. This painting, like many of his paintings, portrays a typical city scene. I am guessing that these paintings are more appreciated by city dwellers than non-city dwellers. I was born and raised in New York City and have walked by scenes just like this. It's the kind of painting that you can weave stories about. (The couple seem unhappy, together but not talking. Perhaps they just had an argument. The solitary man, maybe a gangster waiting for his contact. Or just a lonely man looking to be around other people.)

This painting has something in common with Van Gogh's Starry Night.Both have been popular with young people and both have become part of modern pop culture. The Night Hawks has been referenced in numerous films and tv shows (such as The Simpsons- right) as well as in music and literature. In the current movie Night at the Museum:The Smithsonian it is one of the paintings that comes to life.(although it actually hangs at the Art Institute of Chicago.

By the way, on the outside of the diner is an advertisement for Phillies cigars.

Edward Hopper began this painting right after the attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941. The mood of the country was somber and gloomy. this feeling is captured in the painting.

The paintings below are: The Lighthouse at Two Lights (1929) which is at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and New York Movie (1939). this hangs at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

St. Basil's Cathedral, Moscow

St. Basil's Cathedral in Moscow, Russia is one of the most exquisite buildings ever built. The Russian Orthodox cathedral was commissioned by Ivan IV (the Terrible) to commemorate the capture of the Tatar stronghold of Kazan in 1552. Since this victory occures on the Feast of the Intercession of the Virgin, the cathedral was officially named The Cathedral of the Intercession of the Virgin by the Moat (at that time there was a moat running beside the Kremlin.) It's been almost always been known as St. Basil's though. St. Basil the Blessed (1468-1552) impressed Ivan when he predicted in 1547 that a fire would sweep through Moscow. St. Basil was buried in the Trinity Cathedral that stood on the spot where St. Basil's is now.
The Cathedral was built between 1555- 1560. The architect was Postnik Yakovlev. Legend has it that Ivan had him blinded so he would never build a building more beautiful than St. Basil's. But, in fact, Yakovlev went on to design several churches in Russia .
St. Basil Cathedral is located at the south-east end of Red Square just across from the Spasskaya tower of the Kremlin. It is not very large and consists of nine chapels built on a single foundation. Each chapel is filled with icons, medieval painted walls, and varying artwork on the top inside the domes. Unlike Western cathedrals which are massive naves, senses of grandeur,and one design, St. Basil's is more intimate with varying styles.











It originally had eight chapels but in 1588 Tsar Fyodor Ivanovich added the ninth to house the grave of St. Basil.

Outside in the garden stands a bronze statue commemorating Dmitry Pozharsky and Kuzma Minin who rallied Russia's Volunteer army against Polish invaders during the "Time of Troubles' in the late 16th and early 17th centuries

St. Basil's came close to being destroyed by Stalin. He wanted the cathedral razed so that his soldiers could leave Red Square en masse. But the architect Baranovsky stood on the steps of the cathedral and threatened to cut his own throat if the cathedral was destroyed. Stalin relented - but put Baranovsky in prison for 5 years.
In recent years, St. Basil's has suffer from weather damage and neglect. it wasn't until the Millenium that the funds were available to repair it.




all photos by Brian McMorrow http://www.pbase.com/bmcmorrow/moscowstbasils&page=1