Google Art Project - Teaser

JENNY MORGAN

JENNY MORGAN

KELLY WEARSTLER

KELLY WEARSTLER: RHAPSODY, the designer’s fourth book, offers a look into Wearstler's glamorous world, profiling in detail her latest residential designs, including sumptuous new hotels along with her creative process. Inspired by the popularity of her blog, "My Vibe, My Life," follows Wearstler—also known for her striking personal style--behind the scenes to watch her at work, whether creating sculpture at her metal foundry or shopping at auction houses, to reveal the myriad inspirations that fuel her imagination and her dazzling design work.

Hagia Sophia

The Church of the Holy Wisdom, known as Hagia Sophia (Άγια Σοφία) in Greek,Sancta Sophia in Latin, and Ayasofya or Aya Sofya in Turkish, is a former Byzantine church and former Ottoman mosque in Istanbul. Now a museum, Hagia Sophia is universally acknowledged as one of the great buildings of the world.

Hagia Sophia is an amazing architectural beauty and important monument both for Byzantine and for Ottoman Empires. Once a church, later a mosque, and now a museum at the Turkish Republic, Hagia Sophia has always been the precious gem of its time.

Unfortunately nothing remains of the original Hagia Sophia, which was built on this site in the fourth century by Constantine the Great. Constantine was the first Christian emperor and the founder of the city of Constantinople, which he called "the New Rome." The Hagia Sophia was one of several great churches he built in important cities throughout his empire.

Following the destruction of Constantine's church, a second was built by his son Constantius and the emperor Theodosius the Great. This second church was burned down during the Nika riots of 532, though fragments of it have been excavated and can be seen today. Hagia Sophia was rebuilt in her present form between 532 and 537 under the personal supervision of Emperor Justinian I.

The mystical city Istanbul hosted many civilizations since centuries, of which Byzantium and Ottoman Empires were both the most famous ones. The city today carries the characteristics of these two different cultures and surely Hagia Sophia is a perfect synthesis where one can observe both Ottoman and Byzantium effects under one great dome.

SENSATION

YOUNG BRITISH ARTISTS FROM THE SAATCHI GALLERY THE ROYAL ACADEMY, LONDON

 Sarah Lucas, Jenny Saville, Rachel Whiteread, Damien Hirst, Jake and Dinos Chapman

Damien Hirst

Damien Hirst was born in Bristol in 1965. He studied at Goldsmiths College in London and first came to public attention in 1988 when he conceived and curated "Freeze," an exhibition of his work and that of his friends and fellow students at Goldsmiths. In the near quarter century since that pivotal show, Hirst has become one of the most prominent artists of his generation. Many of his works are widely recognized, from the shark suspended in formaldehyde, The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living (1991) and his spot, spin and butterfly paintings, through to later works such as the diamond skull For the Love of God (2007). Of the latter, the art historian Rudi Fuchs has said, “The skull is out of this world, celestial almost. At the same time it represents death as something infinitely more relentless. Compared to the tearful sadness of a vanitas scene, the diamond skull is glory itself.”

Throughout his work, Hirst takes a direct and challenging approach to ideas about existence. His work calls into question our awareness and convictions about the boundaries that separate desire and fear, life and death, reason and faith, love and hate. Hirst uses the tools and iconography of science and religion, creating sculptures and paintings whose beauty and intensity offer the viewer insight into art that transcends our familiar understanding of those domains. “There [are] four important things in life: religion, love, art and science,” the artist has said. “At their best, they’re all just tools to help you find a path through the darkness. None of them really work that well, but they help. Of them all, science seems to be the one right now. Like religion, it provides the glimmer of hope that maybe it will be all right in the end…”

Hirst's Shark: Interpreting Contemporary Art

Michelangelo, Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, 1508-12

Revisiting a Famous Meal, Soup to Nuts

What distinguishes Leonardo’s “Last Supper” from the many versions done by previous artists? As Mr. King observes, the Bible’s accounts were extraordinarily dramatic: a charismatic religious leader and his band of disciples gather for dinner “in the middle of an occupied city whose authorities are plotting against them, waiting for their moment to strike. And in their midst, breaking bread with them, sits a traitor.”

Leonardo was an avid observer of the world around him: he sketched in his notebooks people he encountered in the streets and tried to capture in his paintings the sort of specifics he’d recorded. He was also willing to disregard fashion, precedent and tradition in his work, and in Mr. King’s opinion his “Last Supper” would feature more lifelike details — “from the expressive faces of the apostles to the plates of food and pleats of tablecloth” — than anything yet “created in two dimensions.”

The story of the deterioration of “The Last Supper” and its many restorations is itself a kind of epic. Because the paint Leonardo used did not properly adhere to the wall (he did not use the fresco technique, which bonds the pigments to plaster) and because the wall was damp and exposed to kitchen steam, “The Last Supper” reportedly began disintegrating within 20 years of its completion. NYTimes

Francesco Guardi

Guardi is unsurpassed as Venice’s poet in paint. Last year a large view of the Rialto bridge sold for ($42.7m) at Sotheby’s, the second-highest auction price for an Old Master painting. Now, to celebrate the 300th anniversary of his birth, Guardi is the subject of two important exhibitions—a retrospective in Venice and a Paris show pairing and comparing him with Canaletto. Guardi has emerged from the shadows and his achievements glow.

Francesco Guardi was born and died in Venice. His father was a painter, as was his brother Giovanni Antonio. (Their sister Maria-Cecilia married another Venetian artist, Giambattista Tiepolo.) Guardi struggled financially. He was middle-aged before he achieved any recognition and old before he was sought after. Fame came only after his death. In the 19th century he was feted as the bridge to Impressionism; some called him the first modern artist.

The retrospective now at Venice’s Museo Correr contains some 70 Guardi paintings displayed on ice cream-coloured walls of raspberry, lemon and pistachio, all flooded by natural light. In a suite of grey rooms with drawn blinds are about 50 drawings.

The show begins with intimate interiors, and moves on to festivals crowded with a boisterous populace. There are too many works of similar size but uneven importance, which has a dulling effect on what should be the thrilling paintings that follow—Guardi’s poignant, evocative views of Venice and his fantastical charming capriccios with their romantic ruins and arching trees. The result is a historically informative but ultimately disappointing exhibition. By contrast, “Canaletto and Guardi” in Paris is a joyous eye-opener.

This is a tightly focused show of 50 paintings, all Venetian views and capriccios. The freshness of Canaletto’s early works points to why his pictures were so prized. Guardi saw these paintings and was clearly influenced by them. As the exhibition unfolds the older artist’s vision hardens. Canaletto’s people are there not as individuals but to provide scale for the architecture. His buyers wanted to recollect the city’s beauty, not the life of its people. Guardi the artist, if not the family man with bills to pay, benefited from having few clients and therefore only himself to please. Canaletto’s Venice is a cold beauty, Guardi’s city a living dream. The visitor leaves the Paris show smiling, full of admiration for his painterly spirit. The Economist.

PIAZZETTA, Giovanni Battista

Venetian painter, son of Giacomo Piazzetta, a woodcarver, who studied under Giuseppe Maria Crespi in Bologna and was probably influenced by him to take up genre subjects. He settled in Venice by 1711, and after his death his family petitioned the State for a pension, claiming that his 'constant studies and his pursuit of glory rather than gain had reduced him to poverty and hastened his death'.

His works are comparatively few, and though appearing to be executed with speed and facility were the product of careful deliberation and infinite pains. He made many drawings for collectors and as book-illustrations in order to support his family; his work was much influenced by Rembrandt's etchings and his paintings evolve from Baroque contrasts of chiaroscuro towards a freer and more fluid Rococo handling. Piazzetta's influence on the young Tiepolo was very great and it was Tiepolo who completed the transition to the Rococo. Most of his paintings are in Venice, including his only ceiling decoration, the Glory of S. Dominic, painted before 1727 (SS. Giovanni e Paolo).

Jon Shireman

http://www.jonshireman.com/

Francisco Infante

Some people think that during Soviet era there was no alternative art in Russia, and only portraits of Lenin were popular with scenes of everyday Soviet life depicted. But Russian artist Francisco Infante-Arana installations (having a Spanish father but raised by a Russian mother in Russia) used no photoshop, mainly because most the images you see are from 1970-1980s. He used only natural objects like mirrors, ropes and cords and examined the effect of light and shadow. He became widely recognized even by Soviet officials and held personal exhibitions, as well as shows in Russian museums like Tretyakovka.

James Nares

Rune Guneriussen

 http://www.runeguneriussen.no/index.html

Reed and Radar "I hate Kitties"

http://www.reedandrader.com/#

Giotto's frescoes in the Upper Church of San Francesco in Assisi

The farmer, to whom Francis lent his mule as a mount, was tormented by thirst. Water comes bubbling out of the rocks in answer to the Saint s prayer. Giotto shows Francis praying fervently. The farmer, almost dying of thirst, collapses at the spring. As so often in Giotto's representations, figures - here the two Franciscans - comment on the scene with their glances and so anticipate the reaction of the viewer.

Giotto began his apprenticeship with Cimabue between the ages of ten and fourteen. A trip to Rome presumably rounded off the young painter's training, after which he followed his master to what was at that time the largest "building site" in Italy, the church of San Francesco in Assisi.

There, Cimabue was in charge of the decoration of the newly erected Upper Church. When he left Assisi to fulfil other obligations, several of his assistants and journeymen, including Giotto, stayed behind. At the same time, Roman painters, led by Jacopo Torriti, arrived in Assisi, so that several studio groups were working alongside one another. A short time later, Giotto became the independent leader of a workshop, and the Franciscan order assigned him the task of continuing with the decoration.

Giotto is regarded as the founder of the central tradition of Western painting because his work broke free from the stylizations of Byzantine art, introducing new ideals of naturalism and creating a convincing sense of pictorial space.

During the civil war in Arezzo, St. Francis saw demons over the city. He called upon a brother of his order, Sylvester, to drive them out. The picture area is dominated by the architecture of the city, which is divided from the rest of the world by a crack in the earth, and by the towering church building. Giotto portrays the saint deep in prayer in front of the latter. His strength seems to pass to Brother Sylvester, who raises his hand commandingly in the direction of the city of towers. Thereupon the demons flee, and the citizens can return to their business in peace - they can already be seen at the city gates.

According to the legend, the image in the church of San Damiano spoke to the young nobleman: "Francis, go and restore my house, which is in danger of collapsing". Giotto pictures Francis in a half ruined church, where the saint kneels before the painted crucifix, his arms raised in fright. This lively reaction and the perspectival structure make the events in the picture particularly vivid and intelligible.

During a meeting of the order, St. Anthony of Padua was preaching in the cloister at Aries - Giotto shows a generously proportioned Gothic room. Suddenly, Francis appeared. Giotto depicts the saint with outspread arms - the resulting shape of the cross alludes to his Christ-like life. Only St. Anthony, who had just been speaking about Christ, and one other member of the Order notice the apparition. Giotto shows all the others listening with full attention. The figures seen from the back are also particularly impressive, the artist making the weight of the bodies plain for all to see.

St. Francis came across a flock of birds that did not fly away at his approach. He gave a sermon to the expectantly waiting creatures, who only left the saint after receiving his blessing. As so often, Giotto makes plain the extraordinary nature of events through the reaction of a secondary figure - in this case, through the Franciscan friar, who raises his hand with a surprised expression on his face.

Cimabue Crucifix in Assisi

Cimabue (c. 1240–1302), also known as Bencivieni di Pepo or in modern Italian, Benvenuto di Giuseppe, was a Florentine painter and creator of mosaics. According to Giorgio Vasari, he was the teacher of Giotto, considered the first great artist of the Italian Renaissance.

Cimabue is generally regarded as one of the first great Italian painters to break away from the Italo-Byzantine style, although he still relied on Byzantine models. The art of this period comprised scenes and forms that appeared relatively flat and highly stylized. Cimabue was a pioneer in the move towards naturalism, as his figures were depicted with rather more lifelike proportions and shading. Even though he was a pioneer in that move, his Maestà paintings show Medieval techniques and characteristics.