Turpentine Veins

artmastered: ARTIST OF THE WEEK: Francisco de Zurbarán,...

Mon, 06 May 2013 00:36:57 +0100

ARTIST OF THE WEEK: Francisco de Zurbarán, 1598-1664

San Serapio (1628), Agnus Dei (c.1635-40), Still Life with Lemons, Oranges and Rose (1633)

From the National Gallery:

Between the departure of Velázquez to Madrid in 1623 and the rise to prominence of Murillo in the 1650s, Zurbarán was the leading painter in Seville. His pictures were mostly painted for Spanish religious orders. The distinctive style of Zurbarán was influenced by the realism of Caravaggio and his followers. His best work is both very direct and intensely spiritual.
Zurbarán was born in Fuente de Cantos, near Badajoz. In 1617, after training in Seville, he returned to Llerena in his native province. By 1629 he was back in Seville, where he became the city’s official painter.
In 1634 he was in Madrid painting mythologies for the Buen Retiro, Philip IV’s new palace, perhaps through the intervention of his friend Velázquez. His last years were not so successful and he died in Madrid in poverty.

fleurdulys: Odalisque - Robert Auer 20th century

Mon, 06 May 2013 00:33:55 +0100

fleurdulys:

Odalisque - Robert Auer

20th century

colourthysoul: Pompeo Mariani - The Sea Lover (1897)

Mon, 06 May 2013 00:33:07 +0100

colourthysoul:

Pompeo Mariani - The Sea Lover (1897)

colourthysoul: Pompeo Mariani - Regata (1895)

Mon, 06 May 2013 00:32:56 +0100

colourthysoul:

Pompeo Mariani - Regata (1895)

stilllifequickheart: William H. Johnson Still Life 1923-26

Mon, 06 May 2013 00:32:41 +0100

stilllifequickheart:

William H. Johnson

Still Life

1923-26

"I On the calm black water where the stars are sleeping White Ophelia floats like a great..."

Mon, 06 May 2013 00:31:49 +0100

“

On the calm black water where the stars are sleeping
White Ophelia floats like a great lily;
Floats very slowly, lying in her long veils…
- In the far-off woods you can hear them sound the mort.

For more than a thousand years sad Ophelia
Has passed, a white phantom, down the long black river.
For more than a thousand years her sweet madness
Has murmured its ballad to the evening breeze.

The wind kisses her breasts and unfolds in a wreath
Her great veils rising and falling with the waters;
The shivering willows weep on her shoulder,
The rushes lean over her wide, dreaming brow.

The ruffled water-lilies are sighing around her;
At times she rouses, in a slumbering alder,
Some nest from which escapes a small rustle of wings;
- A mysterious anthem falls from the golden stars.

O pale Ophelia! beautiful as snow!
Yes child, you died, carried off by a river!
- It was the winds descending from the great mountains of Norway
That spoke to you in low voices of better freedom.

It was a breath of wind, that, twisting your great hair,
Brought strange rumors to your dreaming mind;
It was your heart listening to the song of Nature
In the groans of the tree and the sighs of the nights;

It was the voice of mad seas, the great roar,
That shattered your child’s heart, too human and too soft;
It was a handsome pale knight, a poor madman
Who one April morning sate mute at your knees!

Heaven! Love! Freedom! What a dream, oh poor crazed Girl!
You melted to him as snow does to a fire;
Your great visions strangled your words
- And fearful Infinity terrified your blue eye!

III

- And the poet says that by starlight
You come seeking, in the night, the flowers that you picked
And that he has seen on the water, lying in her long veils
White Ophelia floating, like a great lily.

”

- Ophelia, Arthur Rimbaud. (via mirroir)