Something Beautiful

England's most beautiful cathedral?

There's a website where you can vote on the most beautiful cathedral in England.  What's great about it is that the site provides a map showing you the location of all 28 churches (mostly cathedrals but not all) eligible for your vote.  It provides photos and links to the cathedrals' official webpages.  All in all, a delicious site. 

Laon Cathedral

Here's a set of fifty achingly beautiful photos of Laon Cathedral.

And here's a single picture of the Cathedral's interior from above.

Our Lady's Chapel, St. Louis

The Cathedral Basilica of St. Louis, located in St. Louis, Missouri, is famous for the mosaics in its interior. You'll be able to see why if you look at these photos of Our Lady's Chapel.

The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp (Rembrandt)

While pursuing another subject entirely, I came across a reference to this extraordinary work -- The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp, 1623, by Rembrandt. It's housed in the Mauritshuis museum in The Hague, the Netherlands.

Stained Glass

It's not easy to find good photos of stained glass. All the more reason to welcome Stained Glass Splendor, a blog devoted to that art form.

Mary Magdalene, by Crivelli

Here is another work by Carlo Crivelli, his Mary Magdalene, which you can see at the Rijksmuseum site. It's the one mentioned by Tom in his comment a day or two ago.

(Note to Tom: Your comment on Crivelli and sorrow made me think of what is to me the best of its kind, this Lamentation by Giovanni Bellini.)

Carlo Crivelli Online

You can see many works by Carlo Crivelli by consulting Carlo Crivelli Online at the wonderful Artcyclopedia site.  They are not all uniformly good, but the general standard is quite sumptuously pleasing. 

Carlo Crivelli

Carlo Crivelli (ca. 1430-ca. 1495) seems to me a most under-appreciated artist. This depiction of the Immaculate Conception is really extraordinary as to color, complexity and execution. You can view this work through the National Gallery of London's zoom feature (notable for both its excellence and its tacky watermarking).

Seeing the City: Sloan's New York

A very fine web exhibition -- Seeing the City, about artist John Sloan and his depiction of New York City.

St. John Lateran, Rome

Get ready for something totally amazing. Have a look at the Basilica of St. John Lateran, a famous church in Rome, Italy -- Baptistry.

Convinced? I thought so. These interiors of the main church are not quite as spectacular, but still impressive and often lovely --

Nave

Aisle, south nave

Crossing (favorite)

Transept, south

Making the ground green

One of my favorite quotations, from Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) --

The work an unknown good [person] has done is like a vein of water flowing hidden underground, secretly making the ground green.

Nativity (limewood)

Here's one more set of wood sculptures -- Nativity with Angels and Shepherds, ca. 1485 (limewood, polychromy). It's at the Rijksmuseum, in Amsterdam.

Long is life

The Buddha:  "Long is the night to him who is awake; long is a mile to him who is tired; long is life to the foolish who do not know the true law." 

Our new president

I'm not going to celebrate today with a clip or a quote from the inauguration (although I'll probably put Reverend Lowery's prayer up one of these days.)

Instead, here's a beautiful man who moves with grace and elegance, and I love to think of him like this -- Barack on the Ellen Show, when he was still a mere Senator.

Tall thin black dude + neat lesbian white lady = magic in America.

Arenburg Lamentation (wood sculpture)

The Detroit Institute of Arts site has a wonderful zoom feature that enables you to get quite close to any given work of art. Try it on the excellent Arenburg Lamentation, ca. 1460, by an unknown Flemish master (oak with traces of polychromy).

Saturn and its moons

NASA's Cassini Spacecraft is now reaching the end of its four-year prime mission (on June 30th), and about to enter into its extended mission. The Boston Globe has taken advantage of this marker to publish some of the fantastic images Cassini has sent home over the past four years.  These twelve photos of Saturn and its moons are truly extraordinary.

Van Gogh

The exhibition at MoMA has been taken down, but its accompanying website fortunately remains -- Van Gogh and the colors of the night. The site is tres beautiful -- prepare to be impressed!

A few notes --

macro navigation (section to section) is on the left of the screen;

micro navigation (page to page, or painting to painting) is on the right.

There are five main sections, as follows:

Early landscapes (10 works);

Peasant life (8 works);

Sowers and wheatfields (7 works);

Poetry, night, town (9 works);

Poetry, night, country (6 works)

Lute music (poem)

The poem Lute Music by Kenneth Rexroth is certainly a fine one. Wish I'd found it in time for New Year's Eve.

Bowing - a serious practice

"Bowing is a very serious practice. You should be prepared to bow, even in your last moment. Even though it is impossible to get rid of our self-centered desires, we have to do it. Our true nature wants us to. Sometimes the disciple bows to the master, sometimes the master bows to the disciple. A master who cannot bow to his disciple cannot bow to the Buddha. Sometimes the master and disciple bow together to the Buddha. Sometimes we may bow to cats and dogs."

-- Shunryu Suzuki (1904-1971)

Rembrandt in Southern California

Here's a beautifully-done site featuring those of Rembrandt's works currently in any one of five museums in southern California -- Rembrandt in Southern California. Very handsome presentation.