Something Beautiful

Lorenzo Monaco

The colors in this Coronation of the Virgin, 15th century, by Lorenzo Monaco, are just so lovely. 

Daddi Triptych

The Courtauld Institute has a very nice feature about a triptych painted in 1338 by Bernardo Daddi. 

You can view it closed, as it might have been during most of the year.   
And then you can see it open, as it would have been on a major feast day.

There is a good deal of material here, although each page is short and sweet.  You can read see, and read about, the following -

background to the triptych and its painter.

its context.

its production (You can also watch seven short videos on that process!) 

You can also examine each part of the triptych up close --

exterior (closed); and interior -

scenes of the Nativity story, at inner left (open)

Virgin and Child enthroned, at inner centre (open); and

Christ's crucifixion, at inner right (open). 

Cats :-)

Let us not forget our friends, those beautiful cats out there.   Here's a handsome girl cat named Keiko. 

Illuminated Mss. (Denmark)

I have been trying to restrain myself on the illuminated manuscripts front.  Just because I go ape over them doesn't mean that everyone does.   But enough is enough.  Let's do a few. 

It turns out that there are a number of medieval manuscripts online at the Royal Library of Denmark site.   I have selected a mere five as presenting, in my opinion, the finest script and illuminations.    TIP:  Upon arriving at the introductory page of each manuscript, use the links in the left margin to navigate from one large part to another.

These three contain only script and occasional colored initials, but they are still quite handsome:

Passion of St Edmund, ca. 1075, England

Life of St Anselm of Canterbury; ca. 1200, France

Life of St Bernard of Clairvaux; ca. 1200, France 

These two, in contrast, are highly illuminated:

Gospels, ca. 1250, Germany

Psalter, 1500-1535, Flanders  (Check out the section on the seven deadly sins (pride, greed, lust, anger, gluttony, envy, sloth).)

Bonus:  These two are not quite as good, but they are too interesting and enjoyable not to make note of them:

Gospels, ca. 1150, Sweden

Antiphonary, 1250-1275, Norway

Eye Candy from IBM

This is just eye candy, I suppose -- IBM showing off.   But it is entitled to a bit of boasting, as I think you'll agree.   

Jewelry and museum objects:

Dragon pin

Cameo

Jeweled bracelet

National Palace Museum, Taiwan (six objects)

Other uses for the same technology:

Luther Library (two images)

Frames and framing

Mosaic Egg

I think you'll like this.  It's a mosaic egg by Faberge, from the Royal Collection of Queen Elizabeth, Great Britain.   You can enjoy it in several different ways --

You can read about this exquisite craftwork. 

You can examine it close-up.

You can even open it and discover the "surprise" inside.   
          (There are seven different "click-throughs" -- horizontal; vertical; open; contents out; contents reversed; contents returned to interior; closed). 

Raphael's Madonnas (part 3) (end)

Raphael painted these last twelve Madonnas during his years in Rome.   

Garvagh Madonna (Aldobrandini), 1509-10 (NGL)

Madonna of Loreto (del Velo), 1509-10 (Musee Conde, Chantilly)

Madonna with Blue Diadem, 1510-11 (Louvre)

Alba Madonna, ca. 1510 (NGA)  (32+0+none)

Madonna of Foligno, 1511-1512 (Vatican Museum)

Madonna with the Fish, 1512-14 (Museo del Prado, Madrid)

Sistine Madonna, 1513-14 (Gemäldegalerie, Dresden)

Madonna dell'Impannata, 1513-14 (Pitti Palace)

Madonna della Tenda, 1514 (Alte Pinakothek, Munich)

Madonna of the Chair (della Seggiola), 1514 (Pitti Palace)

Holy Family, 1518 (Louvre, Paris)

Holy Family below the Oak, 1518 (Museo del Prado, Madrid) 

Raphael's Madonnas (part 2)

Ten more astonishing Madonnas by Raphael --

Madonna of Belvedere (del Prato), 1506  (KHM, Vienna)

The Madonna of the Pinks (La Madonna dei Garofani), ca. 1506-07  (National Gallery, London NG 6596)

Madonna of the Goldfinch (del Cardellino), 1507 (Uffizi)

Virgin and Child with St John the Baptist (La Belle Jardiniere), 1507 (Louvre)

Canigiani Madonna, 1507  (Alte Pinakothek) 

Madonna del Baldacchino, 1507-08 (Pitti Palace)

Holy Family with a Lamb, 1507 (Museo del Prado, Madrid)

Large Cowper Madonna (Niccolini-Cowper), 1508 (National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.) (33+0+none)   

Tempi Madonna, 1508 (Alte Pinakothek, Munich)

Madonna and Child with the Infant St John (Esterhazy Madonna), 1508 (Museum of Fine Art, Budapest)

 

Raphael's Madonnas (part 1)

The Italian artist Raphael (1483-1520) painted more then twenty world-class Madonnas during this brief career.   I hope to post links to all of them, in chronological order, over the next few days.  Below are links to the first group. 

Raphael painted these during the years 1503-1505 --

Madonna and Child, ca. 1503  (Norton Simon Museum of Art, Pasadena, California)
Madonna and Child Enthroned with Saints, 1504-05 (Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC)

He spent the next three years, 1505-1508, in Florence, where he painted these:

Madonna with the Book (Connestabile), 1504 (Hermitage)
Granduca Madonna, 1504 (Pitti Palace)
Small Cowper Madonna, ca. 1505 (National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.)  (1199+0+none) 

During his Florentine years, he also spent some time in Umbria -

Ansidei, 1505 (National Gallery, London)
Madonna and Child with Beardless St Joseph, 1506 (Hermitage)

On happiness (by Aristotle & Kingwell)

Mark Kingwell, a Canadian professor, wrote the following a few years ago --

I once wrote a book about happiness. . . .  [A]t the end of the day, I kept coming back to old, old insights about happiness and world affairs, ones missed by too many psych studies and the people they poll.

Happiness, said Aristotle, is not a feeling or an experience, it is an ethical state of being. It means judging that you have made the right choices and done the right things, and enjoyed a measure of luck along the way. Where and when you are born, how the play of daily contingency affects you, do not determine your happiness, but they do constrain it. And so it often seems as though the choices of everyday life, cosmically small though they are, matter far more than events in distant capitals and war zones.   

But here is the key point. You must live your entire life with honour and commitment. You must try to build something larger than yourself: a community of citizens, a community of reason, a just and peaceful world. You may be defeated, because violence, arrogance and unreason are powerful forces in history. But that does not diminish your responsibility.

(Note: The above paragraphs came from a column by Professor Kingwell in the National Post, a Canadian newspaper.   The original column is, alas, no longer available at the NP's website.   The book to which Kingwell refers is apparently In Pursuit of Happiness, now out of print, but still availabe at Amazon.com and, I trust, elsewhere on the Web.)