Share some art that inspires me

“A Sunday Afternoon on the Isle of La Grande Jatte” is his most famous work, but it’s such a well-known piece that it’s hard to see it with fresh eyes anymore. In 2004, The Art Institute of Chicago created an exhibition about its creation that provides a neat set of lenses (so to speak) to try to view it anew. Much of this material, featuring a number of related images, is still available at:

http://www.artic.edu/aic/exhibitions/seurat/seurat_overview.html

For a basic biography & links to other resouces, see:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georges_Seurat

The image I’ve chosen, “A Study for La Grande Jatte” – just one of many such studies – is held by the National Gallery, in London; it is available online at:

http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/cgi-bin/WebObjects.dll/CollectionPublisher.woa/wa/largeImage?workNumber=NG6556&collectionPublisherSection=work

He tried so many styles – & media – & as a result his work is so varied! Here’s an image I like, a painting that may not be so well-known as some others (the “red room” & the “red studio,” his famous nudes and dancers, etc.) are:

Image found online at: http://www.tamsquare.net/pictures/M/Henri-Matisse-Red-Fish-.jpg

&

for a basic introduction, see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henri_Matisse

“Sunflowers in the Windstorm was painted while World War II raged across much of the globe. At the time he created this work, German artist Emil Nolde was forbidden by the Nazi government to paint. The Nazis, who preferred idealized art that promoted party policies, detested Nolde’s emotionally expressive style of painting, which they labeled “degenerate.” In defiance of the order, Nolde painted in secret anyway. Most often he painted watercolors; only on rare occasions did he dare to paint in oils, for fear that the smell of the pigments might betray him. Sunflowers in the Windstorm is one of just five oil paintings he created in 1943. Its storm-battered flowers, which bend but do not break, may be read as symbols of the human spirit in the toughest of times.” Photo and text from http://www.columbusmuseum.org/about/curatorsview/nolde.html

through my entries & comments, & added “inspiring art” images whenever/wherever possible. Perhaps this may help you understand why I find these works inspiring…. smile

Essaydi is an Arabic woman from Morocco living in the West, having gone to art school here in the U.S. She’s doing some amazing photography series & other (“conceptual”) art as well. I really like her stuff!

View images at (index URL):

http://images.google.com/images?gbv=2&hl=en&safe=off&q=Lalla+Essaydi&btnG=Search+Images

When I was in Austria, I visited the Hundertwasser House & as many of the Hundertwasser designs that have been built as I could. Most of them are in Vienna (a few are outside the city; for example, Saint Barbara’s church and the Bad Blumau spa are in the region of Styria).

I will admit that Hundertwasser’s work is an acquired taste—folks tend either to love his stuff or hate it & nothing in-between. (Me? I’m a huge fan! smile)

Images of some of his most famous buildings may be found at:

http://www.hundertwasserhaus.com/ (German)
http://www.kidsnet.at/Sachunterricht/hundertwasser.htm (German)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundertwasserhaus (English)

I fell in love with works by Klimt (of which The Kiss is probably the most famous, if not, perhaps, the best) when I first saw them (of all places!) in reproduction in a museum store in Indiana.

So, when I was in Vienna (on a trip that I had planned in order to see a different exhibition in that city) I made certain to see his many wonderful pieces then on display at the Belvedere Gallery. (Sadly, that collection has since been dispersed to the four winds; one can no longer see the pieces together. I feel very privileged to have done so, in the last summer the works were on show there).

Images at:

http://www.belvedere.at/jart/prj3/belvedere/main.jart?rel=en&content-id=1169655781728&reserve-mode=active

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f3/Gustav_Klimt_016.jpg

This was one of the few times I’ve actually planned a “pilgrimage” to see (or created a trip around) a specific work of art or exhibition. In 2005, I travelled to Vienna, Austria, specifically in order to see this show at the Leopold Museum:

“The Naked Truth: Klimt, Schiele, Kokoschka, & Other Scandals”

It was wonderful (both the show & the new museum that houses it). smile

Information at:

http://www.leopoldmuseum.org/nw/ (German)

http://www.leopoldmuseum.org/exhibitions_en.php?nav=2&id=3&sub=6&zaehler=18&total=23 (English)

This is one of the works I recall most strongly from a Western art history / art appreciation class that I took during my first two years in college. When I was in Vienna (on a trip that I had planned in order to see a different exhibition) I made certain to see the Bosch when I realized it was on display in the same city! smile

Images at:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0c/BoschTheLastJudgementTriptychLeftInnerWing.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a0/BoschTheLastJudgementTriptychCenterPanel.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d3/BoschTheLastJudgementTriptychRightInnerWing.jpg

This is the second example of an “Old Masters” artwork from the Western tradition that I remember ever liking of my own accord (as opposed to being told that I should). Like the previous image I posted here, it was painted by Pieter Breughel the Elder; also like that image, it was reproduced in an art & literature textbook that I had in my ninth-grade year.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:BrueghelLand_of_Cockaignedetail.jpg

Apologies for the color in this image (it’s not nearly this “yellowish” in real life)!