My post disappeared. It was my second post on L’Impromptu de Versailles. I cannot explain what happened. Inserting the original French quotations is somewhat difficult because I have to use a PDF version. It is not the copy you see. The PDF version of Molière’s play can be copied easily. However, copying Henri van Laun’s is a challenge. So, a post on Molière can take a full week to build. Building is the correct word.
No I cannot rebuild it today. I copied the text in Word, but something happened. The copy lacks final paragraphs.
It is not as rich a text as the Critique de l’École de femmes, but it is both a théâtre dans le théâtre (a play within a play, in the broadest acceptation of the word) and a mise en abyme. The Russian dolls nestled one inside another is a form of mise en abyme. But if there are two mirrors, one on each side of an object, the result is an eternal abyss, a kaleidoscope. We are about to read La Princesse de Clèves. It contains stories that could be considered mises en abyme.
I’m thinking of Christmas. The Premier wanted to wait until 11 December before allowing or cancelling Christmas, but it has already been cancelled for all red areas of the province. It’s much too dangerous.
I miss my Nova Scotia home. Life is humbler now, and I left friends behind.
Japonismeis a French term. It was first used by Jules Claretie(3 December 1840 – 23December 1913) in L’Art français en 1872(French Art in 1872) 1913) in L’Art français en 1872 (French Art in 1872). I chose it to describe, in part, the Golden Age of illustration in Britain. The art work that was flooding Europe after Japan’s Sakoku (locked country) period were mere wood-block prints, or ukiyo-e, but no one questioned their beauty. They were in fact not only genuine art, but in many cases, masterpieces.
the Writer and the Illustrator
In Britain, Japonisme ushered in the Golden Age of illustrations. Both word and art could be reproduced very quickly. An author retained the services of an artist, John Tenniel, who, for his part, retained the services of an engraver or engravers. The engravers of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking-Glass (1871) are the Brothers Daziel.
Although some artists could illustrate their text, which was the case with Beatrix Potter (28 July 1866 – 22 December 1943), the author of The Tale of Peter Rabbit, in most cases, illustrating a book successfully required the collaboration and compatibility of a writer and an artist. The illustrations were then engraved, unless the illustrator was also an engraver.
The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Therefore, when JohnTenniel accepted to illustrate Lewis Carroll‘s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and its sequel, Through the Looking-Glass (1871), he and Lewis Carroll had long discussions. John Tenniel was accepting his first commission as the illustrator of children’s literature. Until he agreed to illustrate Lewis Carroll’s Alice, John Tenniel had been working as a political cartoonist for Punchmagazine. He could draw, but the subject matter was brand new. Consequently, if successful, illustrating Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass could make history. Besides given that Lewis Carroll was a pioneer in the area of official literary nonsense, his task was all the more challenging. What was John Tenniel to do each time the text grew “curiouser and couriouser”?
Literary nonsense
Edward Lear (12 or 13 May 1812 – 29 January 1888) had published his Book of Nonsense, in 1846, a few decades before the Golden Age of Illustration. In particular, he had popularized limericks, a literary genre, poetry to be precise. Witty literature was not new. It found a rich expression in the Salons of the first half of the 17th century in France and it was, to a certain extent, related to the conceit(la pointe), the witty and ingenious metaphors of the metaphysical poets of 17th-century England. Literary nonsense would become a feature of children’s literature.
The flowers are beginning their masquerade as people. Sir Jonquil begins the fun by Walter Crane, 1899 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass were very successful and all the more so because children had gained importance. Although the mortality rate among children had not abated drastically, advances in medicine allowed parents to expect their children to survive childhood. Queen Victoria married her first cousin, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, a Prince consort, and gave birth to nine healthy children who married royals.
Gutenberg continued: the Instantaneous, yet…
Moreover the success of LewisCarroll‘s and Tenniel’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass, word and art, did make history. Johannes Gutenberg‘s invention of the printing-press in the middle of the 15th century had been major revolution, one of the most significant in European history. Well, a book had been produced that included fine reproductions of beautiful images. Printed books containing printed illustrations had been produced between 1500 and 1865 but Japonisme had eased the task.
The Calligrapher & the Artist
Compared to the labour of monks who copied books one at a time, Gutenberg’s invention made printing a text seem instantaneous, hence the revolutionary character of the invention of the printing-press. Let us also consider that the printing-press led to the growth of literacy which, in 19th-century Britain, was being extended to children as children’s literature was popular. However, if an illustrated book were to be a commercial success, producing the book demanded that word and art match in an almost inextricable manner.
What comes to mind is the collaboration between the calligrapher and the artist who illuminated such books as Books of Hours, laicity’s Liber Usualis. The printing-press had been invented but, as noted above, a good relationship between the author and the illustrator was crucial:
“There was a physical relation of the illustrations to the text, intended to subtly mesh illustrations with certain points of the text.” (See John Tenniel, Wikipedia.)
Japonisme
Printing illustrations, however, constituted a more challenging task than printing a text, a challenge that was eased by Japonisme.First, Japonisme allowed the rapid printing of illustrations. Second, it validated the work of illustrators. But third, it also simplified the duplication of illustrations.
Typically, the art of Japan featured:
a diagonal line crossing a vertical or horizontal line;
flat or lightly shaded colours;
a stark outline;
&c
Composition did not ease a printer’s labour, but flat colours and a stark outline, i.e. the linearity of Japanese wood-block prints, did help the illustrator and the printer. So did the use of flat colours.
Rackham’s work is often described as a fusion of a northern European ‘Nordic’ style strongly influenced by the Japanese woodblock tradition of the early 19th century. (See Arthur Rackham, Wikipedia.)
Rackham’s “Mad Tea-Party”, featured above, exhibits a diagonal line and it is a linear work of art. The colours are poured inside lines, which reminds me of colouring books for children. But note that there are few shadows. The cups and saucer do not cast a shadow, nor does the teapot. As for dimensionality, it is expressed through the use of lines rather than a juxtaposition of shades of the same colour or the juxtaposition of different colours. Wood-block printing allowed for a measure of dimensionality through the use of lighter or darker tones of a colour or colours. However, by and large, Japanese wood-block prints do not show the shadow of the objects they depict.
With respect to linearity, one need only compare Katsushika Hokusai‘s (c. 31 October 1760 – 10 May 1849) “Self-Portrait” and Rackham’s illustration of the “Town mouse and Country mouse”, shown in a previous post. Moreover, draping or dimensionality is achieved by using less lines (pale: close) or more lines (dark: distant).
Self-Portrait by Hokusai (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Town Mouse and Country Mouse by Arthur Rackham (Photo credit: Wikimedia.org)
Conclusion
Arthur Rackham’s illustrations are close to ukiyo-e(“pictures of the floatingworld”).Walter Crane, however, is the most prolific among Japoniste illustrators of children’s books. He illustrated a very large number of literary works. We are acquainted with his Baby’s Own Æsop (Gutenberg [EBook #25433]), but he also illustrated The Baby’s Own Opera (Gutenberg [EBook #25418]), songs for children. Folklorists, however, had collected and classified a very large number of folk tales.
Illustrators had countless tales to illustrate: those produced by the Brothers Grimm, Hans Christian Andersen, Perrault, Madame d’Aulnoy. Anyone can rewrite the “Little Red Riding Hood” and illustrate it. Carl Larsson illustrated the “Little Red Riding Hood” in 1881. The Arts and Crafts movement was international. (to be cont’d)
I apologize for the delay. My computer is nearly dead and life has a way of making demands.
With my kindest regards. ♥
The Little Red Riding Hood by Carl Larsson (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
This post was written earlier, but my computer “crashed.” So please accept my belated greetings and my apologies.
This was the last in a series of mishaps. My computer failed me. It became unstable. I therefore phoned the technicians at Dell. They had repaired my computer the previous week and did not think this was serious.
However, the technician soon realized that the antivirus program they had installed, a powerful program, had not prevented several battalions of viruses, Trojan horses, and other nasty invaders, from entering the computer. Beware of hackers! So the poor technician started to work at about or four-thirty pm, or 16:20, and did not finish until nearly 9 o’clock, or 21:00. After scanning and cleaning the computer, he installed a second protection program and gave me a phone number, so he could be reached easily.
I may have to download my WordPress program again, as it was affected. How does one download WordPress without erasing posts?
An interior with a Woman, by Carl Larsson
I am therefore rather pleased to be entering a New Year. The year 2012 was a little more difficult than former years. For instance, there was a second “crash,” so to speak. My car went out of control and landed in a ditch. This was my first real accident in a lifetime of driving. I live in a county called “winter,” where changes in the weather can occur quickly.
Fortunately, I was buckled up and my cat Belaud’s was on the back seat, sitting on a thick fleece blanket in his carrier. He enjoys riding in a car and does not have to be in a carrier. But, in my opinion, that could be dangerous and he loves being in his carrier.
I was afraid we would be hit by oncoming traffic, but we were not. I was also afraid the car would turn upside down when it finally left the highway. We ended up in a ditch. One window was shattered and the car lost two doors. But Belaud and I are just fine.
Esbjörn, by Carl Larsson
Good Samaritans helped us out of the vehicle and a friend came to pick me up. I am now awaiting to hear what the Insurance Company‘s specialist has to say. I talked with an employee who told me she had a list of garages and that my car could be repaired in one of their facilities. She explained that my Yaris was not a luxury car and that the Company would spend as little money repairing it as they could.
So I phoned my garage, told the gentleman where my car was and asked him to have it towed away to safety, i. e. to his carrosserie or body shop. The irony is that he is having difficulties earning a living because he is not on the list. He looks after luxury vehicles.
My best news at the moment is that Islamic countries have archangels.
I’ll be blogging again. Once again, I wish a very Happy New Year.
—ooo—
My featured artist is Swedish artist Carl Larsson (28 May 1853 – 22 January 1919), whose paintings of his family and house I like very much.
This video is so joyful that I must share it with you. I would also like to mention that although he worked with the Barbizon plein air artist, Carl Larsson’s (May 28, 1853 – January 22, 1919) influence on home decor and furniture design has been too significant not to mention. He may have enjoyed painting landscapes, but he excelled at designing and decorating his home and, I believe, other homes.
Ett Hem therefore constitutes an invaluable document concerning home design and the rooms Larsson depicted have a lived-in characteristic that makes them particularly attractive. We see a dog sleeping and a little white cat in the kitchen.
I love the corner stoves. If I had a house built, I would consider installing such a stove, if they are still available. I do not feel altogether secure in a house that does not have a stove. What if the power goes out during a furious winter storm. I also keep a good supply of candles and candle holders. I would like my stove to be covered with white and blue tiles, something Dutch. White and blue are my favourite home decor colours, provided they are not the only colours. I enjoy a little diversity.
When my husband and I lived in France, we travelled everywhere and I saw all kinds of interiors. It was an education! My best preparation were the Fine Arts courses I had taken as an undergraduate. They included several classes on architecture and styles.
Europe is also the place where I learned to cook. French cuisine was so delicious, that I returned to Canada prepared to entertain. In fact, I learned a lifestyle.
It is the last day in July. Some of you enjoyed Ett Hem, so I thought I would close the month by sending you pictures that belong to Carl Larsson’s Ett Hem collection.
The picture featured above is entitled Crayfishing (1897) and the picture to your left, October (1883).
Carl Larsson had been influenced by the Barbizon painters plein air (out in the open) school. Both these pictures depict life outdoors.
Pink in the Breakers, by Mesdag (23 February 1831 – 10 July 1915)
(Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Preparations for Departure, Mesdag
The Art of Hendrik Willem Mesdag
When I discovered the work of Dutchmarine painter Hendrik Willem Mesdag, I caught a tiny glimpse of all things infinite. Look at the yellow and mauve hues of the sky in the picture to your left. If I lived near a marina, I would produce paintings of tall ships and sailboats. Mesdag’s paintings therefore speak to me. They are immensely evocative.
My ancestors crossed the ocean in sail boats to settle on the North-American continent.
Hendrik Willem Mesdag was born in Groningen, the Netherlands. He was the son of banker Klaas Mesdag and his wife Johanna Wilhelmina van Giffen. Hendrik Willem’s father was an amateur painter and encouraged his son to persevere in his artistic endeavours.
Mesdag married Sina van Houten (also an artist) in 1856 and, after the couple inherited a fortune from Sina’s family, Mesdag was able to go to Brussels and study art under Willem Roelofs who would later join the Hague School (described below).
In 1868, the Mesdags moved to The Hague, which allowed Mesdag to paint his seascapes with sailboats, a vanishing world. In 1870, Mesdag won a gold medal for The Breakers of the North Sea at the Paris Salon, the official art exhibition of the Paris Académie des Beaux-Arts. Between 1748–1890, the Paris Salon was “the greatest annual or biannual art event in the Western world.” (Wikipedia)
The Hague School
Mesdag is associated with The Hague School and was also a member of the Pulchri [beauty] Studio, an art society of which he was elected chairman in 1889. Members of the Hague School were painters who, following members of the plein air (outdoors)Barbizon School, Corot for instance, painted their surroundings: landcapes, seascapes, farm animals (cows, sheep, etc.). They painted their world, yet a world we can identify as well as identify with, and which can therefore be especially evocative.
Critic, Jacob van Santen Kolff, who coined the term The Hague School, spoke of “a new way of seeing and depicting things” and of an “intent to convey mood, [where] tone takes precedence over color.” Hague School artists had a preference for the consummately dramatic ‘bad weather’ effects, and for a “gray mood.” Many enjoyed using dark colours, which is, in fact, a characteristic of the The Hague School. (Wikipedia)
It is true that an approaching storm is quite literally breathtaking. We wait for what is about to happen and, if what happens is not destructive, nature is refreshed and acquires an intoxicating smell. There is, in the world of art, a love of approaching storms and of storms. They are a drama and they have a resolution. This could be said of Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony, “The Pastoral.” As for Mesdag, a marine painter, his moods are contained in seascapes and sailboats.
Wikipedia is very generous. Its Hague School entry provides us with the name of all its members and each name is a link, which affords us the privilege of spending several hours visiting various “art galleries,” private collections and sites featuring works for sale or sold in art auctions.
Realism and Naturalism
Not all members of the Hague School chose to depict the sea. They in fact depicted a variety of motifs or “subjects,”but all painted familiar scenes, or what they saw or their vision of what they saw. They therefore produced landscapes, seascapes, paintings of farm animals and other subjects.They were chroniclers and shared a common umbrella in the fine arts:Realism and Naturalism. However, it was first and foremost a Dutch school.
Looking at the works of the Hague School, one thinks first of the Dutch masters, such as Vermeer. Second we think of earlier artists, the Limbourg brothers, miniaturists who decorated Jean de France’s book of Hours,Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry. But let us return to Mesdag and witness the whims of fashion.
The Scheveningen Panorama
According to Wikipedia, “[i]n 1880 [Mesdag] received a commission from a Belgian company to paint a panorama giving a view over the village of Scheveningen on the North Sea coast near The Hague.” However, Mesdag bought his own Panorama at an auction when the buyers’ company crumbled. Suddenly, realism and naturalism had gone out of fashion.
Carl Larsson’s Midvinterblot
Hendrik Willem Mesdag’s Scheveningen Panorama seems to have suffered the same fate as Carl Larsson’s Midvinterblot, a rejection of realistic and naturalistic art. Abstract art can be extremely beautiful, but there is nothing wrong with Leonardo da’ Vinci’s “Mona Lisa.”
The Museum Mesdag
In 1903, Mesdag and Sina gave their house at Laan van Meerdervoort and their collection of works of art to the Netherlands. They had acquired many works of art, including Japanese art. Laan van Meerdervoort is now the Museum Mesdag.
There is a sense in which this story is its own conclusion. Fashions change, but the Pendulum swings back. More importantly,there are works the beauty of which can never be Diminished. This discussion is not over.
The return of the fishing fleet on Scheveningen Beach, by Mesdag
You probably remember that after studying in Norway, Carl Larsson spent two years with the plein air French group of artists who called their outdoors group the Barbizon School.
So what is the Barbizon School?
First, Barbizon is or was a village near idyllic Fontainebleau.
As for the artists constituting the Barbizon School, who are named below, they were active from approximately 1830 to 1870.
However, unlike the works of Arts and Crafts movement artists, décor is not a main interest of this group. They are painting the outdoors. But Millet made a painting of William Morris. These artists did not work in isolation.
One coud say that the Barbizon School is also associated with the Pre-Raphaelites, or the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. In both cases, we are dealing with representational artists, but the Barbizon artists were plein airartists, at least to begin with, and their reality was not as idealistic as that of the Pre-Raphaelites.
However, the group has its antecedents in the works of John Constable (11 June 1776 – 31 March 1837) and it has its common denominator: realism, ranging from an idealized and ethereal rendering of reality to a rugged depiction of that same reality. Moreover, as mentioned above, in its early stage, the group was a plein air group. Their reality was nature in its diversity. So, initially, authorities were shocked by content of certain works. Corot, maybe, but cows!
In fact, when first introduced to the Barbizon school, France’s Director of Fine Arts quickly pronounced that
[t]his is the painting of men who don’t change their linen, who want to intrude themselves upon gentlemen; this art offends and disgusts me.[i]
Indeed, Constant Troyon, who is also a member of the group, choses a subject that is elemental. We are looking at cows. There is nothing ethereal about cows. Yet, Troyon’s painting is beautiful.
The Ford, by Constant Troyon
(please click on the picture to enlarge it)
This post is no more than a general introduction to a movement and it lists the names of artists connected with the movement. For the time being, that suffices.
Yet, I will let one of my former teachers formulate a conclusion. Alan Gowans writes that members of the Barbizon School “continued to behave in the same docile way as those painters who were merely concerned with making the world more Beautiful.” [ii]
Les Glaneuses, etching, after 1857
(click on the picture to enlarge it)
To which I would add that neither a movement nor an objective, in our case realism, define an artist’s works. Reality is subjective. There are affinities between the Arts and Crafts Movement, the Pre-Raphaelites, the Barbizon school and Carl Larsson. However, although they enjoy rubbing elbows and share similar goals, artists differ from one another.
17 Mendelssohn Lieder ohne Worte, Op.38 – No. 5. Agitato in A minor ‘Appassionata’
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[i] Alan Gowans, The Restless Art, A History of Painting 1760-1960 (Philadelphia and New York: J. B. Lippincott Company, 1966), p. 159.
This painting representing a mid-winter sacrifice (blot), an evocation of Norse mythology, created a controversy. It is difficult to imagine that an inoffensive masterpiece by Carl Larsson (1853 – 1919), the artist who gave us Ett Hem, should have been targeted in any form of dispute and that morality should have been an issue. However, the vast mural, now at long last housed in the Swedish National Museum of Fine Arts, did unleash a debate and although commissioned for the Swedish National Museum of Fine Arts and completed in 1915, four years before Carl Larsson’s death, it was rejected.
In fact, it did not adorn the prominent wall for which it was intended until 1997, when the Museum bought it from a Japanese collector who had purchased it at Sotheby’s in London, in 1987. Opinion changed when the fresco was borrowed from its Japanese owner for the National Museum’s bicentennial anniversary in 1992, the anniversary being dedicated to Carl Larsson. Public praise of the large fresco was such that the National Museum was motivated to buy back the mural and install it where it was meant to be installed in 1915.
Midvinterblot:the Legend
According to legend, during a lengthy period of famine, kind Domalde was sacrificed in the hope that his land would again feed his people. The story is told by Adam of BremenaGerman medieval chronicler who lived in the second half of the eleventh century. It is also told by Snorri Sturluson (1179 – 23 September 1241) an Icelandic historian, poet, and politician, in his Ynglinga saga (1225). Wikipedia has incorporated the relevant part of Sturluson’s saga. The following is Sturluson’s account of Kind Domalde’s sacrifice, quoted in Wikipedia:
Domald took the heritage after his father Visbur, and ruled over the land. As in his time there was great famine and distress, the Swedes made great offerings of sacrifice at Upsal. The first autumn they sacrificed oxen, but the succeeding season was not improved thereby. The following autumn they sacrificed men, but the succeeding year was rather worse. The third autumn, when the offer of sacrifices should begin, a great multitude of Swedes came to Upsal; and now the chiefs held consultations with each other, and all agreed that the times of scarcity were on account of their king Domald, and they resolved to offer him for good seasons, and to assault and kill him, and sprinkle the stalle of the gods with his blood. And they did so.
— Blomsterfönstret (Windowsill with Flowers), 1894 -1898
Look at this beautiful room. There are flowers on the windowsill. A young girl is watering the flowers. To the left, we find the essential day bed. The carpeting seems hand-woven and is almost identical to French-Canadian “catalognes.” The wooden floor is made of wide planks. They were still available in those days. The little stage is just right for children and makes a delightful side table for the person lying on the day bed. The furniture is colored and the day bed, covered with striped fabric: blue stripes.
In my eyes, Carlsson’s paintings of his family and home are his masterpieces. I love the details suggesting the daily life of a family. For instance, I see the little white cat in the kitchen, the wool on a small dining-table, a young pianist at the piano. Carl and Karin Larsson loved their home and made it their jewell. They made it Ett Hem (A home).
Carl Larsson
Carl Larsson (May 28, 1853 – January 22, 1919) was born in Stockholm to a very poor family. But his artistic talents were recognized in time for him to be trained at the “principskola” of the Royal Swedish Academy of Arts where success as a student gave him confidence and led to employment. For instance, he was, among other things, an illustrator.
Larsson, the illustrator
Working as an illustrator left an imprint on Carl Larsson’s art. Many artists do not let us see the sketch, or the lines, from which emerges the finished work of art. But Larsson leaves in the lines which links him to the Arts and Crafts Movement. The Arts and Crafts Movement, a mainly British movement, included such artists as Walter Crane, an illustrator. Its membership also included the very prominent William Morris, its chief member. The Arts and Crafts Movement is sometimes associated with Pre-Raphaelite artists such as Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Sir Edward Burne-Jones, John Ruskin, an artist and theorist, except that the Pre-Raphaelites went beyond realism. They reached for a utopia. As for Carl Larsson’s art, it is representational but very much alive. In fact, it constitutes a compelling chronicle of a dream come true: a home!
Mammas och småflickornas rum (Mamma's and the small girls' room), 1897 (please click on the picture to enlarge it)
Definition It is neither right nor wrong to show the sketches from which a painting emerges. Carl Larrson’s does so in a discreet manner and to the advantage of his art. It is characterized by definition, definition in its most fundamental acceptation. This style may be a matter of temperament, but it could also be a matter of choice.
Influences
Larsson’s art also reflects exposure to the Barbizon School, a French movement particularly well represented by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot. In fact, having spent two years with the ‘plein-air’ Barbizon disciples, Larsson founded a colony of Swedish artists working in France. Among members of the group was Karin Bergöö, an artist and Carl Larsson’s future wife. She and Carl had eight children.
When he met and married Karin, Larsson left behind abject poverty to enter a world that gave him not a castle but the home he had not had as a child and which would be home not only to his family, but also to those among us who, as I have already expressed, require an occasional refuge. Lilla Hyttnäs is both alive and livable.
Lathörnan (Cosy Corner), 1894
There is so much to say about Carl Larsson, but let the images speak for themselves. I will confine this blog to Carl Larsson’s paintings of Lilla Hyttnäs, in Sundborn, a house given to Karin and Carl by Karin’s father and which expresses the very essence of home.
* * *
Let us listen to Carl Larsson tell us about his feelings when he first visited Lilla Hyttnäs:
While I was here, I experienced an indescribably delightful feeling of seclusion from the hustle and bustle of the world, which I have only experienced once before (and that was in a village in the French countryside).
Inspired & Inspirational
Carl Larsson was influenced by other artists only to become one of the most influential artists of his time and ours.
There are many artists whose work I simply love, but Carl Larsson is a favourite. When I need to escape into fantasy, I find refuge in the pictures of his house, his lovely wife, his children, everything.
