Thursday
Vernissage @ Simon Blais:
Irene F. Whitcome, "The Route of San Romano", 1963, oil on canvas. ($75 000)
Paul-Emile Borduas, "5.45 our petite abstraction grise", 1946, oil on canvas (private collection).
Piet Mondrian, "Landscape with irrigation ditch", 1900-01, oil on canvas. ($110 000)
Marcelle Ferron, "Opaque Transparence", 1945-46, oil on cavas.
Small beer with HK in a busy, cozy Plateau micro-brasserie
Irene F. Whitcome, "The Route of San Romano", 1963, oil on canvas. ($75 000)
Paul-Emile Borduas, "5.45 our petite abstraction grise", 1946, oil on canvas (private collection).
Piet Mondrian, "Landscape with irrigation ditch", 1900-01, oil on canvas. ($110 000)
Marcelle Ferron, "Opaque Transparence", 1945-46, oil on cavas.
Small beer with HK in a busy, cozy Plateau micro-brasserie
Tuesday
Francesco Clemente interview with Charlie Rose, 2008:
Clemente: "In painting, waiting is very big part of the effort."
Charlie Rose: "Waiting for what?"
Clemente: " Waiting for both the mind & the material to explicitate their narrative, to develop their narrative. Painting is not so much about decision, it's more about acceptance."
Charlie Rose: "Acceptance of, of what?"
Clemente: " Of the fact that certain structures and orders and narratives they really have their own saying, and all you have to do is listen."
Rose" "So one of the principle things of an artist is to listen & be able to hear."
"I am a painter by default. I'm a painter because I didn't really want to be anything else."
-Francesco Clemente
@ MMFA w/ JPC (12h00) :
Sapphic Weave, 2012
Kenojuak Ashevak, "The Enchanted Owl", 1960, stonecut.
Pudlo Pudlat,"The big Lemming", 1961, graphite.
Pudlo Pudlat, "The big Lemming", 1961, stonecut.
Luke Anuhadluq, "Untitled", 1970, coloured pencil.
Marc-Aurele de Foy Suzor-Cote, "Sketch for the Death of Montcalm", 1902, oil on canvas.
Tom Thompson, "Early Autumn, Algonquin Park", 1915, oil on wood.
Tom Thompson, "Rock-Burnt Country", 1917, oil on wood.
Guido Molinari, "Untitled", 1955, oil on canvas.
Marcelle Ferron, "Untitled", 1947, oil on canvas mounted on cardboard.
Fourth encounter with Tom Thompson, "Northern Lights" about 1916-17, oil on wood:
(seen from the left side of the room)
An old couple enters while we are there as well, spend more time with the painting than most, then leave.
The painting still feels veiled, somehow separated, as if always at a distance. The power really opens up when up close. The painting is above the eye-line, for most people, so is seen looking-up at a slight angle.
Clemente: "In painting, waiting is very big part of the effort."
Charlie Rose: "Waiting for what?"
Clemente: " Waiting for both the mind & the material to explicitate their narrative, to develop their narrative. Painting is not so much about decision, it's more about acceptance."
Charlie Rose: "Acceptance of, of what?"
Clemente: " Of the fact that certain structures and orders and narratives they really have their own saying, and all you have to do is listen."
Rose" "So one of the principle things of an artist is to listen & be able to hear."
"I am a painter by default. I'm a painter because I didn't really want to be anything else."
-Francesco Clemente
@ MMFA w/ JPC (12h00) :
Sapphic Weave, 2012
Kenojuak Ashevak, "The Enchanted Owl", 1960, stonecut.
Pudlo Pudlat,"The big Lemming", 1961, graphite.
Pudlo Pudlat, "The big Lemming", 1961, stonecut.
Luke Anuhadluq, "Untitled", 1970, coloured pencil.
Marc-Aurele de Foy Suzor-Cote, "Sketch for the Death of Montcalm", 1902, oil on canvas.
Tom Thompson, "Early Autumn, Algonquin Park", 1915, oil on wood.
Tom Thompson, "Rock-Burnt Country", 1917, oil on wood.
Guido Molinari, "Untitled", 1955, oil on canvas.
Marcelle Ferron, "Untitled", 1947, oil on canvas mounted on cardboard.
Fourth encounter with Tom Thompson, "Northern Lights" about 1916-17, oil on wood:
(seen from the left side of the room)
An old couple enters while we are there as well, spend more time with the painting than most, then leave.
The painting still feels veiled, somehow separated, as if always at a distance. The power really opens up when up close. The painting is above the eye-line, for most people, so is seen looking-up at a slight angle.
Sunday
Watched "The Mona Lisa curse", a documentary by Robert Hughes, 2008.
"If Art can't tell us about the world we live in, then I don't believe there is much point in having it. And that is something we are going to have to face more & more as the years go on, that nasty question which never used to be asked because the assumption was always it was answered long ago:
What good is Art? What use is Art? What does it do? Is what it does actually worth doing? And an art which is completly moneterized in the way that it is getting these days is going to have to answer these questions or it is going to die."
Third visit to the MMFA, with EA:
Paul-Emile Borduas, "Composition No. 11", 1957, had titled slightly, two or three degrees up to the right.
Spent about 30 minutes in front of Tom Thompson, "Northern Lights", about 1916-17, oil on board.
(I sit about 6 or 7 meters away from the painting for the duration of my visit)
Q?: How do people approach such an iconic painting?
A: With crossed arms & general confusion.
(A man in his 50's yawns in front of the painting, covering his open mouth with the back of his hand.)
Does the small size of the painting limit or restrict a viewers ability to enter into it deeply?
What is the key to access this painting?
What is the key, to me?
(The fresh snow from Fridays' snow storm still blankets the skylights, making igloo light inside the room.)
Mandarin Stumblebum, for Philip Guston, 2012.
"If Art can't tell us about the world we live in, then I don't believe there is much point in having it. And that is something we are going to have to face more & more as the years go on, that nasty question which never used to be asked because the assumption was always it was answered long ago:
What good is Art? What use is Art? What does it do? Is what it does actually worth doing? And an art which is completly moneterized in the way that it is getting these days is going to have to answer these questions or it is going to die."
Third visit to the MMFA, with EA:
Paul-Emile Borduas, "Composition No. 11", 1957, had titled slightly, two or three degrees up to the right.
Spent about 30 minutes in front of Tom Thompson, "Northern Lights", about 1916-17, oil on board.
(I sit about 6 or 7 meters away from the painting for the duration of my visit)
Q?: How do people approach such an iconic painting?
A: With crossed arms & general confusion.
(A man in his 50's yawns in front of the painting, covering his open mouth with the back of his hand.)
Does the small size of the painting limit or restrict a viewers ability to enter into it deeply?
What is the key to access this painting?
What is the key, to me?
(The fresh snow from Fridays' snow storm still blankets the skylights, making igloo light inside the room.)
Mandarin Stumblebum, for Philip Guston, 2012.
Friday
"Genuine art just cannot be made effective through hurly-burly and propaganda in a journalistic sense. Everything essential happens apart from everyday noise, only to attain a more far-reaching effect. The weak and unoriginal try to obtain shabby fame for one day, and should get it. But this is not for us. One has to wait patiently for things to happen. - Most important is the silent show in your own rooms. By this, as time goes by, you will obtain a central force with which to direct everything, if you submerge yourself completely and consider the game of life as a contest for spiritual power - the only game which is really amusing. But this must happen almost in secret. Everything too public diminishes your strength - at least during the birth of the will and during its youth...Politics is a subaltern matter whose manifestation changes continually with the whims of the masses, just as cocottes manage to react according to the needs of the male and to transform and mask themselves. Which means - nothing essential. What it's all about is: the permanent, the unique, the true existence all through the flight of illusions, the retreat from the whirl of shadows. Perhaps we will succeed in this."
-"Herzlichst" Ihr Beckmann
(Max Beckmann, 194?)
-"Herzlichst" Ihr Beckmann
(Max Beckmann, 194?)
Thursday
@ the MMFA, 11h00.
Tom Thompson, "Northern Lights", about 1916-1917, oil on board.
-seen under a skylight covered with fresh snow at 11 AM in an empty room.
-the balance of the image is superb, especially from a distance.
-the paint & luminosity have visibly darkened, giving a different energy to the piece, especially under the pale, weak winter light. The pink hi-lights have faded into a dirty peach colour. A very tiny bit of exposed board show through in one spot. The board is slightly warped, when viewed from the side.
-The painting still emanates a sense of "spiritual urgency" as HK would call it.
-it looks like it was painted in two sessions. The first being the rays of sunlight and the approaching night sky painted at the same time. The dark clouds cutting across the center & the black treetops were painted later. The trees are formed out of the brush strokes nicely.
-a slash of dark purple in the center of the trees at the very bottom, something I've never seen or seen reproduced.
-practiced Leonardo da Vinci's regarde irratante with it from different angles for a while.
-I had a strong desire to take my heavy winter boots off in front of it & be very quiet in my wintery wool socks.
Paul-Emile Borduas, "Compositon No.11", 1957, huile sur toile.
-attracted to the row of old-school nails along the sides like in a Picasso or Guston painting. The slight slip of green into the white slabs of white paint across the muscular surface. Six black splotches just frozen. Very dynamic, after 55 years.
Patterson Ewen, "Nuit d'ete", 1958, oil on canvas.
Patterson Ewen, "Star eruption", 1981, Acrylic on gouged plywood.
Tom Thompson, "Northern Lights", about 1916-1917, oil on board.
-seen under a skylight covered with fresh snow at 11 AM in an empty room.
-the balance of the image is superb, especially from a distance.
-the paint & luminosity have visibly darkened, giving a different energy to the piece, especially under the pale, weak winter light. The pink hi-lights have faded into a dirty peach colour. A very tiny bit of exposed board show through in one spot. The board is slightly warped, when viewed from the side.
-The painting still emanates a sense of "spiritual urgency" as HK would call it.
-it looks like it was painted in two sessions. The first being the rays of sunlight and the approaching night sky painted at the same time. The dark clouds cutting across the center & the black treetops were painted later. The trees are formed out of the brush strokes nicely.
-a slash of dark purple in the center of the trees at the very bottom, something I've never seen or seen reproduced.
-practiced Leonardo da Vinci's regarde irratante with it from different angles for a while.
-I had a strong desire to take my heavy winter boots off in front of it & be very quiet in my wintery wool socks.
Paul-Emile Borduas, "Compositon No.11", 1957, huile sur toile.
-attracted to the row of old-school nails along the sides like in a Picasso or Guston painting. The slight slip of green into the white slabs of white paint across the muscular surface. Six black splotches just frozen. Very dynamic, after 55 years.
Patterson Ewen, "Nuit d'ete", 1958, oil on canvas.
Patterson Ewen, "Star eruption", 1981, Acrylic on gouged plywood.
Wednesday
@ Galerie Samuel Lalouz:
Anselm Kiefer, "Melancholia", 2005, Oil, acrylic, rust and polyhedral sculpture on canvas (sculpture made out of iron and glass, containing ash, iron dried flowers).
Anselm Kiefer, "Der Herbstes Runengespinst / The Web of Autumn Runes", 2003, Oil, lacquer, emulsion, cork and wood on canvas on steel support.
Visit to the Triennale @ the MAC. Disappointing.
Anselm Kiefer, "Melancholia", 2005, Oil, acrylic, rust and polyhedral sculpture on canvas (sculpture made out of iron and glass, containing ash, iron dried flowers).
Anselm Kiefer, "Der Herbstes Runengespinst / The Web of Autumn Runes", 2003, Oil, lacquer, emulsion, cork and wood on canvas on steel support.
Visit to the Triennale @ the MAC. Disappointing.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)