El Greco to Velazquez

We went to see this exhibit at Duke yesterday. Spanish baroque art, quite impressive. D is reading through the exhibit catalog today. I still have trouble appreciating El Greco-- I always think his people look like they've been painted on silly putty and then stretched-- which probably just proves that I'm an artistic philistine.

But it was a really interesting exhibit in many ways. Paintings were arranged by genre so as to contrast how different artists interpreted the same themes. We highly recommend going, if you're within driving distance of Durham.

Dagfari's recommended background reading: How to Read a Painting: Lessons from the Old Masters, by Patrick De Rynck.

Dagfari's impressions of the exhibit:
"This exhibit not only captured the spirit of the art of the time, it captured everything that happened. One of my favorite paintings was Velazquez's "The Immaculate Conception". Velazquez has captured an air of tranquility in a scene that is full of motion and religious drama. I also liked Eugenio Cajes's " Christ at Calvary", which was a common theme and composition. Compared to similar paintings, Cajes's work has a feeling of loneliness, and the black background gives an air of cold and of night. I am hoping to go back and see it again!"

Ode to Fall

A poem by Dagfari, inspired, he says, by the prologue to the Canterbury Tales.

When Old Septembre
Came again
In glorious array, with
Shadows long,
And each blooming blossom
Giving homage to the sun,
In glints of dew.
'Twas then that even the spiders
Wove their webs of finest silk,
Which shone silver
In the morning light,
And shadows leapt around,
In playful dance,
To celebrate the coming
Of the Fall.