THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO: THE IMPRESSIONISTS PT2

 Let's talk about Impressionism…

Shop Girls, c. 1912 by Elizabeth Sparhawk-Jones. 🤍

I love the rapid, open brushwork, especially when you can see the things that have no detail but it's just our own eyes who create this, also the effects of light and atmosphere it's so beautiful.

In the Sea, 1883 by Arnold Böcklin. 🧜‍♀️ I interpret themes from Classical mythology in an idiosyncratic, I love the combination of earthy and fantastical realism. Mermaids and tritons frolic in the water with a lusty energy and abandon verging on coarseness. I really hope to see more paintings from this artist because they are haunting.

Pardon in Brittany, 1896 by Gaston La Touche. 🕯️

The canvas, depicting people gathered in a religious ceremony, a pilgrimage of penance, under a blush-colored sky. The lights of candles flicker among their white bonnets, like stars twinkling over a blanket of snow. This piece took my attention because the lights, I feel like if I were the painter I would feel so uncomfortable by not finding sense to the figures, but as a viewer, I can totally understand it.

Stacks of Wheat (Sunset, Snow Effect), 1890–91 by Claude Monet ✨

The monumental stacks that Claude Monet depicted in his series Stacks of Wheat rose fifteen to twenty feet and stood just outside the artist's farmhouse at Giverny. Through 1890 and 1891, he worked on this series both in the field, painting simultaneously at several easels, and in the studio, refining pictorial harmonies during winter time and I love despite being almost the same image, each time because the light of the day, they all look different. watching his painting it's really emotional, there is some kind of halo or glow that seems to go out of the painting. The colors look absolutely amazing, almost like pastel neons.

Charing Cross Bridge, London, 1901 🇬🇧

Beginning in September 1899, Claude Monet made almost one hundred paintings of the river Thames in London. These works show only three different views—Charing Cross Bridge and Waterloo Bridge, both painted from the Savoy Hotel; and the Houses of Parliament, painted from Saint Thomas's Hospital. In the smoggy, industrial city, Monet challenged himself to capture effects of light seen through a dense atmospheric screen.

THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO: THE IMPRESSIONISTS.

 HELLO AND WELCOME!

Has been a month full of art, SO MUCH ART! and I want to keep sharing this time my favorite paintings from the Institute of Art in Chicago.

Another haul, now with the Impressionists. 🖼️ 🎨

Fruits of the Midi, 1881 by Pierre-Auguste Renoir. 🍆

Renoir’s style in this piece is described as an attempt to balance the fleeting luminosity of Impressionism with classical pictorial structure. He emphasizes the three-dimensional shape of the objects through strong contours and diagonal brushstrokes. Personally I like the eggplant and the visible direction of the brushstrokes from the tablecloth.

The Basket of Apples, c. 1893 by Paul Cezanne. 🍏 🍎

Paul Cézanne once claimed, is “a harmony running parallel to nature,” not an imitation of nature. In his quest for underlying structure and composition, he recognized that the artist is not bound to represent real objects in real space. Thus, The Basket of Apples contains one of his signature tilted tables, an impossible rectangle with no right angles.

Then a painting from 1877, The lozenge-shaped pattern of the wallpaper identifies the setting for this still life as the Paris apartment where Paul Cezanne and his family lived.

Grapes, Lemons, Pears, and Apples, 1887 by Van Gogh. 🍇 🍋 🍐 🍎

Here I have explored the use of complementary colors—yellow and purple, blue and orange, and red and green—in the service of chromatic intensity and I love the brushwork which as part of his signature it’s hard not to identify.

Apples and Grapes, 1880 by Claude Monet 🍎 🍇

We can see the play of light on the horizontal brushstrokes that folds in the tablecloth. I like how the light follows the direction of the texture for the tablecloth.

Chrysanthemums, 1881–82 by Pierre-Auguste Renoir 🌼

“I just let my brain rest when I paint flowers,” Pierre-Auguste Renoir remarked. "I don't experience the same tension as I do when confronted by the model. When I am painting flowers, I establish the tones, I study the values carefully without worrying about losing the picture. I don't dare do this with a figure piece for fear of ruining it."

I think it looks so messy like if every brushstroke were a petal, even the background or the table, but that's the magic of this work.

THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO: ART OF THE AMERICAS, GREEK AND ROMAN

 Hello everyone! welcome to another Saturday blog post.

For this post I want to share what I saw in THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO, my favorite pieces during the visit, so get ready for a long time looking art.

Starting with Marc Chagall stained glass “America Windows” which celebrated the United States and its culture, it was amazing to see Chagall stained glass as I gave a video about his biography and I talked about his work with strained glass. 💙

Another piece is the painting from Chagall that I saw was “Birth” a cubist piece from 1912 where we see the birth of Chagall’s brother David in the family home around 1892, an especially powerful memory from the artist’s early life. I think here we can see all about Chagall’s passions: Family, Circus, surrealism, cubism, colors and shapes as stained glass.

Then ai jumped to Greeks, Romans and Byzantine art. I like very much some sculptures and here some favorites:

-Abduction of Persephone

-Bound roster mosaic

-Fish on a platter mosaic

-Marine life mosaic

I had the chance to see American Gothic by Grant Wood with the farmers posed stiffly and dressed as if they were, as the artist put it, They stand outside their home, built in an 1880s style known as Carpenter Gothic. Wood had seen a similar farmhouse during a visit to Eldon, Iowa and I confirmed it, I never visited but it’s a well-known place.

🦴 Cow’s Skull with Calico Roses by Georgia O’ Keeffe, she collected a lot of skulls and bones in New Mexico and even she took some to New York. She noted, “To me they are as beautiful as anything I know... The bones seem to cut sharply to the center of something that is keenly alive on the desert.”

🌺 Red Hills with Flowers, 1937 also by Georgia O'Keeffe.

She loved the contrasts in scale, she said "All the earth colors of the painter's palette are out there in the many miles of badlands. The light Naples yellow through the ochers orange and red and purple earth even the soft earth greens." And I'm agree.

🪨 Fragment of a Funerary Lekythos

4th century BCE, only prominent families would have had the means to immortalize their loved ones by having their names set in stone.

🏺 Water Jar Hydria, Created by an artist known as the Leningrad Painter, the front of this vessel shows intimate scenes of couples, they are unusual in Greek art.

🐪 Byzantine mosaics with tiny cubes from the 5th century with details of camels, giraffes and dogs, they have flowers and hearts. They were found in the Mediterranean

🧐Icon with the Virgin and Child from by Cretan School c. 1500

Painted with tempera and golden leaf over wood panel, it takes my attention the little perforations it has to make the patterns. I don't know why I always like to see Virgin with child paintings as they are so they portray the same image.

🤍 Eye detail of a Portrait Bust of a Woman

Craved by a very talented sculpture, I noticed she has the hearts on her eyes just like David by Michelangelo 😍 love it!

🌞 Fragment of a Portrait Statue of a Man, Perhaps a Roman Emperor with a stunning ceremonial armor suggests that he was a general or even the emperor, as the latter held the role of commander of the Roman army. I love the little faces!

Art of the Americas, here a favorites.

Twilight c. 1926 by Hale Woodruff it’s so beautiful because the messy brushstrokes and bright and warm colors. 🥰

Nighthawks 1942 by Edward Hopper,

This is the second painting that I have the privilege to see. “unconsciously, probably, I was painting the loneliness of a large city.”

It was discovered or revealed by his wife that before making the painting he made a full detailed script about how this painting had to be done. ✍🏻

Untitled c. 1938–41 by Jackson Pollock

Pollock became engaged in an intense dialogue with the work of the Mexican muralists José Clemente Orozco and David Alfaro Siqueiros; he was inspired by their social commitment and use of primitive, archetypal imagery. And of course we can notice how similar style has from Picasso. 🎨

Portrait of Marevna, c. 1915 by Diego Rivera

Here we can see when Diego Rivera enjoyed a brief but sparkling period as a Cubist painter. He made the portrait of one of his lovers and we can see all the elements like a puzzle. 🧩

Love of Winter 1914 by George Wesley Bellows.

In January 1914 George Bellows wrote to a friend, "There has been none of my favorite snow. I must always paint the snow at least once a year." Soon after, on February 13, a major blizzard hit New York City, inspiring the artist to paint Love of Winter.

Imagine to dress that nice during a blizzard in the Midwest 😜

The Milliners, 1921 by Theresa F. Bernstein.

"In The Milliners, Theresa Bernstein depicted a group of women sewing accessories on hats, exploring the aesthetic qualities of community and concentration. The window at upper left suggests that they are in a city apartment, perhaps undertaking piecework at home to earn extra income." That's what the people who wrote this think. I like the way some looks so focused and some others looking other women. 👀