Frederic Leighton, The Garden of the Hesperides, c.1892. Lady Lever Art Gallery, Port Sunlight. After some delay I will be very happy to talk about Frederic Leighton and Flaming June at last – this Monday, 22 April at 6pm. This is a superb opportunity to focus on a painting which is widely recognised as theContinue reading “220 – At the end of the day”
Category Archives: Myths
218 – Living two lives
Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Proserpine, 1881-82. Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery. With the appalling news that over the next two years the Birmingham City Council will be cutting its arts funding to leading institutions by 100%, I am especially looking forward to talking about the exhibition Victorian Radicals: From the Pre-Raphaelites to the Arts and CraftsContinue reading “218 – Living two lives”
202 – Flora, from Florence
Evelyn De Morgan, Flora, 1894. De Morgan Collection. There have been a plethora of exhibitions of the work of Evelyn De Morgan in the past few years, but I am only now in a position to dedicate an entire talk to her (on Monday 21 August at 6pm), thanks to the exhibition The Gold DrawingsContinue reading “202 – Flora, from Florence”
Day 54 – Psyche V: ‘Reawakening’
Anthony van Dyck, Cupid and Psyche, 1639-40, Royal Collection Trust. This is another re-post, but somehow, and I really don’t know how, I managed to delete the original quite a long time ago. I was probably on a train with dodgy WiFi, and maybe even using my phone, all of which would generally result inContinue reading “Day 54 – Psyche V: ‘Reawakening’”
Re-telling the tale (Spinning a Yarn)
Diego Velázquez, ‘Las Hilanderas’, 1655-60, The Prado, Madrid. Another ‘re-post’ today, as I am currently in Glasgow researching a trip which is coming up in September for Artemisia, details of which can be found in the diary (along with everything else, of course). It looks at a painting which concerns the maltreatment of a human by aContinue reading “Re-telling the tale (Spinning a Yarn)”
Venus reborn
Alessandro Botticelli, The Birth of Venus, c. 1485, The Uffizi, Florence. I want to look back to Botticelli’s Birth of Venus today as she is one of the Gods and Goddesses I will be talking about this Tuesday, 4 July (5:30-7:30pm) in the first of my three talks covering Classical Mythology in European Art. On TuesdayContinue reading “Venus reborn”
Three years on…
Day 1 – Titian, The Rape of Europa, 1562. Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston. So – it’s three years since I started writing this blog! On the 17 March I walked into London to see the National Gallery’s Titian, and, realising that all the museums were closing, all the theatres were shut, and all myContinue reading “Three years on…”
176 – All change!
Salvador Dalí, Metamorphosis of Narcissus, 1937. Tate. Salvador Dalí was a Surrealist, obviously, and, some would say, the Arch-Surrealist. In 1934 he even claimed a form of ‘über-Surrealism’ when he explained that ‘The difference between the Surrealists and me is that I am a Surrealist’ – a typically Surreal statement. As such, like all membersContinue reading “176 – All change!”
170 – Drawing to an end
Michelangelo, The Fall of Phaethon, 1533. The Royal Collection/HM King Charles III. This week, a drawing from the Royal Collection – it seems apt. And, although Monday sees the funeral of its former owner, Queen Elizabeth (she held it in trust for the nation), I have decided to go ahead with my talk, Michelangelo 3:Continue reading “170 – Drawing to an end”
Psyche, a coda (a repeat)
Antonio Canova, Psyche revived by Cupid’s Kiss, 1787-93, Louvre, Paris. So far in my series on sculpture I haven’t mentioned Antonio Canova, although I will this Monday, 20 June at 6.00pm, when I will discuss the very substance of art (or, at least, the different substances from which sculpture is made), in a talk entitled Material:Continue reading “Psyche, a coda (a repeat)”
dr richard stemp 