Non-Western Art- Ming Dynasty

The Ming Dynasty dated from 1368 to 1644. The early part of this dynasty was marked by cultural restoration and expansion. The Ming Dynasty was when a indigenous Chinese ruling house, or family, returned to power and with it, artists returned to earlier styles of art. Much like the European Renaissance, the ruling powers had a lot of influence on the art of the time. Ming rulers and upper class, like any, wanted to be represented in the best light and praised with local art. Ink-wash and calligraphic art forms were returned to and expanded upon during this time and mastery of the performance of art creation became very important. West Asian and Mongol Yuan dynasty continued to influence the art of the Ming Dynasty.

 

Due to an increase in supplies and mediums, an increase in patronage of the arts became available. This medallion is one of the few pieces that can be dated to the Ming Dynasty, though the exact timing and artist is unknown. Its guessed that this piece is from the late 16th century or early 17th century. The scene in it details a scholar coming home from travels with four attendants carrying his supplies and a fifth attendant who has rushed ahead to open the gates of the compound. The detail work on the back of the medallion is what helps date this piece to the Ming Dynasty. The choice of scene is similar to others that were painted around the more specific time that it is believed this piece was carved. Scenes like this often were about a spring outing that involved poetry and wine.

My reasons: The detail and beauty of this piece amazed me. Then to find out that the whole sculpture is only 3 3/8 inches in diameter, that blew me away. I couldn’t attempt to do something like this if I was working with something the size of a dinner plate, let alone something so small. The skill and detail intrigued me and the moment I saw it, I didn’t have to look any further for an art piece to feature, not to say I didn’t look, but my decision had already been made.

 

 

 

 

References:

Department of Asian Art. “Ming Dynasty (1368–1644)”. In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/ming/hd_ming.htm (October 2002) Retrieved on 11/21/11

 

“Medallion with Return from a Spring Outing [China] (1993.176)”. In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/works-of-art/1993.176 (September 2008)

Non-Western Art: Kabuki

Kabuki is one of the traditional forms of Japanese theatre, and like many theatre forms in Europe, it was performed by men. This is kind of interesting because the creator of Kabuki Theatre was a female shrine attendant in the 1600’s. It had a lot of influence from the Noh, an aristocratic class in Japan, but was popular for the masses. Similar to theatre in England was heavily influenced by the ruling classes. The characters were often familiar to those who had any learning in the history of Japan because they were often based off the different historical stories, again, similar to theatre in England and playwrights like Shakespeare. The language may be old but the story ideas were familiar.

At one point, women were allowed to act in Kabuki theatre, but there was an issue with most the female actors being

Typical Kabuki actors

prostitutes and this caused an uprising in the seats. Women were banished, but the young men that took their place were also prostitutes which insighted similar problems. Eventually just older actors were asked to perform the pieces. In addition, those that played female roles used to have to  be female in their everyday lives as well, but this practice was changed in 1868.

Standard roles included the “Good guy” roles such as the virtuous hero or handsome lover. A “Bad guy” role such as an evil samurai, and the females roles like the wicked woman, young maiden, or high-ranking samurai lady.

A couple of the most famous Kabuki playwrights included Chikamatsu Monzaemon (1653~1724) and Ichikawa Danjuro. Chikamatsu Monzaemon was more known for his bunraku plays, but Ichikawa Danjuro’s  plays are still performed today, and sometimes even by his decedents.

 

Image by by Kunisada Utagawa (1786-1865) in 1860

The play I chose to highlight was one of Ichikawa Danjuro’s  “Eighteen Great Plays” or Kabuki Juhachiban called Shibaraku.  Shibaraku was originally performed in 1697 at the Nakamura-za by its creator, Ichikawa Danjuro I

The main themes involve the Bad guy who has taken over and a goodly samurai is trying, in vain, to right them off.  From off stage the word “SHIBARAKU!” is shouted, meaning roughly “Wait a minute”, and out steps our hero,  Kamakura Gongoro Kagemasa, dressed in a costume to make him appear huge and intimidating, and make-uped in red and white. This costuming is often seen as stereotypical of kabuki actors now. He delivers his monologue, strikes a mie (srossed eyes, exaggerated expression) pose, and drives off the villain to save the day. The shouting of “Shibaraku” came about by accident when Ichikawa was first performing this play. His fellow actors wouldn’t give him his cue to enter, so he shouted “wait a minute” and made his entrance. Its been a part of the play ever since.

Ezibo Ichikawa

 

 

My reason for choosing this form of art is because of the historical value of Kabuki for the Japanese culture.  It was made a Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity by UNSECO in November of 2005. Though its popularity has waned to mostly the older population and women, I see it as important to Japanese culture as Shakespeare is to the Western World. My reasoning for choosing Shibaraku is because of the recognizably of the play and that it still exists and is performed to this day. There have been adaptations made of it as well as parodies. For me, this play shows a lot of what many people think of when they think of Kabuki.

 

References:

Japan Zone, Class reading

“Shibaraku” Last updated on 7/28/ 2010. Retrieved on 11/18/11 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shibaraku

Environmental/Eatable Art

Art comes in many many forms, especially as the years have progressed from where we started with our lessons to where we are now. At one point, most art could be lumped under one name, but now, there are so many different forms, it can make one’s head spin.

One form of post-modern art is Environmental Art. Environmental art isn’t supposed to last long, though it can. It is often destroyed by the artist, not always done for galleries or big urban centers, and can even take teams of people to put together.  Environmental art doesn’t make money from the sale of the art piece itself, but from the pictures and sometimes the directions of how to make the piece. One form of Environmental art, in my opinions, is eatable art. This form of art includes Cake art, Chocolate art, and Sugar art. Buddy Valastro, Stephane Treand, and Gerhard Petzl are each examples of such art.

Bortolo “Buddy Valastro was born in Hoboken, New Jersey, to a very Italian American family, and is the fourth generation to run his family business. He has managed to bring his business to a point where TLC has a television show that details the work that Buddy, and his crew, do in order to make the amazing cake art pieces that they put together. Buddy’s show, and shop, bring together old world charm and techniques as well as new ideas of how to put cake together. The pieces chosen include the Sesame Street Cake that Buddy made for the celebration of Sesame Street’s 40th anniversary in 2009. The second Piece is an Octopus Cake that I believe was done this year, and the third is a Transformer Cake that was commissioned for the Transformers 3: Dark Side of the Moon this past June, 2011. Buddy is one that earns his living not only by selling his art, but by having the creation of it filmed and put on T.V.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stephane Treand is known for his sugar art. Raised in Northern France, his father sent him to work in a bakery. He worked hard and found a passion in pastry and won a Best Apprentice in France award in 1999.  In 2005, he moved to the United States and stated working here. Through his time as a pastry chef, he has also learned a passion for sugar art. The three pieces from Treand I was unable to find titles or a year to go with them, but he created them during a demonstration at the Four Seasons in Dana Point, California.

 

 

 

 

 

 

My third artist chooses to use chocolate as his medium for art. Born in Austria, Gerhard Petzl worked in the art world  before earning a diploma of ‘Master Classes of Art & Design’, section ‘Sculpturing’, in 2005.  From there, he experimented with different things to make sculptures out of, eventually winning awards for his chocolate  and sugar work. I included three of his chocolate pieces, though again, I had a hard time finding years. One is Petzl’s version of Aphrodite. He also did an advertizing column, which, if you look close, you can see the image of Jesus in. His third piece is a body art done in a Japanese Style.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yes, those are all done in real food and very eatable.

My Opinions: I chose eatable art because, for me, it falls into the Environmental Art category. I also think that it is amazing what people can do with non traditional mediums to work their art pieces in. There are people that say presentation is everything, but I think food artists take it to a new level.

 

References:

“The Art of Pastry: Stephane Treand” Copyright 2011, Retrieved 11/9/2011 from http://www.stephanetreand.com/stephane-treand

Petzl, Gerhard, “Forever Art” Copyright 2011 Retrieved 11/9/2011 from http://foreverart.at/en/index.php?/home/

“Carlo’s Bake Shoppe” Copyright 2007, retrieved 11/9/11 from http://www.carlosbakery.com/

Early Modern-Photography

Dorothea Lange 1895-1965 was born from second generation German immigrant in Hoboken, New Jersey. She had two major traumatic events in her youth, at age 7, she contracted polio that left her with a limp and a weak right leg. This would effect her through her life, especially in her later life. When she was 12, her father abandoned the family, at that point she dropped her middle name and started using her mother’s maiden name as her own. Lange was not her birth name. She was educated and apprenticed in New York City, then moved to San Francisco where she opened a studio in 1918. She moved to Berkeley in 1920 where she maintained her primary residence for the rest of her life.

 

 

 

Lange was funded by the Farm Security Administration (FSA) to take pictures of different scenes from the Depression Era. Her pictures capture the destitution that faced families of migrant farmers in Arizona and California. One of her most famous works was Migrant Mother, Nipomo California 1936. The woman was a mother of seven. In the picture, you can tell that she is stressed beyond belief and is trying to figure out what she is going to do in order to take care of her children.

 

 

 

 

I chose a second picture as well. Its from Tulare County, California. Cheap auto camp housing for citrus workers. I think this picture does a good job of showing the squalor that people were forced to live in when they were forced from their homes during the Dust Bowl, and were trying to find anything they could in order to take care of their families, or put a roof over their heads. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that there were probably multiple families live in each one of those “houses”. The families in this picture, as well as all the other works that Lange did for the FSA were from areas like Arkansas and Oklahoma. All they wanted to do was to support their families.

 

The third picture is one that hits home for many people in any era. I have a child about the age of the one pictured here with his father. I can only imagine the thoughts running through that man’s head as he holds and comforts his little one. This picture, though attributed to Lange, I had a hard time finding any further information.

 

My Opinions: Compared to Abstract or other Early Modern Art forms, I’ll take photography any day. I have a hard time understanding the scenes in some of the works by Picasso or Dali, and though they are interesting, they aren’t my first choice for what I want to look at. For me, photography captures the ideas that some of the Impressionists were trying for, though sometimes in a much darker form. Impressionists were going for an impression of a moment or the emotion behind the scene. This, for me, is instantly captured in photography. I look at the pictures by Lange and I can feel the heart ache that those parents were going through. I can easily imagine myself in the position of those parents and the idea of trying, but not being able to provide for my children makes me weep. I can only thank the powers that be that I was born after that time period, but I have heard the stories from my grandparents and great grandparents.

 Lange…and Einstein, had a sense of humor sometimes also.

 

 

 

References:

“The History Place: Dorothea Lange” 2000, retrieved on 10/29/11 from http://www.historyplace.com/unitedstates/lange/index.html

 

Various Authors, “Dorothea Lange” Last updated 10/15/11. Retrieved on 10/29/11 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothea_Lange

Still Life, old and new

Monet and the Pheasant: Oscar Claude Monet was born on November 14, 1826 and lived till December 5, 1926. He is known as the father of Impressionism. The art form called “Impressionism” came from one of Monet’s own paintings Impression: Sunrise. His father wanted him to go into the family grocery business, but he had other aspirations. Around 1856/1857 he met and started mentoring under Eugene Boudin who taught him about oil painting and outdoor techniques. Monet did join the Army for a seven year tour in Africa, but caught typhoid and, with the help of his aunt, got out of the Army after two years.  After getting out he got to know Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Alfred Sisley, and Frederic Bazille. They were unhappy with traditional forms of painting and started experimenting with new techniques and styles that would become known as Impressionism.

Pheasant was painted in 1869, probably painted in Paris before he went to England. It is considered part of Monet’s early works. His works were mostly sold to the middle classes, but because Impressionism was new, he did remain on the poverty level till the 1880’s.

My opinions: I enjoy Impressionism. To me, many of the paintings give off the idea of a simpler time and happy moments, for the most part. I like that the artists were starting to try out new techniques and didn’t seem overly occupied with the traditional ways of painting. It takes a lot of guts to step away from the norm.

Comparisons: I chose Pheasant because of its resemblance to much earlier still lifes. I chose Willem van Aelst’s Still Life of Hunting Equipment and a Dead Bird to compare Monet’s work to. They both have a common theme, hunting and the catch. Each one has that death aspect that was common with still life pieces, as well as the triangular shaping to the items in the picture. One difference is that there is only one bird on a table in Monet’s work, and there is a bunch of other items in Aelst’s. Of course, the different painting styles is also a huge different. Aelst probably spent days  trying to get every little detail, every little hair or feather just right for his painting, where Monet was experimenting with new techniques. Its not to say that Monet didn’t take as long, but his style is vastly different. Had Aelst done the same painting as Monet, then the lines in the table cloth would have been very crisp, the individual feathers would have been done separately, where Monet was going for the “impression” of a pheasant on a table, all the fine details weren’t exactly necessary for the new style of painting.

 

 

 

References:

Unknown Author “Claude Monet—Pheasant” Retrieved on 10/26/11 from  http://en.wahooart.com/A55A04/w.nsf/Opra/BRUE-8EWE8Z

 

Various Authors, “Willem van Aelst” retrieved on 10/26/11 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willem_van_Aelst

Requiem

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart composed most of Requiem Mass in D Minor in Vienna in 1791. Due to his death in December of that year, it was never completed. It was rumored (and a movie was made) about the end of his life, his preoccupation with finishing the work, and about him possibly having dictated the rest of the piece to a student of his, Franz Xaver Süssmayr on his death bed. Sussmayer did deliver a “finished” version Requiem to the Count Franz von Walsegg. The Count used it to commemorate his own wife’s death later. Sussmayer was probably commissioned to finish the work so that Mozart’s widow could collect the rest of the money the Count owed for the piece.

When Mozart died at the young age of 35, only the opening part was completely finished, vocals, orchestra, and all. The rest had bits and pieces of the work completed; vocals through most, some of the major orchestral parts, and other notations. The Lacrimosa section broke off completely after 8 bars. It was quite the task that Mozart’s widow left to his student.

Mozart, himself, had been a child prodigy. He started composing at the age of five. He was one of two children to survive infancy. He and his sister were extraordinarily talented and toured a bit, which eventually earned Mozart a court appointment. He had a hard time keeping such appointments, though, and during one of his travels he ended up in Vienna when he lost an appointment. He did fall on hard times when Austria went to war, but that was standard of everyone at the time. He suffered from depression, but seemed to be coming out of it when he died at 35. The reasons for his death are many. He was buried in a pauper’s grave, but not because that was his status so much as that was the customs of the time in Austria.

What appealed to me about the piece was the fact that Mozart was working on it when he died. I was initially introduced to it through the movie about Mozart, Amadeus. The movie, to me, seemed to portray that someone was out to get Mozart and gave him such emotional fits that it drove him to his grave. Writing Requiem was almost like he was preparing for his death, like a person might take the time to put their affairs in order if they find out they have something terminal. For me, when I think of Mozart, I know he has many, many beautiful works, but Requiem stand out not only because of its timing, but because of the mystery that seems to be attached to it.

The attached video contains the completed introduction which was done when Mozart died. It also contains the Kyrie sequence that had only been completed with the vocals and some orchestral parts. It is not the whole piece.

 

References:

Unknown Authors, “Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart” wikipedia.com/wolfgang_amadeus>mozart, retrieved on 10/8/11

Unknown Authors, “Requiem (Mozart)”. wikipedia.com/requiem_(Mozart). retrieved on 10/8/11

Primavera and the Medici

Primavera

Alessandro di Mariano di Vanni Filipepi, better known as Sandro Botticelli painted Primavera as a partner painting to The Birth of Venus in 1478 in Florence Italy.

 

Themes:

The main theme of the painting, Primavera, was of marriage. There are nine characters within the painting. The center figure is Venus herself. Not only was she the goddess of fertility and love, but the guardian of marriage as well. Venus has Cupid above her head, the three graces dancing to her right (left side of the painting), and Mercury just next to them. On the right side of the painting is the transformation of Chloris to Flora as she went from the rape victim of Zypher (The dark winged figure in the upper left of the painting), to his wife and took a new name. The right side of the painting also has no fruit on the tree, but as marriage (through Venus) happens, than the fruitful trees can produce, another theme of fertility that should come through marriage.  (Rymer)

 

Link to the Medici:

The painting Primavera was painted on commission of the Medici family.(www.sandrobotticelli.net)  The Medici Family was one of the most influential and wealthy families in Italy during the Renaissance, to the point that they ruled the city of Florence and were one of the most influential families when it came to beautifying the city. The painting was commissioned by the Medici and was originally supposed to hang in the bedroom of one of the Medici brides. (Rymer)

 

My Interpretation:

The first impression, before I even started reading more about Primavera was that it was an image of spring. Initially I thought the black figure, now identified as Zypher, was a Winter spirit that was trying desperately to hold onto the world, even to the point of clinging to one of the spring partiers. With Cupid in the air and all the others dancing and enjoying the new season, I took this to be a picture that celebrates the coming of the new season.

 

References:

“Sandro Botticelli: The Complete Works” Copyright © 2002-2011. Retrieved on 9/18/11 from http://www.sandrobotticelli.net/

 

Rymer, Eric. “Sandro Botticelli: Primavera (Allegory of Spring)  Copyright © 2000-      2011. Retrieved on 9/18/11 from             http://www.historylink101.com/art/Sandro_Botticelli/pages/09_Primavera_jpg.ht

About Jordan

   Hello Everyone!!!

My name is Heather Jordan, though I’ve gone by Fonzie for a long time as well. I’m a mother of 5 from 13 to 1. I’ve done a variety of things in my life, single mom, military wife, data coordinator for a substance abuse treatment facility and bartender. I currently work for the Boys and Girls Town of Missouri, part of Great Circle. The kids I work with have had some sort of abuse in their life, been taken out of their natural parents home, and are receiving treatment to get them in a place to either move out on their own (for the older kids), or get to a place where they are ready to go into a good foster home or adoption. In some cases, if things have gotten better and the state says OK, they do go back to their parents. I wish the best for all the kids and hope that someone is watching over them. I love my work, though I can tell you I’m tired when I get home.

For me, one of the reasons that I’m taking the ART 200 class is because there is healing through art, all of its forms. One thing the kids I work with need is healing. In addition, it is one of my requirements too, but I think it’s best to get something personal out of every class. You learn better that way.