I say yes, you say no, OR People are Strange

I really don't like the temperature, not only because it's not Christmas time without cold, but it worries me for my children and grandchildren, for the earth and everyone who lives on it. 

Notself, I just hope you manage to get the colonoscopy done before they realize their mistake.

Chickadee - yeah for another cruise!

Here's to boring!

Linda

Those bucolic bits of paradise are not accidental. Romantics yearned for an idealized past when industry and civilization had not corrupted man - that is how they saw it. It is Rousseau, at this time, who posits that man is born good but society corrupts him.

Here is Gainsborough's compatriot, the great John Constable:

Here is Turner again - one of my very favorites. He is a few decades after the Romantic period. This is Rain, Steam and Speed (I think)

Also from Turner,

An earlier work of Turner's, Ivy Bridge, does follow the Romantic bucolic style described above:

But Sunny had me thinking of fog, so I here digress to show y'all some, IMHO, memorable and moving depictions of fog. Interestingly, Monet has some of the best depictions of London fog:

Here is his Waterloo Bridge:

Here is the superb American Thomas Eakins:

I can never look at that painting by Toulouse Lautrec without thinking of this one by the very different but equally troubled Van Gogh. This is his atelier:

Probably my favorite Van Gogh there. If I see more of his sunflowers I shall scream. They have been so over-promoted.

Man, every time one thinks of art one leaves so much out....and what about architecture. That is another fascinating subject....

A final note. Notice how off the proportions are in Van Gogh and Toulouse Lautrec. It is their unique brand of impressionism and expressionism. Their view of this topsy turvy but highly energized world. In Van Gogh's case, no doubt fueled by his mental illness and in Toulouse Lautrec's, by his life. Notice, too, the richness of the color. There is not that intent to so faithfully reproduce forms as you see in the landscapes. Nor is Leonardo da Vinci's perspective even paid lip service to. The emotion with these two artists is very individual. In the past, painters expressed a school or a way of thought, often, in France, regulated by the Academie. But those ideas had gone as out of favor as petticoats and ths was a new reality.

Speaking of casting off convention, final one.....a Dadaist work - Dadaism, a movement roughly coinciding with WWI --and not a well known one-- fairly posits that capitalism and bourgeois values led to war. It is an anti-war movement:

Max Ernst:

Marcel Duchamp:

Below, German Expressionism (roughly contemporary to Dadaism). One of my favorite movements in both painting and literature.This is by Ludwig Meiner, also post WWI, also a reaction to the horrors of that war (and the chaos whiich followed in Germany):

Chickadee, congrats on the boring bloodwork!

I know we're not supposed to talk about politics (hope this doesn't get deleted), but just google Bob Dole.  Saw the news a bit ago and felt so bad for him today.  Disgraceful what happened on the senate floor.  And that's all I'll say about that!

I agree Belinda. It was disgraceful. 

Edited to add-isn't it nice, though, that we still have lots to talk about, even without politics? 

Mary

Gaudi on the inside:

Art 101?  This is more like Art 442.  My appreciation for your art appreciation skills are off the chart.  I would like to learn more about the appreciation part...what are you seeing that I'm not - I assume that is what you learn in those sorts of classes.

Gaudi on the inside? That's what is going on inside of this church?  I was in Barcelona and probably saw this place, but the only memory I have of that day was bumping into someone (from the other side of the globe) on a lonely side street that I had just mentioned to my partner, hours earlier.  My appreciation for the mathmatics of coincidences is higher than art and architecture, it seems.

Kam -lol! I am an egghead in general, but love of art was something that was bred into me growing up. I was dragged around the museums of Europe from a young age. It is also a love of mine and I never forget what I hear, see or read about it. Same with architecture - and history. I did not major in either. I majored in English and Political Science. Funnily enough, I have this annoying habit of forgetting the plot of books I read. Head in the clouds. I will remember, say, a metaphor on page XVIII (prologue!) but not the bloody ending. You do NOT want to be me - you want to stay NORMAL! I have this annoying habit of thinking differently from others on really crucial things.

Re: other areas, I appreciate physics and maths now more than I used to as a child. Recently finished a book on the history of zero, and have read lots of Stephen Hawking.

Gaudi - we need a primer on architecture. There is so much I want to see in that regard.