Detroit Industry Murals, Diego Rivera,1932, Detroit Institute of Arts
The Mitchnick “Gang of 4” continued onward to the Detroit Institute of Arts; one of my favorite places in the city. Nancy had set up a private presentation of the Diego Rivera murals. If you’ve never been to the DIA or seen these incredible murals in person – you really must! I wish I could remember the name of the docent — he’s a lawyer by day and volunteers at the DIA part-time. What a crazy dichotomy! He was so knowledgeable about the Murals — Not only did we learn about the rich history, he also showed us the hidden symbolism Diego had painted into his work and told us a few stories to boot. I wish I had recorded it!
Four walls. Twenty-seven paintings. Nine months of labor-intensive work.
In 1932, Diego was commissioned by the DIA and Edsel Ford to paint two large murals for the Garden Court with the understanding that the work must relate to the history of Detroit and the development of industry. The investors knew hiring a Mexican artist during the Depression would be controversial, but the men were very impressed with his work and went forward. Frida and Diego packed up and headed East in the summer of 1932 and were in Detroit for almost a year.
Using the ancient fresco technique, Rivera and his workers created the complex murals spanning the four enormous walls. Diego depicted multiple modern industries and technologies historically rooted in the ancient Mexican Aztec people. All while weaving in controversial scenes that questioned technology’s place in the world — both socially and politically.
When the murals were finally unveiled in 1933, many people objected and said they were crude, vulgar, and blasphemous. Apparently, Edsel Ford never publicly commented on the matter, but he did issue a statement saying “I admire Rivera’s spirit. I really believe he was trying to express his idea of the spirit of Detroit.”
When Frida and Diego arrived in Detroit, she was pregnant with their child and she hated the city! It was hot and stinky near the Rouge Factory where they stayed, and she was bored! Who could blame her? Sadly, Frida lost the baby shortly after they arrived. This proved to be a turning point in her art — after the miscarriage Frida began to paint about her personal life and all its pain — surviving polio as a child and suffering in a horrific bus accident — had left her body a painful mess. This is the Frida that we’ve come to know and love – sometimes I feel that we are soulmates – or the same soul…
Last month my mom and I saw the movie Loving Vincent at the Detroit Institute of Arts. The four-year project, directed by a Polish husband and wife team was brought to life by 120 artists from around the world. Together, they created the first ever hand-painted movie.
Some of the Paintings Used In the Movie
Told through the eyes of the Postman’s son, the directors used Vincent’s letters and his incredible works of art to explore the mystery of why or even if Vincent took his own life at only 37 years old.
One-hundred-fifty oil paintings were painstakingly reproduced in Vincent’s style by the artists. Real-life actors, shot in front of a green screen, portrayed the characters in his paintings. In the end, the 90 minute movie used a total of 64,000 frames, each one hand-painted, to tell Vincent’s story.
If you have the opportunity to watch this incredibly unique and beautiful film, please do so. You will not regret it!
By Sarah Gottesman May 20th, 2016 Originally found on Artsy.net
Artists invented the first pigments—a combination of soil, animal fat, burnt charcoal, and chalk—as early as 40,000 years ago, creating a basic palette of five colors: red, yellow, brown, black, and white. Since then, the history of color has been one of perpetual discovery, whether through exploration or scientific advancement. The invention of new pigments accompanied the developments of art history’s greatest movements—from the Renaissance to Impressionism—as artists experimented with colors never before seen in the history of painting.
Found in iron-rich soil and first employed as an artistic material (as far as we know) in prehistoric cave paintings, red ochre is one of the oldest pigments still in use. Centuries later, during the 16th and 17th centuries, the most popular red pigment came from a cochineal insect, a creature that could only be found on prickly-pear cacti in Mexico. These white bugs produced a potent red dye so sought-after by artists and patrons that it quickly became the third greatest import out of the “New World” (after gold and silver), as explains Victoria Finlay in A Brilliant History of Color in Art. Raphael, Rembrandt, and Rubens all used cochineal as a glaze, layering the pigment atop other reds (like red ochre) to increase their intensity. A non-toxic source for red pigment, the cochineal bug is still used to color lipsticks and blush today.
Ever since the Medieval era, painters have depicted the Virgin Mary in a bright blue robe, choosing the color not for its religious symbolism, but rather for its hefty price tag. Mary’s iconic hue—called ultramarine blue—comes from lapis lazuli, a gemstone that for centuries could only be found in a single mountain range in Afghanistan. This precious material achieved global popularity, adorning Egyptian funerary portraits, Iranian Qur’ans, and later the headdress in Vermeer’s Girl with a Pearl Earring (1665).
For hundreds of years, the cost of lapis lazuli rivaled even the price of gold. In the 1950s, Yves Klein collaborated with a Parisian paint supplier to invent a synthetic version of ultramarine blue, and this color became the French artist’s signature. Explaining the appeal of this historic hue, Klein said, “Blue has no dimensions. It is beyond dimensions.”
Few artists in history have been known for their use of yellow, though Joseph Mallord William Turner and Vincent van Gogh are the most notable exceptions. Turner so loved the color that contemporary critics mocked the British painter, writing that his images were “afflicted with jaundice,” and that the artist may have a vision disorder. For his sublime and sun-lit seascapes, Turner used the experimental watercolor Indian Yellow—a fluorescent paint derived from the urine of mango-fed cows (a practice banned less than a century later for its cruelty to animals).
For brighter touches, Turner employed the synthetic Chrome Yellow, a lead-based pigment known to cause delirium. Vincent van Gogh also painted his starry nights and sunflowers with this vivid and joyful hue. “Oh yes! He loved yellow, did good Vincent, the painter from Holland, gleams of sunlight warming his soul, which detested fog,” wrote the painter Paul Gauguin of his friend and artistic companion.
While the color green evokes nature and renewal, its pigments have been some of the most poisonous in history. In 1775, the Swedish chemist Carl Wilhelm Scheele invented a deadly hue, Scheele’s Green, a bright green pigment laced with the toxic chemical arsenic. Cheap to produce, Scheele’s Green became a sensation in the Victorian era, even though many suspected the color to be dangerous for artists and patrons alike. The French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte’s bedroom wallpaper even featured Scheele’s Green, and historians believe the pigment caused the revolutionary’s death in 1821.
By the end of the 19th century, Paris Green—a similar mixture of copper and arsenic—replaced Scheele’s Green as a more durable alternative, enabling Claude Monet, Paul Cézanne, and Pierre-Auguste Renoir to create vivid, emerald landscapes. Used as a rodenticide and an insecticide, Paris Green was still highly toxic, and may have been responsible for Cézanne’s diabetes and Monet’s blindness. Not surprisingly, it was eventually banned in the 1960s.
“I have finally discovered the true color of the atmosphere,” Claude Monet once declared. “It’s violet. Fresh air is violet.” The purple shadows and lavender specks of light that enliven Monet’s haystacks and waterlilies owe much to a little-known American portrait painter named John Goffe Rand. In 1841, Rand grew frustrated with the messy practice of storing paint in a pig’s bladder, which was the prevailing method for preserving pigments at the time, and invented a more practical and portable option: a collapsible paint tube made of tin. This enabled artists like Monet to paint plein air, easily transporting their color to outdoor locations to capture impressions of the environment, and in turn led to the production of nuanced, pre-mixed paint shades in tin tubes, such as Manganese Violet, the first affordable mauve-colored paint that meant artists no longer had to mix red and blue to make purple. The Impressionists—especially Monet—so adored the new hue that critics accused the painters of having “violettomania.”
Frank Stella, Zambezi, 1959
The darkest pigment found in Old Masters paintings is aptly named “bone black,” and is produced by burning animal bones in an air-free chamber. While the Impressionists avoided black paint—finding areas of darkness to be filled with color—American artists in the ’50s and ’60s returned to black with a vengeance.
Frank Stella, Richard Serra, and Ad Reinhardt all created monochromatic black paintings, stripping the canvas of any subject matter other than the paint itself. Taken together, these painters prove that black is as nuanced a color as any other, capable of many permutations, tones, and textures. Speaking about his practice in 1967, Reinhardt quoted the Japanese painter and printmaker Katsushika Hokusai, saying, “There is a black which is old and a black which is fresh. Lustrous black and dull black, black in sunlight and black in shadow.”
Robert Ryman, Series # 32, 2005
Of all the pigments—Chrome Yellow, Scheele’s Green, Paris Green—that have been banned over the centuries, the color most missed by painters is likely Lead White. This hue could capture and reflect a gleam of light like no other, though its production was anything but glamorous. The 17th-century Dutch method for manufacturing the pigment involved layering cow and horse manure over lead and vinegar. After three months in a sealed room, these materials would combine to create flakes of pure white.
While scientists in the late 19th century identified lead as poisonous, it wasn’t until 1978 that the United States banned the production of lead white paint. In this era, Robert Rauschenberg, Robert Ryman, and Agnes Martin turned to titanium and zinc whites to create monochromatic white paintings, while artists like Dan Flavin bypassed pigments altogether in sculptures that emitted white light directly.
The following is a funny guide that’ll help you link famous painters and their style and paintings together in the future. Even though it was conceived as a joke you will realize how this list captures the essence of each artist, resulting in the end actually useful.
If the men look like doey-eyed girls, then it’s Caravaggio.If everyone has giant asses, then it’s Reubens.If everybody has some sort of body malfunction, then it’s Picasso.If the paintings have tons of little people in them but otherwise seem normal, it’s Bruegel.If the paintings have lots of little people in them but also have a ton of crazy bullshit, it’s Bosch.If it’s something you saw on your acid trip last night, it’s Dali.If the images have a dark background and everyone has tortured expressions on their faces, it’s Titian.If everyone – including the women – looks like Putin, then it’s van Eyck.If everyone looks like hobos illuminated only by a dim streetlamp, it’s Rembrandt.If everyone is beautiful, naked, and stacked, it’s Michelangelo.If the painting could easily have a few chubby Cupids or sheep added (or already has them), it’s Boucher.If you see a ballerina, it’s Degas.If everything is highly contrasted and sharp, sort of bluish, and everyone has gaunt bearded faces, it’s El Greco.Dappled light but no figures, it’s Monet.If every painting is the face of a uni-browed woman, it’s Frida.Dappled light and happy party-time people, it’s Renoir.Dappled light and unhappy party-time people, then it’s Manet.It it looks like an Excel sheet with colored squares, it’s Mondrian.
The exclusive exhibit of Diego and Frida was at the Detroit Institute of Arts from March 15 to July 12. I had seen the advertising for the event in the winter months and it was definitely a To Do art event.
My mom is a huge Frida fan and introduced me to her long ago. I had watched the movie, “Frida” with Salma Hayek in 2002 and loved it. Strange enough, as I was channel surfing a few weeks ago I caught the beginning of the movie and proceeded to watch it again in its entirety. Being back into the art world again, I had a new found appreciation for her unique style and subject matter. If you have not seen the movie, I highly recommend it! You can not truly appreciate her work, unless you know her life story.
Mom and I were determined to see the exhibit, but between busy schedules we had a difficult time putting it on the books. Now that the event was ending, we had no choice but to go on the last day. Note to self: never see an exclusive exhibit on the last day! When we arrived at the DIA, the next available time was 6:30. We walked around the Institute, grabbed a bite to eat and waited for our turn to get in line.
Breadline (Courtesy of Internet)
The line twisted and turned throughout the museum like a snake. For some reason, standing in long lines feels worse for my body than
walking a mile and I was hurting! Thankfully at some points I found a chair while my mom stayed in the line to keep our place. (Thanks Mommy!) We must have waited for 1 1/2 hours but it seemed more like three and felt more like a 1930’s bread line.
Once we were finally inside we were treated to nearly 70 works of art by both Frida and Diego, including massive drawings from Diego’s plans for the DIA murals, paintings from both artists, and a short movie highlighting their story. According to the website there were 23 paintings from Frida, none of which had been exhibited at the DIA before. Since we were not allowed to take photographs inside the exhibit, I’ve included some of the paintings that we saw.
Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo were an explosive couple. He carried a pistol. She carried a flask. He romanticized Detroit. She rejected it. But what they shared was a belief in communism, a thirst for tequila and a passion for each other. (DIA Website)
What a couple. What a story. What an exhibit. Thank you Frida and Diego for sharing yourselves and your art with the world!
Upon returning from Paris, I decided my first painting from the trip would be the quaint pink house turned bistro at 2 Rue de l’Abreuvoir, Montmartre. I began the painting process in Mid-April and just finished up a couple of weeks ago, taking a hiatus to create the 5th grade promotion video for my sons’ class.
Because of the hilly nature of the Montmartre landscape, the perspective on this one was extremely difficult. From where I took the photograph, the bistro and street corner were slightly below me receding into the distance at a slight angle. Not one single point was straight!
While researching La Maison Rose, I learned that Picasso himself had frequented the place and that it was home of Germaine Pichot, a well known painting model and notorious femme fatale. Picasso and Carlos Casagemas, Picasso’s best friend, met Germaine when they first came to Paris in 1900. Carlos fell madly in love with Germaine, but the feelings were not mutual.
In 1901, in his grief and drunkenness, Carlos attempted to shoot Germaine. He missed his target and instead turned the gun on himself. Shocked and saddened by his friend’s death, Picasso fell into a depression. It was this tragic incident that provoked his Blue Period. Germaine was depicted in Picasso’s 1905 painting At the Lapin Agile shown below.
La Maison Rose, Montmartre, Parris, France.
The Blind Man’s Meal] is one of Picasso’s most moving pictures from his Blue Period (autumn1901–mid-1904). Most prevalent among his subjects were the old, the destitute, the blind, the homeless, and the otherwise underprivileged outcasts of society. The painting is not merely a portrait of a blind man; it is also Picasso’s commentary on human suffering in general. Additionally, the work elicits affinities to Picasso’s own situation at the time, when, impoverished and depressed, he closely identified with the unfortunates of society. (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
The destitute outcasts featured in Picasso’s Blue Period gave way, in 1905, to circus performers and harlequins in more colorful settings. The Lapin Agile was originally conceived to decorate a bar in Montmartre, the interior of which is depicted here. Standing at the counter is Picasso himself, dressed as the melancholy and gaunt Harlequin in a vivid diamond-patterned shirt and three-cornered hat. Behind him, in profile with heavy makeup and pouty lips, leans Germaine Pichot, wearing a gaudy orange dress, bead choker, boa, and feathered hat. (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Since 2007 photographer Matthias Schaller has photographed raw, abstract paintings. The paintings however are not found on canvas, but rather smeared onto the tools used to craft each work of art—the palettes. His series, Das Meisterstück (The Masterpiece), claims these behind-the-scene objects as portraits of the artist, while also giving a direct insight into the detailed techniques performed by each painter.
Schaller was first inspired to begin his photographic collection during a visit to Cy Twombly’s late studio. During the visit he stumbled upon the artist’s palette, which he discovered to be an accurate reflection of the artist’s paintings. Encouraged to further discover the similarities between palette and painting, Schaller has gone on to photograph over two hundred of these historic portraits. His search has led him to collect palettes from all across Europe and the United States, finding the objects in major museums and private foundations and in the custody of artists’ relatives and collectors. The palettes he’s photographed so far in the series belong to seventy painters from both the 19th and 20th century, and include such artists as Monet, van Gogh, Matisse, and Picasso. To accurately analyze the details from paint hue to brushstroke, Schaller presents the images in large format, each work existing at approximately 190 x 150 cm.
Through June 8, the Giorgio Cini Foundation will present Schaller’s Das Meisterstück alongside the Venice Biennale, an exhibition that will focus on 20 of Schaller’s palette photographs. (via Hyperallergic)
Last month as I was preparing to head off to art class I received a call from my husband who was at work. His company, TWI, does non-destructive thermal imaging for a myriad of clients, mostly aerospace related. However, on this day, they were inspecting a very different kind of material; an original Parisian work of Art from 1916. He invited me to come down and see it up close in person.
TWI had previously done inspection work for MoMa. They put TWI in touch with a Florida lawyer who was assisting his friends in researching an original work of art from the Spanish Cubist Juan Gris. They had acquired the two-panel Papier Colle’ while vacationing in Argentina.
Once at TWI, I met the couple and their lawyer. A professor at the Rochester Institute of Technology and a second academic gentleman proficient in manuscript analysis were also present and had already conducted their analysis of the piece.
The couple’s journey began about two years ago when upon returning home from vacation, the husband placed the two panels in his home office and just stared at it for about 6 months, trying to make sense of the Cubist collage.
Juan Gris_Papier Colle’_1916
After some time, he began to notice that among the drawings of the clouds, bottles, fruit, revolver, bullet holes, military figure, French newspaper clippings and note cards, were various books drawn within books. On the right-hand side of the left panel, the artist drew in a book binding with “Juan Gris Paris 1916” printed at the top.
Trying to make meaning of the collage, the owners showed the piece to an art curator. She noted the round bottle and flat-bottomed clouds of the left-hand panel were characteristic of Pablo Picasso. While Gris’ collage work was usually very colorful, Picasso’s were more neutral. Some of the hand writing also looked like Picasso’s.
By 1916, WWI had taken a major toll on France. Gris, a pacifist, did not fight. We also know that Picasso did not enter the war. Actually he and Gris’ were nearly the only two in their circle that did not go to war. As such, both men were in Paris in 1916.
While each panel has Juan Gris’ name on it, the real mystery, and million dollar (literally) question is whether Pablo Picasso collaborated on the papier colle’. If so, it would be the only documented collaboration (that we know of) between the two artists and worth millions of dollars!
We did not solve the mystery on this day, but their journey will continue. Eventually the piece will be auctioned off at Sotheby’s and either way, the couple will be all set. I wish them the best!
As for me, it truly was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity 🙂