I noticed, first as a godmother then a mother, that good children’s books about Christmas and Easter were rather thin on the ground. I didn’t expect to find anything more esoteric than this, but I didn’t expect it would be so hard to find decent board books for such major holidays! Most were so trivial that I gave up in disgust and resolved to look in the big Catholic bookstore next time I was in the area.

After that look, I wished I could put my eyes out, because the majority of the children’s book art was unnecessarily and sometimes horrifically creepy. And to give a reference point for creepy, it wasn’t quite “teletubbies toys with eyes that glow red” creepy, but very close.

And then I found this:

I read about it on The Wine-Dark Sea several months ago, but when I was browsing the kids section of the big Catholic bookstore this week for a separate project, I stumbled across it and snatched it up.

And it’s just beautiful. It’s not like the trivial, overly sweetened, diluted content “children’s” book I’ve run across. The writing is simple, but runs deep. It will still have use long after GeekBaby has graduated to books with more words than pictures.

I just love it. It’s beautiful. It’s not cheesy. It’s got great works of art AND a list of citations in the back. How can I resist a children’s book with a bibliography?? I’m also tickled that Blessed Fra Angelico is credited with co-authorship. It has extra appeal for me, because we saw most of these paintings at the Museo di San Marco in Florence on our honeymoon.

It’s supposed to be a series of three books, one for each Person of the Trinity. I’m eagerly awaiting the rest of them.

[As stated in my About, I want to tell the world about the Orthodox faith. Up to this point, my blogs have somewhat unorganized to do that. Now God has given me a more coorinated way to do that.  I will be sharing articles from the Orthodox Faith.  

This will be a long series, but I trust it will be profitable to you in learning about the Orthodox faith. From time to time, I will also provide addition blogs of interest.  – Herman Art]

Fiftennth Century

The Papacy

The West in the fifteenth century was in turmoil over, the relationship between the papacy and church councils. Some held that the papacy was supreme. Others held that the authority of the church councils supercedes that of the pope. A council was called in Ferrara-Florence (1438-1439) to consider that question. Representatives of the Eastern Church arrived at this council once again looking for help in the struggle against the Turks. Among the Eastern Churchmen who were accepted at the council on “equal terms” with the Latins, were the emperor of Constantinople, John VIII; the patriarch of Constantinople, Joseph; and, the Metropolitan of Kiev, a Greek named Isidore.

The Council of Florence

At the council of Florence the Eastern representatives accepted a strong doctrine of papal power – although the issue was not deeply discussed – and the doctrines of filioque and purgatory. The Byzantine emperor pressed to stop theological discussions in the hopes of completing the union. All the Orthodox bishops signed the union statement except Mark Eugenikos, the bishop of Ephesus.

The union of Florence was not publicly proclaimed until 1452 in Hagia Sophia in Constantinople. On May 29, 1453, the Turks under Mohammed II took the city which was renamed Istanbul, marking the end of the Byzantine Empire. The first act of the patriarch Gennadios Scholarios after the fall of Constantinople was to repudiate the union of Florence. The patriarch was under strong pressure of St. Mark of Ephesus in this action. Saint Mark, the firm defender of Orthodoxy against what has come to be called through him the “unrighteous union,” was canonized a saint for his actions.

Russia

Just as the Byzantine empire was falling to the Moslems, the seeds of the coming Russian empire were beginning to take root in Moscow. Ivan III the Great (1462-1505), the Muscovite prince, succeeded in extending his role in the Russian north by defeating and annexing Novgorod. He married the Byzantine princess Sophia Paleologos in 1472, and accepted the title of Tsar (the Slav form of the old Russian imperial title of Caesar) and the symbol of the double-headed eagle. The ideology of Moscow as the “third Rome” after Constantinople was being born.

In fifteenth-century Russia a great controversy was waged over the role which the Church should play relative to the political and social life of the nation. The two leaders of the controversy – both of whom shared the legacy of Saint Sergius, and both of whom are canonized saints of the Church – were Nilus of the Sora (Nil Sorsky, 1433-1508) and Joseph of Volotsk (1439-1515).

Saint Nilus led the party of the “non-possessors” who lived beyond the Volga River. They are sometimes called the “transvolgans.” The “non-possessors” held that the Church, particularly the monasteries, should be free from owning and ruling over large properties. They held that the Church should be free from the direct influence and control of the state. They defended poverty as the chief virtue, with humility and spiritual freedom dominating the contemplative, silent life for monks. They were the inheritors of the mystical, hesychastic, and kenotic tradition of Saint Sergius and early Kievan spirituality.

The “possessors” were led by Saint Joseph. Hence, they are sometimes called the “Josephites.” They held that the Church and state should be in the closest possible relationship, and that the Church should serve the social and political needs of the emerging Russian nation. The ideal of the “possessors” was that the Church, particularly the monasteries, should control vast properties. The Church should foster a life of ascetic discipline and social service among the people which would be rooted in the strict observance of liturgical and cultic rituals. In this tendency the “possessors” also followed the tradition of Saint Sergius. Both Saint Sergius and Metropolitan Alexius played a very prominent role in Russian social and political life of the fourteenth century, as well as continuing the original Byzantine legacy of the Russian Church and nation which was present in the land from its earliest Kievan beginnings.

Although the spirit of the “non-possessors” always remained in Russian Orthodoxy, it was the way of the “possessors” which dominated Russian ecclesiastical and national development in subsequent centuries.

The Fall of Byzantium

Serbia fell to the Turks in 1459, Greece in 1459-60, Bosnia in 1463, and Egypt finally in 1517. For the next four hundred years the Moslem Turks held sway over the Orthodox Christians in the former Byzantine empire in the East.

The West

In the West, the fifteenth century saw the continual resistance to the power of the papacy by the conciliar movement mentioned already; by the rise of national consciousness among the various Western European peoples; by the religious movements forerunning the reformation era; and by the humanist movements of the renaissance now becoming most powerful in their stress on the natural man through the rebirth of interest in ancient Roman and Hellenistic culture. The name of Erasmus (d.1536) must be mentioned in this regard, as well as the artists and scientists such as Leonardo di Vinci (d.1519) and Raphael (d.1520).

Further mention must be made of the Czech leader Jan Hus who was condemned and burned at the stake in 1415 at the Council of Constance for his opposition to the pope and the practices of the Roman Church; of Savonarola, the fiery Dominican friar of Florence, who was burned to death by papal instigation in 1498 for his denunciation and condemnation of churchly wickedness and sin; of Fra Angelico (d.1455), the Florentine painter, many of whose masterpieces hang in Savonarola’s monastery of San Marco in Florence; and of Donatello (d.1466), Fra Filippo Lippi (d.1469), and Botticelli (d.1510).

http://www.oca.org/OCchapter.asp?SID=2&ID=148

You’ll see this divine image all over Italy: The Annunciation. The moment when Mary gets the Announcement from the Angel Gabriel: The Divine Is Within You!

Florence is full of them…The city celebrates its birthday on The Feast of The Annunciation, March 25…nine months before Christmas. Renaissaince painters wore down their paintbrushes capturing the action packed scene.  The most famous is the one above, by Fra Angelico, that you’ll see in San Marco. Here’s a favorite of mine by the Mannerist Pontormo, in Santa Felicita, where Mary looks like a runway model.

Every painter wanted to capture this wonderful idea: the divine presence in a mortal woman. The moment when she accepts her destiny.

Oh, I’ve heard the laments from girlfriends: “I saw too much of that in Catholic school–blah-blah…” And I say, “Come on, you’ve got to get Jungian about it or you’re going to miss out.” This is a rite of passage, this is the beautiful glorification of the A-HA moments in our lives when nothing that follows will ever be the same.

Can all these Annunciations be one of the many reasons why we women love Florence so much? Does this scene of a woman being called to a destiny she could never have imagined resonate somewhere within us? Does it fan the spark of the divine within?

Soft, receptive, obedient…

The Annunciation, by Fra Angelico

The year is quickly coming to a close. (Once again, the season finds me wondering HOW it is upon me so fast). And this morning as I read an excerpt from Refractions by Makoto Fujimura, I had to pause.

If life seems to speed up as we tally years, if my life is a blip on the radar of history, if I hope to be more than a “blink” of goodness in my time on earth, the greatest gift I could offer would be a means of transcending the dash of this season. As this sense of time flies at me, it seems right to ponder a gift which will make life — your’s and mine — richer, fuller, more engaging, and a bigger blessing to the “close others” in our lives. Beginning now.

It occurs to me that the best gift I could give comes in the form of a question I tripped over in what I read this morning. The question is one Makoto recalled as he stepped back, breathtaken, from the beautiful painting, Madonna and Child, at the Met’s 2005 exhibit of Fra Angelico. It  is “The 500 Year Question,” according to Fujimura.

“What is the five-hundred-year question? Well, it’s a long-term, historical look at the reality of our cultures that asks, What ideas, what art, what vision in our current culture has the capacity to affect  humanity for more than five hundred years? It’s the opposite of the Warholian ‘fifteen minutes of fame.’ It’s also a question I raise to my teenagers, whose cutlure celebrates immediate gratification, also seeking after ‘fifteen minutes of fame.’ If our decisions matter and make ripple effects in the world, then should we not weigh what we say and do in light of the five-hundred-year question?…If Fra Angelico were alive today, he would have a hard time being apprenticed or finding anyone to teach him his craft, let alone joining an order. The church is not the first place a creative genius would look to be trained in art. That statement alone reveals how much Christians have abdicated our responsibility to steward culture…In short, we are all staggering about, or should be…those who have eyes to see. That is precisely how we should react to Fra Angelico and the five-hundred-year question. We stagger because we have lost even our ability to ask that question.”

I get sucked into the drivel of our culture…heck, of my calendar. And I, too, have teenagers. The slick, fine and beautiful garner the most attention, too many days (that and the scandalous trainwrecks outlined on the nightly news, in tabloids and entertainment “journalism”). But what can I say and do — TODAY — that has the capacity to affect humanity in 2509? Afterall, Ecclesiastes 3:11 says, ”He has planted eternity in our hearts.” When we live for less, we undoubtedly find ourselves yearning for more. Purpose. We change history by how we live now. 

Though this may sound like more of a new year’s wish than a Christmas gift, I place it directly beneath the branches of your glorious tannenbaum. For I find no greater occasion to consider what has been given to us than what will truly last well-beyond when our overstuffed trashbags and overfilled stomaches are again empty. This Christmas, I humbly invite you to a Renaissance of spirit. To a creche turned Kingdom. To a silent, peaceful, revolution of heart. May it carry us both world-changingly forward — ever toward God’s creative heart.

Merry Christmas all year through…

Want an adventure? The question is it. Spend the last week of this year considering how to spend each day in the its shadow…

I’m headed 50 miles south today from Houston to Galveston to have lunch, take a walk and look around.

Hopefully you will be able to take a nice day trip at some point soon. Odds are that you’ve earned some peace.

I’m going by myself. I enjoy time with my wife and with friends.  I also enjoy time by myself. You need time by yourself to keep yourself together and to be able to remain useful to others.  

Driving to Galveston on I-45, the Gulf Freeway, I will resume an internal debate that I think would make the man I get my last name from, St. Thomas Aquinas, proud. My last name is Aquino.

I’m not any expert on St. Thomas, but I know he did a lot of thinking. Here is information on St. Thomas from the Stanford Dictionary of Philosophy. He lived 1225-1274.

( The painting of St. Thomas you see above was completed in the 15th century by Fra Angelico.)

Are Houston’s highways a literal Hell on Earth, or are they more correctly seen as representations of Hell?

Is Hell all around us? Do we make our own Hell by the failure of mental discipline involved in not managing our reaction to things that are lousy? Is the idea that I-45 is a kind of Hell a manifestation of some type of anxiety about where life’s travels are taking us? Am I afraid of just my own course in life? Or, given how many people ride on I-45, do I see all of us on a Highway to Hell?  

Or maybe I-45 is simply a real living Hell on Earth. You can’t rule that out.

At least once a day I wonder how many people contemplate their death. If people realize that one tiny twist of fate, one wrong step could be their last. This isn’t something that I became fascinated with after my arm surgery either – this is something I’ve thought about since I was little.

Fra Angelico -- The Mocking of Christ

This subjects just made me think of this piece  of work and it has to be one of my [true] favorites.

The concepts of heaven and hell don’t really make sense to me. I prefer to think that when you die, there is nothing. It’s something that I cannot fathom … nor do I believe many (if any) others can either. I think is why mankind had to create something bigger than himself in order to not fear such unknowns. Then again, I suppose I don’t fear the unknown? I fear small cramped spaces that I can’t move in or being tucked in … but if one day there was nothing – I wouldn’t even know. Of course the idea of having something out can be comforting … but why limit yourself to such extents? Ideally, I like the concept brought to light by such movies like Titanic – you get to go back and re-live the best times of your life. Sort of like … a parallel universe. You’ll never actually come into contact with anyone else – you are alone … but you have your memories and dreams and illusions that you have created with your mind. Yet how can that … be valid when in death … you leave your earthly body. So really, if I die – can I be 5′9 in my dreams? My dead dreams that is?

Side Note: I consider the Egyptians some of the most educated and intelligent people to have ever existed and they considered the brain useless…

If God creates us all, and especially if we already have a set fate – how can he punish us for that which he ordained us to do? Free will? That cannot exist if there is destiny.

That’s why I don’t understand why suicide is a sin… God would rather you suffer, as his son suffered for you, then accept mercy and die. How is that not a vengeful God? Suffer for me as my son suffered for you? Merciful? Ha.

Prayer is something that I will admit I have gone too when things seem hopeless. I don’t really think anyone hears me … then again, it’s sort of like posting something on the internet. Maybe someone will read it – maybe they won’t. Hit or miss. Sometimes just saying something into the unknown helps. It’s sort of like yelling into a canyon, or from a mountain top … the release from saying something aloud or on paper – it is freedom. If I were to imagine all the secrets I keep for myself, for others, my thoughts and the ideas of others that I keep inside … I feel my body isn’t big enough. I suppose that’s why I feel the need to write … otherwise I might just implode into a million pieces of paper and crumpled thoughts.

Vers 1450,Florence,couvent saint Marc.Fresque,166×125 cm.

A sketch I did of part of a Fra Angelico and Chardin drawn at the Louvre

I’ll admit it.  I draw in public places.  The drawing you see here I did in the Louvre last May while traveling with a group of students from George Fox Univeristy.  I find myself often “combining” things in my sketch book, as it is a place to put ideas down; and often they just are drawn in, in the the order I saw or thought of them. The objective is not to get a finished product per-say as it is to render form or an idea.

In the sketch you see I drew the dog from a Chardin painting first, then, while waiting for my colleague Steve, I sat in front of a Fra Angelico crucifixion and integrated the dog into his composition.  Additionally I included myself, or at least a figure that represented us in our time at the foot of the cross.  On the upper left of the sketch is a rendering of the over all Fra Angelico image.

Sad to say I’m not much for being “watched” while I sketch.  In fact I dislike it very much.  So much so I have stopped and moved when I have found someone wathcing me.  To me the creation process is very personal and vulnerable.  I’m happy to show someone the art or even the sketch when I am done, but the creation process to me is risky.

This May while in the Mauritshis Museum at the Huage in Amsterdam I was sketching a Rembrandt only to have a kind women gaze over at my work and tell me that my drawing looked wonderful. The drawing had just begun and was a patch of scribbles; perhpas she thought I was rendering a Pollock.

I don’t ask to read what others are journaling in public.   I guess art being a “visual” meida – folks think if you are in public doing it, it’s an open game.

If you run onto me in a museum drawing, all I ask is that you ask first before craning your neck around my shoulder.  I’d apprecriate it.  Perhaps I’ll have more than a mess of scribbles.

San Brizio Chapel, Orvieto Cathedral – Luca Signorelli’s Day of Judgement Frescoes.

In 1447 Fra’ Angelico and his assistant, Benozzo Gozzoli came to Orvieto and painted two of the triangular sections of the vaulted ceiling in the San Brizio chapel in the Cathedral (Duomo). they painted scenes showing the Prophets and Christ the Judge. Just over 50 years later, in 1499, Luca Signorelli painted the remaining two sections, completing Fra Angelico’s original scheme. In 1500, he started on the chapel walls, using the Day of Judgement as his subject matter.

Detail of The Damned. Luca Signorelli, San Brizio, Orvieto, Umbria

The frescoes depicting scenes from the Book of Revelations in Orvieto Cathedral are Luca Signorelli’s finest work. I remember going to see these frescoes in 1996 and for the first time, becoming really interested in Italian Renaissance art. Instead of the endlessly repeated depictions of the Madonna con Bambino I had become accustomed to, here was some genuinely exciting subject matter: grotesque winged devils carrying off their victims, the Antichrist preaching whilst people are murdered around him and skeletons climbing out of the ground ready to be resurrected. It was like a Renaissance superhero comic, or more accurately, an anti-superhero comic.

The Damned Crossing Into Hell. Luca Signorelli, San Brizio, Orvieto, Umbria

Luca Signorelli was painting these frescoes at the same time that Pinturicchio was working in Spello and Perugino was frescoing the Collegio del Cambio in Perugia. Whilst Perugino and Pinturicchio’s paintings went out of fashion soon afterwards, Luca Signorelli’s frescoes had a profound influence on the art of the High Renaissance. It is well known that Michelangelo stopped to study the frescoes in Orvieto before making his way to Rome to paint the Sistine Chapel. It’s therefore slightly disappointing to learn that Luca Signorelli became a more conservative painter in his later years, producing accomplished but fairly unexciting altarpieces in his hometown of Cortona and the towns of the Upper Tiber Valley.

The Elect. Luca Signorelli, San Brizio, Orvieto, Umbria

As I have mentioned in other posts, Luca Signorelli was a student of one of the greatest Renaissance painters, Piero della Francesca, and also the Florentine Antonio Pollaiolo. He combined the spatial awareness of  the former with the latter’s interest in figure painting, just look at the contorted bodies of the damned as they are carried away.

The Preaching of the Antichrist. Luca Signorelli, San Brizio, Orvieto, Umbria.

Detail from the preaching of the Antichrist. Luca Signorelli, San Brizio, Orvieto, Umbria

The six scenes show The Preaching of the Antichrist, The End of the World, The Resurrection of the Dead, The Last Judgement, The Elect and The Damned.

Resurrection. Luca Signorelli, San Brizio, Orvieto, Umbria.

Detail From The Resurrection. Luca Signorelli, San Brizio, Orvieto, Umbria.

Detail From The Apocalypse. Luca Signorelli, San Brizio, Orvieto, Umbria

Read about Luca Signorelli’s frescoes in San Crescentino church, Morra, Umbria

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Annunciation. 1438-1445. San Marco, Florence, Italy.

“The large Fra Angelico in the Academy is as clear and keen as if the good old monk stood there wiping his brushes; the colours seem to sing, as it were, like new-fledged birds in June.” – Henry James, Italian Hours

“Newland Archer prided himself on his knowledge of Italian art. […] He talked easily of Botticelli, and spoke of Fra Angelico with a faint condescension.” – Edith Wharton, The Age of Innocence

The San Marco monastery in Florence is one of my favorite places in the world. Despite being located in the city center the museum is calm, a respite from the sweaty, tourist-crowded streets of a Florentine summer.I have a soft spot for museums that are dedicated to a single artist (the Rodin museum in Paris is another favorite and I can’t wait for Herzog and De Meuron’s new Goya museum to be finished). For anyone with my attention span, over-saturation is inevitable in any museum. But those with a more intimate scope at least allow me to leave feeling as if I’ve made some new and lovely acquaintance. I’ve managed to visit San Marco during almost every trip to Florence and over the years Angelico has shifted from acquaintance to old friend.

Each room of the cloisters is adorned with a fresco depicting a scene from the life of Christ. Italy does not lack for talented painters of religious subjects but there’s a simple grace unique to Angelico. I’ve been to Padua and I’ve been blown away by the force of Giotto’s chapel. That is not what you’ll find at San Marco. Angelico does not paint the fearsome Last Judgments and devils that you see in Giotto and other predecessors. In Angelico’s depiction of Christ being tormented, the demons are not blue creatures with fangs, but rather phantom hands. For Angelico the gruesome remains outside of the visible realm, in focus is the sacred.

Noli Me Tangere. 1437-1446. San Marco, Florence, Italy.

My first trip to New York coincided with a Fra Angelico exhibit at the Met, the most comprehensive collection of his paintings in fifty years. It was an unforgettable introduction to the variety of his work beyond my familiar, beloved frescoes. The Capitolini exhibit was advertised in the same way so I suspected it might be a repeat of the same exhibit and was excited to see the pieces again.

In fact, the collection was almost exactly the same but the curation was completely different. Both exhibits were arranged chronologically, a natural choice since Angelico is one of those comforting examples of an artist achieving mastery only after much time and practice. His angels of the 1420s and early 1430s are wooden and clumsy when compared to the San Marco frescoes in 1440. As I weaved my way through the Capitolini’s maze-like exhibit, the paintings became increasingly realistic and compelling.

The space was dark with deep blue walls and soft golden highlights hanging above each painting. I was at the museum late on a Wednesday morning and though there were plenty of other visitors, it was easy to score a few minutes alone in front of each of my favorite pieces. Two nuns in brown habits paused beside me to look at a Madonna and Child. They were visiting the exhibit for the second time and as I eavesdropped I learned that one of them had written a thesis on Angelico years ago, in university. Angelico is now known as “Beato Angelico,” after being beatified (the first step to sainthood) by Pope John Paul II in 1982. By all accounts he led a remarkably pious and devout life, worthy of his subject matter. One of the most well-known anecdotes comes from the 16th century biography by Giorgio Vasari, which states that Angelico always painted the Crucifixtion with “tears streaming down his cheeks.”*

Fra Angelico. Christ Crowned with Thorns. 1438-1439. Museo Civico, Livorno, Italy.

In both the Met and the Capitolini exhibits, you see a stronger, more vibrant side of Angelico than is apparent in the San Marco frescoes. Angelico’s rosy color palate and his predilection for painting angels often cause his work to be co-opted by Hallmark greeting cards. In fact, at many points in history he has been regarded with the “faint condescension” that Edith Wharton mentions in the quote at the beginning of this post. But there is a sincerity and strength to his lines that refuses to be saccharine. Even if he is named for the angels he so often paints, what I like most are his saints.

In the best of his Annunciations, such as the one in San Marco, Mary looks stricken and almost nauseous from the news Gabriel brings. To me, this seems an appropriate response to an unwanted, mystical pregnancy. Also remarkable is Angelico’s treatment of John the Baptist. Theologically, John isn’t the cuddliest saint. It’s easy to feel affection for St. Francis with his birds or Mary Magdalene, for centuries wrongly maligned as a whore. But John is trickier. The dressing in haircloth, casting down of sinners, and emphasis on austere living are a bit intimidating. Often depictions of John reflect this grim austerity.

Panel of Saint John the Baptist and Saint Dominic. C. 1430-1433. The Getty Center, Los Angeles, USA.

Instead, Angelico’s John is, for lack of a better word, companionable.  In an oil painting conversing with St. Dominic, he leans in and gestures with his hand in typical Italian fashion. In a 1440 altarpiece, he looks off to the side and shyly smiles as if at a private joke. As a child, my favorite story about John was that when the newly pregnant Mary greeted his mother he “leaped for joy” in the womb. This is the John the Baptist of Angelico’s paintings, a friendlier version who’s excited to have a cousin. Perhaps because he spent so much time painting devotionals, Angelico excels at infusing human emotion into the saintly figures that are too often shown as stoic vessels of piety.

Just before the end of the exhibit I spotted a small, almost hidden room to the right. Completely empty, it was pitch black except for the illuminated manuscripts along the wall. Most of the illustrations had been done by Angelico in the late 1420s; in the rich pastels and gilded accents you could see the style of the tempera and oil paintings he would do throughout the following decades. A small computer nearby guided you through the iconography of the manuscripts. I savored my final moments with Angelico there, reminded  by the hymnals and icons that at moments even old friends can surprise you.

“Beato Angelico: L’alba del Rinascimento” will be up at Rome’s Capitolini Museums through July 5, 2009. It is open Tues-Sun 9 am – 8 pm and tickets cost 6 Euros for just the exhibit, 9 Euros for the exhibit and the rest of the museum. www.museicapitolini.org for more info. Just below the Fra Angelico exhibit is the Museum’s cafe, complete with a panoramic terrace. Nice for a post-exhibit cappuccino.

If you happen to be in Florence you should visit San Marco, which only costs 4 Euros but has absolutely insane hours. From Monday through Friday it is open 8:15-1:50, on weekends and holidays it is open 8:15-4:50, the ticket office closes 30 min before the museum. BUT the museum is closed the 1st, 3rd, and 5th Sundays and the 2nd and 4th Mondays of every month. So check a calendar before you plan a visit.

Here are two wonderful reviews of the Met Exhibit: One from The New Yorker and the other by Arthur Danto at The Nation.

*Side note: When I googled to check my spelling of Vasari, I came across a book called “Pictures and Tears: A History of People Who Have Cried In Front of Paintings.” This has to be one of the stranger histories published recently, even more than Petroski’s one on toothpicks.

St. Francis Fresco Cycle by Benozzo Gozzoli in Montefalco, Umbria

Benozzo Gozzoli was a student of Fra’ Angelico, his most famous work is the frescoed room in the Medici-Riccardi Palace in Florence, showing members of the Medici family dressed up as the wise men in the Journey Of The Magi.

Benozzo Gozzoli: St Francis Expels The Demons From Arezzo.

Benozzo Gozzoli frescoed the apse of the Franciscan church (San Francesco) in Montefalco, Umbria with the Life of Saint Francis between 1450 and 1452.

St Francis Preaches To The Birds & Blesses Montefalco. Benozzo Gozzoli, Montefalco, Umbria

It’s interesting to compare the Life of St. Francis by Benozzo Gozzoli with the frescoes in the Basilica of St Francis in nearby Assisi. You can see how art had progressed in 160 years, it’s also interesting to note how the Life of St.Francis in Montefalco has more parallels with the life of Christ than Giotto’s frescoes in Assisi. The paintings show him being born in the presence of an ox and a donkey!

Benozzo Gozzoli: The Birth of St Francis (left), San Francesco, Montefalco, Umbria

Benozzo Gozzoli has been criticised for lacking the spirituality of his teacher Fra’ Angelico. I don’t see this as a drawback and love seeing his colourful paintings, crowded with people wearing the costume of the day. I suggest you judge for yourself and visit Montefalco.

Trial by Fire Before The Sultan. Benozzo Gozzoli, St Francis Frescoes, Montefalco, Umbria Italy

Montefalco is also famous for Sagrantino di Montefalco, a full bodied red wine made from the Sagrantino grape. You can combine a visit to Benozzo Gozzoli’s frescoes with a vineyard visit. Read about Italian Wine & Sagrantino  di Montefalco

Tuscany Villas Umbria Villas

Montefalco and the frecoes by Benozzo Gozzoli are not far from Gorgacce Rentals’ Villas, Farmhouses & Apartments on the Tuscany Umbria Border. Tuscany Villas Umbria Villas: Gorgacce Rentals

…. pronto voltei.  A engraçadinha da empregada nao voltou para a casa dizendo que teve um problema em casa, tudo bem, pelo menos eu sei que ela vai voltar. Bom, voltando a Florença. Depois do almoço fui para São Marcos  que é um edificio simples e que foi casa dos monges dominicos. Hoje em día guarda uma colecao de pinturas de Fra Bartolomeo, Ghirlandaio y Fra Angélico.  Uma das pinturas mais importantes e a da “Anunciação” feita por Fran Angélico, que é o arcanjo dando a noticia a Virgem Maria da gravidez e que terá o filho de Deus. É um pintura colorida, simples e muito delicada.  Dai sai correndo e vi que tinha tempo de chegar até a Santa Croce. Tinha que aproveitar o tempo em Florença para conhecer tudo, tantos lugares que tinha lido histórias, arte…etc.  Eu adoro romance histórico e uma das cidades que tinham chamado mais minha atenção foi Florença.

When we used Perugia’s minimetro to go into the city centre we went to the Galleria Nazionale dell’ Umbria to see paintings by Piero della Francesca, Fra Angelico, Perugino, Pinturrichio, Duccio di Buoninsegna and many others. We also saw the frescoes by the Umbrian artist, Perugino, in the chamber of the money changers’ guild (Collegio del Cambio) and the superb intarsia wooden panels in the Merchants’ Guild (Sala del Collegi della Mercanzia). The National Gallery, Perugino’s frescos and the Merchant’s Guild are located in the Palazzo dei Priori, Perugia’s impressive medieval civic building.

The Palazzo dei Priori & the Corso Vannucci, Perugia, Umbria

Perugino’s Frescoes in the Collegio del Cambio, Perugia, Umbria

Frescoes by Perugino, Collegio di Cambio, Perugia

The entrance to the Collegio del Cambio is a small door to the left of the main entrance of the Palazzo dei Priori. There is a tiny sign, but it’s very easy to miss if you don’t know what you’re looking for. It’s worth buying a combined day ticket for all the museums in Perugia if you are going on the National Gallery of Perugia. It’s considerably cheaper than buying individual tickets and you can also visit other places in Perugia, for example, the Etruscan Well and the Raphael / Perugino fresco in the church of San Severino.

Pietro Vannucci, known as Il Perugino, trained with both Piero della Francesca and Verrocchio, he combined the skilled compostion and spatial awareness of the former with the naturalistic painting of the latter. He was one of the first painters to master aerial, or bird’s eye perspective, the technique which fades colours out to blue with distance. You can see his use of aerial perspective in his depiction of the Umbrian countryside in the Collegio del Cambio frescoes. These paintings are among his greatest achievements.

Detail from the Perugino Frescoes in the Collegio del Cambio, Perugia

Renaissance, or humanist thinkers looked back to the civilisations of Greece and Rome for inspiration. They did not see anything wrong with combining pagan symbolism and characters from classical antiquity with Biblical figures and stories. These frescoes were based on a scheme devised by Francesco Maturanzio, a humanist scholar at the University and secretary to the ruling council. A few decades later, the Counter Reformation decreed that religious art had to have strictly Christian themes; a fresco such as this, which depicts Old Testament Prophets with Greek Sybils and signs of the Zodiac alongside Christian symbolism, would have been deemed unacceptable. It is ironic that these beautiful frescoes were painted while the powerful Baglioni family’s opposing factions were busy murdering each other in the streets of Perugia. Look for Perugino’s self portrait, painted in fresco to look as if it is a picture hanging on the wall.

Perugino's Self-Portrait in the Collegio del Cambio, Perugia

Sala del Collegio della Mercanzia, Merchants’ Guild, Perugia Umbria

If you turn left and walk beyond the main entrance to the Palazzi dei Priori, you will find the entrance to the Sala del Collegi della Mercanzia, the impressive wood panelled meeting room of the Merchants’ Guild. Each small wooden tile is inlaid with intricate intarsia geometric patterns. The merchant’s guild must have been extremely wealthy to afford such lavish decoration. Looking around the light absorbing panels, you do have to wonder how gloomy it was before electric lighting was invented.

Sala del Collegio della Mercanzia in Perugia, Umbria.

The National Gallery of Umbria, Perugia

The National Gallery of Umbria is a treasure trove of art, I tend to move swiftly through the medieval art with it’s endless repetitions of Madonna con Bambino  and the Crucifixtion. As a first time visitor you might be tempted to spend a little longer here.

Duccio di Buoninsegna, Perugia, Umbria

Duccio di Buoninsegna's Madonna and Child, Perugia

Duccio di Buoninsegna’s Madonna con Bambino is definitely a cut above the other medieval painters. The figures in this painting have more life to them than the other Byzantine influenced pictures. The art of Byzantium, or Constantinople, the Eastern Roman Empire, could never attempt to depict subjects realistically because of the belief in Orthodox Christianity that true to life portrayals of Biblical figures was considered heretical, the term iconclast comes from Byzantium and the destruction of icons considered too life like.

Fra Angelico, Perugia, Umbria

Fra Angelico Altarpiece, Central Panel, Perugia Umbria

You soon come to the San Domenico altarpiece by Fra Angelico, or Beato Angelico as he is sometimes called. Originally painted for the church of San Domenico, this altarpiece stands out from the other artworks because of the quality and grace with which the figures are painted. Fra Angelico was a master of the newly discovered perspective but he also loved the style of earlier paintings.

Detail from Fra Angelico's Perugia altarpiece

Piero della Francesca, Perugia, Umbria

Shortly afterwards you come to the museum’s greatest work of art, an altarpiece by Piero della Francesca. The Annunciation scene at the top is astounding, behind Gabriel and Mary is an arcade drawn in perfect perspective that draws your eye down the rows of columns. A visit to the National Gallery of Umbria and this altarpiece can be included in the Piero della Francesca Trail. Read about a Piero della Francesca Painting In The Uffizi, Florence and the Flagellation Of Christ, National Gallery of The Marche, Urbino.

Annunciation by Piero della Francesca, Perugia

Note the accuracy with which Piero della Francesca has painted the shadows of each column, this painting is comparable to the Flagellation of Christ in Urbino, both use light and atmosphere to portray space in a way that no one else had mastered.

Piero della Francesca's Perugia Altarpiece

Continuing through the gallery you come to more Peruginos and paintings from his work shop (bottega). Look for one in room XV which shows a much younger Perugino looking directly out while members of the Baglioni family pose as the Magi.

Nativity by Perugino, Perugia, National Gallery of Umbria

Room XXI is of interest for the frescoes of medieval Perugia, note the large number of fortified towers, only one remains, the painting of the Palazzo dei Priori and the steps to a building which no longer exists by the Duomo. Usually there is a superb small Perugino here, Christ in Pity, but it had been loaned to another museum when we were there. You then pass more Perugino paintings of varying quality, his enormous output and reliance on assistants meant that his standards varied greatly. The last few rooms of the museum have little of note except that just before the exit you can see paintings of how the Rocca Paolina once looked. This papal fortress was torn down when Italy was unified in 1860.

Tuscany Villas Umbria Villas

Perugia is easily visited when staying at one of Gorgacce Rentals’ Self-catering Villas, Farmhouses or Apartments on the Tuscany Umbria border. Gorgacce Rentals  Tuscany Villas Umbria Villas

Rien de tel qu’un dimanche de printemps pluvieux pour aller admirer les chef-d’oeuvres de la collection d’ Altenbourg. Les oeuvres des grands maîtres primitifs italiens des XIIIe, XIVe et XVe siècles ont été  rassemblées au XIXème siècle par B. Von Lindenau. La réunification des deux Allemagne nous a permis d’accéder à ces merveilles longtemps cachées.

Les oeuvres sont admirablement exposées au sein de la somptueuse demeure de Nélie André et de Edouard Jacquemart.

Une belle occasion de faire le lien avec les tempera vues lors d’un voyage en Toscane et surtout une forte envie de retourner en balade dans l’un des berceaux de l’art européen…

http://www.musee-jacquemart-andre.com/fr/jacquemart/177-events/?displayType=DetailALaUne&eventId=367

En attendant de retourner en Toscane, un ‘tit brunch dans la jolie salle à manger du musée s’imposait.Toujours sous les fastes du plafond peint par Tiepolo…

Et toujours pour patienter, le musée du Luxembourg expose jusqu’au 2 août 2009,  Filippo et Filippino Lippi. A suivre donc…

A più di cinquanta anni anni dall’ultima retrospettiva dedicata a Beato Angelico, una mostra e nuovi studi riaprono la discussione sulla sua operae sul suo colore intriso di luce

di Simona Maggiorelli

Colpito da quella speciale luce che hanno gli affreschi di Beato Angelico in San Marco a Firenze, Rothko si mise a studiare una preparazione in gesso per dare al pigmento una qualità simile all’affresco e quella consistenza diradata che facesse sembrare le sue forme di puro colore come percorse da un movimento. Nasceva così l’osmosi di giallo radioso, bianco e azzurro di Untitled del 1950. Ma dalla nuova monografia, edita da Phaidon che Diane Cole Ahl ha dedicato all’opera dell’Angelico si apprende anche che il colore intriso di luce che faceva risplendere gli affreschi e i dipinti del pittore toscano affascinò anche molti altri pittori di avanguardia.

Studiando la luce e il colore, Rothko voleva davvero realizzare “i colori trascendenti e la spiritualità dell’arte” del maestro di Fiesole come è stato scritto? O piuttosto – come ci piacerebbe pensare – cercava quel valore prismatico, mobile, del colore che regala una straordinaria gamma di timbri alla pittura sacra del Quattrocento?

Domande che qui non possiamo che tenere aperte per ricerche future. Ma che, intanto, devono fare i conti con la risposta filologica di Maurizio Calvesi che, annota: “Quella luce che diverrà nella storia della pittura agente fondamentale di animazione, nell’Angelico è soprattutto un fissativo che scende su uno spettacolo ne varietur” .

Consulente scientifico della mostra Beato Angelico l’alba del Rinascimento aperta dall’8 aprile al 5 luglio nei musei Capitolini di Roma, nel suo saggio pubblicato nel denso catalogo Skira, Calvesi ricostruisce la biografia di Beato Angelico (al secolo Pietro di Guido) e la koinè culturale in cui visse e fu attivo fra il 1417 e il 1455. D’accordo con Cole Ahl, nel dire che se Vasari creò una leggenda agiografica intorno a Beato Angelico, Calvesi però ci ricorda che il pittore aveva fatto studi tomistici e che la sua arte intesa come predicazione dipinta era densa di sfumature teologiche.

La scelta di fra’ Angelico indubbiamente fu diversa da quella di un altro artista suo contemporaneo, fra’ Filippo Lippi che, invece, fuggì con una giovane suora e smise il saio. Peraltro senza che questo pregiudicasse la sua carriera di pittore di immagini sacre. Papi, cardinali e principi, a quell’epoca, non vedevano affatto sconveniente che a dei “libertini” fossero commissionate le più importanti immagini sacre. Gli ordini minori, come insegna la storia di molti letterati e artisti fra Medioevo e Rinascimento, si prendevano perlopiù per avere di che vivere. Ma l’angelicus pictor, come fu subito nominato, si tramanda che avesse fede fervente e quella aureola che gli fu da subito assegnata è stata un ingombro non di poco conto alla lettura della sua opera.

Il primo a tentare di liberare la sua multiforme produzione di affreschi, quadri, disegni e opere miniate dal cliché di arte mistica e fatta di atmosfere celestiali fu Roberto Longhi rintracciando nella pittura dell’Angelico degli anni 20 e 30 del Quattrocento gli incunaboli del Rinascimento. Poi sarebbero venuti le importanti retrospettive di Roma e Firenze per il cinquecentenario della nascita dell’artista, il saggio di Giulio Carlo Argan e una gran messe di studi e acquisizioni recenti che (confermate dalle indagini riflettografiche di alcune opere realizzate dalla Normale di Pisa) oggi ci permettono di mettere a fuoco la figura di Beato Angelico come pittore di grande respiro pienamente inserito nel dibattito sulla prospettiva e sull’evoluzione dell’immagine del Quattrocento, capace di cimentarsi con le più diverse tecniche e aperto alla rivoluzione espressiva di un artista più giovane di lui di 15 anni, come Masaccio. Di un artista inserito nel suo tempo e in transito fra tradizione e innovazione oggi parla autorevolmente la storica dell’arte inglese Diane Cole Ahl, raccontando come nella luminosa pala di Cortona (ora in mostra a Roma) Beato Angelico avesse innovato la tradizione iconografica dell’annunciazione,mentre Calvesi nel catalogo Skira racconta come l’artista fosse passato da una concezione di una “natura naturata”, cioè immobile come dio l’ha creata, a una rappresentazione della natura come, physis, come divenire e come energia vitale aprendo la strada alla dinamica veduta del Valdarno che un giovane Leonardo avrebbe tracciato nel 1473.

E se una maggiore espressività delle figure, Beato Angelico la realizzò in rapporto con la pittura di Masaccio, dal Brunelleschi ricavò l’idea della profondità dello spazio architettonico, abbandonando a poco a poco gli sfondi oro, ma anche tralasciando la struttura a più ante del polittico a favore della più sintetica pala che gli consentiva di mettere in rapporto le figure umane.

Percorrendo le sale capitoline che ospitano questa nuova retrospettiva dell’ Angelico si può leggere questa evoluzione: dalle finezze tardo gotiche della prima Madonna di Cedri (proveniente dal Museo San Matteo di Pisa) alla scrittura ancora paratattica della Tebaide fino all’approdo a un Umanesimo tosco-emiliano, monumentale e classicheggiante che, alla fine dei suoi anni, lo porterà a affrescare la cappella Nicolina.

FIn mezzo a questo articolato percorso, capolavori come la luminosa Annunciazione di San Giovanni Valdarno (1434) e il grande trittico di Cortona completo di predella. Ma anche opere da poco restaurate come il Trittico della Galleria Corsini di Roma e la predella della Pala di Bosco dei frati. Da Desdra arriva l’Annunciazione riassemblata nel XVI secolo e da Lipsia il frammento con San Giovanni Battista. Ma ad attrarre lo sguardo è anche una potente raffigurazione di Beati e Dannati (1430c.), oggi appartenente a una collezione privata americana. Una pittura di cremisi, neri, bianchi e blu radiosi che fa risplendere la tavola come pietre preziose.

da left-avvenimenti del 10 aprile 2009

FRA’ANGELICO , IL GRANDE INNOVATORE

Beato Angelico pittore devozionale, ma anche grande innovatore. Ripercorrendo tutte le più importanti acquisizioni che gli studiosi hanno messo a punto dal 1955 (l’anno delle grandi mostre per il cinquecentenario) a oggi, la storica dell’arte inglese Diane Cole Ahl, nel volume Fra’ Angelico pubblicato da Phaidon, ricolloca finalmente l’opera del pittore toscano nel suo giusto contesto storico, offrendone una lettura aggiornata. «Innovatore che seppe trasmettere le tradizioni iconografiche e spirituali del proprio ordine domenicano, egli concepì la propria arte come predicazione reinterpretando i temi sacri e conferendogli una nuova risonanza», scrive Cole Ahl. Dunque non più pittore del tutto chiuso in mondo di smalti medievali e sordo al tumultuoso rinnovamento culturale che la Firenze medicea stava vivendo grazie a una folta schiera di studiosi umanisti e artisti. Con questa sua importante monografia Cole Ahl invita a prestare maggiore attenzione ai segni di innovazione che le opere dell’Angelico mostrano, sia che si tratti di affreschi monumentali, sia di pale d’altare o di codici miniati. L’orchestrazione prospettica e la tridimensionalità architettonica delle scene sacre degli anni Trenta del Quattrocento, in effetti, ci dicono quanto il pittore fiesolano fosse lontano dagli appiattiti sfondi medievali, e interessato alle novità introdotte da Brunelleschi e Ghiberti. Mentre l’uso sapiente della luce e dei colori, in quella gamma vastissima di bianchi brillanti, cremisi e blu radiosi che fa risplendere le sue pitture come pietre preziose, appare in un certo modo in sintonia con nuova visione umanistica e rischiarata. E non si può dire nemmeno che Beato Angelico, con Masaccio, non avesse compreso la novità di una rappresentazione pittorica che dava nuova centralità e dignità all’umano. Basta guardare, nota Cole Ahl, il volto della Vergine nella Grande crocefissione e più ancora il gesto della Maddalena, bella e sensuale ai piedi della croce. «L’Angelico creò opere di profonda espressività», scrive la studiosa inglese e la mostra Beato Angelico, l’alba del Rinascimento che si apre oggi ai Musei Capitolini a Roma sembra, fin dal titolo, volerne raccogliere il messaggio. ( Simona Maggiorelli)

Da  Europa 8  aprile 2009

]]> http://oslik.wordpress.com/2009/03/24/slavnost-zvestovani-pane/ Tue, 24 Mar 2009 10:52:17 +0000 oslik http://oslik.wordpress.com/2009/03/24/slavnost-zvestovani-pane/ http://anielskiewersety.wordpress.com/2009/03/20/024/ Fri, 20 Mar 2009 08:34:15 +0000 Witold Skaczkiewicz http://anielskiewersety.wordpress.com/2009/03/20/024/ http://cacina.wordpress.com/2009/03/18/carry-the-gospel-with-you-118/ Wed, 18 Mar 2009 04:26:21 +0000 frmike http://cacina.wordpress.com/2009/03/18/carry-the-gospel-with-you-118/

Gospel reading of the day:

Matthew 5:17-19

Jesus said to his disciples: “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter will pass from the law, until all things have taken place. Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do so will be called least in the Kingdom of heaven. But whoever obeys and teaches these commandments will be called greatest in the Kingdom of heaven.”

Reflection on the gospel reading: Scripture scholars believe that a Jewish scribe or a group of Jewish scribes who converted to Christianity wrote the gospel of Matthew. The evangelist’s preoccupation is to show the connection of Jesus to the tradition of Israel, and we see evidence of this intention in today’s gospel reading. Jesus tells us in this passage that he has not come to destroy the law but to fulfill it. He seeks not break away from the tradition but to transcend it through a deeper understanding of the law’s implications for our inner lives. The law is a danger to us if we follow only its letter; it must radiate through our thoughts and actions, and we must be prepared even to break its letter when it is necessary to fulfill its spirit.

Saint of the day: Fra Angelico was a famous painter of the Florentine school, born near Castello di Vicchio in the province of Mugello, Tuscany, 1387, he died at Rome, 1455. He was christened Guido, and his father’s name being Pietro, he was known as Guido, or Guidolino, di Pietro, but his full appellation today is that of “Blessed Fra Angelico Giovanni da Fiesole.” He and his supposed younger brother, Fra Benedetto da Fiesole, or da Mugello, joined the order of Preachers in 1407, entering the Dominican convent at Fiesole.

Fra Angelico was twenty years old at the time the brothers began their art careers as illustrators of manuscripts, and Fra Benedetto, who had considerable talent as an illuminator and miniaturist, is supposed to have assisted his more celebrated brother in his famous frescoes in the convent of San Marco in Florence. Fra Benedetto was superior at San Dominico at Fiesole for some years before his death in 1448. Fra Angelico, who during a residence at Foligno had come under the influence of Giotto whose work at Assisi was within easy reach, soon graduated from the illumination of missals and choir books into a remarkably naive and inspiring maker of religious paintings, who glorified the quaint naturalness of his types with a peculiarly pious mysticism. He was convinced that to picture Christ perfectly one must need be Christlike, and Vasari says that he prefaced his paintings by prayer. His technical equipment was somewhat slender, as was natural for an artist with his beginnings, his work being rather thin dry and hard.

His spirit, however, glorified his paintings. His noble holy figures, his beautiful angels, human but in form, robed with the hues of the sunrise and sunset, and his supremely earnest saints and martyrs are permeated with the sincerest of religious feeling. His early training in miniature and illumination had its influence in his more important works, with their robes of golden embroidery, their decorative arrangements and details, and pure, brilliant colors. As for the early studies in art of Fra Angelico, nothing is known. His painting shows the influence of the Siennese school, and it is thought he may have studied under Gherardo, Starnina, or Lorenzo Monaco.

Spiritual reading: Do not forget that holiness consists not in extraordinary actions,

but in performing your duties towards God, yourself, and others well. (Text for the Assumption by Maximilian Kolbe, 1940)

Peter Bruegel the Elder, “Faith,” ca. 1559

{Source: Artnet, www.artnet.com}

Fra Angelico, “Right-hand panel with Dominican Blessed” & “Left-hand panel with Dominican Blessed,”1423-4, National Gallery

{Source: National Gallery, www.nationalgallery.org.uk}