Sunrise

 

Soloppgang I Åsgårdstrand (Sunrise in Åsgårdstrand), by Edvard Munch, 1893-94.

Matin sur la Seine, le beau temps, by Claude Monet, 1897.

Beach Scene - Sunrise, by David Cox, circa 1820.

 Daybreak, by Isaac Levitan, 1890.

Above the Clouds at Sunrise, by Frederic Edwin Church, 1849.

Wheatfield at Sunrise, by Vincent van Gogh, 1889.

 Sunrise, by Edward Mitchell Bannister, circa second half of the nineteenth century.

Sunrise in Feodosia, by Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky, 1852.

Sunrise, Eastern Arms of Shoreham Harbour, West Sussex, by Isaac Walter Jenner, circa 1870s.

Haystacks at Chailly, by Claude Monet, 1865.

The Blue Rigi, Sunrise, by Joseph Mallord William Turner, 1842.

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And with these, hope for the coming year.

In common light - photographs of Mel Fillini by Jared French, studies for "The Sea", circa 1946

 

The purpose of these images was as reference toward a further study in plaster; the sculpture is damaged but survives. 

Appearing to veer far from the original concept of the planned work, this drawing marks a further step in the process.

Which eventually led to this finished painting. (Which, if you ask me, is really rather ghastly.)

“The Sea”, egg tempera on gesso panel, 24.5 x 36 inches, 1946.

(I apologize for the small size and poor quality of these last two images; they were all that was available online.)

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Mel Fillini was a popular model who worked frequently with French and with George Platt Lynes. Other than that, the only mention of him I could find referred to him simply as "a Broadway actor." How much or how little he was was included in the ménage that included Jared and Margaret French, Paul Cadmus, George Tooker, Lynes, and others I really can't say.

Two portraits by George Platt Lynes, 1950.

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Edit: Since posting this I've read of Fillini described as being an "actor and bon vivant," with a reader of this blog informing me that he had been the life partner of artist and designer Ronald Robles (1937-2012). I also found this image of him taken by photographer Herbert Lotz in 1982. He was said to be fifty-eight at the time, which means that he would have been born in 1923 or 1924.

Fruity - our annual holiday card, 2023 edition

 

Just a simple "reveal" of the seasonal-holiday-of-your-choice card that we've sent out this year. We alternate the design duties, and this year the job fell to G. Her most excellent and perverse brain conjured this fruitcake extravaganza, a group portrait of the artist Jan Brueghel the Elder and his family by Rubens serving as the base for the transformation. As she is currently crazy busy with a huge, teetering stack of freelance design jobs, in addition to her full-time day-job, I offered to do a little fine tuning of the image before handing it back for her to deliver the final polish. 

I must say I fared better in the "face/off". She took a rather flattering picture of me and pretty much just dropped it onto the original image; only Bruegel's ears are still showing. The image G used of herself was decidedly not so flattering. And it was not helped by her having to change the lighting to better fit the lighting in the painting underneath, and having the side of madame Bruegel's grayish cheek showing through. When I first saw the Photoshopped image, I commented on how ungenerous she'd been to herself. And I also asked if her rather grumpy expression was intentional. You know, for humor's sake. I mean, she has a gigantic fruitcake around her neck. I think a certain degree of grumpiness would not be an entirely unreasonable reaction if one found oneself so encumbered. But she only said, "That's just the way I look." Gentle readers, I am here to tell you that that is quite false! I see the very dear woman every day, and I can testify that she's actually a most attractive human who smiles frequently and generally possesses a very pleasant demeaner. Very.

Other than being gifted with a pair of inexplicable hands, I think Nicholas came off pretty well.

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Portrait of Jan Brueghel the Elder and his family, by Peter Paul Rubens, circa 1613-15.

Le Bruissement élégant de leurs jupons - selected work of Georges de Feure, circa 1900-1914

 

I'm not really a "fan" of most things Art Nouveau. Just as with the Rococo, which I also don't particularly admire, I certainly recognize and appreciate the artistry of it, applaud the wonderful, imaginative design and beautiful craftsmanship. It's just that I usually find the sinuous lines, the flowing forms just too "soft", somehow unstable, even slightly vulgar. These caught my eye, though, because of the clear influence of Japanese prints - decades earlier an inspiration for many of the Impressionists, and obviously still potent - the storytelling, and the sense of motion so deftly captured. But more than anything I was drawn to the elegant representation of - very au courant - period fashion. (With the stylistic consistency of the decorative elements of the ladies' toilettes, I feel fairly safe in assuming they were the work of the artist's imagination.)

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I will admit that when I was very much younger I was slightly more appreciative of both periods. During the height of my childhood craze for Marie Antoinette and all things Versailles, I'm sure I made little distinction between le style Louis XV and le style Louis XVI.  And for some while I had a poster of this painting by de Feure on my apartment wall. I think I was twenty-one at the time.

 La Voie du mal / The Path of Evil, 1895.