Category: Eye Candy for Today

Boulevard Montmartre: Mardi Gras, Camille Pissarro Image on WikiArt. Original is in the Armand Hammer Museum at UCLA. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find a larger version of this image. Though different in many ways — a different boulevard, a different season, and certainly a different kind of procession — I couldn’t help but think of this…

The Letter of Introduction, David Wilkie Link is to Google Art Project; high-resolution downloadable file on Wikimedia Commons; original is in the National Galleries of Scotland. Wilkie gives us a scene supposedly referenced from his own experience, as a young man presents what is evidently an insufficient letter of introduction to a disdainful older man.…

The Silk Merchant, Japan; Robert Frederick Blum Link is to Google Art Project, downloadable high-res file on Wikimedia Commons, original is in the Cincinnati Art Museum. After Japan opened relations with Europe and the U.S. in the mid 19th century, many European and American artists were dramatically influenced by imported Japanese art and culture; but…

A Watermill, Meindert Hobbema In the Rijksmuseum. The wonderful 17th century Dutch landscape painter Meindert Hobbema — who studied with Jacob van Ruisdael — gives us an idyllic view of a watermill, set amid trees and reeds bent in a breeze, perhaps in anticipation of a coming storm. Hobbema had a masterful touch with foliage,…

Still Life with Strawberries and Nuts, Raphaelle Peale Link is to a large image found on NPR, there is another, smaller and somewhat darker image on Wikipedia. The original is in the Art Institute of Chicago. Raphaelle Peale, one of Charles Wilson Peale’s artistic (and artistically named) sons, was America’s first dedicated still life painter,…

The Victorian Chair, Childe Hassam Link is to the Google Art Project; downloadable high-resolution file on Wikimedia Commons; original is in the Smithsonian American Art Museum (which also has a zoom feature, though the Google one is a bit smoother). What a wonderful portrait — sensitive and delicate from the intended viewing distance — but…