Category: Europe
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Blue nude
Throughout his long creative life the female figure, dressed or nude, has been a favourite theme of Henri Matisse. In hundreds of paintings, drawings and sculptures he has sung the beauty of woman. The last ten years of his life he was bedridden and couldn’t paint anymore but his creativity remained unbroken. From this period…
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Fränzi
More than a century ago, the painter Ernst Ludwig Kirchner was part of “Die Brücke”, a small group of German artists that with their work wanted to form a bridge (Brücke) between the old art and a new style of painting which became known as expressionism. For a few years around 1910, a young girl…
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Rolled, rubbed and rounded
The rock and the stones, they look of the same soft make-up, only differing in colour. What a nice and quiet ensemble they make in the blazing sun. Till the tide comes in and the waves wash over them. Then the stones roll up and down in splashing water, rubbing against each other over the…
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A streak of yellow
All I can say about this terrace is that I sat down there once with Theodora for a good meal, sea food of course. After a week of intensive work we thought we deserved it.* And why this photo? Right, because of the pleasant surprise of this bright streak of yellow against the dark and…
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Equine reveries
This little member of the horse family seems overwhelmed by the abundance of nature around her. I like to think it’s a she although the photo does not permit us to see and know. Standing stock-still, does she think she’s dreaming or is she closing her eyes behind the curtain of her dark manes, afraid…
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Dissected and compounded
A breast, a breast with arm, a head, a neck, black hairdo … the figure of a woman put together of its constituent parts. The artist has done a decent job, at least for the portion we see in the picture, which was the part of the sculpture most to my liking when I saw it at the…
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Dryads
Are they wounded, these stately wood nymphs with their heavy breasts? The red-lined cuts over the full length of their bodies lead one to suspect this is the case. Maybe the god of thunder and lightning has violated them and left his marks. Many years ago, during a walk on the island of Corsica, I…
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Encounter in the forest
Encounter in the forest Two weeks ago I showed you a photo of nature as art. Here we have a case of art in nature. Art and nature … they often go well together. Two ladies in the forest, facing each other. Their upright, elegant figures in wood with metal dress stand still like the trees.…
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Ka’aba Love
Why do I consider Dana Awartani’s contribution one of the high points of the 2016 Kochi-Muziris Biennale? 1. I find it a beautiful work. It is hanging beautifully in space and dependent on the position of the viewer it reveals its different qualities. Being beautiful may not be a decisive criterion, but as for me…
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Ελαιώνας
Eleonas is the Greek word for olive grove. There is a real ancient one on the island of Aegina with trees of 500 and a single one even over 1500 years old. What amazing creatures! Having reached such a respectable age, all twisted and grooved and gnarled and knotty, this is not to be seen as…
καιρός remembered 