Category: Switzerland
-
Snow Country
Snow Country Why do I think of Snow Country, of Kawabata? Not only because the picture shows a snow country. It is the sensitivity and perfection with which Kawabata depicts female beauty in his novels. Here it is nature that gives me the sensation of looking at a reclining nude, drawn with the same sensitivity…
-
Mountain goats
Mountain goats Like in Nolde’s Flower garden – Woman with Purple Dress where a woman merges with her garden (see last week’s Union), in Marc’s painting it is mountain goats that become one with their environment. The symbiotic relationship of goats with their surrounding mountain landscape gets in Marc’s case an abstract expression in bright…
-
Union
Union A woman is wrapped up in her garden; she integrates with the splendour of flowers. If she wasn’t mentioned in the title of the painting you probably would not have noticed her. A nice example of a painter’s expression of unification. Photo of the week: Emil Nolde, Flower garden – Woman with Purple Dress,…
-
Munch’s carpet
Munch’s carpet Munch has portrayed Wilhelm Wartmann several times; this is a detail of his portrait at the Kunsthaus in Zürich, of which he was the director during most of the first half of the 20th century. We see his feet on the corner of a carpet. Who would paint a carpet in such a…
-
Stately beauty
Stately beauty Sculpture of a woman in a large empty space. All attention is drawn to her naked figure. A truly moving image. Giacometti has put her on a pedestal in the form of a chariot, which creates a strange tension. She is on view but doesn’t look a fool. On the contrary: straight and…
-
Majestic distinction
Majestic distinction The pose of Diego, in spite of his loose-fitting sweater, is of majestic distinction. This is how Alberto has portrayed his brother, in his own unique style. Many of Giacometti’s sculptured figures, his thin ones too, show this characteristic distinction. It reflects the respectful, humane way Giacometti saw and approached his models. Photo…
-
The artist at work
The artist at work On the picture by Ernst Scheidegger in the back we see Giacometti at work in his studio, surrounded by his sculptures. And on my picture you see Giacometti’s picture in turn surrounded by one of his sculptures and its reflections, creating layers of representation. Photo of the week: Alberto Giacometti, Bust…
-
Alberto paints Annette
Alberto paints Annette The fact that the artist (Alberto Giacometti) paints a picture of his wife on this photo by Ernst Scheidegger is nothing special. She was his favourite female model. Still it gives the scene a touch of intimacy, a feeling that is intensified by the incident light in the otherwise dark wooden atmosphere…
-
Kunsthaus window
Kunsthaus window When taking in and digesting art works in a museum there is always a moment that I pass a window and look through it at the world outside with an art-infused eye. This time it happened in the Kunsthaus in Zürich. It was winter and it had snowed a bit. Photo of the…
-
Piet Mondria(a)n
Piet Mondria(a)n Mondria(a)n belongs to the canon of modern art. In the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam I saw the two top paintings exposed, in the Kunsthaus in Zürich the two bottom ones. The resemblance in choice of the two museums is striking. Mondria(a)n’s abstract work has become so commonplace and has been violated to such…
καιρός remembered 