Tag: Art
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Ithyphallic Shiva Nataraj
In last week’s post we saw the ancient sculpture of an ithyphallic dancing Shiva inside Kalinjar Fort in Uttar Pradesh. Here we have one on a 9th century temple in Bhubaneshvar, Orissa. It is better preserved, with the erect phallus clearly visible. This may be due to its high placement on the temple wall, out…
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Kalinjar Fort
Kalinjar means ‘the destroyer of time’ and thus refers to Shiva, who next to Brahma, the creator, and Vishnu, the preserver, takes care of this part in the eternal cycle of creation, preservation and destruction. However, apart from being the destroyer, Shiva is at the same time very much regarded as creator, which explains his prominent…
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Desert Art
The painters mentioned in last week’s post, as the painters of the works you see here, are all part of the Papunya Tula group of artists that live in the Western Desert region of Australia. Their collectively owned company, with a studio in the Western Desert and a gallery in Alice Springs, dates back to…
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Modern art
It is interesting to see Aboriginal art exhibited in a context of old and contemporary art from other parts of the world, as is the case in the Art Gallery of New South Wales. When I visited this museum in Sydney I was impressed to see how well the Aboriginal art collection holds between the rest.…
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Sleeping beauty
The bacchante sleeps off her glow of last night’s pleasure under the attentive eyes of a row of men. Only they can see from their point of view that this Maenad is actually a hermaphrodite. The generous curves of her soft, feminine body are beyond their reach. The kouros stands tall in the characteristic posture…
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See-through blouse
And even see-through underwear! All suspended on a clothesline. Meanwhile Aphrodite seems to be anxiously waiting till they’re dry. Photo of the week: Driftwood at Hokitika beach, New Zealand 2013
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Black Arch
It happened at the 2011 biennale in Venice. For the first time Saudi Arabia was represented here in a space of its own. And, even more surprising, the work of art on show was made by two women, the sisters Shadia and Raja Alem. Modern art from Saudi Arabia made by women? It’s nice to…
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Witness from Baghdad
The heads of the women are blurred and their faces hidden in veils. But their eyes see. We see eyes that see. Eyes that have seen. And now the eyes have directed their penetrating look at us, confronting us onlookers. Remember last week’s photo? REMEMBER? We shall remember, Halim Al Karim! Photos of the week:…
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Remember
REMEMBER: written in capital letters on a wall on a hillside in Amman, Jordan. I saw it from the opposite hill during a visit to two modern art galleries situated there. REMEMBER: is it an artistic statement; is it related to the works of art in the gallery compounds and buildings? It could well be. As an isolated…
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Ganesha in Venice
The Italian artist Felipe Cardena called this work of his ‘The last crisis of this crazy, crazy world’. The Hindu gods are well represented in it. Apart from the popular Ganesha, there is Vishnu and also a small Shiva. They are in the company of some iconic figures – political, religious, revolutionary, terrorist, … –…
καιρός remembered 