Mickey Donates African Art

In a move that will expand a strapped museum's resources, the Walt Disney Company donated a 525-piece collection of mainly West African traditional art on Thursday to the Smithsonian Institution, with the works to go to its National Museum of African Art.

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African art specialists praised the collection, noting that it would be difficult to duplicate today given the rising prices for African art and the proliferation of fakes.

"It's the breadth of the collection and the choice pieces from around Africa that make this a historically important collection," said Lizzetta LeFalle-Collins, a California-based art scholar who was the curator of an exhibition of works from the collection last year at the Disney American Heritage Gallery at Epcot in Orlando, Fla. - the first time Disney displayed any of these pieces.

Among the collection's other highlights are an 18th-century copper alloy mask from the Edo tribe in Nigeria, a soapstone carving of a beetle-back man from Zimbabwe, and from Cameroon, a life-size 19th-century statue of a seated king holding a weapon and the head of an enemy.

"There are some key pieces in the collection," including the one from Cameroon, which has been displayed at the Louvre for three years, said Susan Vogel, an art historian at Columbia University and founder of the Museum for African Art in New York. Ms. Vogel was a curator for an exhibition of works from the collection for the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1981.

Ms. Vogel said the collection could be worth $50 million "and probably more."

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Saturday at the MOCA

Just a reminder that we will be meeting at the Museum of Contemporary Art on Grand Avenue this Saturday at 1:00 PM near the ticket booth. There is an incredible Basquiat exhibition on display, as well as the Blake Byrne Collection. For those taking the Contemporary Art course, this is a great opportunity to complete the optional term project. Hope to see many of you on Saturday.

For those up for a full day in L.A. there is also NIGHT VISION: MOCA AFTER DARK at 6:00 PM. This late-night program features live music, artmaking, film screenings, groundbreaking DJs, spoken word, guided tours of Basquiat, and a bar and light fare by Patinette Café.

If you are interested in setting up carpools, which I would recommend, leave comments in the responses below.

Susanna and the Elders

During yesterday's discussion of Baroque period paintings of the story of Susanna and the Elders, one of the "apocryphal" stories from the Book of Daniel, a student (during the 5 PM class) raised the point that this is not a Biblical story. I tried to explain that it was, but realize now that the confusion arose from a lack of understanding of historical context.

The paintings we were discussing were 17th century Baroque. Many of which were Italian Baroque, such as the one seen here painted by Artemisia Gentileschi (1610) in Rome. Rome was part of the Papal States of the Holy Roman Catholic church. All Bibles of Western Europe at this time included the story of Susanna and the Elders. It was not until the late nineteenth century that these "apocryphal" stories began to be removed from some Bibles. That is 200 years after these paintings were created.

Today the Bible of the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox Churches, which include the great majority of Christians, still contain what they refer to as the the deuterocanonical books. These include Tobit, Judith, 1 Maccabees, 2 Maccabees, Wisdom of Solomon, Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), and Baruch, as well as some parts of Esther and Daniel (including the story of Susanna).

So, it is not surprising that these stories were extremely well known as part of the seventeenth century Christian Bible. The story of Susanna, as we saw in class, was very popular with European painters. Susanna, along with David's Bathsheba (click here for an example by Rembrandt, 1654), gave painters their best Biblical related legitimate excuse for depicting a woman in the nude.

I hope this clarifies any confusion.

National Geographic Magazine

In the National Geographic magazine for October 2005 it mentions some trips/explorations that are upcoming. One that stood out was Belize. Here is the information it gives : "At night, circle crocodile nests by boat to measure eggs and hatchlings. Spend days snorkeling at a nearby reef to assess the health of fish and coral. Eight-day Oceanic Society expeditions (www.oceanicsociety.org) in Belize's Turneffe Islands start June 2006 and cost $1,590. Inland, the Belize Institute of A rchaeology (www.bvar.org) will direct a two-week, $975 trip in January 2006 to excavate Maya ruins at the jungle caves of Caracol."
Pg. 76 National Geographic Adeventure magazine, Oct 2005

Artemisia

I wanted to write about Artemisia because she is the first woman artist to appear in the book! Her Baroque style paintings really stood out to me because of her use of chiaroscuro. The colors are rich and vibrant due to the contrasts of light and dark as seen in her portrait Penitent Magdalen. Artemisia's artwork includes many biblical subjects and she put Magdalen in many of them. It almost seems like the characters in her paintings are creeping out of the darkness yet their expressions are so visible. Out of all the Baroque artists, I like her and Caravaggio the best. Their techniques are very similar. -Amanda

The Last Supper

Feast in the House of Levi, Veronese, I believe is a piece of art work that reflects the artists point view at a historical point of time. In the painting, Veronses's perception of the Last Supper causes a ruckus from his collegaue, who believe that he is not creating a wholy and accurate image of the Last Supper. I like this one, because he is showing his own belief and opionio of what he think it would have been like. Aside from a artist vs. society controversy, the painting itself shows many diamonsal work. From the ceiling to the columns which fade into the background of the city, it represents many early artwork of its time. The painting gives a lot of old age viewings and then from Veronses it represents a lot of new "different" view. From the man picking at his teeth, scruffy dogs, and foreign soliders. I believe art works teaches us that there will be some things that not everybody is going to like, but that is art...art in the eyes of the beholder.

Local Petroglyphs

This is a picture of the petroglyphs found in the local Jurupa Mountains. Very different from those we are studying in Art 9. What I have learned from Archaelogist Daniel McCarthy,(A.R.A.R.A.) is that so far archaelogists know that these markings are an indication of water found nearby deeming a sacred area. Just below there are two cave openings with a natural spring. So far, there have been 5 such markings found in California. Lake Perris and Barstow are the other two that I know of. It is believed the Serrano and possibly Tonva tribes dwelled here.
There are mortar bowls and slicks that also exist in the area. This rock art was dated as being over 1,000 years old.

History/Religion

For those interested in how people arrived in the americas there is a book called THE BOOK OF MORMON. It mentions how people were led from Jerusalem to Central America area in the year 600 BC. Also of another group of people that came here many years before that. It mentions many wars and many materials used in that time as tools and weapons. Some may agree or disagree with this book. I just thought I would mention it to give more ideas on how civilizations started here.

L.A. County Museum of Art

Recently I went to the L.A. County Museum of Art, I originally intended on solely seeing the King Tut exhibit, but found my self inching towards other exhibits. Since taking art history classes its nearly impossible going to a museum and only seeing one exhibit. I adored the European Painting and Sculptor, a permanent exhibit, my favorite piece of work was Georges De La Tour's Magdealen with the Smoking Flame, seeing the picture in the book does not do it justice. The museum also had an impressive print and drawing exhibit, a large number of Albrecht Durer prints, which was amazing, fellow art five students recently learned about prints, then to be up close and truly appreciate these prints and other works in our book, it is very awe-inspiring. I did want to suggest the Jacob van Ruisdael exhibit which is due to leave September 18. Ruisdael who is called the Master of Landscape truly earns his title, the movement in the paintings are true to Baroque art, it seems as if the clouds are actually moving. The exhibit features forty-eight of his works, it is also the first American exhibition dedicated to Ruisdael since 1981.


Jacob van Ruisdael,"The Great Oak" Holland, Haarlem, 1652


Museum Hours:
Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday noon-8 pm; Friday noon-9 pm; Saturday and Sunday 11 am-8 pm; closed Wednesday. Call 323-857-6000, or visit our web site at http://www.lacma.org/ for more information.
General LACMA Admission: Adults $9; students 18+ with ID and senior citizens 62+ $5; children 17 and under are admitted free. Admission (except to specially ticketed exhibitions) is free the second Tuesday of every month, and evenings after 5 pm.

Museum-Related Damage Caused by Katrina

Information about the federal and technical assistance, first reports of museum-related damage, and information about how to contribute to the recovery is available through the American Association of Museums.

Read the first reports of museum damage caused by Hurricane Katrina here.

The American Association for State & Local History (AASLH) is working with the Southeastern Museums Conference (SEMC) to assess needs of museums affected by the hurricane. AASLH is also developing a database to centralize the offers of goods, services, and space for the recovery efforts for all types of museums, regardless of discipline. To offer use of space or equipment, donate salvage supplies, or volunteer for salvage and recovery, contact Terry Davis, AASLH president and CEO, at davis@aaslh.org.

Mesoamerican Ballgame Lecture

This may be short notice but there is a lecture on the mesoamerican ballgame and aztec stories on Saturday, September 17th in Hollywood Hills. (From Site) Join James Brady, Professor of Anthropology at Cal State LA and his graduate students for an illustrated discussion of one of the world’s first team sports, Ulamaliztli, a game played from 1500 BC throughout the Mesoamerican world on stone courts with a rubber ball. In 2003, Professor Brady and his students visited a number of small towns in Sinaloa, Mexico, where Ulama, a survival of Ulamaliztli, is still played. Find out what they observed, what players say about the game, how the rubber balls are made, and why this ancient sport is threatened. Check out the link.

A.R.T. As An Acronym

Autonomous Resonance Theory. What does that mean to you? To some it means that people that create expressions in any Media Form can be understood. For instance, I am writing this in English. Alphanumeric Code, Mathematics, Painting, Music, Sculpture... These are some of the Mediums that we are all familiar with. Please list forms that interest you and that are your favorites. Don't be afraid to list the interesting ways that these forms manifest and form part of our daily lives, and what about them interests you.

A Day at the Getty

Thank you to those of you that joined me at the J. Paul Getty Museum this weekend. It is a beautiful complex with some great views and a world-class art collection and research center. I also enjoyed the entertaining Looking Toward Modern Art tour that focused on the collection's still life paintings.




I hope to see even more of you at our next trip to the Museum of Contemporary Art on October 1.

Evolution of a Stick Figure

Teotihuacan

Through the Chaffey College summer study abroad program to Mexico, we also took an excursion to Teotihuacan. Teotihuacan is an important ancient, ceremonial site that is a part of Mesoamerica located in the Valley of Mexico. Cultural, political and economical significance are evident through the pyramids known as the Sun and the Moon, the citadel, the temple of Quetzalcoatl and the palace of Quetzalcoatl. Our tour starts at the citadel where we receive an explanation and demonstration on how paint was obtained from animal and vegetable sources. In the temples and palaces are a variety of original paintings. Furthermore, in the temple of Quetzalcoatl are 365 original heads of jaguars, lizards and serpents representing the 365 days of the solar year. We continue to explore a museum and to climb the pyramids. You can see some of Teotihuacan including what they call the Street of the Dead in the picture provided above.

Latino Art at the L.A. County Fair

This was a response by Heather Dunham to another post, but I think it deserves to be its own post. Heather, would you like to become a contributor to Tesserae?

As a bit of art news, I just visited the L.A. County Fair at the Pomona Fairplex, which is going through October 2, open W-Sun. They have an exhibit this year which showcases "Latino" art. I found it very interesting and the fascinating part was that I recognized Aztec and Mayan gods portrayed through the eyes of the contemporary artists. It was a unique experience that I recommend to any other ART 9 students learning to recognize art inspired and created around these time periods and seeing the evolution of beliefs and inspirations starting from these fascinating ancient stories and art. I believe adult admission is $12 and parking starts at $10

Just Like An Art Museum

My friend, Kelly, is in London right now and offered this observation that I thought might give you a laugh :)

Then this afternoon I Tubed on down to Harrods. Harrods is to London what Macy's is to New York, only without the cool wooden escalators. It's incredible, it's expensive, it's pretentious, and it's a MAZE. But oh, the shoes. So many lovely, lovely shoes. All well beyond my budget, but still so pretty to gaze at and so nice to stroke. The shoe department at Harrods is like an art museum. The shoes are on display, either on white shelves on the wall or behind glass cases. They've got lights everywhere spotlighting each pair. There are artistic arrangements and displays in the middle of the floor that you can walk around. And everywhere, women are standing, looking intently at the shoes in hushed appreciation, just like people examine art in museums. And of course, the sales people stand on the periphery and watch everyone, just like the security people at museums. And seriously, that shoe department winds in and around just like an art museum. Fabulous. Absolutely fabulous.