Leonard and Leonardo…….

| Mairead

19 11a

(Botanic Gardens, succulents)

We were looking at a very good documentary about Leonard Cohen on Saturday night. It was called I’m your Man and had other people singing his songs from a concert tour, while he chatted to the interviewer (and to us.). One of the songs I hadn’t heard before was called The Traitor. While Leonard explained the song to us I was reminded of Leonardo da Vinci. (Yes, interestingly similar names….)

19 11b

(Fly catcher)

Each week in Art History we get an assignment, this week it’s about the High Renaissance, we have to choose one of the artists of the time and write about them. There are (as far as I can tell) only three artists in that time – Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo and Raphael. I was wondering which one to go for when our lecturer told us a small detail about Leonardo….. he didn’t finish everything he started! Not really surprising when you think of all the things he did. He was a  painter, sculptor, architect, musician, scientist, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, geologist, cartographer, botanist, and writer. Not really surprising and yet I was surprised, I thought finishing was really, really important and have felt guilty many times for the things I didn’t finish.

19 11c

(Are they seeds?)

So getting back to Leonard Cohen who was explaining the song. He was saying that it was about a feeling that you had messed up some important mission, some important thing you were supposed to do. But you come to understand that the bigger mission was not to complete it. The real mission was whatever happened…. the deepest courage was to stand guiltless as “people called me traitor to my face“.

All is well, Mairead.

Down memory lane with buttons….

| Mairead

12 11a

(A Sony Walkman picture  – can’t find mine – too small…)

Yesterday we went to the market in Dun Laoghaire. It’s held in the People’s Park and there’s food, books, music (live and recorded), vegetables, meat (cooked and raw), crafts, coffee and cake. We bought almond slices and Americanos (they offered to add whiskey for free if we wanted!) and sat on a picnic bench watching the world go by. I forgot to bring my camera so you’ll just have to imagine the scene.

12 11b

(In case you don’t know – this is a cassette tape)

Then I remembered an assignment I had and we started talking about when I was twenty-one and Denis bought me the latest gadget (I think he had to take out a loan to buy it…) It was the Sony Walkman, a cassette tape player with head phones (not earphones) that worked on AA battery power and could fit in your hand (almost). We thought it was amazing. Before the Walkman the smallest cassette player was a chunky black plastic device needing mains power or huge batteries. The Walkman was shiny with cute buttons.

12 11c

(In the process of making ceramic buttons – will be shiny)

Of course now we’re older and more mature we don’t fall for the latest gadgets, we don’t need to own the latest smallest thing that will make listening to music easier. We don’t get excited by cute buttons and shiny covers……

Maybe we haven’t changed all that much…. Mairead.

Watch La Luna by Pixar!

| Mairead

3

(Butterfly on lavender at Powerscourt Estate)

I watched a beautiful short movie on Sunday… here’s the blurb about it. There’s a little boy, his father and his grandfather and they are out in their boat. In the beginning of the movie the father gives his son a hat, the same kind of hat as the father’s, the same kind of hat as the grandfather’s. The father places this hat on the son, in a particular way – just like his own hat is placed on his head. The grandfather huffs and puffs, grabs the hat and then places it on his grandson’s head in a different particular way – just like his own hat is placed on his head.

7 8b

(Gothic doorway)

There’s a bit of a scuffle and the father’s way of placing the hat on the little boy’s head finally wins and the story continues.

7 8k

(Raindrops on flowers… requested by Grahame…..;-/)

By the end of the story the little boy places his hat in a completely different particular way on his own head as he teaches his father and grandfather something new. Our children learn all they can from us and then there comes a time for us to learn from our children. Probably sooner than we think…..

What’s the lesson for today? Mairead.

Art Works – David Hockney

| Mairead

Dh david hockney pop art paintings

This is Bigger Trees Near Warter Winter Version by David Hockney.

Besides drawing, painting, printing and ceramics my course includes an art history module where I will learn to write essays about works of art, artists and the art period in which they worked. In order to write about the paintings I will need to learn the language of art and so far although I seem to have the words I don’t have the ability to put the words together. So… I was thinking that I could get some practice here on the blog and…. with your help I might learn faster. So for the first painting I picked Bigger Trees near Warter by David Hockney.

David Hockney at Tate Bri 001

(The artist with another of his pictures – that’s how big they are)

First, let me tell you about the words I have learned. The words are called Art Elements and you use them to describe any painting…. Point, as in dot or dots; Line, as in the shortest distance between two points but in art elements lines don’t have to be straight, they can be wavy; Shape, as in square, triangular, etc; Form, a 3D shape; Tone, I think this is lighting and shading; Colour, shouldn’t be a problem here; Texture, as in you get a sense of what it might feel like to touch; Pattern, as in there’s a pattern; Symmetry, as in there’s balance between one side and the other; Content, as in what’s it a painting of?

David Hockney

(The trees were cut down before Hockney had finished his painting….)

To describe this painting I want to say – I really, really love this! But that’s not using any art elements. So instead… In this picture the artist definitely includes lines, in the trees, some straight and some wavy. There are also lines for the lanes and the house. He uses colour to show the grass on the side of the lanes and of the trees. The grass definitely looks like it is nicer to touch than the prickly trees so he must be using texture? He is using pattern in the trees repeating on into the distance. I suppose you could say there’s symmetry with the little house on the left and the little hedges on the right. Finally the content, this is a picture of huge trees in winter (without leaves) in the countryside, located between two small country roads with a line of hedges in the right foreground and a house in the left background.

Any help gratefully received, Mairead.