Friday, January 6, 2017

Sincere & Various Manifestations of the 19th century

William Blake (England)
Behemoth and Leviathan from the Book of Job
ca. 1805-1810
wash drawing
Morgan Library, New York

Pen and black ink and wash, and watercolor, over graphite, on paper. Purchased by Pierpont Morgan (1837-1913) in 1909. One of twenty-one original drawings executed for Thomas Butts, ca. 1805-10, illustrating the Book of Job. This sheet is no. 15 in the series.

Vittorio Caradossi (Florence)
Shooting Stars
19th century
marble
private collection

Alexandre Calame (Switzerland)
Oak-tree Trunk
1850s
oil on canvas
private collection

Alexandre Calame (1810-1864) was the son of a Swiss marble carver who went bankrupt and died young. Somehow, young Calame struggled and prevailed, transforming himself by the 1840s into a successful Salon painter in Paris. Fashions in French art altered rapidly at mid-century, and suddenly artists with thriving studios built on the traditional system like that of Alexandre Calame were ignored by advanced viewers. Then he died.

Anonymous French sculptor
Sea-putto with two dolphins
19th century
ivory
Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, Connecticut

Johann Martin von Rohden (Germany)
Grotto of Neptune at Tivoli
1812
oil on canvas
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Sèvres Manufactory (France)
Cream-jug
1813
porcelain
Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, Connecticut

Gustave Courbet (France)
Beach at Saint-Aubin sur Mer
1867
oil on canvas
Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid

after Hendrik de Keyser (Netherlands)
Statues on Façade
19th century
watercolor
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

Eduard Gaertner (Germany)
View of the Opera and Unter den Linden, Berlin
1845
oil on canvas
Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid

"The Opera, designed by the architect Georg Wenzelhaus von Knobelsdorff, was built between 1741 and 1743. It was intended to mark the beginning of the Forum Fridericianum, a monumental complex planned by the King of Prussia, Frederick the Great, so as to be visible from his castle. The Opera remains the only building erected according to this plan. "

 from curator's notes, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza

Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres (France)
Odalisque (in miniature)
ca. 1830
oil on canvas
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Christen Købke (Denmark)
Gateway in the Via Sepulcralis, Pompeii
1846
oil on canvas
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Gustave Moreau (France)
The Voices
ca. 1880
gouache and watercolor on paper
Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid

Pierrre-Paul Prud'hon (France)
Furniture designs for the Infant King of Rome
1811
etching
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

Berthe Morisot (France)
Reclining Nude Shepherdess
1891
oil on canvas
Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid