Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Turner
One of the best things about New York is the sheer abundnce of art. There are several major galleries here, the two most important being the 'MOMA' or Museum of Modern Art, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The latter has just finished showing a J.W.M. Turner retrospective. Turner is one of my favourite artists, a British painter who at the time of his exhibitions was often panned by his critics because his work involved large swathes of colour, that represented landscape scenes but weren't very detailed. It was assumed that what he was doing was just splashing a few colours on without much skill. However, his reputation was made by the approval and high praise of John Ruskin who appreciated Turner's eye for Nature, and also his ability to evoke so much emotion with his use of colour. Perhaps his most famous paintings are of the Houses of Parliament burning...but here is my favourite, Fishermen at Sea.
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2 comments:
Love it... evokes images of sailors going out not knowing if they'll return. Personally I prefer "The Fighting Temeraire" which was a beautiful ship being escorted back to dock by a steam tug. It shows the new steam age replacing the beauty of the classic sail perfectly.
I like this one too... never seen it before bit there is great drama and tension, created by the scavange seagulls swarming around dark choppy sea, looming over the guys freshly won 'bread'. The low visability evokes sympathy for the battle the fishermen face, and the bright moon peering through thick black clouds creates an eery moment, is it about to rain and make things much worse? Love Turner, glad you got to see that exhibition. I agree with Paul too, "The Fighting Temeraire" is also about a once celebrated battle ship that is being replaced. I have seen that one and is very poignant.
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