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I’m taking a break from this journal for the next two-and-a-half weeks. I’ll be away on vacation from Saturday, and won’t have anything new to post here before then. In the meantime, while bandwidth allows, here is some music: §1, §2, §3, §4, §5.

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de’Barbari

The Venetian painter and graphic artist Jacopo de’Barbari was born sometime in the mid-15th Century. Almost nothing is documented of his early life, and estimates of his year of birth vary from 1440 to 1470. It is thought that de’Barbari met Albrecht Dürer during the latter’s first trip to Venice in 1495: it is presumed that the Venetian was a well-established painter and engraver by this time. A famous portrait of the mathematician Luca Pacioli, dating from 1495, has been attributed to de’Barbari, but the styling of the figures in this composition strikes me as quite unlike that in the artist’s better-attested works. Another remarkable work credited to ‘Meister Jakob’ (as Dürer sometimes referred to him), is an elaborate map from an aerial perspective of the city of Venice, dating from about 1500.

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De’Barbari’s fame had evidently spread as far as Germany, as, in 1500, he was summoned to the Court of the Emperor Maximilian I. Thereafter, he lived in Nuremberg for at least a year, before moving on to Torgau, Naumburg, Wittenberg and Weimar. Dürer and de’Barbari renewed their acquaintance during the latter’s German sojourn, and the Venetian also came into contact with Lucas Cranach the Elder. It is thought that many of the artist’s surviving engravings date from his time in Germany. Also from this period, de’Barbari’s Still-Life with Pheasant and Iron Gloves is the earliest known signed & dated pure still-life painting. Note that this canvas bears both de’Barbari’s name, and the sign of the caduceus: on the engravings, this symbol takes the place of a signature.

In 1510 de’Barbari is mentioned as painter to the Duchess Margaret, Regent of the Netherlands. The following year, the Duchess granted him a generous pension. He died sometime between 1511 and 1516. Of his work, a few dozen engravings and a small number of paintings and woodcuts survive. Besides the still-life mentioned above, there is a painting of a Sparrowhawk (thought to be a detail cut from a larger canvas) by his hand at the National Gallery in London; a Madonna and Child (Between St John the Baptist and St Anthony) at the Louvre; and a striking Portrait of Christ at Weimar.

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In his book Four Early Italian Engravers (my source for the present images), Tancred Borenius describes the figures in de’Barbari’s engravings as having ‘drooping attitudes’ and ‘langorous expressions’ with ‘long, softly gliding curves that seem an echo of Gothic art.’

Although most of the images I’ve chosen to present here have subjects drawn from Classical mythology, there are at least as many straightforwardly religious subjects in de’Barbari’s graphic oeuvre. The present images are, from top to bottom: Triton and Nereid, Victory Reclining amid Trophies, The Man with the Cradle, A Satyr Playing the Fiddle, A Satyr with a Wine-Skin, A Centaur Pursued by Dragons, The Guardian Angel and Mars and Venus.

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Click on the images to see them enlarged…

Summer

It has been a poor sort of summer in Sweden: one newspaper report I saw said that this June was the coolest here since 1928. So far, July has been no better. The weather continues to lurch indecisively from the pleasantly vernal to the greyly autumnal, and the last few days’ rain has tricked mushrooms into raising their heads from the damp soil in Admiralty Park as if it were already October. I can still hope that we’ll see some of the blazing sunshine that was so prevalent during our last two summers here: ideally, it should arrive by the start of August, when we’ll be on vacation.

Regardless of the weather, I am presenting here three versions of Summer by Giuseppe Arcimboldo. The first (above) belongs to his original set of four seasons, dating from 1563, and is housed in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. The second picture (below) is from a complete set of seasons dating from 1573, that today hang in the Louvre. If you look at the figures’ collars of plaited straw, you will see Arcimboldo’s ‘signature’ thereupon: in the various sets of four seasons, the Summer pictures alone bear his name.

It is the inexact spelling of the artist’s surname on the third of these pictures (below) that has ‘raised doubts about the attribution of this series [a set of four seasons in a private collection in Bergamo] to the highly meticulous hand of Giuseppe Arcimboldo.’ There is apparently yet another Summer bearing the same date as this one (1572) in a collection in Lausanne.

As with my previous entries on Arcimboldo, the present images are scans from the 1980 book Arcimboldo published by Franco Maria Ricci. Click on the images to see them much enlarged…

Campagnola

Giulio Campagnola was born at Padua, in about 1482. His father Girolamo was a distinguished writer, and an amateur painter. Giulio, it seems, showed precocious artistic talent, and efforts were made to place him in the Gonzaga Court at Mantua, so that he could study painting under Andrea Mantegna. Instead, he went to the Court of Ercole I, Duke of Ferrara, although some accounts mention him as one of Giovanni Bellini’s pupils. An archetypal ‘Renaissance Man’, Campagnola was a painter, sculptor, poet, musician and scholar. It is as an engraver, however, that he is best remembered.

Campagnola’s graphic work shows the influence of Dürer, Mantegna and, above all, of Giorgione. The landscape in the background of Saturn (above), was, for example, apparently copied from a work of Dürer’s. Giorgione was a near-exact contemporary of Campagnola’s, and several of the latter’s engravings echo the Venetian painter’s figure-in-a-landscape compositions, and seem to strive to emulate his subtle handling of light. It has been suggested that Campagnola and Giorgione were friends and artistic collaborators, and, whilst this is certainly possible, the most that can be said with any certainty, thanks to the laconic nature of the surviving documentary evidence, is that the two knew of each other, and had acquaintances in common.

My source for the present images was a book entitled Four Early Italian Engravers by one Tancred Borenius. In the book, which was published in 1923, Borenius wrote that, Campagnola’s contemporary renown as a painter notwithstanding, there was only one painting whose attribution to the artist could be accepted with any certainty. This canvas, The Lovers and the Pilgrim, was then in a private collection in London. Its attribution rested on the likeness of its background with that of Campagnola’s engraving The Old Shepherd (above). Sadly, I was unable to locate an image of this painting, or even determine its current whereabouts, on-line.

The engraving known as The Astrologer (above) is probably Campagnola’s most famous image. It is the only one of his works that is dated: 1509. The odd-looking monster is, according to Jaynie Anderson’s monograph on Giorgione, a dragon: such beasts, she writes, were often depicted in connection with lunar eclipses, and indeed there were two such events in that year.

There is apparently some evidence to suggest that Campagnola entered the priesthood at some point in the early 1510s. He must still have been known as a working engraver, though, as there is a stipulation in the will of the renowned printer and publisher Aldo Manuzio, dated January 1515, that states:

In addition, since there is still to be refined that cursive character that we call chancery, I appeal to my father-in-law Andrea that he have it re-worked and perfected by Giulio Campagnola who should execute the capitals that have to accompany the chancellery letters.

There is no evidence, however, that Campagnola ever completed this commission, and it is supposed that he himself died shortly afterwards.

Click on the images above to open enlarged versions of the same.

Basement

Here’s a little trip into the basement of the building where I live, in a sequence of lightly photoshopped digital snapshots and details thereof…

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Like many basements, it can seem a somewhat creepy place. It occurred to me the other day, when I was down there fetching some laundry, that I should see if I could capture any of its creepiness on camera. I found that the results were just about satisfactory (to me, at least), as long as I kept the camera’s flash turned off, and relied on the ambient artificial light. Alas, in one currently unused (and hence unlit) section of the building, as shown in the final three pictures, I was unable to do this…

Free CD Giveaway

Having successfully disposed of some fifty books through these pages, my attention now turns to my CD collection. I have a few dozen CDs that I’m pretty sure I won’t want to listen to again, and I thought I might try disposing of some of them in the same way that I shifted the books. It has been said that the stuff we throw away says more about us than the stuff we hold on to. If that’s true then the following may tell you a good deal about my taste in music, or perhaps even more about how my taste sometimes doesn’t conform to my own apperception of it. Also, I should have learnt by now to ‘try before I buy’, but still I very seldom do…

To lay claim to one of these discs, leave a comment below stating which of them you’d like. Then, send me an e-mail which includes your mailing address. I’ll decide who gets what (it’s almost always first-come, first-served), and will mail out the discs within a week or so. I’ll limit the offer to two single-CDs or one double-CD per recipient.

1. Kanon Pokajanen, composed by Arvo Pärt, performed by the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir under the direction of Tõnu Kaljuste. This is austere, sacred choral music: beautiful, but I only ever listened to it twice, and even then lacked the patience to play this 90-minute work right the way through. (2 CD set).

2. Orient Occident, again composed by Arvo Pärt. This disc comprises three orchestral/choral works by the Estonian composer, performed by the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, and Swedish Radio Choir, again conducted by Tõnu Kaljuste. I love some of Pärt’s work, but these pieces didn’t catch my imagination.

3. Peteris Vasks’ Symphony no. 2, performed by the Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by John Storgärds, with Vasks’ Violin Concerto ‘Distant Light’, played by Storgärds and the Ostrobothnian Chamber Orchestra, under the direction of Juha Kangas. These are lush orchestral works by the contemporary Latvian composer which have won high praise from the critics, but which failed to float my particular boat.

4. The Complete Piano Music (vol. 1) of György Ligeti, as performed by Frederik Ullén. I admire and enjoy Ligeti’s music, but I don’t listen to it often, and when I do, I tend to put on one of his orchestral works. Here, Swedish pianist Ullén does a fine job with Ligeti’s first and second books of Études, which are, by all accounts, incredibly difficult to play.

5. Alexander Scriabin’s Complete Piano Sonatas, performed by Marc-André Hamelin. I had heard a couple of these sonatas elsewhere & had liked them enough to want to hear more… collectively, however, I found their effect to be off-puttingly numbing. Plus there is something about Hamelin’s playing that I find hard to like (2 CD set).

6. The People United Will Never be Defeated!, composed by Frederic Rzewski, performed, again, by Marc-André Hamelin. This was a disc that sounded interesting: a series of virtuoso variations on the theme of a Chilean protest-song; but which I definitely should have tried before I buyed: I only listened to it once…

7. Sonatas and Interludes for Prepared Piano composed by John Cage, and performed by Boris Berman. I was curious to hear these sonatas, but, curiosity satisfied, I haven’t felt the need to listen to them again.

8. Perpetuum Mobile by Einstürzende Neubaten. While there were a few fine moments on this latest release from the German band, it didn’t hold my attention for long.

9. 26 Mixes for Cash by Aphex Twin. I’m a great admirer of the Twin’s own music, but was underwhelmed by this mercenary selection of remixes (2 CD set).

10. Sheath by LFO. As is too often the case, I bought this out of curiosity, listened to it a couple of times, liked it but did’t love it, & will probably never listen to it again.

11. Summer Make Good by Múm. I had heard only good things about this Icelandic band’s stuff, but was distinctly unimpressed when I listened to this, which I think is their latest release.

12. Calling Out of Context by Arthur Russell. A glowing review in Uncut magazine led me to this disc, which I found moderately interesting, but not so interesting that I’ve felt any desire to return to it.

13. Popular Songbook, recordings by Alan Lomax of Various Artists. This disc collects early recordings of classic songs (Midnight Special, Stagolee, Black Betty, Rock Island Line, etc.) later made (more) famous by other artists. In most cases, alas, long-standing familiarity with the newer (presumably less authentic) versions of these songs just led me to compare these ‘scratchier’ but more authentic renditions unfavourably with them.

14. “Why Don’t You Kill Yourself?” by The Only Ones. I used to own, and came to dearly love a cassette of the Only Ones’ ‘Peel Sessions’. I later bought a CD of their official studio recordings, only to find the latter rather flat and lifeless-sounding by comparison. I recently came upon this 2-CD set in a local store, and, overcome by wishful thinking, bought it, only to realise that the official studio recordings still struck me as lifeless and flat. Oh dear.

15. Virginia Creeper by Grant Lee Phillips. I really liked some of his older stuff, & so snapped this up when I saw it in a Malmö record store. Sadly, I was disappointed when I played it: although there’s nothing obviously wrong with this music, it lacks the spark I thought lit up some of those Grant Lee Buffalo songs.

‘The Hundred-Headless Woman,’ Continued

There follow another seven of the collages from Max Ernst’s 1929 collage-novel, La Femme 100 Têtes (‘The Hundred-Headless Woman’). As in the previous entry, below, my source for these images (and for the quotations that accompany them), was the book Max Ernst edited by Edward Quinn, published by the New York Graphic Society in 1977.

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Where and when did collage first appear? I believe, despite the claims put forward by several of the pioneers of Dada, that it is Max Ernst who is to be thanked for it, at least as regards the two forms of collage furthest from the original idea of glued paper: photographic collage and the collage of illustrations - Louis Aragon, La Peinture au défi, (1930).

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If it is the plumes that make the plumage, it is not the glue [la colle] that makes the gluing [le collage]. One day in the summer of 1929, a painter I knew asked me: ‘What are you doing these days? Are you working?’ I replied: ‘Yes, I'm making gluings [collages]. I'm preparing a book that will be called La Femme 100 Têtes.’ Then he whispered in my ear: ‘And what sort of glue do you use?’ With that modest air that my contemporaries admire in me I was obliged to confess to him that in most of my collages there wasn't any glue at all… Max Ernst (1936), from Beyond Painting (1948).

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The elements he [Max Ernst] borrows are, above all, elements that have been drawn, and it is the drawing that is most frequently replaced by collage. Here collage becomes a poetic process, perfectly opposable in its aims to the collage of the Cubists, which is primarily realistic in intention. Max Ernst borrows his elements principally from printed drawings, drawings for advertisements, dictionary illustrations, popular images, newspaper photographs. He blends them so skilfully into his pictures that sometimes one hardly suspects their presence… - Louis Aragon, from Max Ernst, peintre des illusions (1923).

The titles of the collages above are as follows: Loplop and the mouse’s horoscope; Let us give thanks unto Satan and rejoice in the goodwill he has shown us; The eye without eyes, the hundred-headless woman keeps her secret; The Eternal Father vainly endeavours to separate light from darkness; Spiritual repose; Loplop and The Fair Gardener and The Hundred-Headless Woman Loosens her Majestic Sleeve. Clicking on the images will open enlarged versions of the same.

‘Misfortunes of the Immortals’ and ‘The Hundred-Headless Woman’

Une Semaine de Bonté (A Week of Kindness, 1934) is the best-known of Max Ernst’s ‘collage novels’, but was not the first. As early as 1922, Ernst had collaborated with the poet Paul Eluard to produce a small volume of texts illustrated by twenty-one collages, entitled Les Malheurs des Immortelles (‘Misfortunes of the Immortals’). The first two images below belong to this series.

Disparate elements are here brought together in a less complex and more acute form. The man-beast hybrid makes its appearence and transforms an idyllic interior into a demonic stage-set … The twin starting-points of Max Ernst’s expressive impulse are a search for appropriate avenues for working out in visual terms the private obsessions of his childhood, and also his understanding of the Freudian analysis of such obsessions. His relationship with an authoritarian father, the pressures of middle-class family life, are psychoanalytically interpreted … - U.M. Schneede.

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Ernst’s first collage-novel proper was La Femme 100 Têtes (‘The Hundred-Headless Woman’), which comprised nearly 150 collages, and an accompanying text by Ernst himself. The work was published in Paris in 1929, indtroduced with a prefatory note by André Breton. The six images below are a selection of the collages from this work as reproduced in Edward Quinn’s 1977 monograph on Ernst, which was my source for all of the images and quotations in this entry.

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In contrast to the later Une Semaine de Bonté, La Femme 100 Têtes lacks thematic unity. Max Ernst likes to pounce on taboo subjects. Often the theme of a picture is the Immaculate Conception; on one occasion it is Extreme Unction; then St Nicholas walking on the waters like Christ (and steered by remote control), and finally God the Father involved in an underground railway accident. This anticlerical tendency […] finds expression in the sarcastic distortion of religious rites. Another frequent feature is the exposure of repressed middle-calss notions about sex… - U.M. Schneede.

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The titles of the four images above are, respectively: The unsuccessful Immaculate Conception, The scenery changes three times (III), …and the third time unsuccessful and Show me your suitcase, my dear. The two images that follow bear the titles The Immaculate Conception and Winter visitors on La Grande Jatte.

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Click on the images to see enlarged versions of the same.