Palisades-News-March-18-2015

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Palisades News Page 20 March 18, 2015 J.W.M. Turner: Master of Sea, Mist and Light By LIBBY MOTIKA Palisades News Contributor If the renowned 18th-century British artist J.W.M. Turner could have slipped into the eye of a hurricane, he most certainly would have rendered the power and intensity of the storm looking from the inside out, with an emotional intensity that seemed impossible with paint on canvas. But this was the man who claimed that he was tied to the mast of a ship on the night of a storm and witnessed it for four hours. When looking at the finished painting, “Snow Storm: Steamboat off a Harbour’s Mouth,” the viewer is caught up in that very vortex. Turner was captivated by natural phenomena—sunrises, fog and the mutable skies— J.M.W. Turner self-portrait “The Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons, October 16, 1834.” and he was obsessed with natural catastrophes, raging storms and conflagrations. Turner was captivated by natural phenomena—sunrises, fog and the mutable skies—and he was obsessed with natural catastrophes, raging storms and conflagrations. “When the Tower of London was burning down in 1821, Turner applied to the Duke of Wellington to go into the Tower and make studies, but he was denied. So he made the studies from across the water, which are so incredibly fresh to our eye,” says Julian Brooks, co-curator of the exhibition “J.M.W. Turner: Painting Set Free” at the Getty Museum through May 24. The 60 watercolors and oil paintings on view represent the last 15 years of Turner’s life. Remarkably, these are the most expressive, dynamic and innovative of his life’s work, says Timothy Potts, director of the J. Paul Getty Museum. “This is an exhibition with a thesis,” Potts continues. “It wants to look at Turner’s late work and understand it going back to the end of the 18th century and early 19th century when he is consciously drawing on the work of other great landscape artists. Then you have this flourish that is so totally different. Instead of defining and representing reality in a traditional way, the artist’s late work is much more expressive. It flows between solid and liquid, air and wind and sea—all these elements of nature in a very expressive and atmospheric way. That’s what appeals to modern audiences.” It has Courtesy of the Philadelphia Museum of Art: The John Howard McFadden Collection, 1928 been seen as, in a sense, proto-modern. Turner was born in London in 1775 and lived as the Industrial Revolution was transforming England from hand production methods to machines. He showed an early talent for drawing and watercolor and was admitted to the Royal Academy of Art in 1789 at age 14. During these early years, he developed the custom of traveling throughout Britain, producing a wide range of sketches for working up into studies and watercolors. Throughout his life, Turner continued to travel every summer on his own, often on foot, having no retinue carrying his bags. He had his boots resoled and re-heeled countless times, but he was just driven to carry on. This was where his subject matter was. He expanded his itinerary to the Continent, after the end of the Napoleonic wars in 1815 when Continental travel was possible. Venice was one of his favorite places and it was easy to see why. It was all about (Continued on Page 21) “Venice at Sunrise from the Hotel Europa, with Campanile of San Marco,” about 1840. Photo © Tate, London 2014
March 18, 2015 Palisades News Page 21 “Snow Storm: Steam-Boat off a Harbour’s Mouth,” exhibited 1842. Photo © Tate, London 2014 whole career focuses on the sea. These maritime scenes capture more than just pretty seascapes, but rather show his intensely emotional observations of the play of light on the water and the radiance of the skies. “In ‘Snow Storm,’ the steamboat is absolutely at the mercy of the elements,” Brooks says. “This new technology (steam power) is nothing compared to the power of nature. Here you can’t even see the horizon, it’s a vortex. These veils of spray that come up, you feel it also in the coloring, there is hardly any blue or green—the normal colors you’d find in a maritime picture. It’s really black and white; you feel a seeth - ing power of the ocean underneath.” Critics were outraged by this exhibition. One opined, “It’s just a load of soapsuds and whitewash.” Turner replied, “Well, I wish I’d been in it.” Notably eccentric, Turner had few friends, except for his father, who lived with him for 30 years until his death in 1829. While he never married, later in life Turner lived with Sophia Caroline Booth, in whose house he had rented a room in the seaside town of Margate. The two lived together in Chelsea until his death in 1851. (Mr. Turner, director Mike Leigh’s film currently in theaters, received high marks from the director of the Tate Galleries, who said: “Mike Leigh and star Timothy Spall’s great achievement is showing us how the artist approached the physical business of painting. But they also convey the spirit of a man whose reputation as a curmudgeon is un- (Continued from Page 20) atmosphere. As he said to John Ruskin, the leading English art critic at the time, “Atmosphere is my style.” Success followed Turner’s recognized talent, which allowed him financial independence. His early works stayed true to the traditions of English landscape, but as he aged he began to push the envelope by introducing new subject matter that his contemporaries weren’t painting. “He painted contemporary scenes and much more assiduously than his contemporaries, who were generally working on medieval subjects or pure landscapes, descriptive, photographical landscapes,” Brooks says. By 1835, when Turner was 60 years old, he was at the top of his game, had made a great deal of money, and could have easily settled into a quiet life, but continued to paint. Everything in the Getty exhibition is what he did after that period. About half of his subject matter over his warranted, given his passionate interest in people and the world around him.”) Turner left the majority of his works, over 19,000 works on paper and 200 paintings, finished and unfinished, to the English nation, which are housed at the Tate Britain. The Getty exhibition is the first major exhibition on the West Coast devoted to Turner’s paintings, organized by Tate Britain. On Tuesday, April 14, at 1:30 p.m., Assistant Curator of Paintings Peter Bjorn Kerber and Curator of Drawings Julian Brooks will lead gallery tours of the exhibition. Want a Free Street Tree? Palisades Beautiful, a nonprofit local organization, will plant new trees in the parkways in front of homeowners’ houses. Every street in Pacific Palisades has a designated tree and those planted will follow that pattern. When signing a request form, people promise to follow instructions for a tree’s future care. Palisades Beautiful will arrange to obtain the tree and plant it. “Get Your Free Tree!” flyers are available at the Pali - sades Branch Library or the Chamber of Commerce. The form is also available online at palisadesbeautiful.org. Contact info@palisadesbeautiful.org; or phone Barbara Marinacci at (310) 459-0190 or Marjorie Friedlander (310) 459-7145. Pulp ’n Hide The Candy Alley Brentwood Two great stores in one location! Stationery Leather Photo Albums Blank Page Books Chocolate Bunnies and Eggs Plush Bunnies for Easter Baskets Chocolate Seder Plates for Passover filled with dipped Matzo, Macaroons and Meringues We are back in Brentwood 310-394-0700 pulpandhide@ aol.com at 13028 San Vicente Blvd. Also available at Nate ‘n Al of Beverly Hills Delicatessen. 310-394-0714 candyalley7@ aol.com
Page 1 and 2: Vol. 1, No. 10 • March 18, 2015 U
Page 3 and 4: March 18, 2015 Palisades News Page
Page 7 and 8: Palisades News March 18, 2015 A for
Page 13 and 14: Palisades News March 18, 2015 Page
Page 19: March 18, 2015 Palisades News Page
Page 29: B”H CHABAD JEWISH COMMUNITY CENTE
Page 33 and 34: SPECIAL SECTION Summer Camps & Scho
Page 35 and 36: March 18, 2015 Palisades News Speci

Palisades-News-March-18-2015

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?