Art Detectives

  We began with a treat from one of our friends sharing her photos of a light show on the surface of the Frank Gehry Disney Concert Hall. We looked at the exterior of Gehry’s surreal silver building a few days ago and, luckily, one of our own took these wonderful pics. Beautiful site-specific color splashes on the curvy surfaces of the iconic building. We switched up the art today by leaving Surrealism (for now) and looking at a plethora of fireworks! Top of the Day is Bruce Seeds quilted mastery! Bruce breaks the traditional form of quilting with his brilliant, hexagonal fabric mosaics. This piece entitled, NLZ, looks like an explosion of flowers, holiday & religious iconography, color – a visual feast perfect to ring in the New Year! (NOTE: It's more 8ft by 8ft than 9x9 as I said!) His work & website got everyone excited with several people showing off their family quilts. What a lovely, lovely way to honor our Beloveds at this reflective time. We also looked at Guerra de

  Today’s Top of the Day is Remedios Varo’s Tránsito Espiral (Spiral Transit) from 1962. One of our group suggested we look at her ethereal work. She was a Spanish-Mexican surrealist and worked in Europe & Mexico. She was inspired by many of the Renaissance paintings of which we’ve become familiar, her elongated gothic type figures (albeit small in this painting) spiraling around a central tower in their Bruegel-like boats. The painting also reminded several of us of Heironymus Bosch. The expression of freedom in the form of a bird about to fly out of the tower was a theme that resonated with us all. We also looked at Zenos Frudakis’s moving sculpture, Freedom, which he dedicated in 2001. This twenty-feet long, eight-feet high bronze sculpture weighs seven thousand pounds and is one of Philadelphia's rich treasures. It spoke to many of us about the trepidation one feels when faced with life’s struggles, pulling away cautiously from situations that weigh us down, and then finall

 First up: a video that one of our group members recommended of Johannes Stötter, an outstanding body paint artist. In the video a group of dancers wear body paint that represents animals in the jungle: an owl, a mandril, a lion, among them. At the end, they combine their bodies to make a grand roaring tiger …. surreal body paint art! Our gang loved the visuals. Dazzling! We continued to discuss Leonora Carrington’s statues La Tamboralera (The Drummer); yesterday’s Top of the Day. We didn’t get enough time to explore this large sculpture on Monday, or the variations of it (she did several of the same figure playing her drum) so we spent time marveling at her artistry. In this piece, she seems to have been inspired by some of her surrealist colleagues, Modigliani & Picasso & in turn, she influenced countless artists including Mexican auteur director, Guillermo Del Toro. One of our group said that she was the last of the great surrealists having passed away less than a decade ago

  The artwork of our blog designer & Art Set Builder (how we make our shows) Jerry G started us off! As Jerry wrote, “This is what passes for art to an Engineer” – and everyone relished seeing the world through his eyes. Not only did he craft a grand clock with multi-hued gears, an exquisitely crafted bench with vintage logo,  and  a couple of water-drilled states shaped out of rock & tile – we had two different trebuchet catapults AND a balloon photo from the exosphere! All that & a Cowstronaut!!!!  Check out the art of our members to see his out-of-this-world artistry!   We leapt into the surreal with Max Ernst’s  Celebes  from 1921 – a painting of an elephant shaped Sudanese iron oven with a mannequin pointing us to its giant horned tail. The conversation was lively & curiosity abounded. Maestra of Assemblage Betye Saar created  Window of the Sirens  in 1966 and had us wondering if these winged figures were angels or sirens as well as what the Sun & Moon figure

  We enjoyed seeing folks-that-celebrate show off their Christmas decor or community's holiday decor ! So much creativity in our group -- from lights & bright ornaments, to cow-covered conifer to porcelain loaded branches, to a spindly Grinch inspired hand-painted tree with little escaping bugs -- we oohed, awed, & chortled! We also took a quick look at some Trail or Wayfinder Trees based on some of our earlier discussions.   Top of the Day is a recommendation from one of our gaggle, Niki de Saint Phalle’s Queen Califia's Magical Circle Garden. This lively park in Escondido, California is a master work of mosaic, sculpture, totems, and curvy walls complete with a maze! This homage to the Spirit of California, the goddess Califia, is set in the Iris Sankey Arboretum in Kit Carson Park & begs a visit! Niki was an imaginative artist & we will explore many pieces of her work in future shows. We follow a great crawling dragon up and around the 17 stories of a Buddhis

 We celebrate the photographic art of Barry T , one of our members! His photographs really set our mood in terms of beauty but also in the whimsical & vivid birds he photographs. Barry also shares a rare portrait, the elegant photo of the hands of Ansel Adams as he signed his book, Yosemite and the Range of Light.   Top of the Day is the fairy art of UK sculptor Robin Wight. Robin creates these variously sized dancing flying fairies out of stainless steel. I added a couple more photos as well as; one with a costume per a member’s suggestion to include the color this artist incorporates. You can also see Robin with one of them to show the grand scale with which he works. Florentijn Hofman’s 100 by 60 ft Party Aardvark is passed out! We enjoyed his whimsical creation along with photos of the children in Arnhem, Netherlands, romping all over the lounging colorful, concrete beast! This really is “a piece of art about an Aardvark!” We briefly gandered at one of Hofman's PVC Ducky sc

  Top of the Day is our review of the Women's Building in the Mission District of San Francisco. Muralists Juana Alicia, Edythe Boone, Meera Desai, Irene Perez, Yvonne Littleton, Miranda Bergman & Susan Cervantes began their story-telling visuals in 1993 into 1994. There have been two restorations since. The murals celebrate women's culture, achievements, soulfulness, power, strength & also calls for better rights & healthcare for women. One of our members said she'd take us on a tour of the neighborhood, which is rife with murals, when it's safe to visit! We can't wait!  We started with a quick look at two Quetzalcoatl images: a statue of the snake god in Santa Cruz & a striking mural from Los Angeles. Yesterday's Leonora Carrington mural inspired another check-in with the flying feathered serpent.  One of our members had asked us to look at the Terra Cotta Army which has to be one of the greatest man-made Wonders of the World, whether official

Today was a thrill! We viewed big bold beautiful murals starting with the 8 mile long Amazon Sistine Chapel suggested by one of our group members! This ancient mural dates back 12,500 years and is such a brilliant discovery. Archaeologists, sociologists, art & cultural historians will be interpreting this masterpiece for eons. We've no idea how many people worked on the wall; as the articles say, some of the images are so high up on the rock walls it takes a drone to document it! Our group hopes this treasure can be preserved another 12,500 years and beyond. El Sueño Original (The Original Dream) is a massive 50,000 square foot mural in Wichita, Kansas. It is the largest acrylic mural in the world by a single artist. Armando Minjarez, an immigrant from Chihuahua, Mexico, developed, designed & painted this colossal painting celebrating the patchwork that makes up our heartland: the immigrants, the women, the variety of peoples who, through unity, as one of his assistants sai

Today is Winter Solstice AND the day of the Conjunction of the planets Saturn & Jupiter! We explored both of these planetary giants mythologically & in modern terms in Baroque artist Nicolas Chaperon's The Nurturing of Saturn from the 1640s. Jealous Saturn is looking at baby Jupiter mighty hungrily! But we know his mother will soon hide him away for safe-keeping!  We reveled at Wassily Kandinsky's 1926 orbital masterpiece Several Circles & got lost in the installation art of Liz Tran's Drops, a large, hanging site-specific work with planet-like orbs of varied sizes, buoyant patterns & bright hues.  Lastly, we marveled at Joan Miró's Constellation: Towards the Rainbow from 194. This is one of a series of his paintings exploring the skies (way) above!  Happy Conjunction Junction, everyone!   Nicolas Chaperon, The Nurture of Jupiter, ~1640 -- link -- Kandinsky, Several Circles 1926 -- link -- Liz Tran, Drops, The Seattle Art Museum's Paccar Pav

  Top of the Day is Georgia O'Keeffe's Pink Moon over Water from 1924. We're used to seeing her bold flowers & Southwestern settings; this is a Maine landscape from when she lived on the East Coast. A rich, beautiful vision, we got lost in her magical imagery. We loved the lively designs of fabric & fine artist Lois Mailou Jones whose seven decade career influences fashion design to this day with her vibrant prints.  We immersed ourselves in the giant kinetic (not Kinnecticut, as I kept spoonerizing!) light & fabric sculpture of Janet Echelman. The Moon Flask Decorated with Insects Among Plants on a Chinese Meander Background from the latter 18th century made some of our gang bring their own straw! And finally, we looked at Brazilian artist Tarsila do Amaral's colorful Setting Sun. She's someone whose color & bold forms fit with today's bright offerings!  Here are links to all of todays art Lois Mailou Jones, Textile Design for Cretonne, 192

 Top of the Day is the vibrant explosion of color, a very large mural entitled The Sun by Edvard Munch! Munch is famous for his macabre interpretations of life, The Scream, for instance -- this mural he created is night & day (is this a pun?) from his usual work. Our Grand Gang saw hints of Klimt & they were contemporaries though it's unclear how well they knew each other. But they certainly inspired each other's work.  Our first visual was the Water and Moon Kuan-yin Bodhisattva by an unknown artist around 1227 in a cave grotto! It's part of a series we hope to explore at a later day. We also viewed a 1635 engraving of The Moon in its Final Quarter by Claude Mellan, created only a couple of decades after the (official) invention of the telescope. Such detail for the early 1600s! Finally an eerie (and huge!) painting of The Phantom Canoe: A Legend of Lake Tarawera from 1888 by Kennett Watkins. The legend says a canoe of Maori Spirits appeared ten days before the eru

  Top of the Day is this sumptuous The Moon on the Musahi Plain from the series One Hundred Aspect of the Moon, by innovative block printer & painter, Yoshitoshi, 1892 We viewed the poster art of Antonio Fernández Reboiro, the mesmerizing quilt painting of Maud Schmid (which Greg thought was an actual quilt! Ha!), Tom Pye's set design for the opera Akhnaten, an Ancestral Pueblo Tonto style olla (wide mouthed jar.) We saw a Lee Krasner painting which some people loved but with which others didn't quite connect. Fascinating time as we discover & explore new works with this auspicious group! Here is the list from Today.  Click on the links to see these great works of art again. Announcement Poster for Edipo Rey -- link -- Akhnaten Set by Tom Pye -- link -- Rising Sun Quilt -- link Sun pottery -- link Lee Krasner -- link Japanese Moon -- link

  Top of the show today was Circular forms. Sun and Moon by Robert Delauney If you want to take a closer look at any of today's art, click on the links below Introduction Slide 1 -- link -- Picasso Sun -- link Robert Delauney -- link Marc Chagall -- link John Coburn Sydney Opera -- link Barantino July -- link

Welcome to the Art Detectives (official name still pending).  This was our first show.  The theme for today was the sun.  All of our images were related to the sun. Our Top of the Day pick today was Sun and Life by Frida Kahlo. If you want to take a better look at any of today's art, click on the links below. Introduction Slide 1 -- link -- Snoopy Sees Earth Wrapped in Sunset, Alma Thomas -- link Altar Vessel Sun Solstice unknown -- link Sun & Life, Frida Kahlo -- link Sun, Dale Chihuly, Montreal Museum of Fine Arts -- link --