Tintoretto Exhibit, National Gallery of Art

Yesterday,Vicky and I went to the National Gallery of Art

to enjoy the large, in more ways than one, Tintoretto Exhibit.

It was a 500 year celebration of the birth 

of this Artist of Renaissance Venice.

Jacopo Timtoretto was born in 1519.

 I am particularly fond of drawings and found 

this preliminary drawing .....

used in a small spot in a near by painting .

I did not take many pictures because I was more interested 

in seeing and reading how he developed his paintings. 

He had many sculptures of human forms in his studio where 

he could make drawings in various perspectives .

 This small hanging sculpture was above the painting so one could 

see the relationship and how he used his various sculptures.

 I could see how he must have used actual models or sculptures 

to have the variety of positions and perspectives 

of the many bodies in some paintings.

So many of the male bodies have that muscular development 

one could see in Michelangelo's art.

 Had to include this writeup and b & w photo of the 

70 foot finished painting in the Doge's Palace.....because....

 This called an oil painting sketch of Paradiso 

must have been his maquette for the 70 foot final Paradiso. 

It appeared about 10 feet long to me., maybe more....

To end this short tour of the Tintoretto exhibit I wanted to show 

Tintoretto's version of The Last Supper. 

With the square table it is so very different 

than the more familiar,  to many,  Last Supper of Leonardo.

I enjoyed the whole day spending a long time with Tintoretto. 

A Walk on the National Mall

Two days before the 2017 Inauguration I took a walk on the Mall 

to see the preparations that were begun and are necessary.

As I came out of the Smithsonian Stop of the Metro, 

the first things I saw were the thousands of portable potties.

 They seems to increase all the time as does the kind fencing. 

Walking toward the castle building there were layers of black fences.

 Outside the Freer Museum so much technical paraphernalia was 

behind its own fence, kind of blocking the entrance.

You see this kind of technical apparatus everywhere.

  In front of the Castle Building and looking across the Mall at the 

Natural History Museum you see a field of white.

 

I knew it was not snow as it has not snowed recently.

So walking over to, what used to be grass, I had to check it out.

 It appears like miles of white tiles. 

They were spongy to walk on (2 to 3 inches thick) and 

much easier than the muddy gravelly walk. 

 Walking on to the Hirschhorn Museum and looking 

in to the Sculpture Garden, everything looked familiar.

 So I turned around and went into the Hirschhorn. 

I had intended to do this for a month now, 

to see the drawings on all of the inside ring of the 

second floor by Linn Meyers,

titled: Our View From Here.

 Going up to the 3rd floor to the window overlooking the Mall

I took this picture, above, looking back toward the Washington Monument.

It was cut it off by the curve of the window.

Then looking the other direction toward the Capitol 

you have a distant view of the National Gallery of Art

with the Capitol hidden by a glass panel.

 Outside the Hirschhorn is Yayoi Kusama's Pumpkin sculpture.

The outer ring of the second floor is now being reorganized 

for the coming exhibition of her Polka Dot art. 

Yahoo Kusama will fill every room with her Infinity Mirrors

and colorful dots when this exhibition opens in February.

 Crossing 7th Street NW I ran into a couple of signs 

that must be everywhere.

Another sign, that got to my thumb in the way, 

as I was debating crossing this line.

 But no problem as I walked on over the spongy tiles and 

down the middle of them to 4th Street, NW toward the Capitol.

Actually I loved walking on this surface and could go everywhere on it. 

 You can see fences to walk between, 

but no one was stopping me from going anyplace, yet.

 Loud speakers and huge screens are up in many places 

for viewers to see what is going on at the Capitol steps.

 From there I cut over to the East Wing.....more portable potties everywhere.

Across the street from the East Wing, surrounding the glass pyramids 

of the National Gallery was more black fencing.

 I do not understand why it is in some places but there is a lot of it. 

 It has always fascinated me the number of white tents 

on top of the buildings along Pennsylvania Blvd, NW.

Many of them are actually for protection of the parade, not just media.

The all glass building is the Newseum and 

the white one with the Maple Leaf flag is the Canadian Embassy. 

I took this picture while standing beside the glass pyramids at the NGA.

I chose to go home on the bus that goes along Pennsylvania Blvd, 

which would be the parade route and saw many of 

these platforms that look like cages. 

There were also several spots with stadium seating being erected.

 Going back to art, at the NGA, is this sculpture called 

a Greek Slave by Hiram Power.

She has chains around her hands.

And at the Hirschhorn, Big Man by Ron Mueck.

Just something to think about.

Three Museum Days

A week or so ago I spent three wonderful art days viewing 

the current exhibits at several museums with my daughter, Vicky.

The first stop was the National Building Museum where the 

unusual exhibit HOT TO COLD: 

An Odyssey of Architectural Adaption was held.

These were models, by the Scandinavian firm, Sagmeister & Walsh, 

cantilevered out from the arches on the second floor.

 They were arranged from Hot to Cold climates as you walked 

around the second floor viewing each model on a platform in an arch.

I'm sorry that I neglected to write down the area 

or city each building or group was planned for.

 This Hot To Cold was the mission of the Bjorke Ingels Group.

Each of these models was on a cantilevered platform that was 

approximately 5 feet wide extended into the open space about 3  feet.

The materials appeared  to be styrofoam, cardboard, and some plastics.

 Needless to say. We were enthralled with the design, 

detail and craftsmanship of each model.

 Our next stop was the Smithsonian's Natural History Museum. 

We saw an exhibit of beautiful orchids and 

I took many many pictures but will post just this one.

We also saw two outstanding photography exhibits with 

huge prize winning photos. One of the American Wilderness 

and the other of Wild Animals of the world.

The next day we headed to the Phillips Collection to see 

two new shows just opening.

Man Ray: Human Equations, A Journey from Mathematics to Shakespeare. 

Some of the mathematical models were from the Sorbonne. 

Man Ray had used them (like the one above0 in drawings and paintings.

There was a video interview with Man Ray 

that explained a lot about his work, 

his artists friends, his homes, and art eras during his life.

The other new exhibit at the Phillips is a small but beautiful 

collection of Hiroshi Sugimoto's large sculpture and photographs.

This exhibit was titled: Conceptual Forms and Mathematical Models.

 After lunch we headed for the National Gallery of Art 

and spent the rest of the day there till it closed.

The new exhibit Piero Cosimo: The Poetry in Renaissance Florence

was the traveling show with some work that had never left Italy before.

There were 44 paintings with both religious themes  and mythological subjects.

 The El Greco exhibit was leaving the following weekend. 

We had to see that again as well. And, I always have to see 

one of my favorite rooms with the Flemish paintings. 

Caroline makes an excellent knowledgeable docent to go with us.

 The following Monday, Dominie Nash, Joan Dryer and I 

saw all the exhibits at the Hirshhorn Museum. 

On the ground floor there are huge graphic quotes 

(Barbara Kruger's Belief and Doubt) 

covering the walls, floor and ceiling. 

I took many pictures and this above is just one that I enjoyed.

This large hanging sculpture was on the third floor with the 

permanent collection.

On the second floor were many videos, collectively titled 

Days of Endless Time. 

Some were meditative, some beautiful, 

some hard to understand but all enlightening.

Those three days were full of such varied art.

I had a wonderful time with good friends and 

days like this should be repeated often.