Art Sunday; Seasonal paintings.

Above
'The shortening winter's day is near a close
by Joseph Farquharson

The Madonna and Child Enthroned with Saints (Young Baptist and Saints Peter, Catherine, Lucy, and Paul), also known as the Colonna Altarpiece, is a painting by the Italian High Renaissance artist Raphael, circa 1504. It is housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City. It is the only altarpiece by Raphael in the United States.

The Madonna and Child Enthroned with Saints

The collection of Metropolitan Museum of Art also contains a painting of the Agony in the Garden from the predella* of the altarpiece. Other panels from the predella* can be found in the collections of the National Gallery, London, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, in Boston, and Dulwich Picture Gallery, in London. A preparatory drawing by Raphael for the composition of the agony in the garden is in the collection of the Morgan Library in Russia.

*A predella is the platform or step on which an altar stands, predalla = kneeling stool. In painting, the predella is the painting or sculpture along the frame at the bottom of an altarpiece. In later medieval and Renaissance altarpieces, where the main panel consisted of a scene with large static figures, it was normal to include a predella below with a number of small-scale narrative paintings depicting events from the life of the dedicatee, whether Christ, the Virgin Mary or a saint. Typically there would be three to five small scenes, in a horizontal format

The pieces of the predella were separated from the altarpiece and sold to Queen Christina of Sweden, from where they reached Orleans Collection, while the main panels themselves were eventually sold to the aristocratic Colonna family in Rome, from whom the altarpiece takes its name. The Altarpiece was the last Raphael altar in private hands when J.P. Morgan purchased it in the early 20th century for a record price.

That’s the potted ‘history’ of the piece but to me the appeal is in the composition, the precision and the colour. I’m particularly fond of the green angel ……….detail seen above.

Druids Cutting the Mistletoe on the Sixth Day of the Moon’’,

The next painting is a nineteenth century romantic painting depicting the druid ceremonies of pre history. This was utter speculation on the part of the artist because he knew nothing with certainty of the practices of druids
This painting is ‘’Druids Cutting the Mistletoe on the Sixth Day of the Moon’’, by French artist Henri Paul Motte, who worked mostly in Paris, b12 December 1846 d1922. It was painted  in about 1890.
Henri Motte was a student of Jean-Léon Gérôme, exhibiting for most of his life at the Salon des Artistes Français in Paris. He specialised in historical and mythological paintings such as ‘Hannibal Crossing the Rhone’ and ‘Vercingetorix Surrendering to Caesar’. He is best known for his work of the ‘Siege of La Rochelle’, a depiction of Cardinal Richelieu in battle in the 17th century. He completed this painting in 1881.

The Druids Bringing in the Mistletoe

Next is one of my favourites. A Scottish painting that hangs in Kelvingrove Galleries and one I have stood in front of quite a few times. Its one of those paintings that reveals more to the viewer every time it’s seen.
Title: The Druids Bringing in the Mistletoe
by George Henry, Edward Atkinson Hornel (a collaboration but believed to be mostly the work of Hornel)
Date: 1890
Medium: Oil on canvas
Here we see the rite of bringing in the sacred mistletoe. We see a group of Druids or Celtic priests in decorated ceremonial robes in procession down a hillside. The mistletoe has been cut from the sacred oak by a golden sickle held by the chief druid. The procession ride  home  on the backs of the white bulls.
In the 1890s there was a revival of interest in Celtic art and folklore and  both of these paintings were painted during this revival. This painting, dating from 1890, was the first on which the two artists collaborated and is their most daring composition. This canvas, painted by Hornel and Henry, was inspired by the interest at that time in the archaeological discoveries about Kirkcudbright.

A Druidess, holding a sprig of mistletoe and a sickle,
 standing next to a dolmen’

A third painting, painted at a similar time and sharing the revival theme is ‘’A Druidess, holding a sprig of mistletoe and a sickle, standing next to a dolmen’’ (megalithic structure.) It is attributed to French painter Delaroche, again from the late nineteenth century, (although this is not among his better known work and virtually nothing is written about this particular painting).
If this is in fact a work by Paul Delaroche; he was a French painter, of mainly historical subjects, who had a marked influence on the English painter Ford Madox Brown and on other artists of the Pre-Raphaelite movement. Delaroche's studio in Paris was highly regarded in its day:

sheep in winter

These last few paintings are not so much ‘christmas' or Winter Solstice paintings, they are just winter scenes typical of the area where I live. This is what Christmas / Winter Solstice actually looks like. They are painted by Scottish artist Joseph Farquharson.
Joseph Farquharson, (4 May 1846 – 15 April 1935) was a Scottish painter, chiefly of landscapes. He is most famous for his snowy winter landscapes, often featuring sheep and often depicting dawn or dusk. He was born in Edinburgh, Scotland and died at Finzean, Aberdeenshire, Scotland. Joseph Farquharson combined a long and prolific career as a painter with his inherited role as a Scottish laird. He painted in both oils and water colours. His mother, a celebrated beauty, was an Ainslie. His early days were spent in his father's house in Northumberland Street below Queen Street Gardens and later at Eaton Terrace beyond the Dean Bridge, Edinburgh and at Finzean, the family estate in the highlands. His father Francis was a doctor and laird of Finzean. Joseph was educated in Edinburgh and permitted by his father to paint only on Saturdays using his father's paint box. When Joseph reached the age of 12, Francis Farquharson bought his son his first paints and only a year later he exhibited his first painting at the Royal Scottish Academy.

Winter breakfast

Today his paintings grace the front of millions of christmas cards and this is something I struggle with, I can't decide if i approve or not. It's wonderful that so many people get to see his work, but mass production does seem to devalue it.




 

Art Sunday, the Scottish Winter.

Joseph Farquharson
Born Edinburgh, May 4, 1846;
died  at Finzean, Aberdeenshire, April 15, 1935


Born in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1846, Joseph Farquharson was a Scottish painter; He painted in oils and water colors and usually used the Scottish countryside as his subject. His father, Francis, was a doctor and laird of Finzean in Aberdeenshire. Joseph was educated in Edinburgh and as a child only permitted (by his father) to paint on Saturdays, and using his father’s paint box until he was given his own. His first exhibit at the Royal Academy, ' Day's Dying Glow ', was in 1873. Much like other leading Aberdeen artists of his day he bypassed the Edinburgh and Glasgow exhibitions in favor of London because he believed it would gain him wider recognition.

Joseph inherited the title of Laird in 1918 after the death of his elder brother Robert, an MP. Joseph Farquharson trained at the Trustees’ Academy in Edinburgh during the 1860s. "The Painting Laird" as he was called, studied under Peter Graham R.A. and then at the Life School at the Royal Scottish Academy. Farquharson exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1873 and was elected an Associate in 1900.  Farquharson is most famous for his works portraying sheep and snow, both remain a common sight in Aberdeenshire.   

Nearly all the early works were inspired by his rural surroundings and he went on to make snow scenes his trademark.  Other subjects he often painted include small local burns and people fly fishing.

This mans work is very ‘pretty’ and indeed the wintery landscapes of Scotland  ARE very pretty, but as a contrast to Farquharsons work here is a very famous painting.

This was painted in 1882     by Scottish artist James Guthrie (Sir James Guthrie June 10, 1859 – September 6, 1930 ) and is called the Highland Funeral. Guthrie was born in Greenock, the son of a  humble clergyman, who originally enrolled at Glasgow University to study law, but  abandoned this in favour of painting in 1877. Unlike many of his contemporaries Guthrie did not study in Paris, instead he was mostly self-taught. This painting shows the harsh realities that often lay behind the pretty Christmas card scenes painted by Farquharson. Prehaps the difference in interpretation of the Scottish winter originates in the difference in life experience of the two artists, one the son of a Scottish Laird, one the son of a humble clergyman.