Pictures taken at the V&A Museum of London

The Cult of Beauty: The Aesthetic Movement 1860-1900

The first major exhibition about the Aesthetic movement takes place in the V&A Museum of London, from the 2nd of April to the 17th of July.

Organised with the Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco in collaboration with the Musée d'Orsay (Paris), it includes paintings, photographs, drawings, portraits, dresses and jewellery of the era, books, and sets evoking the rooms of the typical Aesthetic houses.

The exhibition is arranged in four chronological sections:

The 1860s: focused on romantic bohemians, Pre-Raphaelites and "Olympian" painters: William Morris, Edward Burne-Jones, James McNeill Whistler, and G.F.Watts, as well as paintings by Rosetti and Leighton inspired by their muses Lizzie Sidal and "La Nanna".

The1870s-1880s: focused on the influence between artists and designers for the development of innovative furniture inflenced by Greek and Japanese art: the painter's studio and The White House by James McNeill Whistler and the architect E.W.Godwin.

The 1870s-1880s: focused on decorative arts and its role in the decoration of Aesthetic houses: furniture, ceramics, domestic metalwork and textiles of Walter Crane and Christopher Dresser.

The 1880s-1890s: focused on black-and-white drawings of Aubrey Beardsley in The Yellow Book, bronze sculptures by Alfred Gilbert, concluding with painting masterpieces, such as Leighton's Bath of Psyche, Moore's Midsummer and Rossetti's The Daydream.

As well as the exhibition itself, interesting events are scheduled, such as a discussion about Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray and its adaptation with the film, or a guided tour of Chelsea homes of famous Aesthetes and Tite Street artist's studio.

I will return from the exhibition with all the material and feedback I can obtain to feed this humble blog. Meanwhile, do not miss to visit the exhibition blog, where there is a nice video introduction to Aestheticism movement for the uninitiated in the fieldhttp://www.vam.ac.uk/things-to-do/blogs/creating-cult-beauty

Source: http://www.vam.ac.uk/collections/periods_styles/cult-of-beauty/

 

A Hollywood's Golden Age star has died?

Another Hollywood's Golden Age star has died, leaving us with the feeling that anyone will never bright as she did. In a time when the 7th art was focused on the greatness of humankind and such praiseworthy Renaissance motivations, in contrast with nowadays blockbusters based on special effects and complicated plots, actors were the sole protagonists of the screen, the center part of the picture frame. Either their characters and psychological motivations, or their appearance and body language were revealed fully to the spectator, thus interpretation had to be brilliant. These films were not action-packet, but in fact they did not need to, because they were just mere works of art, masterpieces. And it was due to the grandeur of its stars.

Farina House and Roger & Gallet: two centuries of refined fragance

In 1708, Giovanni Maria Farina, an italian perfum maker, wrote to his brother Jean Baptiste: "I have found a fragrance that reminds me of an Italian spring morning, of mountain daffodils and orange blossoms after the rain". He named his fragrance Eau de Cologne, in honour of his new hometown, Cologne.

The founding of Farina House dates back to 1709. Farina’s list of customers expanded at a great pace and, his perfume, which delighted the upper nobility, soon became a royal and imperial favourite. The company is still run by the founder’s descendants, who are the 8th generation of family members. The company has held Royal Warrants as purveyors of perfume to the German, French, Italian and British Royal Families.

Madrid BP Party

The famous and controversial site http://www.beautifulpeople.com/ launches one of its glamorous parties, this time in Madrid. Worldwide exclusive clubs welcome this events. Few days ago the party took place at the elitist Aura Mayfair Club, in London http://www.auramayfair.com/

Cinematk

Perhaps the best Spanish digital TV channel . It accommodates either Hollywood or Asian and European cinema, either independent films or well-known masterpieces, black-and-white movies, old, avant garde and experimental films, original version with subtitles. Programmes include thematic seasons and off stage documentaries. For those who believe in art as well as entertaiment.

http://www.cinematk.com/



Safe in Their Alabaster Chambers: poetry in the light of Emily Dickinson

Safe in their alabaster chambers,
Untouched by morning and untouched by noon,
Sleep the meek members of the resurrection,
Rafter of satin, and roof of stone. Light laughs
the breeze in her castle of sunshine;
Babbles the bee in a stolid ear;
Pipe the sweet birds in ignorant cadence,--
Ah, what sagacity perished here!

Grand go the years in the crescent above them;
Worlds scoop their arcs, and firmaments row,
Diadems drop and Doges surrender,
Soundless as dots on a disk of snow.

(1861 version) "The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson" by Emily Dickinson

This mysterious woman, this "Myth", conveys in a few words a large amount of feelings. She distresses, dislocates, disorders, frightens. After having read "Safe in Their Alabaster Chambers" (especially 1861 version) I went to sleep upset and I felt that nothing would ever be the same again...

"If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can ever warm me, I know that is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. These are the only ways I know about it. Is there any other way?"–Emily Dickinson

James Dean and Oscar Wilde in the light of Steven Morrissey

"James Dean, even though he was making enormous strides forward with his craft, was still incredibly miserable and obviously doomed. Which is exactly the quality Oscar Wilde had. That kind of mystical knowledge that there is something incredibly black around the corner. People who feel that way are quite special and always end up in a mangled mess."

Steven Morrissey. Smash Hits. June 1984.

 

Editors: ‘In This Light And On This Evening’, a London background

‘In This Light And On This Evening’ was the start of a new chapter for Editors and the band came together in London for the recording sessions with producer Flood at the start of 2009 with a determination to push their sound into wholly new territory. Whilst all four members were keen to make a far more electronic record, they were determined to ‘give the machines a human feel’ in the words of lead singer Tom Smith.
London dominates the record, both lyrically and musically. According to Tom, now resident in the capital for four years, ‘I actually think it’s in every song. In the right time and place, in the right light and on the right evening, something you have seen 1,000 times before can still take your breath away’ whilst the background of electronic whirrs and hums that run under many of the tracks mimic the constant background noise of the city.

Source: http://www.editorsofficial.com/

Ye Olde Fighting Cocks

Ye Olde Fighting Cocks is perhaps the oldest pub in England, dating from around 793. Located in St Albans, on the way from St Albans Cathedral to the Verulamium Park, beside the River Ver. There is a legend about tunnels running between the cathedral and the pub once used by monks. Nowadays there are not cocks fighting outdoors, but wild and fatty ducks running around, old and twisted oaks, and bright and beautiful swans going up and down the river. Indoors there is a  half-light, even heavy, but cosy atmosphere where you can enjoy a beer by the fireplace. At the "Fighting Cocks" you can really taste and smell in olden days.

"The Masque of the Red Death": a relationship between art and nature

"The Masque of the Red Death" by Edgar Allan Poe

The red death had long devastated the country. No pestilence had ever been so fatal, or so hideous. Blood was its Avatar and its seal -- the madness and the horror of blood. There were sharp pains, and sudden dizziness, and then profuse bleeding at the pores, with dissolution. The scarlet stains upon the body and especially upon the face of the victim, were the pest ban which shut him out from the aid and from the sympathy of his fellow-men. And the whole seizure, progress, and termination of the disease, were incidents of half an hour.

But Prince Prospero was happy and dauntless and sagacious. When his dominions were half depopulated, he summoned to his presence a thousand hale and light-hearted friends from among the knights and dames of his court, and with these retired to the deep seclusion of one of his crenellated abbeys. This was an extensive and magnificent structure, the creation of the prince's own eccentric yet august taste. A strong and lofty wall girdled it in. This wall had gates of iron. The courtiers, having entered, brought furnaces and massy hammers and welded the bolts.

Some vintage furniture at grandpa

Aestheticism: an introduction

"Aestheticism is a search after the signs of the beautiful. It is the science of the beautiful through which men seek the correlation of the arts. It is, to speak more exactly, the search after the secret of life." -Oscar Wilde-

Historically aesthetes have been satirised and accused of exaggerated individualism and subjectivity, frivolity, elitism, extravagance, decadence, hedonism, homoerotism, vice and even masochism and sodomy. It has been linked to homosexuality, not only because of the implications of its principles, but also because of the personal sexual tastes of some of its adherents. In an era of rigid moral values, rationalism and industralization, these post romantics were seen as aliens within their society. Somehow they were not accepted neither by an upper class influenced by double moral standards nor by the masses, due to the elititst chatacter of the movement.