...and I'm getting a little sentimental.
I am currently sipping on an excessively frothy cinnamon latte. There is not one way that I don't like coffee. Strong and black during the chilly mornings at a campsite or milky and sweet on cool autumn afternoons. Coffee retains its perfection. Never failing and always full of hope. Coffee is much like love.
I don't know how you drink your coffee, but I would encourage you to explore the many facets of the most lovely and bold beverage this earth has to offer.
A sappy post about trees.
I have been living in Chattanooga for almost a month now. I am working long hours, budgeting my time, pretending to budget my money, and the purple dye that graced my hair during the bliss of summer has almost completely faded. It is so strange to be a functioning adult who is worried about car troubles, insurance, and following plans. People all around me are studying at school and making lofty statements about the adventures they're going to have after they graduate and I'm like "Oh yeah, I remember that." I can hear younger me saying "I'm never going to move back home" or "I'm not looking to ever go back to Chattanooga."
When I was a teenager, I would hang my hammock up at the Riverpark almost everyday. While listening to the water move, I would stare up at the tall pines and wish to be like them. I thought that success and beauty looked like those trees: tall, strong, and evergreen. Imagine my dismay when I did not ever grow taller than 5'2", stopped exercising, and faced some particularly sad times.
Humans are not pine trees. They are fruit trees. They grow however tall they need to be, they face seasons, and some of their branches break under the pressure of living. What is supremely lovely about this? Sometimes the branches of a healthy fruit tree are so laden with blooms and sweet things that they hang low-so low to the ground that they can see their beginning.
The reality is, I'm here in Chattanooga and I'm living at my parent's house. I am "getting back to my roots," as they say. However, through running familiar trails, driving old roads, and seeing those friendly mountains, I have been brought tremendous joy. My fruits and blooms have brought me to this place again. I get to spend a prosperous and lush season here, all the while resting in the hope of future growth.
Week one of camp was so crazy and exhausting that it kind of felt like week five. Week two was so high energy and refreshing that it felt like week one. By the middle of week three, I was feeling rested. I'm now halfway through all nations camp (it's already July!) and I'm so confused.
Anyway, the real week one of resident camp was an incredibly large week. We had a record number of campers and half the staff lost their voice by Wednesday. I lost mine mostly because I had to yell so loudly to get someone pass food from one end of the table to the other. Regardless, my campers were so enthusiastic about camp and really well behaved. They meshed well and there was little to no drama. I could not have had a better group to dress up like robots and learn how to do headstands with. Todd and I taught a super cool activity (1Peter1 club) that was all about encouraging words and acts of kindness. We ended the week out by giving Dirk (the camp dog) a bath. A good time was had by all. There are so many other stories I could tell, but those will have to wait for another day.
Week two was so challenging. My cabin was full of interesting twelve year old girls with layered lives and an unhealthy obsession with farts. I'm serious. Our whole skit on thursday was camp songs with new, flatulent lyrics. I had so much fun this week. The girls were really receptive to what was being shared with them. I also taught "Wild Women" this week. Anna and I teamed up and shared wilderness and self-defense skills in this class. We built fires, punched the boy counselors, and made something out of wood. It was one of my favorite activities I've taught all summer. The week ended with hard rain and one of the sweetest talks with my camper in the warm, dusty woodshop.
I expected week three to be crazy. I had thirteen thirteen year old campers with Hannah in the new cabin...which just so happens to be on the boy's side of camp. Honestly, I was predicting drama, sleep deprivation, and purpling issues. Instead, the girls were all friends, I napped often, and they all seemed pretty aware of the fact that boys are gross (especially at age thirteen). The week included some of the deepest cabin devotions and most open porch talks yet. I can honestly say that this past week is one of my favorites I've worked at Cedar Lake. I saw some incredible spiritual growth and experienced the peace that only Jesus can supply.
Rain, rest, and too much coffee can pretty much sum up all nations camp so far. It's been needed and nice.
Sorry for the excessive amount of information. I'll try to not let three weeks go by next time!
The week I spent in Beaufort was probably one of the most joyful weeks of my relationship with David. The beach was beautiful and many smiles (and macarons) were had. We walked the southern gothic streets of Savannah, people-watched at Hilton Head, and ate delicious food by the river. So many sweet conversations happened. Honestly, it was just fun to really spend time with my best friend. Driving away was the hardest because this is summer number three of long distance for us.
I pulled up to Cedar Lake Camp feeling jittery. The stars were perfect, the evening air was chilled, and some of the best people were gathered around a fire. I realized then that this summer would be a new experience. Police Camp had an incredible amount of campers and I spent more time in the camp kitchen than ever. The loud, stressful days gave me pause and when I drove towards Chattanooga friday night, I really wasn't sure if being at camp was a good choice for me.
Last saturday, I helped my brother film a vietnamese wedding. The couple was beautiful and I hope that they are enjoying being newlyweds...However, Jonathan and I couldn't understand what was going on the majority of the day. We also ate some crazy stuff.
When I returned to camp on sunday, I was exhausted. I could not have been less ready for other staff to get there. A semi-quiet afternoon with Hannah at Common Grounds helped calm my spirit. The week was restful and buzzed with anticipation. Early morning runs with Hannah, quiet talks with friends, getting to edit a semester's worth of poetry, and a few days of cold rain created a stillness in me that I have craved since last year. I received a package from David on the day of his surgery and fell a little bit more in love with him as I ate pretty purple macarons he made himself. The training week concluded with prayer, worship, and more prayer on the porch.
I get my first cabin of the summer tomorrow and I'm staying in the first cabin I ever stayed in (five years ago). In spite of the symmetry of being in Big Elk and having 11-12 year old girls, this summer is feeling like a new start.
December began with the most involved art show and ended with the weirdest celebration of New Year's Eve. I graduated and did not feel that much more accomplished as I walked across a little stage in a robe plagued with static cling. I celebrated Christmas at home and moved out of my trusty little basement apartment. Somedays, I still miss The Den. Three camp friends and I counted down to what we thought was midnight in the car after having a drink and appetizers at a random pizza place in Hixson (of all places). We crossed into a different time zone halfway up the mountain, so when we looked at our cell phones, they said 11:00.
January started with a trip to Cedar Lake Camp and ended with me in Nashville almost half-adjusted to my new life. I packed my car with my things and drove to the house of the parents of someone I hadn't seen in nearly two years. Needless to say, I was nervous and awkward during my first days in the Hanson house. I was also nervous and awkward during my first day of interning with Humanities Tennessee, but I don't think anyone noticed. I got lost a lot this month.
By February, I had gotten a job working as a barista at Atmalogy and kind of knew what I was doing at my internship. "Icemaggedon" happened during this month too, so lots of days were spent doing yoga with Lauren and her black cat fella. I celebrated most of my birthday at work, but mama Sue and Lauren threw me a taco party when I got home. Age twenty-two was well-honored with margaritas and the Bachelor. Lots of driving happened in February, because David and I met halfway in little towns and sat up all night in a Waffle House.
March had a rocky start. David got hurt and I ran a half marathon alone. In spite of ruined plans, tears, and crutches, He and I were able to celebrate our two-year date-iversary in Asheville. By this time, I had started visiting coffee shops around Nashville and documenting them with little sketches (these will be shared and written about in due time). The end of March brought sunshine and friends with it. David visited and the Big Hero 6 crew was established. I don't know how I ended up being Aunt Cass, but it fits.
April was poetry month, so I decided to write a poem everyday (I almost succeeded). David and I went to the Frist on his birthday and so David crutched around saying "pip-pip." I met Robert Morgan, Rodney Jones, and Jane Hirshfield in one weekend and spent the rest of the week thinking of smart things I could have said to them. Before I knew it, I had my last day at Atmalogy and at Humanities Tennessee. Margaret Renkl (the editor at Chapter16) presented me with a gift on my last morning with her. Her inscription in the book is as inspiring as the book itself. I'm still so amazed at how great it was to work with her and the exceptional people at Humanities Tennessee.
May is blurring by quickly. So far, I've packed, moved, unpacked, organized, separated, and repacked. Adventures ahead include: Nashville, visiting David, and settling down for the summer at Cedar Lake Camp. I currently don't know anything for sure past August, but that's just fine with me.
There you have it, the last five months in six hundred words.
I'm already running late for my class, so I'll make this quick.
It is sometimes unsettling how ironic life can be. With all the stress of my show (that is a whole separate story) and not getting sleep, I completely ignored the most thoughtful day of the year.
Usually, on the first weekend or so of November, I take a day to pray and thank God for my life. I tend to write something on that day as well. I guess this is my belated thoughtful day.
I have grappled with death for most of my young life. The comfort of it allures me and the endless pressure of being alive exhausts me. A few years ago, near the first weekend of November, I was ready. I was selfish and wanting to be done. But I was stopped. Not by a fire, not by a storm, not by a wind or an earthquake. I was stopped by a gentle whisper. He whispered "Live" and breathed His peace into me.
Last weekend, I had the pleasure of putting up an installation centering around the idea of abundance and human reaction to overgrowth. It explored how too much of something and living life trying to be in control often leads to extinguishing joy. In hindsight, it makes so much sense that would be on my "life-iversary." I tried to control my life and it almost led me straight to death.
I want to encourage you to live with open hands. Receive the love, blessings, and peace that come from knowing Jesus. Life will not be easy to live. However, you will have a hope to hold on to.


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I am planning on beginning my maternity leave this week, and do not plan to be at church Sunday. The talented and terrific Stasha Lewis will be stepping into my role as Sunday School leader, setting up the activities, leading Christmas Play Practice and coordinating Sunday School teachers. Please, offer to lend her a hand and give her huge thanks as she takes on these responsibilities! I will be accessible via email and phone while I am on leave, please don't hesitate to reach out if needed. I'll still be sending weekly emails, and can help with things remotely as needed. Thank you again for your support of our growing family!
Based on the google form you filled out, I have done my best to match children with Christmas Play parts and parents with volunteer roles. Below are two documents, one with the casting and program text, one with parent volunteer assignments. Please take a look and let me know if I have made any errors or assignments that do not work for you. Thank you!
All kids are invited to join the WPC Children's Choir for a few weeks of practice, then a performance at the 7 p.m. service on Christmas Eve. Thank you to Sabrina Cole and Marian Florence for leading this effort! When Stasha rings the tambourine for Sunday School this week, choir participants will go to the choir loft with Sabrina and Marian to practice, then will join their Sunday School classes at 10:30.
3-5 year olds will be in the nursery, lead by Eric.
k-6th graders will go to the gym for Sunday School during Advent. Stasha will lead everyone in Christmas Play practice. Then classes will move together throughout the gym completing stations that include games, crafts and discussions about the season of Advent.
Mark your calendars for Sunday, Dec. 2, from 5-7 p.m. as we once again begin the season of Advent with a festival full of food, crafts, music and live animals. See the church announcement page for more information, and Click here to sign up to help out!
Join us for dinner and a Christmas Movie on Friday, December 7 at 6 p.m. in the Loft. Pizza and popcorn provided, bring a side dish to share. If you plan on coming, please RSVP by clicking Dec. 7 RSVP.


text:
Iwao Hakamada est un ancien boxeur professionnel japonais né le  à Shizuoka au Japon.

Accusation de meurtre
Alors employé dans une usine de soja, il est arrêté en  pour le meurtre de son patron, de l'épouse de ce dernier et de leurs deux enfants puis est condamné à la mort par pendaison deux ans plus tard. Clamant à plusieurs reprises son innocence, la peine est maintenue par la cour d'appel de Tokyo en 1976 puis par la Cour suprême du Japon en 1980.

Des projections de sang avaient été trouvées sur un pantalon. Des analyses ont prouvé que l'ADN n'était ni celui d'Iwao Hakamada ni celui d'aucune des victimes. Le , il est finalement libéré après avoir passé environ un demi-siècle dans le couloir de la mort et sera rejugé. Il détient le record du condamné à mort ayant passé le plus de temps dans le couloir de la mort.

Le 24 décembre 2020, la Cour suprême nippone casse la décision de la Haute cour de Tokyo, laquelle bloquait la réouverture de son procès. Cette dernière devra donc se pencher à nouveau sur cette affaire.

Références

Voir aussi

Articles connexes

 Peine de mort au Japon

Liens externes
Hakamada, 48 ans dans les couloirs de la mort
 « Japon: le plus ancien condamné à mort va bénéficier d'un nouveau procès »

Naissance en mars 1936
Boxeur japonais
Condamné à la peine de mort au Japon

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
The Jews of the Middle East and North Africa in Modern Times
Reeva Spector Simon, Michael Menachem Laskier, Sara Reguer
Columbia University Press, Apr 30, 2003 - History - 432 pages
Despite considerable research on the Jewish diaspora in the Middle East and North Africa since 1800, there has until now been no comprehensive synthesis that illuminates both the differences and commonalities in Jewish experience across a range of countries and cultures. This lacuna in both Jewish and Middle Eastern studies is due partly to the fact that in general histories of the region, Jews have been omitted from the standard narrative. As part of the religious and ethnic mosaic that was traditional Islamic society, Jews were but one among numerous minorities and so have lacked a systematic treatment.
Addressing this important oversight, this volume documents the variety and diversity of Jewish life in the region over the last two hundred years. It explains the changes that affected the communities under Islamic rule during its "golden age" and describes the processes of modernization that enabled the Jews to play a pivotal role in their respective countries in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The first half of the book is thematic, covering topics ranging from languages to economic life and from religion and music to the world of women. The second half is a country-by-country survey that covers Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israel/Palestine, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Yemen, Egypt, the Sudan, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco.
Page xxi
Page xix
Page xx
Part 2 COUNTRYBYCOUNTRY SURVEY
The Jews of the Middle East and North Africa in Modern Times, Volume 1
Reeva S. Simon,Michael M. Laskier,Sara Reguer
Reeva Spector Simon,Michael Menachem Laskier,Sara Reguer
activities Algeria Algiers Anatolia Arab areas Ashkenazim authorities Baghdad became began British called chief rabbi Christian cities continued culture developed early economic Egypt Egyptian emigration established Europe European example figures followed foreign France French girls Hebrew important increased influence institutions Iran Iraq Iraqi Islamic Israel Istanbul Italian Italy Jerusalem Jewish community Jewry Jews known land language later leaders lived major Middle East Middle Eastern modern Moroccan Morocco movement Muslim nineteenth century North Africa opened organizations Ottoman Ottoman Empire Palestine percent period Persian political population Press published rabbis region religious remained result rule schools secular Sephardic served social society Spanish status synagogue Syria teachers thousand tion Torah trade traditional Tunisia Turkey Turkish twentieth century University Western women World Yemen young Zionist
Reeva Spector Simon is associate director of the Middle East Institute at Columbia University and author of Iraq Between the Two World Wars. Michael Menachem Laskier teaches at the newly created Department of Middle East History at Bar-Ilan University, Israel, and is the author of eight books, including Israel and the Arab World: Israeli-Maghrebi Common Interests,Encounters, and the Arab-Israeli Conflict (forthcoming). Sara Reguer is chair of Judaic studies at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York.
Title The Jews of the Middle East and North Africa in Modern Times
Editors Reeva Spector Simon, Michael Menachem Laskier, Sara Reguer
Publisher Columbia University Press, 2003
History / Middle East / Egypt

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Cuspidaria parva är en musselart. Cuspidaria parva ingår i släktet Cuspidaria och familjen Cuspidariidae. Inga underarter finns listade i Catalogue of Life.

Källor

Musslor
parva


Maybe it can't be reformatted because windows is accessing it as a readyboost drive. Try turning off the readyboost option. I don't recall where it's done, but it's most likely in the properties for the drive. You'll probably have to reboot. Then try to format it again.
Last edited by ThunderRd; 4th November, 2011 at 04:48 AM.


The comic is on hiatus for at least a week, following Rick's hospitalization. You can get status updates via @HousepetsComic.
All my best to the man. Take good care of yourself, Rick!
Oh my gosh. I hope whatever happened wasn't too serious.
... I am utterly bummed right now.
That sounds horrible. I hope everything will go ok with his recovery.
Oh my...well, I hope Rick gets better soon, best of luck Mr. Griffin.
And, yaknow, Rick's health is a concern too.
Get better soon, my fluffy friend!
As I said on Twitter I hope Rick gets well soon. Luckily everything went alright.
I hope every thing's ok.
It's at times like this, we must make the call ~ For Duty and Humanity!
Uh oh. I hope nothing too serious happened! This is seriously bad.... I hope his recovery goes well!
Get well, Herr Griffin. Your health is in our thoughts and prayers.
Any way we can send him an overwhelming quantity of Get Well Soon cards?
Hope you get well soon, Rick.
He can he can he can and HE WILL!!! WOO-HOO!
Wow, sorry to hear. But it's good to see the surgery went well.
Hope you have a speedy and relatively painless recovery, Rick.
I hope you feel better Rick! Make sure you rest and get better soon!
So I mostly registered to post this, but I do wish you the best of luck in your recovery Rick. You've easily become one of the coolest webcomic authors out there, easily up there with Penny Arcade in my favorite webcomics. Nothing but best of wishes, dude.
I think his being in the hospital had something to do with the ice cream he ate the night earlier.
Another Update on Ricks condition Hes doing much better now and the X-rays and Labs came back good.
Looks like Karishad's idea worked.
I hope Rick feel better soon. I hope Rick will soon be restored to health!
Will his insurance cover all of the hospital costs, do we know? Otherwise someone's gonna hafta start a donation pool toward that cause. Rick would really grateful to know that there are those of us who truly care about him as a person. Becos' he does have a real life other than updating the Comic. 'Sides it's certainly alot more meaningful than everybody leaving half-hearted oneliners.
Test the loyalty of the fans where it really hurts the most.
I'll gladly hand out my wallet as soon as I have recharged it.
He doesn't though. He squirmed a lot.
wait til he's completely recovered.


text:
Artwatch Protecting Art
Posts tagged "The Philadelphia Museum"
Barnes, Burrell and a Beck Memorial Lecture: "Philippe Mercier Watteau's English Follower" ~ by Martin Eidelberg
In 1991 a restorer brought Professor James Beck of Columbia University to trial in four Italian cities on charges of aggravated criminal slander. (Beck's comments to one journalist had been carried in four regional newspapers.) Facing a possible three years jail sentence and ruinous, punitive damages – the restorer demanded 60 million lire for "material and moral damages" – Beck was exposed, vulnerable, alone. The restorer had sued Beck but not the four newspapers that had carried the allegedly damaging comments by the world's leading authority on Jacopo della Quercia, whose famous marble carving in Lucca Cathedral, The Ilaria del Carretto, had been stripped of its ancient patina in a "conservation treatment" that included being blasted with particles to remove abrasions and scratches and saturated with penetrating oil to produce a homogeneously shiny surface (see Figs. 2 and 3). Despite the awfulness of the restoration everyone expected Beck to lose. One person who knew that he was going to lose – the trial judge in Florence – told the prosecuting lawyer as they left the court building together for lunch on the first day of the trial that he would find the scholar guilty: "Eh, but I shall convict him".
Fortunately, that declared intention was overhead by an intern-lawyer and former policeman who happened to be working for Beck's own lawyer. The judge and the lawyer disputed the attributed words but not the fact that they had left the court talking to each other about the case. Despite their joint denial, eventually, the judge was replaced and Beck was acquitted. (The story of that trial is told in the book "Art Restoration ~ The Culture, the Business and the Scandal" by James Beck and Michael Daley.) By then, Beck had resolved to set up an international organisation dedicated to speak and act on behalf of art against harmful practices and abusive or exploitative treatments. ArtWatch International was founded in 1992 to be that organisation.
When Beck died in 2007 we knew that the best way to honour his courageous stance was by continuing to campaign through ArtWatch. At the same time, to commemorate his achievements as a rigorous (Rudolph Wittkower-trained) scholar and highly popular teacher, we instigated an annual memorial lecture, alternating between London and New York, to be given by scholars of high esteem. We have been honoured by talks from Professors Hellmut Wohl and Charles Hope in London in 2009 and 2011, and by Professors Mark Zucker and David Freedberg in New York in 2010 and 2012.
The fifth lecture was given in London this year on September 30th by Professor Martin Eidelberg at the Society of Antiquaries of London in Burlington House. It was a sparkling and instructive occasion as Professor Eidelberg showed (through more than fifty PowerPoint slides) a succession of visual comparisons which deftly separated the subject of his talk, Watteau's English follower, Philippe Mercier, from the many inferior works that had been attached to the artist as a kind of attributional flag of convenience, thereby exposing the intriguing conundrum of a painter of considerable quality who had remained a faithful pastichist of his chosen master, borrowing motifs at every step of his own career. An account of this elusive artistic entity will be carried in the next ArtWatch UK journal – just as the fourth lecture by Charles Hope ("The National Gallery Cleaning Controversy") is carried in the current journal. Professor Eidelberg cites on his (excellent, as Selby Whittingham describes below) website, Watteau and His Circle, an anecdote about the friend of a colleague who responded to a general archaeology exam question with:
"an incredibly detailed answer about a minor type of Roman provincial pottery. The examiners were bowled over by this man's extraordinary knowledge on such a minuscule topic, but then asked him why he had expended so much energy on a subject that only three or four people in the world knew anything about. His reply was 'I realize that, but with them I have such interesting conversations.'"
Martin Eidelberg expresses the hope that his own essays will find a readership, encourage others' research, lead to stimulating conversations on the art of Watteau and his circle. Certainly, his lecture on the 30th left the (distinguished) audience delighted and flattered to have been party to so discriminating and illuminating a conversation. Given the talk's rarified subject it seemed appropriate to ask a specialist in the field, Selby Whittingham, who is Secretary of the Watteau Society, Donor Watch and The Independent Turner Society to offer a note on the speaker and his researches.
Dr Whittingham recalls:
"It is 29 years since I first met Martin Eidelberg at the colloquium at Paris to celebrate the tercentenary of Watteau's birth, to which we both contributed, Martin on Watteau and his early master, Gillot. The speaker immediately preceding myself, Brian Allen, spoke about early imitators of Watteau in England, of whom "easily the most important" was Philip Mercier. Fifteen years earlier John Ingamells and the late Robert Raines, a founder member of the Watteau Society in 1984, held an exhibition on Mercier at York Art Gallery, followed by a catalogue of his works published fittingly by the Walpole Society (Horace Walpole having owned an actual Watteau, now at St Petersburg).
"As Martin's conclusions will appear in his excellent Watteau blog, suffice it to say that he has once again challenged accepted views and causes us to revise our ideas about Watteau and his satellites. It was a rare privilege for a London audience to hear such an erudite talk, as the subject of Watteau long bypassed London, the blame for this being laid on the embargo put by Lady Wallace on the Wallace Collection from lending any of its pictures! However the accession of Christoph Vogtherr as its Director (successor but one to Ingamells) has now shown that need not be so, and that scholarly publications are not dependent on blockbuster loan exhibitions. On the other hand it is regrettable that an exhibition, mainly of photographs, on Watteau's techniques held just after the tercentenary at Brussels never transferred, as its organisers had wished, to England, as the matter would have been of great interest to supporters of ArtWatch, some of whom will remember how a conservation mistake was shown by Martin Eidelberg at a previous meeting to have obliterated additions to a painting made by Watteau himself."
The earlier ArtWatch talk to which Selby Whittingham refers was much appreciated by James Beck. As well as providing a platform for good talks, Artwatch soon discovered that people feel freer to approach and pass on intelligence to a dedicated organisation than to individuals. One of the first to do so was Nick Tinari, a young electrical engineer and devoted student at the Barnes Foundation in Merion, Pennsylvania. He brought news of an attempt to overturn a prohibition on loans of art works from the Barnes Foundation's fabulous collection of modern paintings. This, indeed, was alarming: tours not only constitute greatly increased risks (six-fold in the judgement of one insurer) but too often serve also as pretexts for "conservation treatments". With the Barnes collection (as with that of the Sterling and Francine Clark collection – see "Taking Renoir, Sterling and Francine Clark to the Cleaners"), the now-at-risk paintings were in the best, which is to say, least-restored conditions.
The justification for the proposed breach of a fabulously generous donor's wishes and conditions was that money could be raised through a foreign tour of key works in the collection to make "conservation" improvements to the building in which the collection was housed. Alleged conservation needs provide morally-coercive cover for many professional expansions and building projects. Tinari saw the proposal as a ruse contemptuous of Barnes' intentions and philosophy. Events proved him right – the assets of an institution were effectively hi-jacked and its educational purpose greatly subverted. The story of that heist has been well told (and see Tinari's own comments below). Less sufficiently appreciated is Tinari's own remarkable and tenacious defence of Barnes' wishes and instructions against the hot-shot lawyers of the would-be institutional transformers. Those encounters so sharpened his awareness of and appetite for the law that he turned to law school himself and now works as a patents attorney.
Artwatch has always seen itself as something of a standard bearer and supporter of other worthy autonomous campaigns on Art's behalf. James Beck had great fondness for courageous campaigning individuals and created a small prize which he named after the New York painter Frank Mason. Mason, a longstanding and popular traditionalist teacher at New York's famous Art Students League (among his student/devotees was the great American satirist and author of "The Painted Word", Tom Wolfe), was a pioneering anti-restoration figure in the US, leading marches of artists and students at the Art Students League to the Metropolitan Museum in protest at its picture restorations. In opposition to the cleaning of the Sistine Chapel ceiling he enlisted the engagement of the writer and former art critic of Time Magazine, Alexander Eliot. With the philosopher Thomas Molnar and the cultural historian Arcadi Nebolsine, Mason had founded The International Society for the Preservation of Art, which organisation was incorporated within ArtWatch International at its 1992 foundation.
At this year's James Beck Memorial Lecture we awarded the 2013 Frank Mason Prize to Nick Tinari. He, like Selby Whittingham (the recipient of the 2011 Frank Mason Prize), has joined our campaign against Glasgow City Council's attempt to have conditions of Sir William Burrell's bequest overturned by the Scottish Parliament so as to permit foreign tours of works from the collection. The submissions to the Scottish Parliament made by Donor Watch, Nick Tinari, and ourselves, can be read at this site. Evidence given to the Parliamentary Committee by ArtWatch UK and others can be seen here.
Nick Tinari's submission begins:
"I am a practicing attorney and an electrical engineer. I am also an alumnus of the education program of the Barnes Foundation in Merion, Pennsylvania. Like Mr. Burrell, the founder of the Barnes Foundation, Dr. Albert C. Barnes, made his gift of an extensive art collection including the stipulation in an Indenture of Trust that none of the works should be loaned. This stipulation was temporarily breached in the 1990s based on the argument that the foundation was lacking funds to maintain theMerion gallery and that a "once-in-a-lifetime" opportunity had opened for a tour of the artwork to Washington D.C., Paris and Tokyo, with the French and Japanese venues paying a total of $7 million for the loan. This was one of the earliest instances of outright rental of artwork for exhibition and at the time the largest sum ever paid for such a transaction. Since then, the practice has become commonplace…"
In view of this great familarity with the Barnes case and its clear relevance to present considerations of the private bill presently before the Scottish Parliament, we asked Nick Tinari if he might address that relationship when making his response to receiving the Frank Mason Prize.
Nick Tinari's response:
"I want to thank everyone at ArtWatch for awarding me the Frank Mason prize this year. I've worked alongside ArtWatch for many years and they are doing important work that no one else is addressing, namely, protecting our artistic heritage for the long haul, not just for the next exhibition or next year, but for as long as we will continue to recognize artistic genius, which hopefully is a very, very long way out.
"In addition to being a remarkable artist and teacher, Frank Mason was an early voice against imprudent "restoration" of artwork. We are in the small club of those who organized protests at museums, his in the 1970s at the Metropolitan Museum and mine in the 1990s at the Washington National Gallery and Philadelphia Museum of Art.
"I met Jim Beck many years ago when I was trying to stop the dismantling of the Barnes Foundation in Merion Pennsylvania. One aspect of the plan to break the founder's will was an international tour of 80 works from the collection. It was a story that is very similar to the current plans for the Burrell Collection in Glasgow. The trustees no longer had connections to the donor or his intent and they wanted to elevate their own agendas and "put the Barnes on the map," which was, of course, ridiculous because the Barnes Foundation was world-renowned long before the arrival of new trustees.
"I asked Jim for help because the tour organizer, the Washington National Gallery of Art, wanted to remove varnish from many of the works, many of which came into the collection directly from the artists' studios and thus were in pristine condition, even if not bright enough for the kinds of shows the National Gallery puts on.
"This was in the infancy of ArtWatch and Jim wrote some letters and we did press releases together and got some attention to the matter. In the end, the works were not touched for the tour, the rumor being that the French organizers objected to altering the paintings, although some of the same institutions have certainly made their own mistakes since then.
"Between 1993 and 1995, roughly 80 Barnes paintings did travel to Washington, Paris, Tokyo, Fort Worth, Toronto, Philadelphia and Munich. Because I did not believe the National Gallery's officials' promises about the supposedly careful transit conditions—they actually claimed the works would be safer on tour than in Merion—I examined the works myself in Washington, Paris, Fort Worth, Toronto and Philadelphia. Aided by the condition reports for the paintings prepared before the tour by the National Gallery and which I obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, I documented damage to several works as they were moved from city to city.
"The most dramatic damage that I saw was in the form of stretcher creases extending the width of one of the four-meter-wide canvas sections of Matisse's la Danse [see Figs. 24 and 25], which Barnes commissioned for three lunettes in the central gallery at Merion [see Fig. 17]. Contrary to National Gallery testimony that climate-controlled trucks would be used, the large panels were shipped from Merion to Washington in open-air flat bed trucks in 40 degree Fahrenheit weather and then laid flat and rolled up to a special opening in a large window at the National Gallery [see Fig. 19]. I did not witness it, but presumably, a similar procedure was used to move the panels to the Musee d'Art Moderne in Paris. We have photos of the arrival of the panels at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, again on open trucks and again laid flat before being moved into the building.
"These photos [Figs. 24 and 25] show the damage as I recorded it at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, where the painting was on display while the remaining works traveled to other cities. The National Gallery's incredible response was that they simply had not noted the stretcher creases on the original condition reports. This is belied by an earlier report prepared by chief conservator, Ross Merrill, prior to removal of the work from the Barnes' walls. In the report, Merrill states that the panels were in "remarkably good condition . . . taught and in plane." An independent conservator, Paul Himmelstein, testified that the stretcher creases were typical of damage caused by laying a work horizontal against its stretchers, especially during a period of change in relative humidity. That is exactly what one would expect in bringing the work from the heated gallery in Merion to an unheated ride down I95 to Washington and then to be laid flat on the ground there. Prior to this, the work had not been off the wall or out of vertical position since Matisse saw it installed in 1934.
"A second instance of National Gallery mendacity involved the large Seurat les Poseuses, which a previous conservator at the Barnes Foundation stated should not travel [see Fig. 23]. The National Gallery approved the Seurat's travel but, remarkably, changed its mind after the work had been to Washington, Paris and Tokyo. The claim was that the painting was not damaged but just should not travel any further. Of course this makes no sense. Either the painting was in the exact physical condition that it was in when it left Merion and thus fit for continued travel or it had been degraded since Merion, which was why it was no longer fit for travel. I suppose the third option is that, as the earlier conservator observed, the work was never in condition to travel and the National Gallery, having now exhibited the rare work, was willing to reverse itself, while not admitting that the decision to allow travel was wrong from the start. At least for now, the painting has this helpful footnote in its record should the urge to tour it arise again, although, as in the case of the Matisse, it is pretty clear that Alice in Wonderland rules apply to statements from the National Gallery.
"The final affront to the Matisse occurred only recently when it was moved from Merion to a new gallery in Philadelphia. As it played out, the agenda to put the Barnes Foundation "on the map" did not mean on a map of Merion, Pennsylvania but five miles away in center city Philadelphia. Anyone interested in the full saga of the complete reversal of Barnes' wishes that the collection remain in Merion as primarily a teaching collection should view the 2009 documentary The Art of the Steal or consult John Anderson's recently-updated book Art Held Hostage. As for the Matisse, the architects and the Barnes trustees responsible for dismantling Barnes' express mandate for the collection's use and display did not recreate in Philadelphia the same building details that Matisse worked to. Rather, in keeping with the Modernist design of the new Philadelphia gallery, they eliminated oak moldings above three windows that Matisse clearly used as visual pediments supporting the figures in the mural [see Figs. 17 and 18]. In place of these visual anchors, there is now a wide strip of bare wall with the figures in the work now adrift. This stripping of the Merion details is so obvious a disturbance of Matisse's harmonization of the mural to the Merion building that it displays the complete and utter ignorance of both the architects and the Barnes trustees, some of whom fancy themselves as "important" collectors, whose mediocre accretions are regularly exhibited with the connivance of the Philadelphia Museum of Art on whose board they also sit.
"The Barnes matter is unfortunately being replayed nearly verbatim in Glasgow at the Burrell Collection. The present stewards of the collection want to remove Burrell's restriction against the works travelling outside of the UK. The premise is the same as it was in Merion, namely, there are insufficient funds to repair the gallery and touring the collection would raise funds, while the real motive, as with Barnes, is to use a tour of the artwork to put Glasgow "on the map." ArtWatch has joined this present battle, and rightly so, because, collections like Barnes and Burrell are special islands of calm in a noisy field where art is now seen as a commercial enticement for tourist dollars. The conditions that Barnes and Burrell attached to their generous gifts should be observed not only because of the moral imperative, but because I think it is important to have at least some small part of the cultural heritage that is not subject to commercial pressures and dangers of endless tour schedules and inevitable damage and repair, not to mention the desire to brighten up works to suit viewers jaded by digital, LCD-lit images. Because Barnes had such restrictions on his collection, the works were not hastily cleaned when most museums were doing so. I fear that the rare condition of these works is now in jeopardy as they have now become part of Philadelphia's self-declared "museum mile."
"Jim Beck used to say that the experience between the artwork, and by extension the artist, and the viewer is a fragile one, an experience that cannot bear the weight of other agendas like blockbuster tours and "civic boosterism". ArtWatch was founded to "speak for the art." As the Barnes Foundation and Burrell Collection demonstrate, there will always be a need for that voice to be heard and I am glad to be a part of that effort."
In his closing remarks Nick Tinari evoked one of James Beck's greatest fears: that Art's welfare is increasingly considered secondary to that of certain vested interests and professional groups. A key and modish contention employed by those who would overturn Burrell's prohibition on foreign loans is that they wish to increase "access" to art – when art can only ever be in one place at a time and shuttling it around necessarily means that, in addition to being exposed to greatly increased risks, it becomes inaccessible to anyone except professional art handlers for long periods of time between venues, and entirely inaccessible in its home for what can be exremely long periods. A second contention (which we examine in a forthcoming post) is that shuffling art around facilitates scholarship. Many have complained that the scholarship connected with blockbuster exhibitions is often poor and meretricious. James Beck further held in the Art Review ("Facts and Fictions of Restoration", January 1999), that the scholarly spin-off of such exhibitions constitutes a professional inducement to take risks:
"The 'new' interpretations of one artist or another which result from the blockbuster offer the art historian the opportunity to participate in the resulting symposia and international congresses. The same is true of following the restorations of well-known or important works. These too require a whole new apparatus. What art specialist would be willing to forego a role in these activities? This would mean being left out of the massive catalogues that usually accompany art spectaculars. For those who enjoy it, there also opportunities to participate in television interviews or appear on any CD-ROM merchandise. Each of these can involve substantial compensation."
Michael Daley
Comments may be left at: artwatch.uk@gmail.com
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Above, Fig 1. Professor James Beck (born 14 May 1930, died 26 May 2007) photographed in his office at Columbia University by Dr Lynn Catterson.
Above, Figs. 2, 3 and 4.
Fig. 2 (top) Jacopo della Quercia's Ilaria del Carretto before restoration. Fig. 3 (middle) the Ilaria after treatment by a restorer who vainly attempted to return the (nearly six centuries old) monument to "its original state". Fig. 4 (above) an article in the Independent celebrating James Beck's acquittal in Florence on 7 November 1991. On the final day of the proceedings, Beck (who had returned to teaching at Columbia University) had submitted the following statement:
"During the past three decades I have pondered the art of Jacopo della Quercia and have studied his sculptures together with those of his contemporaries, including Donatello and Ghiberti, and those of his followers, chief among them being Michelangelo. I have sought to extract from the documents related to his life and works insights in order to elucidate the art of this Tuscan master. I suggest that I have earned the right to speak in a public forum about his art. In fact, after a dreadfully long space of time, my third book dealing with the artist, a monograph in two volumes ["Jacopo della Quercia"], has finally appeared.
"I believe that not only do I have the right to defend his magnificent statues and reliefs against what I believe to be mistreatment, I also have an obligation to do so: if I declined to speak out, it would be I who were negligent. I would have failed in my duty as an academic, as an art historian and as an art critic to express an expert opinion in the marketplace of ideas. This does not suggest that there there are not other expert opinions which might not agree with mine, nor do I claim a special privilege. Yet following a scholarly preparation and long experience with the material, and, I might add, a period when I was a student at the Academia delle Belle Arti in Florence, not to have spoken out would have been not merely cowardly, but a dereliction of duty.
"The possibility that the considered observations of art critics and art scholars should not be aired, or that their judgements need to be cloaked in palliative euphemisms if they are expressed at all, is a dangerous precedent for the principle of free speech and free criticism. If such rights, which are guaranteed by the world charter of the United Nations and by the constitutions of both the United States and Italy, among others, were qualified, the effect would be chilling, and certainly the true losers would be the art objects of the past and future generations who have every right to expect to enjoy and learn from treasures of the culture, conserved and preserved in the best manner possible."
THE FIFTH ANNUAL JAMES BECK MEMORIAL LECTURE
Above, Figs. 5, 6, 7 and 8; below, Fig 9. Martin Eidelberg delivering his talk on the identity and accomplishment of Philippe Mercier, details of whose L'Heureuse rencontre (oil on canvas, 35 x 30 cm. California private collection) are seen at Figs. 5 and 9. (All photographs of the lecture were by Gareth Hawker.)
THE 2013 FRANK MASON PRIZE
Above, Fig 10. ArtWatch UK's director, Michael Daley, discussing the origins of ArtWatch International and announcing this year's winner of the organisation's annual Frank Mason Prize – Nicholas Tinari.
Above, Figs. 11, 12 and 13.
Top, Fig. 11, the (late) painter Frank Mason in his downtown Manhattan studio, New York. Centre, Fig. 12, the cast of the Louvre's Winged Victory of Samothrace in Mason's studio apartment is one of a number of casts that he had rescued from art school modernist iconoclasts. When Mason's collection of casts was placed with professional storers while he and his wife, Anne, spent several years in Italy, it was moved on a number of occasions resulting in the destruction of many works (on which rental charges had remained in place). Above, Fig. 13, a detail of Canova's plaster maquette of The Killing of Priam, a Homeric episode which together with other famous scenes of classic literature inspired Canova in one of his most famous series of bas-reliefs. Two months ago, as described by the art historian and blogger, Tomaso Montanari, the work was detached from the wall of the Academy of Art in Perugia to be shipped, just 24 kilometers away, to an exhibition at Assisi simply titled "Canova". During the removal operation, headed by the shipping company Alessandro Maggi di Pietrasanta, the unique plaster relief was dropped and smashed beyond repair.
We are indebted to Amsterdam's (excellent) blogger, Maaike Dirkx, for this "accident alert" and for the following account: "Just like bronze, plaster allows you to multiply the originals. In these cases the importance of the specimen is related to the provenance and that of the Perugia relief was impeccable: it was donated by the heirs of Canova's Academy. The insurance value is approx. 700,000 Euros. The episode was hushed up. Neither the website of the Academy nor that of the Ministry for Cultural Heritage have mentioned it. The disaster only came to light in an interview with art historian Francesco Federico Mancini in the Corriere Umbria."
Above, Figs. 14 and 15. Top, Ruthie Osborne, Artwatch International's director, presents the Frank Mason Prize on behalf of ArtWatch's Board to Nick Tinari. Above, ArtWatch UK's director explains that because the recipient was to return to New York very early the following morning, the first layer of the framer's conservation-standard protective shield for the certificate had been left in place.
Above, Fig. 16. Nick Tinari responds to the award with observations on the similarities between the overturning of the terms of the Barnes bequest and the current attempt being made through a private-member's Bill in the Scottish Parliament to overturn Sir William Burrell's prohibition on foreign travels for the works in his bequested collection (see transcript, left).
Above, Figs. 17, 18, 19, 20 and 21.
Fig. 17 shows Matisse's specially commissioned canvas mural la Danse in situ at its original, purpose-built classical home at the Barnes Foundation in Merion, Pennsylvania. Fig. 18 shows the work as housed in the new, supposedly replicated, interior of a modernist building in the centre of Philadelphia. Fig. 19 shows the Matisse mural arriving at the National Gallery, Washington, on the first leg of a money-raising world tour in 1993-95. Figs. 20 and 21 show another loaned large canvas painting being similarly man-handled at a French Museum.
Above, Fig. 22. Nick Tinari discusses the fate of Matisse's la Danse and Seurat's les Poseuses during their contoversial foreign travels.
Above, Fig. 23 Seurat's les Poseuses (top, centre), as situated in the original Barnes Foundation building in Merion.
Above, Figs. 24 and 25, showing damage to a section of Matisse' la Danse photographed by Nick Tinari towards the end of the dismounted canvas mural's world tour.
Above, top, Figs. 26 and 27, the director of Artwatch UK offers congratulations and thanks to Professor Eidelberg on his lecture. Below, Fig. 28, TWO FINE FRIENDS OF ART: Nicholas Tinari and Martin Eidelberg, as photographed after the lecture and award ceremony by Peter Strong.
Click on the images above for larger versions. NOTE: zooming requires the Adobe Flash Plug-in.
October 14, 2013 | Categories: blog | Tags: Alexander Eliot, Arcadi Nebolsine, Art Held Hostage, Charles Hope, Christoph Vogtherr, Donor-Watch, Dr Albert C Barnes, Dr Lynn Catterson, Frank Mason, Glasgow City Council, Glasgow Life, Hellmut Wohl, Jacopo della Quercia, James Beck, Lucca Cathedral, Mark Zucker, Matisse, Michael Daley, Nicholas Tinari, Paul Himmelstein, Philippe Mercier, Prof David Freedberg, Ross Merrill, Selby Whittingham, Seurat, Sir William Burrell, The Art of the Steal, The ArtWatch UK Journal, The Barnes Collection, The Barnes Foundation, The Burrell Collection, The Illaria del Carretto, The Independent Turner Society, The Philadelphia Museum, The Society of Antiquaries, The Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, The Wallace Collection, The watteau society, Thomas Molnar, Tom Wolfe, Watteau | Leave A Comment »
Review: Stone-washed Renoirs and the Shock of the Undone
We knew at a glance that something was amiss. On June 16th, a newspaper photograph trailed an imminent auction sale of Renoir's "Baigneuse" of 1888. Even on the evidence of that single de-saturated newsprint reproduction (right, Fig. 1) it seemed clear that the privately owned masterpiece had gone through the picture restoration wash cycle a time (or two) too often. A comparison of Christie's pre-sale zoom-able online photograph with historic photographs of the painting further suggested that picture conservation's would-be beauticians had been at work with swab and solvent: Renoir's bather had been left (Fig. 2) a paler sugar-smooth pictorially and plastically enfeebled version of her original self. (For the picture's appearance and condition in 1944, see Figs. 7 and 9.)
Just as museum curators who organise splashy temporary exhibitions rarely broadcast the "conservation" injuries borne by works loaned from sister institutions, so auction houses, which of necessity must act primarily as agents for owners, can seem no less reticent on this fraught subject. In practice, we find that in of both of these art spheres, the "now" is often implicitly presented as the "originally-was" and "always-has-been", thereby thwarting what would be the greatest inducement to halt needless adulterations of unique historically-rooted artefacts: a full public disclosure of "conservation" treatments and frank art-critical discussion of their material and artistic consequences. By coincidence, recent museum and saleroom activities have brought to London a slew of little-seen examples of Renoir's oeuvre. As cases in point of Renoir's vulnerability, we examine here treatments of his "Baigneuse" of 1888 and the Washington National Gallery's "The Dancer" of 1874.
Renoir's "Baigneuse" was given star billing (on a £12/18m estimate) at Christie's June 20th Impressionist/Modern sale, for the catalogue of which it provided the cover illustration (Fig. 2). While much was made in the eight pages long catalogue entry of an impeccable and unbroken provenance through ten successive owners, not a word was said about any restorations of the painting, and although many early photographs are identified in the picture's literature, none is reproduced. It is disclosed that this Renoir is to be included in the forthcoming "catalogue critique" of the artist's work being prepared by the Wildenstein Institute from the Archives of François Daulte, Durand-Ruel, Venturi, Vollard and Wildenstein. (Perhaps the present condition of the picture will be discussed in that publication?)
On the night of the sale, an announcement that the picture had been withdrawn drew gasps of surprise. Artinfo reported that the vendor had accepted a private offer from an unidentified buyer for an undisclosed sum somewhere within the estimate. Trade and press eyebrows have been raised at such secretive, pre-auction sales and the withdrawal was the more confounding because expectations of a big auction house "event" had been raised by extensive (and quite stunningly fetching) pre-sale press coverage with photographs of the painting enlivened by the seemingly routine inclusion of beautiful young female staff members.
With modern paintings, the starting point for any appraisal should be the earliest known photograph. Old photographs are historic records. Historic records should never be ignored. Old photographs of pictures assembled in homes or exhibition galleries are especially precious and instructive. The photograph of Renoir's 1905 exhibition at the Grafton Gallery (Fig. 3) testifies not only to the then generally more vivacious relative values within individual works but to the striking variety of pictorial effects and painterly means deployed within Renoir's oeuvre.
With regard to the photographic testimony of the original appearances of individual pictures, consider first the large, near-central painting in the 1905 Grafton Gallery photograph – Renoir's "The Dancer". This picture, now at the National Gallery, Washington, is 138 years old but was then only 31 years old and unrestored. Then, the background was disposed in distinct but linked quadrants (top-left; top-right; bottom right; bottom left). These were not so much naturalistic renderings of an actual space as subservient pictorial devices spotlighting the central bow-tight figure of a child trainee who, through balletic discipline and artistry, had assumed a commanding Velazquez-worthy sideways-on viewer-confronting presence.
To that expressive end Renoir had welded the dramatically contra-directional lower legs into unity by a pronounced dark shadow in the vertical triangular space they bounded. That shadow sprang also from the heel of the (right) weight-supporting foot backwards and upwards in space, thereby throwing the bottom edges of the trailed skirts into relief. This dark zone in the lower-right counterbalanced another in the upper-left, which had in turn emphasised and thrown into relief the front edge of the costume, withdrawing only to leave a lighter, again relieving, tone at the dancer's dark hair. The progressive loss through restorations of those artful dispositions (as seen in Figs. 4 & 5) and the picture's general descent towards an inchoate, arbitrary pictorial froth that increasingly resembles the underlying condition seen today in its own infra-red imaging (see Fig. 6), is heart-breaking. Renoir had here been a sculptor before he became a sculptor, playing off forms that asserted his picture plane with others that ran sharply away from or towards it (rather as Michelangelo had famously done in his crucifixion of Haman). Degas, who spoke of Renoir's "sharpness of tones", had chided himself for constructing his own drawings of standing dancers from the head down instead of from the feet up. Renoir had here given a masterclass in how to project a standing figure upwards from the floor. These things artists know and appreciate.
Compendious photographic evidence suggests that restorers (frequently working myopically through head-mounted magnifying eyepieces) have consistently confounded dirt or discoloured varnish with the shiftingly elusive dark grounds used by artists to set off light-toned figures. As seen in our post of June 1st, Klimt's portrait of Serena Lederer (which was acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in 1980) has suffered in just such a manner. In the same post we saw also how Renoir's deployment of a dark background zone in the upper left quadrant of background and a secondary but counter-balancing dark zone in the lower right quadrant of his "Dance in the City" had also been undone by successive restorers.
By courtesy of the 1905 photograph of the dancer we can now see that by 1944 the picture's decisive tonal orchestration had already been subverted (see Fig. 3 and caption at Fig. 6). By the time of the picture's appearance at the 2012 Frick show of Renoir's full-length portraits (which was reviewed in our post of June 1st), the original dark tones in the lower right quadrant had effectively disappeared, leaving two odd arbitrarily truncated dark attachments to the right heel (Fig. 5). Cumulatively, this painting has suffered needless artistic vandalism of which no one speaks. The fact that graphite underdrawing is now visible on the painting has been mentioned but without any hint of alarm or censure.
With Renoir's "Baigneuse" of 1888, the earliest photograph in our own records (- donations to ArtWatch of old photographs or postcards are always most gratefully received) is that published in 1944 when the painting was 56 years old, as seen here in greyscale at Fig. 7 (left) and at Fig. 9. Six years later, by 1950, the painting had been radically transformed, as seen at Fig. 7 (right, in greyscale) and Fig. 8 (left, in colour). The differences that emerged between 1944 and 1950 were compounded by further changes between the picture's 1950 state (seen in colour at Fig. 8, left) and its 2012 state (seen in colour at Fig. 8, right). However many times and by whomever this painting might have been "restored", it is clear that the resulting interventions have profoundly altered its constructional and pictorial rationales. The total extent of the alterations that occurred between 1944 and 2012 are examined right in greyscale details in Figs. 11-18. The differences between the 1950 and 2012 states are examined in colour details at Figs. 19, 20 and 21.
By 1888 Renoir had visited Algiers and Italy, come to admire Cezanne as well as Delacroix, discovered Italian painting and read Cennino Cennini's Treatise on Painting. He had just completed an intense series of classically inspired, Ingresque female nudes, culminating in that declared trial for decorative painting, the Philadelphia Museum's great "Bathers" of 1887, by which date he held the nude to be one of the most "essential forms of art".
Compared with Fantin-Latour's palpable but fluidly allegorical figure at Fig. 10, Renoir's "Baigneuse" has, in its 1944 state, a markedly more stolid, out-of-Courbet corporeality. For all its spirited brushwork and sparkling colour, plastically, it constitutes an essay in composure, stability and parallelism. The torso seemingly rests on its own base of compressed and spreading buttocks and thighs. The thighs, knees and lower legs are held together in a manner more primly archaic (Egyptian) than classical. Movement is confined to the bather's right hand which dries the left side of the waist. This action has enlivening consequences. The upper torso is pulled round by the right arm and the head is turned leftwards and downwards as if to contemplate the drying action of the towel. The left arm is required to be held aloft to free the left side of the figure, and, flexing at the elbow as the left hand draws across the face, it first echoes the thighs but then curls gracefully, weightlessly away in space.
What, then, explains the differences between the picture's previous and its present condition? In such cases it is always possible to play the "Sistine Chapel Ceiling Restoration Defence" and claim that in 1944 the then 56 years old picture was very dirty and that the removal of this dirt has liberated the forms and the colours of the painting to a hitherto unsuspected degree. But the pattern of relationships that is visible, even under dirt, should not change character during a cleaning. Rather, it should emerge enhanced, with the lights lighter and the darks darker – and all individual values holding their previous positions. This has not happened – the picture has got progressively lighter with successive cleanings instead of returning to its previously cleaned state. If it really had been left by Renoir in today's state, how could the previous but now lost artistically constructive values ever have arisen? If left untouched for the next 56 years, would anyone expect the painting to return to its 1944 appearance with the stripes on the towel and the shading of the fingers regaining strength? Would a general shading and enhancement of forms once more helpfully tuck the left hand behind the head? How might dirt have drawn more clearly and repositioned the left shoulder? How might it have more emphatically shaded the right, distant side of the face?
If we consider the difference between the 1950 and 2012 colour plates (shown at Figs. 8, 19, 20 & 21), what might account for the loss of orange coloured modelling in the left cheek, and of individual brushstrokes depicting the hair? Is it possible to claim on the evidence of these photographs that there has been a build-up of dirt on the picture over the last 62 years?
When examining the bather's face in close-up today, as shown at Fig. 21, can we have any confidence that the paint presently surviving in that section is just as it was when left by Renoir in 1888? What kind of brush or paint might he have used that would have resulted in the present fragmentary, seemingly abraded, scattering of orange paint that lies over the blue background between the hand, the face and the shoulder?
In the next post we examine the conservation fate of more than a score of Renoirs that have been loaned from the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Massachusetts to the Royal Academy. We shall see how Sterling Clark learned the hard way not to trust art experts on matters of condition in paintings when, having been assured that Domenico Ghirlandaio's "Portrait of a Lady" had never been repainted, he bought it, only to discover, very shortly afterwards, a postcard of the painting showing it in an earlier and quite different state.
Above, Fig. 1: A photograph by Stefan Rousseau for PA Wire, published in the Daily Telegraph, on June 16.
Above, Fig. 2: Christie's catalogue (detail) for the June 20th Impressionist/Modern sale.
Above, Fig. 3: A Renoir exhibition (organised by his dealer Paul Durand-Ruel) at the Grafton Galleries in Lonon, 1905.
Above, left, Fig. 4: Renoir's "The Dancer", as seen in 1944 ("Renoir", by Michel Drucker). Above, right, Fig. 5: Renoir's "The Dancer", as seen in 2012 at the Frick ("Renoir ~ Impressionism and Full-Length Painting", Colin B. Bailey).
Above, Fig. 6: Renoir's "The Dancer", as seen in a Washington National Gallery infrared reflectogram published in Colin B. Bailey's "Renoir ~ Impressionism and Full-Length Painting", p. 42. Bailey discloses (p. 53) that the picture, which had been described as needing to be "slightly cleaned and restretched" on February 25th 1927, was said by March 24th that year to be "very dirty" and "very much worn and likely to break". Because the picture was recognised to be "very thinly painted", and therefore not to be "cleaned in the usual way", the restorer was advised to "handle it very carefully". Bailey produces no photographs of the picture before and after this first restoration but comments:
"It must have been the restorers at Beers Brothers who painted the back of the plain weave, double-threaded lining canvas with a layer of opaque, lead white paint." He complains that "While admirably supporting Renoir's original (and now fragile) canvas, this layer has had the unintended consequence of preventing the penetration of X-rays and so limiting our technical knowledge of the artist's preparations."
Never mind about possibly expanding our "virtual" knowledge of the artist's preparatory stages through invasive imaging – what about appraising the actual material consequences of putting the sum total of Renoir's frail, thinly painted picture face-down and ironing onto its back a double-threaded canvas? Do any photographic – or other – records of that intervention exist? Did that particular lining melt no glazes; force no paint into the interstices of the original canvas – or force no glue through them onto the paint layer itself? Was that particular lining never subsequently judged to be in need of ameliorative "conservation treatment"?
Above, Fig. 7: Renoir's "Baigneuse", left, as in Michel Drucker's "Renoir", 1944; and, right, as in "Pierre Auguste Renoir" by Walter Pach, 1950, The Library of Great Painters.
Above, Fig. 8: Renoir's "Baigneuse", left, as in Pach, 1950; right, as in Christie's, 2012.
Above, left, Fig. 9: Renoir's "Baigneuse", 1944, detail as in Drucker. Above, right, Fig. 10: Henri Fantin-Latour's pastel and scraper over charcoal on canvas 1880 "Music", detail. (See "Fantin-Latour", the catalogue to the 1983 exhibition organised by the Réunion des Musées nationaux and the National Gallery of Canada.)
Above, left, Figs 11 (top) & 13, details from Renoir's "Baigneuse", as seen in Drucker, 1944. Above, right, Figs. 12 Top) & 14, details from Renoir's "Baigneuse", as seen in Christie's, 2012.
Above, details, from Renoir's "Baigneuse", top, Fig. 15, 1944, as in Drucker; below, Fig. 16, as in Christie's, 2012.
Above, left, Fig. 17, detail from Renoir's "Baigneuse", as in Drucker, 1944. Above, right, Fig. 18, detail, as in Christie's, 2012. Note how the the shoulder has dissolved and shifted after 1944, simultaneously revealing an earlier position; how the space between the shoulder/face/hand has lightened.
Above, Fig. 19, detail from Renoir's "Baigneuse" as in Pach, 1950. Note the beginning of the shoulder's dissolution.
Above, Fig. 20, detail from Renoir's "Baigneuse", as in Christie's, 2012. Note the loss of Renoir's final drawing with hatched brushstrokes.
Above, Fig. 21, detail from Renoir's "Baigneuse", as in Christie's, 2012. Note the floating orange paint fragments.
Above, Fig. 22: The cover (detail) of the catalogue for the Royal Academy's current exhibition of pictures loaned from the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, USA.
July 11, 2012 | Categories: blog | Tags: Ambroise Vollard, Artinfo, ArtWatch UK, Cennino Cennini, Cezanne, Christie's, Colin Gleadell, Delacroix, Domenico Ghirlandaio, Durand-Ruel, Edgar Degas, Francois Daulte, Gustav Klimt, Henri Fantin-Latour, Ingres, Lionello Venturi, Michael Daley, Michel Drucker, National Gallery of Canada, Old photographs, photographic testimony, Renoir, Renoir's "Baigneuse", Renoir's "Bathers", Renoir's "Dance in the City", Renoir's "The Dancer", Serena Lederer, Sterling and francine Clark Art Institute, The Frick Collection, The Grafton Gallery, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The National Gallery, The Philadelphia Museum, The Royal Academy, The Sistine Chapel Ceiling, The Wildenstein Institute, Walter Pach, Washington | Leave A Comment »
wibble!


text:
Łzawnik różnozarodnikowy (Dacrymyces variisporus McNabb) – gatunek grzybów z rodziny łzawnikowatych (Dacrymycetaceae).

Systematyka i nazewnictwo
Pozycja w klasyfikacji według Index Fungorum: Dacrymyces, Dacrymycetaceae, Dacrymycetales, Incertae sedis, Dacrymycetes, Agaricomycotina, Basidiomycota, Fungi.
Nazwę polską zaproponował Władysław Wojewoda w 2003 r.

Morfologia
 Owocnik
Średnicy 0,5-4 mm, siedzący, lub wyrastający z podłoża na krótkim trzonku. Kształt owocnika dyskowaty, soczewkowaty, poduszeczkowaty lub niemal kulisty. Często owocniki występują grupami, wówczas sąsiednie wskutek nacisku są zdeformowane. Barwa od żółtej do pomarańczowej, kontekst galaretowaty. Powierzchnia gładka lub miejscami nieco szorstka. Hymenofor gładki, występujący na całej powierzchni owocnika.

 Cechy mikroskopowe
Strzępki i podstawki ze sprzążkami. Zarodniki cienkościenne o zmiennym kształcie. Początkowo są elipsoidalne lub niemal cylindryczne o rozmiarach  14–17 × 8–9 μm, potem wąsko elipsoidalne i kiełbaskowate, o rozmiarach 18–30 × 6–9 μm. Posiadają od 3–9 przegród poprzecznych, a czasami także 1–2 przegrody podłużne.

Występowanie i siedlisko
Podano występowanie tego gatunku w Europie, na Wyspach Kanaryjskich i w Korei. W Europie jest szeroko rozprzestrzeniony od Hiszpanii po Półwysep Skandynawski. Najdalej na północ wysunięte stanowisko znajduje się w Finlandii na 62° szerokości geograficznej. W Polsce słabo zbadany. Do 2003 r. w piśmiennictwie naukowym podano jego stanowiska tylko w Tatrach, opisywany jest jednak na stronach internetowych przez hobbystów.

Występuje w lasach na martwym drewnie drzew i krzewów – na opadłych gałęziach lub pniach, zwłaszcza sosnowych, lub jodłowych. Owocniki pojawiają się przy sprzyjających warunkach od wiosny do jesieni.

Gatunki podobne
 łzawnik główkowaty (Dacrymyces capitatus). Ma owocniki o wyraźniejszych trzonkach i bardziej kuliste. Strzępki bez sprzążek, zarodniki kiełbaskowate z trzema przegrodami
 łzawnik rozciekliwy (Dacrymyces stillatus) zazwyczaj mający owocniki mniej okrągłe, nieregularne, mniej przeźroczyste. Strzępki bez sprzążek, zarodniki maksymalnie z trzema przegrodami
Pewne rozróżnienie tych gatunków możliwe jest tylko badaniem mikroskopowym.

Przypisy

Łzawnikowate
Mykobiota Polski