From Geometrical Still Life To The Milkmaid

Two days ago I had a post about the exhibition I visited. It was a special one for several reasons. If you missed it, you can check it out here and please do as it worth it.

Today I'd like to show you the rest of the artworks, so bear with me as it's going to be an interesting ride.

There were quite a lot of still lives and today there will be more in this post.

I was looking at this still life and was thinking, I could describe it as geometric still life. I have no idea if such thing exists, most likely it does. It's interesting.

Another one.

I took a few photos of the gallery and loved it. It's interesting to look at the angles and see which one would give you the best outcome.

I tried to figure out what the face expression of the woman says, but I'm not sure. My guess is she's not happy, on the contrary, she may be deep in some thoughts. But again, I may be wrong, who knows.

Not geometrical still life, but it's still a still life, a nice one. What I liked about this one was the colors. These are not my favorite colors, but overall, they are a nice combination in my very humble opinion.

Choosing a striped canvas as background is an interesting choice. Most of the still life paintings I've seen so far, had a monochromatic cloth or fabric for a good reason. However, I find this idea interesting and I'm not against it at all. Let's do an exercise. Try to imagine this painting with a monochromatic cloth, let's say hazelnut or light brown, to be in line with the other colors. In that case, what is that you first see, when you look at the painting? The objects on the table, right? While with the actual setup, the cloth is playing a role too.

Stripes again, but in a different way.

This painting tells a lot, if you know how to read it. Back in those days, when lighting was done with candles or kerosene lamp, the only so called entertainment was reading for those who were not illiterate and playing some kind of musical instrument, which was the only way to enjoy music.

I love this, love the concept, but I'm a bit puzzled here. You see those tubes at the bottom? I'm not sure those days they had that. However, the painting is nice.

Would love to know who these people are, most likely they are two known personalities, but there was no description about the painting.

Please note, the silhouettes you see here are not reflections. There are no reflections on this by the way. Those silhouettes are part of the composition. Combined with those lines and shapes, it's an interesting concept.

This was a strange one and must admit, I'm not sure what the artist meant here.

And when I saw this scene, I started to smile. Can you see why? Let me know in a comment and come with me to show you the reason.

This was another favorite of mine. The color combination was perfect for me, that cobalt blue with the dark yellow is a perfect match, not to mention the portrait. Love it, love it, love, it.

And this was the painting that made me smile, the second I saw it. I wonder how many of you recognize this scene. For those of you who don't, here it is.

source

If you still don't know what I'm talking about, this is the famous painting of Johannes Vermeer, the Dutch painter who happens to be one of my favorite.

Johannes Vermeer, also known as Jan Vermeer; October 1632 – 15 December 1675) was a Dutch Baroque Period painter who specialized in domestic interior scenes of middle-class life. He is considered one of the greatest painters of the Dutch Golden Age along with Rembrandt. During his lifetime, he was a moderately successful provincial genre painter, recognized in Delft and The Hague. He produced relatively few paintings, primarily earning his living as an art dealer. He was not wealthy at his death, leaving his wife in debt. source

This is the famous painting of Vermeer, called The Milkmaid. You can see it in the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. Unfortunately there wasn't enough time to visit the Rijksmuseum when I was there, as it's huge, but I'm planning to in the near future. On the other hand, I saw the other famous one, the “Girl with a Pearl Earring”, at the Mauritshuis, in The Hague.

Now back to the painting at this exhibition, now you have the original, to compare it with. What do you think? I think it's pretty amazing from such a young artist. Please note, the intention here was not forging the original as you can see the differences. The background is different and the window is missing too. Focus on the woman.

It's kind of fascinating to be an art student in big cities, art centers if you like. I saw art students at the Musée d'Orsay in Paris. She must have been a high school student and she was drawing one of the famous marble sculptures. Like in the movies, it was so cool.

Contrary to the girl in Paris, this student must have worked based on a photo. I wish to be wrong here as every artist or aspiring artist deserves to see these great artworks in original. I'm not an artist, but the feeling can't be described. (Mona Lisa in the Louvre in Paris is ugly by the way. I spent 3 minutes in front of the painting. Yeah, shame on me 😂)

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