Bylines and Byways IN PRAISE OF THE WATERS After the happy conclusion of our visit to the Field Museum, we still have extra time in our hands before calling it a day. At the other end of the long strip of Grant Park from the Field Museum is the Art Institute of Chicago (AIC), a venerable art gallery that houses quite a number of the worlds painting masterpieces and numerous cultural objects from other lands. Beside AIC is the Millennium Park, which means that the open space between Lake Michigan and Michigan Avenue (Chicagos Magnificent Mile) are all devoted to leisure, whether for the body or the mind. At the opposite side of Michigan Avenue is the Financial District. Founded in 1879, it has managed to move up to the ranks of the worlds best museums in the visual arts. Much like the Field Museum, ones visit to the U.S.s second largest city would not be complete if you dont include AIC in the itinerary, because, indeed, there is so much to see especially on the Impressionist and Post-Impressionist genre of painting. If each of us has a comfort food, in the world of painting Impressionism never ceases to amaze and fulfill ones craving for the visual arts, even among those who are new to its exquisite enjoyment. Impressionism in the mid-1800s coincided with the rise of the Industrial Age, a short move away from the Realism of the past, but not yet into the modern worlds Abstract Expressionism where little is left of the realistic images that we know about our world. We are regaled by the splash of colors where objects seem to be transient, an apt metaphor of the fast-changing world in their time. There was so much to see, and realistically one cannot embrace all of that beauty even in two days. So we decided to focus on the Helen Birch Bartlett Memorial Collection before moving over to the other collections in other halls. The story of this collection is so heart-warming that one could only wish that the moneyed elite in every city should emulate. Frederic Bartlett, a wealthy Chicago businessman, began building up his collection of European art as he made regular visits to the other side of the Atlantic. By 1926, his beloved wife died, and in memory of her, he donated all his art collections to the city for the community to enjoy. Nowadays, if you consider that one Van Gogh painting could fetch over $50 million, you can make a modest estimate that in that hall alone, the worth of Bartletts endowment could run into the hundreds of millions. Having enjoyed Bartletts legacy, plus the other art objects, including a remarkable collection of ancient Asian art, I thought of sharing some that I have seen, but there are just too many. So I thought of a modest theme that reflects the reality of Butuan and Agusan. And what better theme than the depiction of waterways in these masterworks. And I suddenly became conscious that the masters have a deep affection for the rivers, creeks, beaches and seascape, as depicted in their paintings. It is a source of inspiration for all of us to have once again a fresh eye for the beauty of nature in the very places where we grew up. Its like peering into the paintings of Amorsolo and recalling the warm translucent light as they reflect on life in the farm, a yearning for that simpler, languid distant past in our sordid and chaotic urban life. Notes on the Paintings: Georges Seurat, A Sunday on La Grande Jatte, 1884 Claude Monet, On the Bank of the Seine, Bennecourt, 1868 Vincent van Gogh, Fishing in Spring, Pont de Clichy, 1887 Camille Pissarro, Woman Bathing her Feet in a Brook, 1895 Paul Gauguin, Day of the God (Mahana no Atua), 1894 Claude Monet, Water Lily Pond, 1900 Harald Sohlberg, Fishermans Cottage, 1906 Paul Cezanne, Bay of Marseilles, Seen from LEstaque, 1885 Claude Monet, Cliff Walk at Pourville, 1882 Claude Monet, Bordighera, 1884 Claude Monet, Vetheuil, 1901 Claude Monet, Waterloo Bridge, Sunlight Effect, 1903
Posted on: Tue, 23 Sep 2014 03:41:41 +0000
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