by Jean Marie Carey | 26 Aug 2012 | Animals in Art, Art History, Franz Marc, German Expressionism / Modernism, Music, Re-Enactments© and MashUps
Apollinaire was very popular in Bonn and in Berlin, where he befriended Herwarth Walden, who, among other things, occupied a societal role similar to that of Apollinaire. Apollinaire also wrote and drew quite prolifically, of course, in addition to being a tastemaker around whom a circle of other artists and authors coalesced.
In early 1913, August Macke was very excited when not only Apollinaire but Robert Delaunay (and later Max Ernst) came to hang out at his place. Apollinaire spoke German very well, also. Anyway, AM just loved these guys, and generally began trailing them around and writing to them all the time and so on.
There is much more to this story, some of it very exciting, and be assured I will get to it all shortly…
However not everyone was enchanted by Apollinaire. That “not everyone” included, well… for the immediate subject at hand, Franz Marc. FM actually had little use for Delaunay, after a (short) while, either. During 1913, FM pesters Delaunay with tons of perplexing, unsolicited criticism, finally in one outburst declaring that RD wasn’t a very good writer, either.
Apollinaire did like FM’s work, but FM kept a distance. Today upon discovering that it is Apollinaire’s birthday, well, what can I say? It explains a lot. Here is a very comprehensive if somewhat outdatedly designed Website about Apollinaire.
AM finally told FM, basically, to stop embarrassing him in front of his cool new friends. FM pointed out that it was he who had introduced these three to one another, and, that also, RD was kind of a jerk, refusing to give AM anything but a scrap of used drawing paper (like literally AM was begging for any type of memento and that was what RD let him have!). Anyway, RM and AM fought all the time as it was, so this altercation of course could not be resolved swiftly or in a few words and continued over the course of some petulant correspondence and huffy silences…full citations to come. FM was jealous, of course, but also he hated to see AM fall in with people he thought embodied the worst characteristic of all, that of being fake.
Fortunately, since everything that has happened before will happen again, this throwdown has been re-enacted by two parallel characters in one of the most important documentaries of our time (it had to be peddled as fiction because of the potency of its truth), Mean Girls (2004).
Above is the epic scene in which Janis Ian (as FM) confronts Cady Heron (as AM) [we won’t even get into the whole LiLo thing here, or about… nevermind) about being plastic…
With a special guest appearance by Damian as Helmuth Macke.
by Jean Marie Carey | 13 Jun 2010 | Art History, Franz Marc, German Expressionism / Modernism
Franz Marc’s best known writing is his public manifesto-ing, and also his correspondence with colleagues and family. But Marc also wrote on the covers of and inside his various sketchbooks all the time. This verse from around 1910 is really trippy in a Rimbaud sort of way. Some of the imagery and words come up again in paintings and painting titles. Thomas de Kayser, the editor of the volume in which this appears, organizes this material by theme very agreeably. Text in French follows the English translation.
Notes in the sketchbook XXVIII
— A pink rain fell over meadows.
— The air is like green glass.
— The girl [observed] looked into the water, the water was clear [as] crystal, the girl was crying.
— Trees had their growth rings, the animals their veins.
Notes in the sketchbook XXXI
The storm roared.
I entered the house and saw all
A tall woman red small black cat [playing] on the green table.
Kraak, lightning strikes the vehicle – the beautiful little cats were playing with the woman, she smiled – ah ah [poor] man and horse are [is] dead. [The man cries] [sky] the angel of fear knocks at the window; the [poor woman] I could shake the red heart of the woman and black kittens knew the green table – what it [?], red and black and green? Three colors give it a thought? If we give to the red heart shape, the black that [one of three interspersed] small kittens, green form of [a large square plate ?…] the square.
I meditate on that thought.
The red heart of the woman breaks.
It [comes] springs a [blood …] [a streak of blood] A stream of blood [across the sky due] which falls into the river, it flows through the now red green pastures grazed by sheep or black.
The storm has withdrawn his hand from the earth.
The blue sky [?] Ogle like a gigantic glass eye the scene [of] red, green, and black, this thought is not it terrible? […] Do you understand what the painters paint?
(more…)
by Jean Marie Carey | 26 May 2010 | Art History
Henry Howard, the Earl of Surrey, is credited along with Thomas Wyatt for founding the English sonnet. Henry Howard lived in France for a long time, was frequently in trouble with Henry VIII for his boisterous behavior, and got into all sorts of adventures; he was a cool dude. This verse, thought to be about Anne Stanhope, Lady Hertford, is from about 1542.
A SONG WRITTEN BY THE EARL OF SURREY.
OF A LADY THAT REFUSED TO DANCE WITH HIM.
EACH beast can choose his fere according to his mind,
And eke can show a friendly chere, like to their beastly kind.
A lion saw I late, as white as any snow,
Which seemed well to lead the race, his port the same did show.
Upon the gentle beast to gaze it pleased me,
For still methought he seemed well of noble blood to be.
And as he pranced before, still seeking for a make,
As who would say, ‘There is none here, I trow, will me forsake’,
I might perceive a Wolf as white as whalèsbone,
A fairer beast of fresher hue, beheld I never none ;
Save that her looks were coy, and froward eke her grace :
Unto the which this gentle beast gan him advance apace,
And with a beck full low he bowed at her feet,
In humble wise, as who would say, ‘I am too far unmeet.’
But such a scornful chere, wherewith she him rewarded !
Was never seen, I trow, the like, to such as well deserved.
With that she start aside well near a foot or twain,
And unto him thus gan she say, with spite and great disdain :
‘Lion,’ she said, ‘if thou hadst known my mind before,
Thou hadst not spent thy travail thus, nor all thy pain for-lore.
Do way ! I let thee weet, thou shalt not play with me : (more…) |
