In this week’s episode of “Cocktails with a Curator,” take a closer look at the extraordinary flickers of paint in the colorful canvases of François Boucher’s Four Seasons series with Deputy Director and Peter Jay Sharp Chief Curator Xavier F. Salomon. Acquired by Henry Clay Frick late in life, the four paintings were commissioned by Boucher’s great patron Madame de Pompadour—the longtime mistress of King Louis XV—to be placed over doors, hence their unusual shape. The complementary cocktail this week is the Time Regained.
Join exhibition curators Desmond Shawe-Taylor and Isabella Manning as they tour the highlights of the exhibition ‘Masterpieces from Buckingham Palace’. With an introduction from Director of the Royal Collection Tim Knox.
The exhibition brings together some of the most important paintings in the Royal Collection from the Picture Gallery at Buckingham Palace. Usually on public view during the annual Summer Opening of the Palace, the paintings will be shown in The Queen’s Gallery while Reservicing works are carried out to protect the historic building for future generations. The Picture Gallery was originally designed by the architect John Nash for George IV to display his collection of Dutch, Flemish and Italian Old Master paintings. Artists represented in the exhibition include Titian, Guercino, Guido Reni, Vermeer, Rembrandt, van Dyck, Rubens, Jan Steen, Claude and Canaletto.
After six months of cumulative closure since the beginning of the health crisis and only a reopening for a few short months between two confinements this summer, the #Louvre lost 72% of attendance by 2020. But despite the absence of visitors, the heart of the museum has not completely stopped beating. The Louvre is even taking advantage of this period to carry out #renovations.
Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse–Lautrec-Monfa (24 November 1864 – 9 September 1901) was a French painter, printmaker, draughtsman, caricaturist and illustrator whose immersion in the colorful and theatrical life of Paris in the late 19th century allowed him to produce a collection of enticing, elegant, and provocative …
Ordering plants by post mostly from Italy, Germany, North Africa, and even the Cape of Good Hope, the Nuremberg merchant Volkamer was a devotee of the fragrant and exotic citrus at a time when such fruits were still largely unknown north of the Alps.
Famous First Edition: First printing of 5,000 numbered copies
Have you ever thought of citrus fruits as celestial bodies, angelically suspended in the sky? Perhaps not, but J. C. Volkamer (1644–1720) did—commissioning an extravagant and breathtaking series of large-sized copperplates representing citrons, lemons, and bitter oranges in surreal scenes of majesty and wonder.
His garden came to contain a wide variety of specimens, and he became so obsessed with the fruits that he commissioned a team of copperplate engravers to create 256 plates of 170 varieties of citrus fruits, many depicted life size, published in a two-volume work.
In both volumes, Volkamer draws on years of hands-on experience to present a far-reaching account of citrus fruits and how to tend them—from a meticulous walk-through of how to construct temporary orangeries, glasshouses, and hothouses for growing pineapples to commentary on each fruit variety, including its size, shape, color, scent, tree or shrub, leaves, and country of origin.
In each plate, Volkamer pays tribute to the verdant landscapes of Northern Italy, his native Nuremberg, and other sites that captured his imagination. From Genovese sea views to the Schönbrunn Palace, each locale is depicted in the same exceptionaldetail as the fruit that overhangs it. We witness branches heavy with grapefruits arching across a sun-bathed yard in Bologna and marvel at a huge pineapple plant sprouting from a South American town. The result is at once a fantastical line-up of botanical beauty and a highly poetic tour through the lush gardens and places where these fruits grew.
Few colored sets of Volkamer’s work are still in existence today. This publication draws on the two recently discovered hand-colored volumes in the city of Fürth’s municipal archive in Schloss Burgfarrnbach. The reprint also includes 56 newly discovered illustrations that Volkamer intended to present in a third volume.
The author
Iris Lauterbachstudied art history and romance languages and literature in Mainz, Pavia and Paris and obtained her doctorate in 1985. Since 1991 she has been a member of the research department of the Central Institute for Art History in Munich and teaches the history of garden architecture at the Technical University in Munich. Her main areas of research include France during the 18th century and the history of European garden art from the 16th to the 20th century, while she has also carried out extensive research about the restitution of artworks that were looted during the Second World War.
Artist: Pieter Bruegel the Elder (Netherlandish, Breda ca. 1525–1569 Brussels) Title: The Harvesters
The Harvesters is an oil painting on wood completed by Pieter Bruegel the Elder in 1565. It depicts the harvest time, in the months of July and August or late summer. Nicolaes Jonghelinck, a merchant banker and art collector from Antwerp, commissioned this painting.
Pieter Bruegel the Elder was the most significant artist of Dutch and Flemish Renaissance painting, a painter and printmaker, known for his landscapes and peasant scenes; he was a pioneer in making both types of subject the focus in large paintings.
In this week’s episode of “Cocktails with a Curator,” celebrate the Yuletide with Deputy Director and Peter Jay Sharp Chief Curator Xavier F. Salomon as he takes a closer look at Lazzaro Bastiani’s “Adoration of the Magi.” Acquired from Pierpont Morgan’s heirs in 1935—the year The Frick Collection opened to the public—this fascinating picture shows the gift-toting kings on different stages of their journey from Jerusalem to Bethlehem. A contemporary of Giovanni Bellini, Bastiani was considered the artist’s equal at the time and commanded similar prices for his pictures. Explore the work of this magnificent but under-appreciated artist while enjoying a festive Cranberry Bourbon cocktail—Merry Christmas!
Lazzaro Bastiani was an Italian painter of the Renaissance, active mainly in Venice. He was born in Padua. He is first recorded as a painter in Venice by 1460 in a payment for an altarpiece of San Samuele, for the Procuratori di San Marco. In 1462 he was paid at the same rate as Giovanni Bellini.
Sir Cedric Lockwood Morris, 9th Baronet was a British artist, art teacher and plantsman. He was born in Swansea in South Wales, but worked mainly in East Anglia. As an artist he is best known for his portraits, flower paintings and landscapes
In this week’s episode of “Cocktails with a Curator,” Deputy Director and Peter Jay Sharp Chief Curator Xavier F. Salomon takes a closer look at Malvina Cornell Hoffman’s marble bust of Henry Clay Frick, the museum’s founder, and considers the complicated legacy of the Pennsylvania-born industrialist. This month marks several important milestones for the Frick, including the eighty-fifth anniversary of the opening of a museum for, in Frick’s words, “all persons whomsoever.” This oft-overlooked bust was commissioned by his daughter, Helen Clay Frick, and for many years welcomed guests in the Entrance Hall at 1 East 70th Street. This week’s complementary cocktail is the Old Fashioned, a nod to Frick’s first job as an accountant for the family whiskey distillery.
In this week’s episode of “Cocktails with a Curator,” Curator Aimee Ng pulls back the curtain on hidden details in “Mistress and Maid,” the largest of the Frick’s three Vermeer paintings and Henry Clay Frick’s final acquisition for his collection. Take a closer look at the rumpled tablecloth, the lady’s wispy curls, and the dark background to understand how this mysterious work has changed since Vermeer applied paint to canvas in the mid-17th century. For this week’s complementary cocktail, the Genever Brûlée, Aimee has dipped into the bottle of genever she featured in her summer episode on Vermeer’s “Officer and Laughing Girl.”
Boomers Daily 