Eidola

Karl Albiker
Fleeing (Daphne)
1909
bronze
Kunsthalle Mannheim

Franz Kobell
Apollo pursuing Daphne through a Forest
before 1822
drawing
Städel Museum, Frankfurt

Cavaliere d'Arpino (Giuseppe Cesari)
Narcissus turning into a Flower
ca. 1595-1600
drawing
Städel Museum, Frankfurt

Hans von Marées
Two Studies for Narcissus
1885
drawing
Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna

Otto Scholderer
Narcissus
1889
drawing
Städel Museum, Frankfurt

Johann Caspar Schwab after Johann Spillenberger
Narcissus
ca. 1810
etching
Herzog Anton Ulrich Museum, Braunschweig

Salomon Gessner
Abduction of Ganymede
ca. 1802-1803
etching
(posthumous printing)
Graphische Sammlung, Zentralbibliothek Zürich

Johann Georg Mansfeld
Abduction of Ganymede
ca. 1795-1805
gouache on paper
Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna

Hans von Marées
Abduction of Ganymede
before 1887
drawing
Kupferstichkabinett, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin

Salomon Gessner
Hylas and the Nymphs
ca. 1802-1803
etching
(posthumous printing)
Graphische Sammlung, Zentralbibliothek Zürich

Nicolas Colombel
Atalanta and Hippomenes
ca. 1680
oil on canvas
Liechtenstein Museum, Vienna

René-Antoine Houasse
Diana and Endymion
ca. 1680
oil on canvas
Musée d'Art et d'Histoire de Narbonne

Marcantonio Franceschini
Metamorphosis of the dead Adonis
ca. 1692-98
oil on canvas
Liechtenstein Museum, Vienna

workshop of Luca Giordano
Venus and Adonis
ca. 1675
drawing
Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna

Benjamin West
Adonis departing for the Hunt
1800
oil on canvas
Dayton Art Institute, Ohio

Joachim Wtewael
Venus and Adonis
ca. 1607-1610
oil on panel
Liechtenstein Museum, Vienna

Eidolon  

Down in fame's flood, down an alley, down
wind of now, elegant in self-denial,
an Iron Range wraith junking cue cards, an ideal,
an idol before which the Zeitgeist kneeled. 

Dylan, named for a poet named from an old
tale of the child who crawled to the sea, this land
is yours: the black plain the needle
ploughs from lip to label; be all, end all.

– Roddy Lumsden (2010)

Traditional Transience - II

Max Schlichting
Poppies
1895
oil on canvas
Alte Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin

Karl Hagemeister
White Poppies
1881
oil on canvas
Landesmuseum, Hannover

Hendrik Schoock
Flower Piece
ca. 1690
oil on canvas
Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen

Balthasar van der Ast
Floral Still Life with Shells
1622
oil on copper
Saint Louis Art Museum

Élise Bruyère and Antoine Chazal
Flowers and Grapes
1843
oil on panel
Musée des Beaux-Arts de Valenciennes

Félix Carme
Flowers in a Vase
ca. 1895
watercolor on paper
Musée des Beaux-Arts de Bordeaux

Jan van Huysum
Bouquet of Flowers in an Urn
1724
oil on panel
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Hans Bollongier
Floral Still Life
1639
oil on panel
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

Theodor Pallady
Flowers at the Window, Place Dauphine, Paris
ca. 1924-26
oil on canvas
Romanian National Museum of Art, Bucharest

Camille Pissarro
Bouquet of Flowers
ca. 1873
oil on canvas
High Museum of Art, Atlanta

Gustave Courbet
Flower Arrangement
1855
oil on canvas
Hamburger Kunsthalle

Anonymous Italian Artist
Bouquet in Gold and Silver Vase
ca. 1700
oil on canvas
Detroit Institute of Arts

Ambrosius Bosschaert the Elder
Bouquet of Flowers in a Porcelain Vase
1609
oil on panel
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

Adolf von Becker
Flower Picture
1862
oil on cardboard
Ateneum Art Museum, Helsinki

Jakob Bogdany
Flowers in a Glass Vase
ca. 1700
oil on canvas
Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest

Édouard Manet
Vase of Lilacs
ca. 1882
oil on canvas
Alte Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin

Gaveston [reading a letter from King Edward]:

My father is deceast, come Gaveston,

And share the kingdom with thy dearest friend.
Ah words that make me surfet with delight:
What greater blisse can hap to Gaveston,

Then live and be the favorit of a king?

Sweete prince I come, these these thy amorous lines,
Might have enforst me to have swum from France,
And like Leander gaspt upon the sande,
So thou wouldst smile and take me in thy armes.

The sight of London to my exiled eyes,
Is as Elizium to a new come soule.
Not that I love the citie or the men,

But that it harbors him I hold so deare,
The king, upon whose bosome let me die,
And with the world be still at enmitie:

What neede the artick people love star-light,
To whom the sunne shines both by day and night.

Farewell base stooping to the lordly peeres,

My knee shall bowe to none but to the king.

As for the multitude that are but sparkes,

Rakt up in embers of their povertie,

Tanti: Ile fawne first on the winde,

That glaunceth at my lips and flieth away. 

– Christopher Marlowe, Edward II, Act I, scene i (1593)

Traditional Transience - I

Rachel Ruysch
Bouquet of Flowers
ca. 1690-95
oil on canvas
Hamburger Kunsthalle

Jan Davidsz de Heem
Vanitas Still Life with Fruit, Flowers and Oysters
1652
oil on panel
Národní Galerie, Prague

Jacob van Walscapelle
Still Life with Bouquet of Flowers
1677
oil on canvas
Städel Museum, Frankfurt

Ambrosius Bosschaert the Elder
Roses in a Glass Vase
ca. 1619
oil on copper
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Henri Fantin-Latour
Roses in a Vase
1872
oil on canvas
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Florine Stettheimer
Bouquet for Ettie
1927
oil on canvas
Rhode Island School of Design, Providence

Nikolaos Gyzis
Flowers
ca. 1890
oil on canvas
National Gallery, Athens

Hans Thoma
Meadow Flowers
1872
oil on canvas
Alte Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin

Franz Werner Tamm
Bouquet of Flowers
1704
oil on canvas
Deutsche Barockgalerie, Augsburg

Jean-Baptiste Oudry
Corner of the Garden of Monsieur de La Bruyère
1744
oil on canvas
Detroit Institute of Arts

Louis Valtat
Flowers
ca. 1912
oil on canvas
Milwaukee Art Museum

Odilon Redon
Flowers in a Green Vase
ca. 1905
oil on canvas
Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh

Anonymous Italian Artist
Bouquet on a Stone Pedestal
ca. 1650-75
oil on canvas
Detroit Institute of Arts

Daniel Seghers
Flowers in a Glass Vase
ca. 1630
oil on canvas
Národní Galerie, Prague

Anonymous Dutch Artist
Bouquet of Flowers
1680
watercolor and gouache on vellum
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

Hans Simon Holtzbecher
Botanical Border
ca. 1665-70
gouache on vellum
Kupferstichkabinett, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin

A Bowl of Fruit

When I think of that room
I see the de Kooning at the end of the hall 

Sometimes rain on the long windows
Or the tinkering of drops on the skylight

But not Yvon
Splashing Scotch into a cocktail glass

Otherwise fastidious –

In retrospect
I should have asked her more

About the famous jazz guitarist
She had been engaged to

But that much was true –

Even after she bought me a pocket knife
Sheathed in velvet

Every young man needs a knife
She informed her group

But in the restaurant her friends
Eyed me like a turnip. One that talked –

While she was away at her office,
I tried to read

Her unfinished essay
On the vagaries of diplomacy

Reclining
On a rug of embroidered storks

The two small Rodins
Seemed misplaced

A grand piano

She didn't play

(though I did, affecting a controlled
passion

while gazing over rooftops
at carefully maintained gardens) –

I don't remember her smell

I don't recall her fingers

The last I heard she was living in Barcelona

She never did learn to cook

Now her letters are worth money

– Robert Vandermolen (2010)

Briefly Alive, Everlastingly Appropriated

Fritz Syberg
Mullein Blossoms
1898
oil on canvas
Ordrupgaard Art Museum, Copenhagen

John La Farge
Roses on a Tray
1861
oil on Japanese lacquer panel
Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh

Jacob Marrel
Still Life with Flowers
ca. 1650
oil on panel
Hamburger Kunsthalle

Robert Caumont
Cascade of Roses
1914
drawing
Musée des Beaux-Arts de Bordeaux

Camille Pissarro
Blossoming Plum Trees, Éragny
1894
oil on canvas
Ordrupgaard Art Museum, Copenhagen

Emil Nolde
Red and Yellow Roses
1907
oil on canvas
Museum Ludwig, Cologne

Henri Le Sidaner
Rose Garden at Twilight
1923
oil on canvas
John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota

Isaak Soreau
Still Life with Tulips, Strawberries, Grapes and Cherries
ca. 1625
oil on copper
National Gallery, Athens

Theodor Aman
Still Life with Roses
ca. 1860-70
oil on canvas
Romanian National Museum of Art, Bucharest

Emil Nolde
Tulips
1915
oil on canvas
Museum Ludwig, Cologne

Barbara Regina Dietzsch
Tulip with Butterfly and Cockchafer
ca. 1750
gouache on paper
Hamburger Kunsthalle

John La Farge
Camellias in a Japanese Pot
1879
watercolor on paper
Rhode Island School of Design, Providence

Emil Rudolf Weiss
Still Life with Roses
1906
oil on canvas
Museum Ludwig, Cologne

Moïse Kisling
Irises
1936-37
oil on canvas
Museum Ludwig, Cologne

Max Ernst
Flowers on Yellow Ground
1929
oil on canvas
Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna

Stephan Bundi
Weisse Rose
(opera by Udo Zimmermann)
2008
screenprint (poster)
Museum Folkwang, Essen

from Little Lesson on How to Be 

The woman at the Salvation Army who sorts and prices is in her eighties
and she underestimates the value of everything, for which I am grateful.

Lightly used snow suits, size 2T, are $6 and snow boots are $3.

There is a little girl, maybe seven, fiddling with a tea set. Her mother

inspects drapes for stains.

Sometimes the very old and lonely are looking for an opening.

She glances up from her pricing and says something about the tea set
and a baby doll long ago.

I am careful not to make eye contact, but the mother with drapes has

such softness in her shoulders and her face and she knows how to say
the perfect kind thing – "What a wonderful mother you had."

"Yes, she was."

Why do children sometimes notice us and sometimes not?

From the bin of dolls: "What happened to your mother?"

– Kathryn Nuemberger (2011)