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| Childe Hassam Plaza de la Merced, Ronda 1910 oil on panel Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
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| Frederick Carl Frieseke Hollyhocks ca. 1912-13 oil on canvas Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
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| Edward Henry Potthast Beach Scene ca. 1915 oil on panel Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
"Hence, the notion of a happy, gentle, sensual, jubilant sexuality is never to be found in any text. Where are we to read it then? In painting, or better still : in color."
– Roland Barthes (1975) translated by Richard Howard
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| Walt Kuhn Bathers on a Beach 1915 oil on canvas Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
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| Max Weber Grand Central Station 1915 oil on canvas Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
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| John Marin Abstraction 1917 watercolor Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
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| Maurice Prendergast Autumn ca. 1918-23 oil on canvas Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
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| Edward Hopper Girl at a Sewing Machine ca. 1921 oil on canvas Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
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| Lyonel Feininger Lady in Mauve 1922 oil on canvas Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
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| Georgia O'Keeffe Abstraction : Blind I 1921 oil on canvas Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
Abundance
O, despite our certain fate ... the bewildering
overflow of our lives! How it pours
over into great parks, stone men shouldering
the balconies, flanking the broad doors;
or the brazen bell that every hour will take
its bludgeon to the dullness of the day,
or that column – that one column – in Karnak
outlasting the temples' near-eternity.
Today, those same abundances will race
past us, agents of pure haste – from the blind
white morning to the undark, bloated night.
The frenzy passes off, and leaves no trace,
But they'll live on, those lovely arcs of flight,
and their inscribers. If only in the mind.
– from Orpheus : a version of Rilke's Die Sonette an Orpheus by Don Patterson (Faber & Faber, 2006)
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| Patrick Henry Bruce Painting : Still-life ca. 1923-24 oil on canvas Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
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| Reginald Marsh The Battery ca. 1926 oil on canvas Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
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| Arthur Dove 'Orange Grove in California' by Irving Berlin 1927 oil on cardboard Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
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| Charles Demuth Love Love Love : Homage to Gertrude Stein 1928 oil on panel Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
I am grateful for the excellent reproductions from Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza in Madrid.