Cynosures

Marwan (Marwan Kassab Bachi)
Portrait of poet Bader Chaker al-Sayyab
1965
oil on canvas
Tate Modern, London

Daniel Massad
Night Piece
1987
pastel on paper
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC

Master of the 1540s
Portrait of a Man
1545
oil on panel
Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen

Margrethe Mather
Pierrot (actor Otto Matiesen)
ca. 1920
platinum palladium print
National Museum of American History, Washington DC

Henri Matisse
Nature Morte avec Livres
ca. 1895
oil on canvas
Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam

Leonard Maurer
Proust
1973
linocut
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC

Gabriel Max
The Anatomist
1869
oil on canvas
Neue Pinakothek, Munich

Ludovico Mazzolino
Circumcision of Christ
1526
oil on panel (altarpiece)
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

Rollie McKenna
Portrait of art historian Agnes Claflin
ca. 1955
gelatin silver print
Loeb Art Center, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York

William McTaggart
Group of Classical Casts
ca. 1860
drawing
Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh

Mendell & Oberer (Munich)
Gerhard Richter - Neue Bilder Galerie
1967
offset lithograph (exhibition poster)
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

William Menelaws
Portrait of Mrs John Muir
1905
oil on canvas
Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, British Columbia

Hans Mettler
Venetian Laundry II
2001
C-print
Ottawa Art Gallery, Ontario

Nicolas Mignard
Portrait présumé de
Françoise Marguerite de Sévigné, comtesse de Grignan
before 1668
oil on canvas
Musée d'Art et d'Histoire de Narbonne

Hieronymus van der Mij
Portrait of Johan van den Bergh
1746
oil on panel
Museum De Lakenhal, Leiden

Peter Milton
The Jolly Corner III (Henry James)
1971
etching and engraving
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC

George Minne
De Kleine Relikwiedrager
1897
marble
Kunstmuseum, The Hague

from Minturno, or, On Beauty

(Modeled on Plato's Hippias Major, Minturno is a conversation between the philosopher Antonio Minturno and Geronimo Ruscelli, a colorful courtier and dilettante)

Giacomo Ruscelli:  If the beautiful is not what is pleasing to the senses of hearing and sight, what other definition can we find that is equally satisfactory?

Antonio Minturno:  Let's not abandon the search for one.

G.R.:  I have often read that beauty is a proportion between parts that are well arranged.  This opinion, which many have shared, is not easy to dismiss.

A.M.:  There is proportion only where there are dissimilar parts.  But if beauty were a proportion between parts that do not resemble each other, there would be no beauty in simple things, but gold and silver are beautiful, in the judgment of miserable mortals, as well as diamonds, rubies, and other precious stones; colors are beautiful, and light, in which there is no proportion at all, is very beautiful indeed.  Besides, there are times when the proportion between the parts remains – as in bodies grown old and feeble – but not beauty, which is lost with the flower of youth.  For these reasons I am not satisfied with this definition either.

G.R.:  I do not know if I can produce any other that will satisfy you more.  But you must recall the definitions of Plutarch and Plotinus.  The first is that beauty is an ornament or glory of the soul which irradiates the body, the other that it is a victory of form over matter.  To these one could add another that beauty is an appearance or an image of the good, as ugliness is a darkened face of evil.

A.M.:  I remember having read something of these things and heard them spoken about, but I find myself with the same doubts.  For if beauty is an ornament of the soul imparted to the body or a victory of form over matter, then it must exist in bodily and material things, in which there is perhaps no beauty at all, or not the kind we are seeking.  And I wonder at Nifo and the other Peripatetics, who have located beauty in the body and in matter, because by its nature matter is ugly and deformed in the extreme, or rather is ugliness itself, so that the beautiful would be found to exist in the ugly as its proper medium, which is not at all fitting, for the beautiful should issue from the beautiful as flower issues from flower.  Besides, if the opinion of those who have defined it in this way is true, the angels would not be beautiful, since in the angelic nature matter is not overcome by form, and there is no body to which the soul's quality can be imparted.  

– Torquato Tasso (ca. 1593-94), translated by Dain A. Trafton and Carnes Lord (1982)

Suspensions

Charles Noel Flagg
Harriet Smith Brown (Mrs Horace Brown)
1898
oil on canvas
New Britain Museum of American Art, Connecticut

Georg Flegel
Still Life with Fish
ca. 1630-40
oil on panel
Deutsche Barockgalerie, Augsburg

Jean-Jacques Flipart after Joseph-Marie Vien
La Jeune Corinthienne
1765
engraving
British Museum

Marcello Fogolino
Return of the Prodigal Son
before 1549
oil on canvas
Musée Ingres Bourdelle, Montauban

Simon Fokke
Looting of a Wine Merchant in Rotterdam
1751
hand-colored etching
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

Jean-Louis Forain
The Verdict
ca. 1900-1910
oil on canvas
North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh

Una Foster
Onions
1951
linocut
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

Giacomo Francia
Holy Family with St Elizabeth and St John the Baptist
ca. 1513
engraving
Graphische Sammlung, ETH Zürich

Ivor Francis
Presiding Genius
1942
oil on canvas
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

Ambrosius Francken the Elder
Martyrdom of St Crispin and St Crispinian of Soissons
before 1618
oil on panel (altarpiece)
Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Antwerp

John Peter Frankenstein
Portrait of Godfrey Frankenstein
ca. 1840
oil on canvas
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC

Antonio Frasconi
Moon
(from series, Ode to Lorca)
1962
lithograph
Art Institute of Chicago

Leonard Freed
Katowice, Poland
1973
gelatin silver print
Art Institute of Chicago

Don Freeman
Ladies of the Evening
1934
lithograph
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC

Roman Freulich
Gloria Swanson
1947
gelatin silver print
National Portrait Gallery, Washington DC

Francis Frith
Wells Cathedral
1890
albumen silver print
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

Jesse Frohman
Donna Karan
1996
inkjet print
National Portrait Gallery, Washington DC

from Minturno, or, On Beauty

(Modeled on Plato's Hippias Major, Minturno is a conversation between the philosopher Antonio Minturno and Geronimo Ruscelli, a colorful courtier and dilettante)

Geronimo Ruscelli:  The beautiful will then be a part of the pleasing, for as that which gives delight is the object of all the senses, only that small part of it deserves to be called beautiful which is judged to be so by the nobler senses.  Not only therefore, will colors and lights and the various images of things be beautiful, but also songs and the music of instruments, which provide a most beautiful harmony for ears that are suitably refined.  But it seems to me that to these senses belongs as well everything that has been written of customs, laws, and the sciences – things which yield many marvelous beauties.

Antonio Minturno:  What you say is undoubtedly true.  Still, the senses judge in one way of color and sound, and in another way of proportions or the things that belong to the sciences, for of the latter the senses are unable to make a judgment that is true, and act instead as ministers or messengers to the intellect, bringing to the mind what they learn from the world outside.  And so it seems that the beauty we are in the process of seeking is not one and the same, for the objects of the material senses must of necessity be corruptible, as must the senses themselves, but the mind, which is divine and immortal, judges only of those things that resemble it.  The genius of beauty is not, then, one or univocal, as the philosophers say and as Nifo believed, but just as the light of the glow-worm or of rotting mushrooms appearing at night differs from the light of the stars or the sun, so the beauty of the things of this world is very different from that beauty which may be contemplated in the eternal and divine forms.  If this is true, that which is beautiful in itself will not be pleasing to the senses, for they will not be able to judge of it.  

– Torquato Tasso (ca. 1593-94), translated by Dain A. Trafton and Carnes Lord (1982)

Efforts

Ruth Orkin
Waiting for a Train, Penn Station, NY
ca. 1958
gelatin silver print
Beaverbrook Art Gallery, Fredericton, New Brunswick

Tommi Parzinger
Design for Textile
ca. 1950
gouache on paper
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Étienne Picart
Portrait of Madame de Montespan
1668
engraving
Kupferstichkabinett, Kunstsammlungen der Veste Coburg

Ed Pien
Pond #8
1993
oil on canvas
Agnes Etherington Art Centre, Kingston, Ontario

Hobson Pittman
Still Life no. 1
ca. 1930
linocut
Reynolda House Museum of American Art,
Winston-Salem, North Carolina

Alex Prager
Kimberly
2008
C-print
North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh

George Agnew Reid
Portrait of Mary Hiester Reid
1898
oil on canvas
Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto

Robert Riggs
Corner #1
ca. 1932-33
lithograph
Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh

Michael Riley
Daryl
1989
gelatin silver print
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

Alexander Rodchenko
Pioneer Girl
1930
gelatin silver print
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

Florence Rodway
Portrait of a Woman
ca. 1907-1910
charcoal on paper
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

Roman Empire
Fortuna
AD 50
marble
Allard Pierson Museum, Amsterdam

George Romney
Contemplation
ca. 1772
oil on canvas
Denver Art Museum

Salvator Rosa
Landscape with Figures
ca. 1660
oil on canvas
Princeton University Art Museum

Lewis Morris Rutherfurd
The Moon
1865
albumen silver print
National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa

Marten Ryckaert
Landscape
ca. 1610
oil on panel
Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Antwerp

François Sallé
Anatomy Class at the École des Beaux-Arts
1888
oil on canvas
Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney

from Malpiglio, or, On the Court

(The young Giovanlorenzo Malpiglio wants to become a courtier; his father, Vincenzo, wishes Giovanlorenzo were less attracted to the court and more attentive to his studies; the Neapolitan Stranger, who functions as Tasso's spokesman, presents a cautiously balanced view.)

Neapolitan Stranger:  Then physical training, a good mind, and moral virtue, Signor Giovanlorenzo, are what make a courtier pleasing to his prince.

Giovanlorenzo Malpiglio:  So they are.

N.S.:  But are the virtues all esteemed equally in courts, or one more than another?

G.M.:  I suppose that courage and liberality are the most esteemed, because they are the most useful to everyone.

N.S.:  And perhaps the virtues which are most esteemed are also the ones which most impress the lord of the court.  It is reasonable for him to prefer those which are valued most highly.

G.M.:  It seems reasonable enough to me.

N.S.:  Well now, do we want the courtier to exercise only his body?  Or only that part of his soul which is subject to the passions?  Or his intellect too?

G.M.:  His intellect too.

N.S.:  Then he ought to learn mathematics and moral philosophy as well as natural science and theology, and he ought to be well acquainted with the historians, the poets, the orators, and with the noble arts, such as sculpture, painting, and architecture.  He ought to know enough about all these subjects so that no one can accuse him of ignorance.  Such knowledge will win high honor from his prince, and goodwill will follow honor.

G.M.:  In my opinion nothing is truer.  Love for what is not esteemed never seems to result from judgment but always from passion.

N.S.:  But is excellence in all these arts and virtues worthy of any envy?

G.M.:  Of a great deal, in fact.

N.S.:  Then those very things that win goodwill from princes cause envy in courtiers, and since it is impossible to attain both of the goals you mentioned earlier, we must either cease to care about being envied by the court or refrain from seeking the grace of princes with so much eagerness.

G.M.:  This is a great difficulty, for without both the prince's grace and the goodwill of other courtiers I do not see how the courtier can ever be happy.

N.S.:  If there is any way to achieve two such disparate goals, then, it will not be through great virtue or knowledge or other such qualities which call attention to themselves but through some other art.

G.M.  This is exactly what I have been waiting to hear about.

– Torquato Tasso (1585), translated by Dain A. Trafton (1973)