Author name: Sayling@@Away

Remember to click on the artwork to see it clearly in an enlarged format! Antonio Allegri da Correggio (1489 –1534) or Correggio was the foremost painter of the Parma school of the Italian Renaissance.  He is known for dynamic composition, perspective, and dramatic foreshortening, and his art is considered to have influenced both Baroque and Rococo artists in the 18th century.  I’ve chosen paintings from his prolific output to illustrate the development of his style. Correggio’s early artistic education was with his uncle, the painter Lorenze Allegri, a muralist of moderate ability, but in 1502 he was apprenticed to Francesco Bianchi Ferrara of Modena, whose works were much esteemed at the time. It is in the studio of Bianchi Ferrara that Correggio was introduced classicism in art.  He left Modena and arrived in Mantua sometime before the death of the famous early Renaissance painter Mantegna, in 1506.  Tradition has it that he completed the decoration of Mantegna’s family chapel after the artist’s death. Two round paintings or tondi, the Entombment of Christ and Madonna and Saints are by the young Correggio. He returned to Correggio where he stayed until 1510, and during this time painted  Adoration of the Child with St. Elizabeth and John, which shows the influence of Mantegna’s perspective and the maturation of his own style.  Corregio was clearly influenced by Leonardo da Vinci, a towering presence in the painters of northern Italy, because of his use of chiaroscuro, the name for a technique and manipulates light and shade to create a softness in a contour and an atmospheric effect (Mystic Marriage of St. Catherine).  He also visited Rome, where he would have seen, and possibly been influenced by, the Vatican frescoes of Michelangelo and Raphael. Correggio divided his time largely between Parma and his hometown. His first documented painting, an altarpiece of the Madonna of St. Francis, was commissioned for San Francesco in Correggio in 1514 . His artistic output was so prodigious, I can only introduce a few works, for example, the dome of the Cathedral of Parma with its Assumption of the Virgin, crowded with layers of receding figures  The massing of spectators in a vortex and its upward perspective were at the time without precedent and presaged the dynamism seen in Baroque painting.   Aside from his religious themes, which were many, Correggio also created a voluptuous series of paintings depicting the Loves of Jupiter as described in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, one of the most famous being Jupiter and Io. Correggio died in the town of the same name in 1534.  He was remembered as melancholic and introverted, enigmatic and eclectic.  He had no major apprenticeship in his background nor did he have any little immediate influence in terms of apprenticed successors.  Nevertheless, his experiments in illusion, in which imaginary spaces replace the natural reality, seem to prefigure many elements of Mannerist and Baroque style of painting. approaches more than a century later. 0 0

Remember to click on the artwork to see it clearly in an enlarged format! I would bet money that many would have chosen Botticelli, the grace of whose paintings such as Primavera and the Birth of Venus is so iconic.  I chose Brunelleschi because like Altichiero, he made a valuable contribution to the art of the Renaissance: his development of linear perspective, that is, the ability to show objects getting smaller as their distance from the observer increases.  He also considered the greatest architect and engineer of the Renaissance. Filippo Brunelleschi (1377-1436) was the child of a lawyer and was educated in literature and mathematics, so he could become a civil servant like his father. Instead, for reasons unknown, he enrolled in the silk merchants’ guild, which included goldsmiths, and metal- and bronze-workers, and became a master goldsmith. His first commission was the design of the first phase of the Ospedale degli Innocenti, an orphanage, which demonstrates a clean sense of proportion based on Classical Roman, Italian Romanesque and late Gothic architecture.  In 1401, Brunelleschi entered a competition to design a new set of bronze doors for the Florence Baptistery, the famous golden doors which are gilded. Brunelleschi’s panel, depicting the Sacrifice of Isaac, is one of only two to have survived. However, Ghiberti was announced the victor, largely because of his superior technical skill. Early in his architectural career, Brunelleschi rediscovered the principles of linear perspective, known to ancient Greeks and Romans, but lost during the Middle Ages.  His rediscovery was shown in two painted panels (since lost) of Florentine streets and buildings.  With his perspective principles, artists of his generation were able to use two-dimensional canvases to create illusions of three-dimensional space. Brunelleschi is best known for his design of the Duomo of Florence, the dome of Santa Maria del Fiore, an evocative outline of the cityscape of Florence.  At the time, it was unclear how a dome of that size could be constructed without it collapsing under its own weight, since the stresses of compression were not understood. Interestingly, Brunelleschi and Ghiberti competed for the commission, and in this case, Brunelleschi won. The building of the dome would occupy most of his life, and he was successful because of his genius in mathematics and engineering.  Remarkably, he built the Duomo without any formal training. He invented a hoist to bring the four million bricks used in the construction of the dome up to the work site.  He had food and drink brought up to his workers so they would not have to walk up and down hundreds of stairs, and he had a safety net erected to catch any workers that fell. Brunelleschi was supported by a sponsor, Cosimo de Medici, as were many other Florentine artists of the time.  When he died in 1436, he was buried beneath his greatest achievement. 0 0

Remember to click on the artwork to see it clearly in an enlarged format! Altichiero, also called Aldighieri da Zevio, or simply Altichiero of Verona, was born around 1330 somewhere near Zevio, Italy. He was a painter reflecting the art of that period, in other words, the late Byzantine style (note the Byzantine Madonna). But he is considered a proto-Renaissance painter, the effective founder of the Veronese school and perhaps the most significant northern Italian artist of the 14th century. So what was the Veronese school? It is a school of art following in Giotto’s (1267/1276 – 1337) footsteps, breaking with the static Byzantine style of art by the creation of dynamic, life-like figures, with an intuitive sense of perspective. This resulted in the first truly three-dimensional images. By March 1369 Altichiero was already a practicing painter living in Verona where he painted frescoes in the Scaglieri palace, as described by Vasari, who documented the history of Renaissance painters in his Lives of the Artists, written during the Renaissance.  I will reference this book often. Fresco is the technique of mural painting  on freshly laid lime plaster. Water is used as the vehicle for the pigment and, with the setting of the plaster, the painting becomes an integral part of the wall.  Regrettably, Altichiero’s early frescoes  were destroyed by the early eighteenth century, as was the Coronation of the Virgin in the church of the Eremitani in Padua, by Allied bombing towards the end of World War II. Altichiero’s major surviving works are all frescoes. The first cycle in the church of Sant’Antonio, probably painted in collaboration with another artist, was completed in 1379.   It includes a Crucifixion and scenes from the life of St. James,  The second series of frescoes, in the neighboring Oratorio di San Giorgio, were completed in 1384, and show scenes from the lives of St. George and other saints .  These frescoes show a style similar to Giotto in the portrayal of related figures with a real sense of vitality. A restoration has revealed beauty and originality, a clear narrative, good portraiture, soft  wonderful color, and clever anecdotal detail, all in elaborate late Gothic architectural settings. He died around 1390, it is assumed in Verona.   0 0

Okay, I’m almost ready for April Fool’s Day. I have five more entries to go and I’m editing the ones for next week for typos and general appearance.  My texts changed as I wrote about more and more artists, so much of my editing is in expanding the text a bit or adding pictures. This was a bigger challenge than I expected, and I hope it’s worth it.  At least, despite the slogging, I’ve enjoyed learning. Add to that, the fact I am editing the last few chapters of my second book in order to get a copy out to my beta readers, and also critiquing for members of my two groups…you get it! I’m sitting in front of this computer way too long each day.  One of my friends calls it the curse of the box butt. So to every one participating in the Challenge, let’s go!  I’m eagerly awaiting what everyone else has to say! P.S. Don’t’ forget to left click on the artwork to see it in a bigger and better and more beautiful format.   0 0

This is the second year I’ve done this challenge. Last year I did odors, something that should be integral to any fiction writing. This year I’ve taken on something that has been challenging but a lot of fun: Renaissance artists and their art. I was an art minor in college and took two courses on Renaissance art. Some of my happiest hours were those spent poring over the art books in the college library, learning to recognize the artists and their work.  Trying to write a short summary of the artist’s life, deciphering their contribution to the development of art at the time, and picking appropriate examples has been challenging. I hope you enjoy the results! Don’t forget to left click on each of the pictures to see each work of art in all it’s detail and beauty! 0 0

Today is a rather special St. Patrick’s Day for me.  I’ve always worn green on the 17th of March but felt like phony because I wasn’t Irish.  For years, I had heard stories about my ancestry – English, French and Polish – backed by stories from my family on both sides.  Also maybe Native American?  So in December I decided to find out for certain, and bought a DNA kit from Ancestry.com and sent in a saliva sample.  It took almost nine weeks, and the results were a surprise.  Large percentages of my DNA were indeed English, western European (French) and Eastern European(the Polish) but also 12% Irish! I recently took a trip to Maine to do some research and learned that Maine was a major center for potato production for many years, and still is (there’s a potato research facility just south of Presque Isle), because many Irish immigrated to Maine and southern Canada during the potato famine and brought their agriculture with them. Then I recalled that my father had once mentioned offhandedly that his family, the Parsons, had settled in Maine a long time ago.  Lightbulb!  Parsons is an Irish name and maybe they came to Maine during the potato famine.  So now I need to get on Ancestry and do a little research. Anyone else out there interested in their ancestry? 0 0

Do you do research for your books/stories?  Since I spent many years doing scientific research, I found it natural to see a need for at least some research in my writing. Writing a mystery book with a completely imaginary setting somehow didn’t resonate; I needed some real places to ground it.  Previously I have spent time with a lobsterman, pulling traps on his boat, and interviewed a famous sail maker.  Last week, in order to check out some details in my second book, my husband and I once again set out for Maine, in the midst of one of the worst winters ever.  Maybe we needed to have our head examined, but setting a book in Maine in the winter needs some real life experience and mine only extended to Massachusetts. We drove from Boston to Caribou the first day, admiring the change from hardwoods and firs to stands of white birch scattered among the green of the firs. The vast spaces covered with untrodden snow were stunning and often tested our perspective.  Snow blown high against the sides of barns and the thickness of snow on roofs, some curling over the eaves, was testimony to the harsh weather.  We were lucky to take our trip in between snow storms, but it wasn’t warm: in the teens during the day and single digits overnight.  Still, we missed the worst of it, because it’s -16 there today. The next day I had a wonderful Irish lunch with the John Dennis, the Cultural Director of the Aroostook band of the MicMaks.  He grew up in Cape Breton, where apparently a boiled dinner (corned beef with boiled potatoes, cabbage, and root vegetables), a staple of New England, became one of his favorites. And there is an Irish restaurant in Caribou that serves this.  Since I consulted with Mr. Dennis as an elder of his tribe, I brought him a gift of tobacco to be used in MicMac ceremonies.  Mr. Dennis is a deep well of information about the history of the MicMacs, their spiritual beliefs and customs, their problems and needs – our time together went by in the blink of an eye. We then drove from Caribou to Bar Harbor, in order to be near Bass Harbor for the next day’s adventure.  That was a ferry trip to one of Maine’s Islands, Swan Island.  We got to Bass Harbor early and that was lucky, because the line of cars waiting to drive onto the ferry grew.  You travel to Swan Island in your car; there is no saloon on this ferry. As the car grew colder and icy salt spray coated the windows, we wrapped ourselves in our coats and watched the islands slip by, surrounded by white caps, car gently rocking with the big ferry.  Once on Swan Island, we drove around, noting the neat stacks of lobster traps on virtually every front lawn of the mostly white or gray houses.  Houses there range from normal, one or two story New England boxes to multimillion dollar mansions, where the owners only live for a few weeks a year. Small coves were iced up with some of the ice piled up by the tides.  And it was really windy and really cold! We visited the small store on the island, where stocks were clearly depleted by the winter, and learned that with the small winter population, everyone knows everything about everyone, and the gossip is rampant.  I left some bookmarks with information about my first book at the store and figured by that night, everyone on the island would know a writer had visited! After Swan Island, we had to head south, in order to overnight within driving distance of Boston.  Along the way, we visited an independent bookstore in Bangor and another in Bath.  I’ve come to believe that Independent bookstore owners are characters. The owner of the Bath Book Shop was running around in a tall red and white striped hat, in celebration of Dr. Suess’s birthday. We arrived home after another long day of travel. For those of you who know Boston, the Callahan Tunnel is closed and that required some re-routing in order to get to Logan Airport. Thank heaven we brought our Garmin and left plenty of time to get there.  So research this time was a bit of an adventure. Hope you have as much fun doing yours! 0 0

Just thought I’d issue a bit of a warning. For last year’s A-Z blog challenge, I did odors – something every mystery writer should include in their stories. And it was a challenge! There are many blog writers out there whose musing on writing, specifically mystery writing, are so far beyond anything I would write, I decided this year to do something completely different. This year I am writing about Renaissance artists. So my blog will still be related to an art, just not writing (except in the case of Georgio Vasari and Leonardo daVinci). I took Renaissance art courses in college and became entranced with the art and history of the time. So I am going to take a jog down memory lane and see if I can find Renaissance artists, A=Z. I’ve already put together blogs A-C, and I must say it’s fun, but challenging, since I need to keep them fairly short and include appropriate illustrations. I am trying to choose artists who made a contribution to the development of their craft, in terms of medium, technique, mechanics, or style. The main problem is that the blog is non-linear. I jump around from early to middle to late Renaissance to keep to the A-Z. I’ll put a timeline in at the end. Stay tuned! 0 0

It’s amazing to me how the South responds to a “winter event.” A winter event is snow, sleet, ice or any combination thereof, and despite the fact we usually have 1-2 of these each winter, the Southern states are woefully unprepared. Consider the situation in Atlanta, Georgia, where traffic during the recent winter event became snarled and came to a full stop on the major roads. People either slept in their cars overnight or abandoned them to seek shelter. Winter weather preparedness is not at the forefront of people’s thinking in the South. Witness the run on stores for who knows what the minute snow is mentioned in the forecast. Here in North Caroline, schools close if there is even a threat of a snowflake and stay closed as long as there is any snow on the ground. School closures when there is real ice and snow is a good idea, because many of our secondary roads are not plowed, but I remember sitting home with my kids when absolutely nothing precipitated. I am by birth a hearty New Englander and I spent five years in Chicago, where snow is a way of life. Thus driving in it was never a challenge, but driving down here IS a challenge, not because of the snow but because of the other drivers. I remember one of my first winters here, driving down the road and seeing cars upended in ditches alongside the roadway, like so many tombstones in a line. That is not to say I haven’t skidded myself, but I know how to get out of the skid, and I always carry a bag of kitty litter in the back of my car. I’ve always thought that driving courses, which are required for all potential drivers in NC, should have driving in snow and icy conditions a required experience in the course. Now that I’ve written this, I’ll probably go out today and do a 360 in an intersection! 0 0

This is loooong overdue. I kind of hit a wall in early December with all of the holiday activities, and despite promising myself to post a blog, it just kept being put off. I know other writers go through this, and it was complicated by a lot of critiquing and working in fits and starts on my second book. Which brings me to the point of the blog. I need to do research for my books. They are set in Maine, a state which I visited quite a bit when I was growing up, boating along the coast with my family and occasionally going on trips with my Dad when he was heading up the Marine Division at the Boston office of Aetna Life and Casualty. I had decided long before I started the first book that the stories would be set on the Maine coast. My husband and I have taken trips – during the summer – to gather in the environment and background for both books. But this second one is set in February, and although I remember vividly my winters in Plymouth, MA, that was many years ago. I really need to experience what the winter is like in Maine. Several friends have suggested that I wait, and certainly with the Canada Clippers that are sweeping down every few days and leaving Maine in a deep freeze, with or without snow, their cautions are reasonable. But I was a scientist for more than four decades, and the urge to do research is still there. So off to Maine we will go – to visit Presque Isle and the MicMak Cultural Center, circle the area of Crystal Bog, and take a ferry trip from Bass Harbor to Swan’s Island. And perhaps a few visits to independent bookstores, to see if they would display my first book. Not more than four days. Really. Unless it snows. Do you do research for your books? And please note my daughter felt that my blog site needed to be modernized. Comments on this new format would be welcome! 0 0