Cathy's Art Diary

Topical online lecture from the National Gallery on flowers in art to mark Mother’s Day in the UK. Lydia Bauman led us through 10 pictures from the collection and one more contemporary piece explaining the symbolism of flowers in each of them and how that changed over time. We started with one of my favourites shown here by Gerard David from 1510 of the Virgin and Child with saints in an enclosed garden and ended with a Georgia O’Keefe of a single flower. On the way we touched on Bronzino, Claud, Van Gogh and, of course, some 17th century Dutch flower arrangements. I would have liked a bit more depth on some of the works rather than this whirl wind tour but it gave me a different view of some familiar works and a desire to know more.

Excellent seven-week online course from the National Gallery looking at painting in 17th century Holland. Lydia Bauman, artist and art historian, led us clearly through a series to themes with enough repetition to embed ideas while still making all the sessions feel fresh. She began giving an overview of the economics and society of the time to give context. She explained why she didn’t want to use the more usually descriptor of the period as “The Dutch Golden Age” as it wasn’t golden for people whose lands the Dutch colonised. The second week was also a useful overview of how artists worked paying particular attention to the different genre specialisms. She discussed how, with the rise of the Protestant religion in the region, the church was no longer commissioning art so artists had to start to work for the open market rather than to commission. In later weeks we looked at themes ranging from portraiture with a focus on the recent Frans Hals exhibition, the role of the home an...

Interesting online lecture from the National Gallery on Polish painting in the 19th century and how it was used to create an idea of Polishness when the country no longer existed. Lydia Bauman, an educator from the gallery, led us through the history of the land mass of Poland from the start of its partition in 1733 through the 19th century and discussed how artists reacted to this. She outlined how King Stanislaw II Augustus brought in an Italian artist to start an art school and commissioned pictures of the city from Bellotto. However this art school did not survive partition and Polish artists had to go to Munich, Vienna or St Petersburg to study where they learnt Western art techniques and genres. She then talked about how they used these styles to create a Polish culture and to promote Polish history and events. I was introduced to lots of artists I had not come across before and particularly liked the work of Aleksander Gierymski including his picture “The Sandblasters” fr...