Well, G’day Possums,
I’ve been a bit tardy with this blog lately …been working on
the renovation which, as all building projects, is taking longer than
anticipated.
Wall panelling goes up next then there are in the final stages of
tiling and the glass splash backs. Two more weeks should see it all complete.
Mrs Wombat and I took a jaunt to the “Big-Smoke” to have a
look at the samples from The Hermitage in St Petersburg at the NGV that was all
sort of decked out as a facsimile of the Catherine the Great’s Russian palace.
Catherine the Great, NGV
Drawings, paintings, sculpture, jewellery, topographic views,
architectural drawings, Chinese object d’ art, furniture and ceramics made this
sampling of masterpieces an exhibition to help whet your appetite for the real
venue and the magnificent collection started by Empress Catherine in 1765.
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| NGV |
Favourite of mine, Jean Baptiste Simeon Chardin was there
represented with the beautifully subtle “The Laundress.” The harmonious tones enveloping all from the
misted background woman hanging the laundry to the little boy pulling our eye
forward with his ephemeral bubble and the central white of the freshly washed
cloth all is studied and so very quiet. The composition too, is placed with
care as an adjunct to the colour and tones.
As his contemporary critic Cochin said, Chardin could be “…. a dangerous
neighbour.”
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| The Laundress, JBS Chardin |
This painting has a version in the Stockholm Nationalmuseum.
The cats eyes are open and looking at the viewer and the tonalities seem darker
with more contrast….. it would be
interesting to visit it.
Then Perroneau’’s “ Boy with Book” Another delightful rococo
piece of “sensibilitie.” The muted
tones in this seem to reflect Perroneau’s interest in pastel painting and his
superb drawing skills.
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| Perroneau, Boy with Book |
The immediacy present in Anthony Van Dyck’s “Family Portrait”
subjects is stunning. The family could still be at the sitting their presence
is so affective. Each personality, and its individual character is rendered so
beautifully and drawn so articulately that the diamond lozenge composition seems
less rigid in its control.
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| A. Van Dyck Family Portrait |
Then, mentor to Van Dyck is Peter Paul Rubens’ “St Paul”
looking as intense as Rasputin.
And look at that hand literally popping off the canvas, the
subtle counter-swing of the head and the shoulders to enliven the subject in
the composition where the light is as much a compositional element as is the
palpable space behind the subject.
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| PP Rubens St Paul |
All of these works had glorious paint handling, as did the
Jacob Jordaens seen in this detail of “Saints Paul and Barbara” where textures
are real; silk is silk, hair is hair and flesh is flesh.
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| Detail: J. Jordaens |
Then there was the C18th Chinese silver-ware of Filigree
Silver, gold and enamel and utterly exquisite workmanship.
But let’s not forget the millions of poor serfs who made all
this possible for Catherine to collect.
A fine show that was followed by a very ordinary dinner
(Italian…sort of…) at Southbank and then off to the concert hall for the
Melbourne Symphony and Choir to perform Mozart’s, Requiem….. that was
brilliant!
Wombat Droppings
The chronicle of
Australia’s inexorable slide into fascism.
"AUSTRALIA will not yield to blackmail by pregnant
asylum seekers," says Non-Immigration facsimile, Peter “Dodo” Dutton.
Journalist may have to pay $8,000.00 to visit our refugee
concentration camps on Manus or Nauru and Gillian Triggs, Human Rights
Commissioner is banned from visiting but “The Ugly American,” Murdoch’s scribe
Chris Kenny (with many long standing contacts with the Liarbrils) can get in
with a Border-Farce escort and photographer to harass the said woman.
Let’s not forget the Hazara refugee Khodayar Amini who self
immolated out of fear that Border Farce were looking for him and might deport him
back to Afghanistan.
Sieg Heil, Dodo and Border Farce!
Joe “Eleventy-Cereal-Toyota Killer” Hockey, failed Treasurer
has left the house. His final speech
was as useless and as pointless and as forgetable as his 19 years in
parliament.
Good riddance!
Rabid-the-Hun, failed Prime Miniature, Health, Workplace
Relations ministers, failed concrete plant manager, failed journalist and failed
seminarian is putting himself forward as a public speaker. This is very odd, as
Australia’s experience of his public speaking would indicate that he had no talent for this either and as he
usually only uttered three word slogans his proposed fee indicates he wants
$13,333.33 per word.
Tongue Flicking will be free.
New
pretend Treasurer “The Drone” Morrison, provides misleading figure to bolster
his Xtian (well if you call Hillsong Xtian) act of slashing social services.
Why
should today be different?
The Ruling Rabble has suggested that children 14 years of age
be subject to control orders.
“The effect
of a control order may range from house arrest without access to electronic
communications, to a restriction on the people you can associate with. The
order can remain in effect for up to 12 months.
It can be obtained in a secret hearing about which the
subject knows nothing at all, until they are arrested and served with the
order. And even then they are not to be told what the evidence was that was
used against them.
So if someone made a mistake, the subject of the order
won't know and they can't find out because they are not
allowed to see the evidence that was used against them.”
(From Julian
Burnside’s spray on this)
So you think I’m being silly about our
slide into fascism?
Three eminent Climate scientist are invited to have
talk with Pollies about their subject… talks a gazumped into a slanging match
“debate” when three non-entities from “The
Coots-With-Queer-Ideas-From-a-Parallel-Universe” asylum (the IPA) earn their 30
pieces of silver from The Ugly American, Murdoch, The Biggest Miner, Rinehart,
The Cancer Company, Phillip Morris and probably the Koch Bros.
New
Prime Miniature, Malcon Turnbullfop is hereby ordered to note that this country
is staying “far right.”
Liarbril
“woman,” Concetta Terrazzo-Pomidora or something or other, opined similarly
echoing Vichy Abetz’s chagrin at Malcon looking dangerously centrist.
Rabid-the-Hun
has offered to pay for the marble table broken at his sacking party. He still
expects the taxpayer to foot the bill of $7,000.00 for the booze though.
Hoo-roo
Petals,
Shane
