#Morgan Library & Museum

[lionofchaeronea]

Job Rebuked by His Friends, William Blake, 1805

[thinkingimages]

Wolfgang Paalen, Fumage (Smoke Painting) (c. 1938), oil, candle burns and soot on canvas, 10-3/4″ x 16-3/8″; courtesy The Morgan Library & Museum

[arthistoryanimalia]

Four cicada brooches, Eastern Germanic, c. 380-500 CE

silver, copper alloy, iron

The Morgan Library & Museum display

“Cicadas symbolized immortality in the ancient world, perhaps because of their seemingly miraculous regeneration after long periods of dormancy. Cicada brooches were worn by women living along the Danube and on the northern shores of the Black Sea. The Goths converted to Christianity in the period after AD 350, and these brooches may have had connotations of spiritual renewal and rebirth.”

#cicadapocalypse #cicadaggedon #cicadamania

[blueiscoool]

Lost Chopin Music Uncovered in ‘Thrilling’ Discovery

A curator at a museum in New York City has discovered a previously unknown waltz written by Frédéric Chopin, the first time that a new piece of work by the Polish composer has been found in nearly 100 years.

The waltz, written on a small manuscript measuring about 4 inches by 5 inches, was first discovered by curator Robinson McClellan in 2019, who then sought outside expert help, according to a statement from the Morgan Library & Museum on Monday.

“He found it peculiar that he could not think of any waltzes by Chopin that matched the measures on the page,” reads the statement.

“Chopin famously wrote in ‘small forms,’ but this work, lasting about one minute, is shorter than any other waltz by him,” adds the statement.

“It is nevertheless a complete piece, showing the kind of ‘tightness’ that we expect from a finished work by the composer.”

McClellan asked Chopin expert Jeffrey Kallberg, associate dean for arts and letters at the University of Pennsylvania, to help authenticate the waltz. “Extensive research points to the strong likelihood that the piece is by Chopin,” according to the statement.

This research included analysis by paper conservators who found that the paper and ink match those that Chopin normally used.

The Morgan Library & Museum believes that the fact that the manuscript is so small could mean that it was meant to be a gift that the recipient would have kept in an autograph album.

Chopin was known to sign manuscripts that were gifts, but this one is unsigned, which the museum says suggests that he ultimately decided against giving it away.

“This newly discovered waltz expands our understanding of Chopin as a composer and opens new questions for scholars to consider regarding when he wrote it and for whom it was intended,” said McClellan in the statement.

“To hear this work for the first time will be an exciting moment for everyone in the world of classical piano.”

“Our extensive music collection is defined by handwritten examples of the creative process and it is thrilling to have uncovered a new and unknown work by such a renowned composer,” said Colin B. Bailey, museum director, in the statement.

The discovery of an unknown piece of work by Chopin has not happened since the late 1930s, according to the museum.

The Polish composer was born in 1810 and was best known for solo piano pieces.

Chopin died in Paris, France, at the age of just 39. He’s one of Poland’s most famous sons, and his name adorns the airport serving the capital Warsaw, as well as parks, streets, benches and buildings.

His works and image are ubiquitous across the central European country, and his residences bear unmissable plaques. Busts and statues of his likeness are dotted across several major cities.

Even his heart, preserved in alcohol after his death in 1849 is sealed into a wall of Warsaw’s Holy Cross Church.

But recent suggestions about Chopin’s private life collided awkwardly with Poland’s staunchly conservative traditions – and caused some to question whether the story of Chopin that Poles are told from a young age is true.

According to a Swiss radio documentary released in 2020, the composer had relationships with men, and those relationships were left out of history by successive historians and biographers; a potentially thorny charge in one of Europe’s worst countries for LGBTQ rights.

By Jack Guy.

Chopin - Waltz in A Minor (Discovered in 2024) - Played by Lang Lang

[coolthingsguyslike]

[xpuigc-bloc]

The Morgan Library & Museum

Crafting the Ballets Russes

The Robert Owen Lehman Collection

Crafting the Ballets Russes: The Robert Owen Lehman Collection

June 28 through September 22, 2024

Robert Owen Lehman’s extraordinary collection of music manuscripts has been an inspiration to scholars and visitors since it was placed on deposit at the Morgan Library & Museum. Among its many splendid works are deep holdings of early-twentieth-century ballet, including Igor Stravinsky’s Firebird (1910), Petrouchka (1911), and Les Noces (1923); Claude Debussy’s L’après-midi d’un Faune (1912); and Maurice Ravel’s Bolero (1928) and La Valse (1920).

The exhibition opens with the dramatic arrival of Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes troupe in Paris in 1909 and goes on to trace its impact across the arts, highlighting the rise of women in leading creative roles. They include Bronislava Nijinska, who in 1921 became the Ballets Russes’ only female choreographer and whose groundbreaking choreography defined Les Noces, Bolero, and other ballets of the era; and Ida Rubinstein, whose riveting stage presence helped establish the Ballets Russes in its first seasons and who came to rival Diaghilev as a patron of music, commissioning Bolero in 1928.

At the core of the exhibition is the creative process that brought these ballets to life. The exhibition and accompanying catalogue address the sketches, drafts, and working copies of the composers, choreographers, and designers, capturing the ways in which they imagined, conceived, and collaborated to kindle works of astonishing originality and ongoing influence.

The exhibition is organized by Robinson McClellan, Assistant Curator of Music Manuscripts and Printed Music.

Crafting the Ballets Russes: The Robert Owen Lehman Collection is supported by the William Randolph Hearst Fund for Scholarly Research and Exhibitions, the Robert Lehman Foundation, Mr. and Mrs. Clement C. Moore II, the Lucy Ricciardi Family Exhibition Fund, Elizabeth and Jean-Marie Eveillard, Cynthia Hazen Polsky and Leon Polsky, and the Franklin Jasper Walls Lecture Fund. Assistance is provided by the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation and Hubert and Mireille Goldschmidt.

(L) Igor Stravinsky (1882–1971), Firebird, autograph manuscript, piano, extensive revisions, [1910]. The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, Robert Owen Lehman Collection, on deposit. Used by kind permission of European American Music Distributors Company, sole U.S. and Canadian agent for Schott Music GmbH & Co. KG, Mainz, Germany, publisher and copyright owner.

(R) Léon Bakst (1866–1924), “Firebird and the Prince (Tsarevitch),” poster design for Firebird, 1915. Harvard Theatre Collection, Houghton Library, Howard D. Rothschild Collection.

#. The Morgan Library & Museum, New York #art #original art #xpuigc

[crying-on-the-six]

The Morgan Library & Museum

[kallenchi]

Sketches drawn at the Morgan Library. Image description under cut.

[ID: Six image photo set of sketchbook drawings drawn at the Morgan Library. 1) A gray mannequin bust wearing a golden floral headdress, gold hair coils and a series of necklaces with carnelian, lapis lazuli, and golden beaded chains hanging down the chest, drawn in marker. Written in pencil beneath the drawing, “Study of Queen Puabi’s funerary ensemble ca 2500BC.” 2) A stone carving of a female figure, drawn in yellow and orange marker, and shadows marked in gray. The figure is forward facing with her hands clasped at her abdomen. She wears a long-sleeved dress, hair braided around the top of her head, and bears a smile on her face. Written in pencil beneath the drawing, “Standing Female Figure w/ Clasped Hands - Mesopotamia (2600-2450 BC).” 3) Top half of stone female figure, drawn in pencil. The figure faces front-left three quarters, her right arm and left hand broken off. She bears a neutral expression, voluminous hair tied in a bob, and a woven dress with triangular etchings. The figure’s left side (the viewer’s right) is heavily worn down. Written on the right of the drawing, “Standing female figure Assur Temple 2400BC.” 4) Domed ceiling of the rotunda of the Morgan Library, sketched loosely in pencil. The center of the dome is an octagonal window, divided into eight triangular panes. Branching out from it are a series of repeating scribbled patterns, and mosaic panels featuring cherubs and other classical figures. 5) A casually dressed woman seated front-facing on a bench at the historic library room of the Morgan Library, sketched loosely in pencil. She has straight, medium-length hair, wearing sunglasses resting on her head, a face mask, open cardigan, t shirt, culottes, and closed-toe shoes. Her right hand rests on the side of her face, in the middle of a thought. Behind her is a glass case displaying books, and a wall of bookshelves. Beneath her is a carpeted floor marked by loose scribbles. 6) The fireplace of the Morgan Library historic library room, viewed at a right-facing, three quarter angle. It is drawn in pencil, spanning across one and a half sketchbook pages. The marble fireplace is carved with two Ionian columns to the sides, flanked by two, classical-style, bronze statuettes. Several birch logs fill the firebox. The back of the fireplace is decorated with a relief of a dragon resting atop flames.

End ID]

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

October 18 is the Feast Day of St Luke. He appears here at the start of the Gospel that bears his name in the Evangelium of Judith of Flanders (Cantorbéry, 1065). The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, ms M.709, f° 77v, 29,3 × 19,1 cm. :: [Robert Scott Horton]

* * * *

Night Surrender to Praise at Dawn – Nov. 16, 2021

“In the middle of the night I hold hands with trust and surrender to the One who sees without a light… My prayer travels deep into my soul space, into the essence of my being.

Rising from sleep, I raise high the chalice of my life. Dressed in robes of joyful anticipation, I enter this day with an open heart. This is the awakening hour. This is the hour of praise. ‘O medicine of dawn; O healing drink of morning!’ Offering both words and silence, I join in the dance of creation.”

–Macrina Wiederkehr, Seven Sacred Pauses: Living Mindfully Through the Hours of the Day, p. 29 and 47

[alive on all channels]

[doriansdismay]

O 🧍

[didoofcarthage]

Ruins of an Aqueduct with a House Built into One End, attributed to Willem Schellinks

Dutch, 17th century

brush and gray-brown wash on paper

Morgan Library and Museum

[arthistoryanimalia]

A silly snail for a slow Sunday:

Beatrix Potter (English, 1866-1943)

"There was an old snail with a nest,"

June 26-July 28, 1898

Watercolor, pen & ink, & graphite on card

On display at The Morgan Library’s Beatrix Potter: Drawn to Nature exhibition

AN OLD SNAIL WITH A NEST

Beatrix saw a snail digging a nest and watched its eggs hatch. This drawing illustrates a limerick:

There was an old snail with a nest—

Who very great terror expressed,

Lest the wood-lice all round In the cracks under ground

Should eat up her eggs in that nest!

Her days and her nights were oppressed, But soon all her fears were at rest;

For eleven young snails

With extremely short tails,

Hatched out of the eggs in that nest.

[balladof-bignothing]

the Morgan Museum & Library, New York City

[rhianna]

Visconti-Sforza Tarot Cards Italy, Milan, ca. 1450-1480 M.630.17

See more information »

Tarot Card: Knight of Cups -- Soldier, wearing armor, astride horse, holds vessel in right hand.

Source: The Morgan Library & Museum is open Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday from 10:30 am to 5 pm, and Friday from 10:30 am to 7 pm.

[tentothemonkeynine]

Eddie Izzard will offer a special performance of her solo version of Charles Dickens' Great Expectations, which features Izzard as 21 characters, at The Morgan Library & Museum February 7 at 10 PM.

The performance, which will benefit Covenant House and The Morgan, marks the birthdays of both Izzard and Dickens. Tickets for the event, priced at $200, are extremely limited and will become available at noon ET January 27 at TheMorgan.org.

The setting for the special performance is apt: The Morgan Library & Museum houses a renowned collection of Dickens artifacts, which include the original manuscript of A Christmas Carol and Dickens' letters to Wilkie Collins about the writing of Great Expectations.

According to The Morgan, this show has already sold out.

[fuckinuhhh]

Take a Walk 06/30/2023

Welcome back to my daily walk diaries. Today we walked around between 5th ave and Park Ave because I was going to check out the Morgan Library & Museum (which if you live in NYC and you didn't know they have free friday's, they do). Anyways I was a little early for the entry time so I walked around and here were the buildings that caught my eye. If you want to listen to the music I was listening to while you read this, I made a playlist of it. Buckle in, this might be a long one.

Edit: As I was writing this entry I accidentally deleted ~1.5 hrs of work so Im going to keep this rewrite real brief. sry :/

The Robb House

Built 1892

Architect: Stanford White

Fellow Architect/architectural critic of the time Russel Sturgis (who I love) said of this building, "not a palace, but a fit dwelling house for a first-rate citizen."

Curious as to whether one of those medallions on the third floor was replaced since they're slightly different.

The Haviland Building/Lightolier Building/Morgan Lofts

Built 1912, unknown architect

The interesting split facades and bell tower are without a doubt what grabbed my eye.

Funny enough they also stood out on the back of the building when I took a trip around the block without even realizing they were the same building!

Next we have Tiffany & Co.'s second building, built after their previous cast-iron store at Union Square, and as a posthumous completion in honor of Tiffany founder, Charles Tiffany.

Built 1905

Architect: Stanford White! (yes again)

Just look at those Corinthian orders! This building is massive.

(Now is probably a good time to bring up my camera situation.) I've been shooting these on my iPhone 8 mainly because my only other camera is film, and because of it's convenience. However I may end up getting another camera so that my pictures don't come out with such poor quality. (I wish I remember how I worded this during the first take of this post, it was much better)

This is the CUNY Graduates Building, formerly known as its original identity the B. Altman department store. The past 3 buildings in fact were part of a push up 5th ave from Barclay's St downtown where Haviland's, Tiffany's, and Altman all had stores previously.

Built 1906

Architect: Trowbridge & Livingston

The back of the Altman building has this interesting moment where seemingly 3 portions of the building meet. I say 3 instead of the obvious division of the top addition only because if you look closely at the roof overhang on the left, it turns 90 degrees into the building before the 4th window in.

Regardless this transition between is artfully done both between the front and the back, as well as between the base and the upper addition in the reference but not direct copying of window/facade themes.

The Stewart Building

Built 1914

Architect: Whitney Warren

(Bonus picture of the proximity to the Empire State Building)

Right across the street from the Tiffany building lies this beautifully ornamented loft/department building with terracotta tiles said to resemble Josiah Wedgwood jasperware pottery.

Before we get to the Chrysler building this building caught my eye with it's geometric ornamentation on the facade of the building, which I assumed was to fit in amongst the foothills of such an icon in Art Deco Architecture (the Chrysler Building).

This is the Socony-Mobil Building

Built in 1956

Architect: Harrison & Abramovitz

The Icon in question, The Chrysler Building.

Built 1930

Architect: William Van Allen

There is a wealth of knowledge on the internet about this art deco beauty, but I'm just going to give you my brief takeaway.

First, that entry way!!! I'm in love, its so grand and those angles are so pleasing to look at. There is one on each side of the building facing the street and boy oh boy it does not lose it's charm the second time you see it.

I also wanted to point out that, um, the base of the building is not centered????? I had literally no idea prior to this but if you look, in the third picture there are three bays of windows to the right of the center and five bays to the left. No your eyes aren't tricking you that's really how it looks in person.

In the tune of imperfections to such a seemingly pristine design, the backwall isn't actually perpendicular to the road or to the rest of the building. It wanders off at some other angle as seen in the fourth picture.

I give it a 9/10 still, it's imperfections are even more reason to love it. They give it an organic beauty that art deco even tends to reference and emphasize, the beauty in natural forms.

Right around the corner of the Chrysler Building is Tudor City, and here are just some highlights. In the order of most difficult things to photograph, these buildings are all built up in a style I like to call the princess tower style with an elaborate penthouse on top. Here are some of the highlights of this group of blocks on the east side.

45 Tudor City Pl. (pics 1 & 2) aka Prospect Tower & St. Albans Church Built 1927, the worlds first residential housing skyscraper Architect: H. Douglas Ives

Around the corner (which regrettably is not pictured) is Harry Osborne's penthouse in the Spider-man movies at 5 Tudor City Pl. aka Windsor Tower

The Church of the Covenant (pic 3) Built 1871 Architect: J. Cleveland Cady

Woodstock Tower (pic 4) Built 1929 Architect: H. Douglas Ives

(pics 5-7) The Cloister & The Manor Built 1927 & 1928 Architect: H. Douglas Ives I think this is also an interesting marrying of facade courses.