On 20th January, I went to the exhibitioin “Dreams and Reality” with Zhongxin and Jinglin and i have to say that it was such a enriching experience! The exhibition consisted of Realist, Impressionist and Post-impressionist artworks, mostly paintings, from the world renowned Musée d‘Orsay, Paris. In this exhibition, we saw so many paintings by the artists we learnt in Sec 1 and 2, like Vincent Vangogh, Paul Cézanne, Claude Monet, Jean-François Millet and Gustave Courbet. I guess this sort of made me less depressed for the cancelled trip to Paris (:
Pictures: (sorry, please parden me for the bad quality pictures as we could not take the with flashlight)
Oil on canvas
Georges Rochegrosse
This is one of the paintings that I really like a lot. I like the cheerful but not too vibrant colours used in the artwork and I like the theme of it-fantasy! It is very large-scaled and it is about flower fairies with a knight. I think the fairies look like they are seducing the knght or prince, partly because they are all naked. However, it seems that the knight is not very responsive and from his eyes I see more of helplessness than enjoyment. This is something I don’t really like about, because in my mind, a perfect fantasy painting would be about a nice love story between a fairy and a prince and the whole picture would not look so seductive. Nevertheless, the pretty and bright colours captured my attention at the start a lot.
Oil on canvas
Henry Fantin-Latour
As stated in the description, the two people seated are Fatin’s Parents in law, while the lady behind them is his wife, Victoria. Charlotte is his sister-in-law, wearing her gloves in preparation to go to town. This painting is arranged in 17th Century Dutch painting and group paintings compostion. I think that this painting is painted with photographic realism, but I felt that the way the three ladies look at the viewers is quite creepy and eery, unlike the man who looks natural.
Oil on canvas
Paul Cézanne
This is another famous artwork that we have learnt before. We have learnt in Sec 2 that Cezanne loves to use geometric shapes to put together to form the subject matters and indeed, we see squares and rectangles of colours put side by side or over each other to form the subject matters. I like the colours in this painting as although they are shades of brown mainly, the orange-brown table lit up the whole picture, giving it a happy feeling.
Oil on Canvas
Claude Monet
This painting was rather grand and very big in size that it almost filled up a whole wall in the exhibition site. I personally like the way Monet painted the texture of the dress of the lady as it looks very very realistic and the glossy surface of the artwork made it even more pretty as light is reflected and the lighter parts of the dress then seem real. The modal in this painting turns away in the photo, unlike the usual portraits. I think this was on purpose as Monet wanted to neglect the facial features of the modal, but by painting skilfully the way light falls on the fabric and the play of patterns and textures of the dress to depict the elegance of the lady.
Oi on Canvas
Claude Monet
This is another painting that we are familiar with! The focus in this painting is not the modal herself, but the landscape behind and around her. I have always liked how impressionists deal with the painting of “light” and the way they apply colours to depict the light. There is a strong sense of movement in this picture as the clouds at the back swirled, painted with broken brushstrokes that further enhances its sense of movement.
Oil on Canvas
Paul Cezanne
This painting depicts Madam Cezanne, the painter’s wife.The geometrisation of forms and simplificatin of the background are very striking, it was just like the way he dealed with landscape paintings. The lack of expression of his wife and her unfocused eyes seem to convey the impression of incommunicability and solitude. On the side note, this reminds me of Portrait of Madam Matisse, by Matisse. their composition are the same, with background of different bog blocks of colours. The centre parting of Madam Cezanne seem similar to the green stripe of Madam Matisse too.
Oil on Canvas
Vincent Vangogh
Finally, it’s my favourite piece-starry night! I feel so happy and honored to be able to see the real artwork of Starry Night. This may not be the most famous starry night, but I like this piece more than many others he had painted, like the most famous one with black smoke. I like the reflections of the street lights on the waters. The sky dominates the composition, painted in cobalt blue. When we look closely, we can see that the stars are painted in outwardly radiating strokes with thick white highlights at their centres. The stars are really pretty from afar and when we look closely. In fact, the whole rough and glossy texture of the painting goes well with the subject matters, making the stars truly shine.
I am Xinge :) I draw people and places! 