Sunday, February 15, 2015

Inspiration and a New Find

Rogier van der Weyden
Portrait of a Lady is one of the first portraits I liked. I like the pins holding the veil together and the flawless complexion of the sitter. 
When spouse and I were in the Baltic Gateshead in 2008 we saw a photographic exhibition of People of Tyneside, and I loved it. This theme runs because in Hackney Library recently we enjoyed an exhibition of Photos of Hackney residents , made all the more poignant when we met a family who had made a special trip to see 4 of their own Family Pictures from years over 40 yrs earlier on display .
Nelissa Mendy with pics of her family taken in the 70s
I never get tired of seeing Photos and Portraits of my fellow men , indeed I love People watching , and am never bored when theres a stream of passers by , and sitters around , and coffee drinkers . Starbucks in the Whitgift Centre is a joy of  an Observation Hide, as its in the middle of the Mall with life going on all around it . I spent hours there when I was caring for the needs of my aunt in 2013, waiting for her to die, and needing to be in the midst of life whilst she determinely withdrew from us. Croydon is a great place for People as the population is so diverse.
Zubeir Tai , Freelance Photographer 
We had a great day in Leeds last week . We were people watching as we had our lunch in the cafe opposite the Parkinson Building , and our coffee inside the Costa Place inside the Parkinson Building before we saw the Exhibition that had brought us to Leeds , Nostalgia and Progress.
Replete with culture we moved on to the Art Gallery , and were people watched ourselves by Zubeir Tai (I love his name). He runs a great Facebook Site and Tumblr page . I am going to Blogroll him , and have  already done so on the Filey Parish facebook Site . He takes random pictures of people as inspired by HONY*. His site is Humans of Leeds. Well done for calling it that , of Leeds and not in Leeds. 

I started this blog page on Monday night , but have been overtaken by the events of a Family get- together to celebrate the Baptism of my Grandsons. They just decided they wanted it . So today with all my children around me , and they with all their grandparents around them we have been taking lots of photos, not the random sort , but the lets get us all in the picture together sort. 




*Humans of New York

4 comments:

  1. A nicely mixed post Margaret. Something for everyone, and as always, very well illustrated. Thanks for the introduction to the van der Weyden. Never heard of him, but I share your love of the Flemish school's attention to tiny detail.
    My favourite painting is a still-life by Willem Claesz Heda, entitled Still Life with Goblet.
    Every time John and I headed for the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, he would wander round the Rembrandts while I hogged my favourite till I nearly wore it out. Powerful things, pictures.

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  2. So agree, especially portraits. I used to love one in the Reserve Collection of National Gallery of an ugly woman in similar costume to the one on my post. Am going to see if I can find it in Google images, and will look for your favourite too. We won't be bored will we Ray!

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  3. http://www.theguardian.com/culture/2008/oct/11/art-painting This is it ,Ray .
    And as for yours its Lovely , will try to see it in June when I go to Amsterdam .

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  4. I followed your immensely long link Margaret, b ut had already guessed which painting you meant.
    I had always assumed the poor unfortunate subject was a man in drag, but having read the Guardian article now know better.
    If you do get to the Rijksmuseum the Heda painting is in the corner of the Rembrandt room
    near the doorway into the next room.
    Unless of course they have done some housekeeping and switched them all around :-)

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