7/2/13 – Day 6 Metropolitan Museum of Art Infusion Week

After the gym today we had lunch in the Met restaurant next to the sculpture gallery. It was a joy to gaze at Peter and then let my eyes roam across to one of Rodin’s reclining male nudes … and then back to Peter. 

It reminded me of a game I used to play when I was at kindergarten called ‘which one of these isn’t like the other one?’ That Degas and the ballerina sure stood out from the others in the gallery!! Shame on you… what did you think I meant?

Today I chose to visit the Old Masters. How wonderful it must have been to have been alive in their time and to have seen these paintings in their original state; the fresh paint and bright colours of the canvas that were not ravaged by time, soot and attempts at cleaning them that only resulted in removing the brilliant detail.

To add a bonus to my day, art students were allowed into the gallery today to copy the masters of their choice. So as I roamed these hallowed halls there they were, young painters with passion in their hearts not to mention considerable talent scratching away at their canvasses as thousands have done before them - copying Caravaggio, Vermeer, Rembrandt and El Greco.    

I started with an altar piece from a nunnery in Perugia, Italy by Raphael before moving on to other

Venetian religious tributes by Tintoretto (Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes 1581 was impressive), Giovanni Bellini, Tiepolo and Crivelli. 

I loved Veronese’s ‘Mars and Venus united by Love’, but was not that impressed by Titian’s ‘Venus and the Lute Player’. I loved Reubens and Velasquez’ ‘Juan de Pareja’, but my favourite was Caravaggio’s ‘The Musicians’. The colour and light dancing on their skin was amazing and no photo can do it justice.

Filled in the final hour with a walk around the Lehman Collection and was pleasantly surprised by its quality and diversity. The father (who collected some 3,000 works) and son (who organised the collection and was on the Met Board for some time) donated this collection in 1969 to fill the latest wing of the Met.

 

Loved the Bonnard ‘Before Dinner’, Renior’s ‘The Daughters of Catulle Mendès Huguette (1871–1964), Claudine (1876–1937), and Helyonne (1879–1955)’ and Daddi’s ‘Assumption of the Virgin’.

 

Peter has a new hat.