In 1869, banker and landowner Edwin Bryant Crocker and his wife Margaret Crocker began collecting paintings during a long trip to Europe. In 1885, as a widow, Margaret Crocker donated the family collection, whose value at the time was estimated at more to the city of Sacramento and the California Museum Association.

The museum was originally housed in the Edwin Crocker Mansion, which was built by local architect Seth Babson (1830-1908). He carried out special work to create a gallery in it, which was completed in 1872. This building is considered one of Babson’s finest works. Over the course of its existence, the museum has been rebuilt and added to. In 1989, it was thoroughly modernized. A major renovation of the museum by Gwathmey Siegel & Associates began in 2000 and ended in 2002. The finally renovated museum was opened on October 10, 2010. It included a new 125,000 square foot (11600 m²) building with a new education center with four art studios, faculty space, an expanded library, exhibition gallery, and auditorium, greatly expanding the functionality of the museum.

The post Crocker Art Museum appeared first on The Curator Gallery.

History of Botticelli’s Venus

The stunning image of Venus at the brush of the great master is a certain benchmark of feminine beauty, replicated in modern art. Of course, every era had its own types and aesthetic standards, but most experts are inclined to believe that the young goddess in the painting “Birth of Venus” is unimaginably good.

If pagan goddesses existed in reality, perhaps they would resemble this captivating image. During the Renaissance, the image of the bather emerging from the water was popular. Not every sitter that artists of the time might have spied on the shore was deified by capturing on canvas.

There is no reliable information as to whether this was a collective image or a sitter with the same figure actually existed, but this face has a real medieval prototype. The detached, exalted gaze, without any attraction to earthly pleasures, underlines the unearthly origins of Venus, the goddess of beauty and love. The artist additionally painted her hair in gold.

Most likely, the embodiment of unearthly beauty, according to the artist himself and his contemporaries – this is the image from the painting “Birth of “Venus” by Botticelli. One can argue about the shape of the feet and breasts, the thickness and color of the hair, otherwise, the charm of this image is striking. The proportionality of the body, the imperturbability of the face and the general impression of the pose of “Lady Perfect” make an indelible impression. A similar image by the same artist, The Shy Venus, has been preserved.

The post The Birth of Venus by Sandro Botticelli appeared first on The Curator Gallery.

The main masterpiece that draws millions of tourists to Paris every year is Da Vinci’s Gioconda (aka Mona Lisa), exhibited in the Louvre collection. Her eyes seem to simultaneously gaze at everyone looking at the portrait from anywhere in the picture gallery. It is worth appreciating the mystical quality of the eyes of the beautiful medieval Madonna, with her hypnotic half-smile and her spaghetti-like cleavage. This is her permanent home, the “Hall of the Gioconda” of Museum No. 711.

Who was the model for Leonardo’s masterpiece?

Da Vinci’s painting of the Mona Lisa is also known as the portrait of Madame Lisa del Giocondo. She is said to have been the young wife of a wealthy Florentine. Leonardo’s contemporary claims that it is Lisa Gherardini, a beautiful noble Italian woman, whose image has become the main “jewel” of the Louvre. She was the wife of Francesco del Giocondo, a well-known merchant of expensive fabrics at the time.

Most of our contemporaries do not consider her a beauty. Art historians insist that every era has its own standard of beauty, and the portrait of Gioconda is one of them. But why is this beauty without eyebrows? Today, that would be considered a serious flaw. Some argue that Renaissance eyebrows were shaved off to reveal a beautiful wide forehead. Others insist that the restorers “messed up”.

One can argue about the standards of beauty, but this image has been stirring the imagination of viewers for 5 centuries. And Leonardo da Vinci himself could not part with “Gioconda”. Even on his deathbed visitors found a portrait of Mona Lisa beside the great master. However, no one can say with absolute certainty whether it was the original or another copy of the famous masterpiece. Until our days there are only two paintings, one in a private collection, the other in the Louvre.

Either way, no one could deny that Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa depicts the same Lisa Gherardini from Florence. The Ritratto di Monna Lisa del Giocondo is the name given to this painting in the registers of the museum. None of the great artist’s pupils has ever been able to replicate that enigmatic shadow of a smile from the Portrait of Miss Lisa del Giocondo.

The mysteries of the “Mona Lisa.”

No one knows what pictorial means were used in the early 16th century, but it seems that the entire Louvre is illuminated by the radiant light of the confident Italian Lise del Giocondo by the brush of the great Leonardo. Perhaps when the portrait was completed, it was even better – the colors had not had time to fade and crack from time.

One thing is clear, the face appears spherical, like a holographic or digitally processed image. The technology of our time was not yet known in those days, and the Ritratto di Monna Lisa del Giocondo is the most famous painting in the world, unmistakably recognizable even to children.

The eyes of the silk merchant’s wife have been watching everything simultaneously for five centuries. It seems that the lady sitting in the chair is about to wink at one of the many visitors to the Louvre, so vivid seems the portrait of Gioconda.

We know for a fact that Leonardo experimented with a new portrait manner, so that the faces on the canvases were not flat, like on cheap paintings. This secret he never revealed to anyone, but we know that he worked in the technique of shading light, blurring the sharp boundaries of outlines. Today Da Vinci’s work is the most visited exhibit in the Louvre’s museum collection, where admission costs at least 17 euros today.

The post Painting of Mona Lisa appeared first on The Curator Gallery.