GSTELLIHORN PAINTED BY FRANÇOIS DIDAY

FRANÇOIS DIDAY  (1802-1877 ) 

Gstellihorn (2,855m - 9127ft)

Switzerland

In Cascades à  Rosenlaui avec le massif du Engelhörner à l'arriere, Oberland bernois, oil on canvas   Courstesy John Mitchell Gallery, London

The mountain
The Gstellihorn (2855m - 9127ft) is the highest peak of The Engelhörner (literally: "angel horns")  a mountain range about four kilometers long stretching to the northeastern end of the Bernese Alps and comprising several peaks. The Reichenbach valley lies to the north-west and the Urbach valley to the south-east.Others peaks of that range are  the Grosse Engelhorn (2,782 m), the Urbachsengelhorn (2,767 m) and the Hohjegiburg (2,639 m).
The Engelhörner are part of the Swiss aquifers of the Aar massif and are mostly made of light limestone lime. Only the summit of Gstellihorn is made of granite and is therefore part of the Aare massif in the geological sense. Since 1951, the Engelhörner have been accessible via the Engelhorn hut of the Academic Alpine Club Bern (AACB.


The painter 
François Diday was a Swiss painter. Originally from Graubünden, François Diday studied art at the Society of Arts. Landscapers such as Charles-Joseph Auriol, Joseph Hornung and Wolgang-Adam Toepffer also gave him lessons and trained him in their art. In 1821, François Diday made a short stay in Paris  where he   he worked in 1823 at Antoine Gros's studio. In 1824  he received a small scholarship for a stay in Italy. His works are noticed by the French painter Alexandre-Auguste Robineau   Around 1830, François Diday opens his own studio and trains young painters. He takes the head of the School of Alpine painting in Geneva, criticized by the french painters as representing only mountain landscapes. The paintings by François Diday are characterized by a harmonious light that illuminates the landscape.
François Diday received awards, notably in Paris (gold medal in 1841 and Legion of honor in 1842 for his painting Le Lac de Brienz or Les Baigneuses) and in Vienna in 1873 (bronze medal at the Universal Exhibition). He then exhibited in Berlin and Switzerland.
In politics, he joined the city council of Geneva in 1854. Upon his death, he bequeathed part of his property to the city of Geneva through the Diday Foundation and the Society of Arts.
He is buried in the Cimetière des Rois in Geneva.

_______________________________

2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

BLAKCHEAD / MONHEGAN PAINTED BY NICHOLAS ROERICH

 

NICHOLAS ROERICH (1874-1947)

Blackhead (50 m-150 ft) 

United States of America (Maine)

In Monhegan, Maine From Ocean series,  1922, Roerich Museum NYC

The rock
Blackhead (50m-150 ft) are northside cliffs situated on Monhegan, Manana Island, that have drawn the interest of many artists. The beginnings of the art colony on Monhegan date to the mid-19th century; by 1890, it was firmly established. Two of the early artists in residence from the 1890s, William Henry Singer (1868–1943) and Martin Borgord (1869–1935), left Monhegan to study at the Académie Julian in Paris in 1901. Among many early members who found inspiration on the island were summer visitors from the New York School of Art and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, such as Robert Henri, Frederick Waugh, George Bellows, Edward Hopper and Rockwell Kent. The Monhegan Museum celebrated more the continuing draw of the island for artists in a 2014 exhibit entitled, “The Famous and the Forgotten: Revisiting Monhegan’s Celebrated 1914 Art Exhibition."
Monhegan is a plantation in Lincoln County, Maine, United States, about 12 nautical miles (22 km) off the mainland. The population was 75 at the 2000 census. The plantation comprises its namesake island and the uninhabited neighboring island of Manana. The island is accessible by scheduled boat service from Boothbay Harbor, New Harbor and Port Clyde. It was designated a National Natural Landmark for its coastal and island flora in 1966.

The painter
Nicholas Roerich known also as Nikolai Konstantinovich Rerikh (Никола́й Константи́нович Ре́рих) is quite an important figure of mountain paintings in the early 20th century. He was a Russian painter, writer, archaeologist, theosophist, perceived by some in Russia as an enlightener, philosopher, and public figure. In his youth was he was quite influenced by a movement in Russian society around the occult and was interested in hypnosis and other spiritual practices. His paintings are said to have hypnotic expression.

More about the painter =>

_______________________________

2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

MOUNT KUMGANG OR GEUMGANG BY JEONG SEON

  

 

JEONG SEON (1676-1759)

Mount Geumgang / Biro peak (1,638-m-5,374 ft)

North Korea

In Album of Mount Geumgang (Pungak-docheop), 

Six leaves from a fourteen-leaf album; ink and light color on silk, 1711 

National Museum of Korea

About thos two views  (ftom The MET Notes) 
Jeong Seon painted this album following his first trip to the Diamond Mountains. He likely traveled northeast from the capital, Hanyang (today’s Seoul), and traversed the mountain range from Inner to Outer Geumgang toward the sea. Displayed here are six scenes from a total of thirteen (the last leaf in the album is a colophon). The varied compositions reveal Jeong’s early experimentations, which he would repeat, adapt, or refine over the course of his career. 
1. General View of Inner Geumgang
This overview format as well as the juxtaposition of dark, foliage-covered rolling peaks and the white spiky pillars reveal Jeong’s ingenuity. Prominent sites enfolded into this view include Jangan Temple and the adjacent stone bridge in the foreground center and the tallest summit, Biro Peak, in the far distance. Labeling important sites is a convention Jeong applied to many of his paintings of the Diamond Mountains, which other artists followed.
2. Mount Geumgang Viewed from Danbal Ridge
Travelers to the Diamond Mountains usually approached from the Danbal Ridge, from where they would catch their first glimpse of the glittering rocky peaks—depicted here as if floating in the sky, creating a sense of drama and wondrous discovery. Jeong employed multiple perspectives to create this view.

The mountain
Mount Kumgang  (1,638 m - 5,374 ft) or  Geumpang Mountains or The Diamond mountain, are a mountain/mountain range, in Kangwon-do, North Korea. It is about 50 kilometres (31 mi) from the South Korean city of Sokcho in Gangwon-do. It is one of the best-known mountains in North Korea. It is located on the east coast of the country, in Mount Kumgang Tourist Region, formerly part of Kangwŏn Province). Mount Kumgang is part of the Taebaek mountain range which runs along the east of the Korean Peninsula.
Koreans have perceived Kŭmgangsan as their muse since well before the Middle Ages. Practically every poet and artist who lived during the Joseon dynasty (1392-1910) made a pilgrimage to Kŭmgangsan. The division of the Korean peninsula in 1950 resulted in the South Korean people finding themselves unable to visit this beloved mountain for the better part of 50 years. The 155-mile-long (249 km) barbed-wire fence erected as part of the DMZ (Demilitarized zone) separating the two Koreas proved to be an obstacle stronger than any other barrier.[
In 1894 the British writer Isabella Bird Bishop referred to it in her travelogue as "Diamond Mountain".

The painter
Jeong Seon (정선)  was a Korean landscape painter, also known by his pen name Kyomjae ("humble study"). His works include ink and oriental water paintings, such as Inwangjesaekdo (1751), Geumgang jeondo, and Ingokjeongsa (1742), as well as numerous "true-view" landscape paintings on the subject of Korea and the history of its culture.  He is counted among the most famous Korean painters.  The landscape paintings that he produced reflect most of the geographical features of Korea.  The poverty he experienced in his youth made him pursue his career as a painter.  He was proficient at Zhou-I and astronomy. He worked at the Bureau of Painting creating landscapes for patrons and clients.
He was discovered by an aristocratic neighbour who recommended him to the court. He soon gained an official position. Jeong is said to have painted daily, with a prolific output until old age. 
Jeong was the most eminent painter in the late Joseon Dynasty (1700–1850) and explored the scenic beauty of the capital city of Hanyang (Seoul), the Han River, the East Sea, and the Diamond Mountain (above). He is the first painter of true-view Korean landscapes. Differing from earlier techniques and traditional Chinese styles, he created a new style of painting depicting the virtues of Korea. It is reported that he frequently left his studio and painted the world around him, as he could see it. His paintings are classified as Southern School, but he developed his own style by realistically portraying natural scenes such as mountains and streams with bold strokes of his brush.
A major characteristic of his work is intermixed dark and light areas, created by layers of ink wash and lines. His mountains are punctuated by forests, which in turn are lightened by mists and waterfalls. Vegetation is made from dots, a technique that bears the influence of Chinese painter Mi Fei (1052–1107). Jeong's style would influence generations of Korean artists, and become one of the iconic images of Korean nationalism.

MOUNT EARNSLAW / PIKIRAKATAHI BY LAURENCE WILLIAM WILSON

 

LAURENCE WILLIAM  WILSON  (1851-1912),

Mount Earnslaw / Pikirakatahi  (2,819m -9,249 ft)

New Zealand 

In  Mount Earnslaw, 1887,   oil on canvas., 84x120cm

The mountain 

Mount Earnslaw, (2,819m -9,249 ft) also named Pikirakatahi by Māori is located on New Zealand's South Island. It is named after Earnslaw (formerly Herneslawe) village in the parish of Eccles, Berwickshire, hometown of the surveyor John Turnbull Thomson's father.

Mount Earnslaw is within Mount Aspiring National Park at the southern end of the Forbes Range of New Zealand's Southern Alps. It is located 25 kilometres north of the settlement of Glenorchy, which lies at the northern end of Lake Wakatipu.

The painter
Laurence William Wilson emigrated to Auckland in 1877 and then travelled extensively to settle in Dunedin in 1884. He painted in both oils and watercolours, became a painting companion of George O'Brien and a teacher. One of his pupils was the Dunedin artist Alfred O'Keefe. In 1895, LW Wilson together with Grace Joel, Alfred O'Keefe, Jane Wimperis and Girolami Nerli formed the Easel Club , a breakaway from the Dunedin Establishment, which offered a programme of special classes and the introduction of a professional lady model for life drawing. In 1904 LW Wilson left Dunedin for Melbourne where he spent 5 months on a commissioned painting of the city before he set out for England, eventually returning to New Zealand via India and Africa. He exhibited with the Canterbury Society of Arts in 1882 and the Otago Art Society between 1994 and 1904. His work was included in the NZ and South Seas Exhibition Dunedin 1889-90 and at the St Louis Exposition in 1904. LW Wilson is represented in the collections of all the major public galleries in New Zealand.

___________________________________________

2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

CLIFFS OF SEELISBERG & OBERBAUENSTOCK PEAK BY ALEXANDRE CALAME

ALEXANDRE CALAME (1810-1864) 

Oberbauenstock peak  (2,117m - 6,946 ft) 

Switzerland

In Cliffs of Seelisberg, Lake Lucerne, oil on canvas laid on cardboard, 1861,  

Courtesy John Mitchell Gallery, London 

About this painting
The hamlet of Seelisberg is located on one of Lake Lucerne’s promontories. Also referred to as the Vierwaldstättersee, the lake was a favourite haunt of Calame.  The shores of the lake have changed little since this daring and vertiginous view over the cliffs was painted. This oil sketch echoes Caspar David Friedrich’s sublime Cliffs at Rügen in the Oskar Reinhart Museum in Winterthur which also has an important collection of Calame paintings on public display.  

The mountain
The Oberbauenstock peak (2,117m -6,946 ft)  is a mountain of the Urner Alps, overlooking Lake Lucerne in Central Switzerland. Its summit is located on the border between the cantons of Nidwalden and Uri. The small resort of Seelisberg is situated like a peninsula and surrounded by the Vierwaldstättersee with majestic views of lake and mountains. The historically symbolic Rütli Meadow, legendary founding site of the Swiss Confederation, also belongs to Seelisberg.

The painter
Alexandre Calame was a Swiss painter. He was the son of a skillful marble worker in Vevey. His father lost the family fortune, and Alexandre Calame was forced to work in a bank at the age of 15. When his father fell from a building and then died, the young Calame provided for his mother.
In his spare time he began to practice drawing small views of Switzerland. In 1829 he met his patron, the banker Diodati, who made it possible for him to study under landscape painter François Diday. After a few months he decided to devote himself fully to art.
In 1835, he began exhibiting his Swiss-Alps and forest paintings in Paris and Berlin. He became quite well known, especially in Germany, although Calame was more a drawer than an illustrator. He is associated with the Dusseldorf school of painting. In 1842 he went to Paris and displayed his works Mont Blanc, the Jungfrau, the Brienzersee, the Monte Rosa and Mont Cervin. He taught in Geneva, where Adolf Mosengel was one of his pupils.
He went to Italy in 1844 and brought back from Rome and Naples countless paintings, among them one of the ruins of Paestum (in the city museum in Leipzig). He showed that he was capable of understanding Italian nature; but the Alps remained his speciality.
The glaciers, emerald-green, white foaming mountain water, which split the trees during the storm, and the whipped clouds, the multi-colored rocks, half masked from fog, in the rays of the gleaming sun, are those things, which he knew to be true to nature.
One of his most ingenious works is the representation of the four seasons and times of the day in four landscapes, a spring morning in the south, a summer midday in the Nordic flatlands, an Autumn evening, and a winter night on a mountain. He became popular with these large works, and his popularity grew with smaller pieces and lithographies, namely 18 studies of Lauterbrunnen and Meiringen and the 24 sheets of Alpine passes. These were widespread in France, England, and Germany and are still today used to teach this style of painting. 

An exhibition featuring more than thirty of Calame's paintings was held at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Massachusetts in 2006.
______________________________

2020 - Wandering Vertexes..
by Francis Rousseau

 

GRAN ZEBRU PAINTED BY FRANZ JOSEPH BLASCHKE

 

FRANZ JOSEPH BLASCHKE (1916-1984)
Gran Zebru or Königspitze (3,851m- 12,635 ft)
Italy

In Königspitze (or Gran Zebru) South Tyrol, watercolor, Courtesy John Mitchell Gallery, London, 

The mountain
The Gran Zebru (3,851m- 12,635 ft) or Königspitze (in german ) is a mountain of the Ortler Alps on the border between South Tyrol and the Province of Sondrio, Italy. After Ortler, it is the second highest peak in the Ortler Alps, know to have been a important strategic place during World War I. The Gran Zebru forms the southeast end of this Dolomit Range. The Italian name Gran Zebru (Big Zebra) derives from Val Zebru and is etymologically unclear. It is thought an origin of the pre-Roman name Gimberu.
The mountain was first climbed (the date is controversial) on August 3, 1854, by Stephan Steinberger or 3 August 2864 by Tuckett, Buxton and the Biner Brothers. The mountain can be dangerous in warm weather, when the snow and ice can become unstable and particularly nowadays with the global warning melt of the permafrost. The worst day for climbing fatalities on the mountain occurred on August 5, 1997, when seven people were killed in two separate incidents. On June 23, 2013, six were killed, also in two separate incidents.

The painter
Son of a drawing teacher and an architect, Franz Josef Blaschke is in Bad Salzungen. After a successful training as a wood sculptor in Eslohe, he received a scholarship for a student at the State Sculpture School with Dell Antonio in 1937.
During the Second World War, the artist moved to France, then to Russia and Poland. 

After the war, he continued his art studies at the Düsseldorf Academy with Fritz Reusing (portrait) and Hermann Baptist Hundt (landscape painting) and became a pupil of Friedrich Vordemberge at the Cologne school after 1948.
Blaschke is today mostly known for his  landscapes, in which he explored the limits of form, often approaching abstraction. Its panoramas with striking graphic elements as well as its very colorful views have posed it among the successors of Oskar Kokoschka.
He produced sculptures in public space for the University Dental Clinic in Bonn, for the Gerling Group in Cologne and for an Insurance Company in Düsseldorf.
The artist has made himself known through commissions for portraits of famous German personalities such as Chancellor Konrad Adenauer, Otto Wolff von Amerongen, Willy Millowitsch, Claudia Doren and others .... Franz Josef Blaschke has always been attached to paint the psychiology of the characters rather than making a physical description similar or detailed.

___________________________________________

2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

ELEPHANT CASTLE PAINTED BY JACOBUS HENDRIK PIERNEEF

 

JACOBUS HENDRIK PIERNEEF (1886-1957)

Elephant Castle (400m-1,300ft) 

South Africa  

 In Elephant Castle, Selati Rivier, Phalaborwa, 1945, oil on canvas 60,5x 76cm, Private collection

The rock formation
Elephant Castle (400m-1,300ft) is part of The Lebombo Mountains, also called Lubombo Mountains are an 800 km-long (500 mi), narrow range of mountains in Southern Africa. The name of the mountains is derived from the Zulu word ubombo meaning "big nose".
They stretch from Hluhluwe in KwaZulu-Natal in the south to Punda Maria in the Limpopo Province in South Africa in the north. Parts of the mountain range are also found in Mozambique and Eswatini.
Geologically, the range is considered a monocline; part of a rifted volcanic margin. The Lebombo monocline was aligned with the Explora Escarpment off-shore Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica, before the break-up of Gondwana. The Lebombo monocline strikes N-S and dips to the east. It is composed of a sequence of Jurassic age volcanic rock, both basaltic lavas and rhyolitic flows and tuffs. The sequence rests on essentially horizontal Karoo Supergroup sedimentary rocks of the Kalahari Craton to the west and is overlain by Cretaceous to recent sediments to the east. The alternating resistant rhyolite and easily eroded basalts produce a series of parallel sharp cuesta ridges separated by savanna plains.
The range is relatively low with heights between 400 m (1,300 ft) and less than 800 m (2,600 ft). The highest peak is the 776 m-high (2,546 ft) Mount Mananga. The 480 m-high (1,570 ft) Longwe is the highest point in the Lebombo Range north of the Letaba River.


The painter
Jacobus Hendrik (Henk) Pierneef (usually referred to as Pierneef) was a South African landscape artist, generally considered to be one of the best of the old South African masters. His distinctive style is widely recognized and his work was greatly influenced by the South African landscape.
Most of his landscapes were of the South African highveld, which provided a lifelong source of inspiration for him. Pierneef's style was to reduce and simplify the landscape to geometric structures, using flat planes, lines and colour to present the harmony and order in nature. This resulted in formalised, ordered and often-monumental view of the South African landscape, uninhabited and with dramatic light and colour.
Pierneef's work can be seen worldwide in many private, corporate and public collections, including the Africana Museum, Durban Art Gallery, Johannesburg Art Gallery, King George VI Art Gallery, Pierneef Museum and the Pretoria Art Gallery.

___________________________________________

2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

LALLA KHEDIDJA ATTRIBUTED TO JOHN-LEWIS SHONBORN

 

JOHN-LEWIS SHONBORN (1852- 1931)  (attributed to)

Lalla Khedidja (2,308 m -7,572 ft)

Algeria (Kabylie) 

The mountain
Lalla Khedidja (2,308 m -7,572 ft) in the Jurjura Range is the highest summit of the Tell Atlas, a mountain chain over 1,500 km (932 mi) in length, belonging to the Atlas mountain ranges in North Africa, stretching from Morocco, to Tunisia through Algeria. The ranges of this system have average elevations of about 1,500 m (4,900 ft) and form a natural barrier between the Mediterranean and the Sahara. Several large cities such as the Algerian capital, Algiers and Oran lie at the base of the Tell Atlas. The Algerian city Constantine lies 80 km inland and directly in the mountains at 650 meters in elevation. A number of smaller towns and villages are situated within the Tell; for example, Chiffa is nestled within the Chiffa gorge.
The Tell Atlas runs parallel to the Mediterranean coast. Together with the Saharan Atlas to the south it forms the northernmost of two more or less parallel ranges which approach one another towards the east, remaining quite distinct from one another in Western Algeria and merging in Eastern Algeria. At the western end, it ends at the Rif and Middle Atlas ranges in Morocco. The Tell Atlas are also a distinct physiographic section of the larger Atlas Mountains province, which in turn is part of the larger African Alpine System physiographic division. The Tell Atlas and the Saharan Atlas form two natural barriers, the first against the Mediterranean and the second against the Sahara. Between them lies the valley of the Chelif and various lesser rivers.

 The painter
 Born from Hungarian parents who settled while still very young in American Middle-West, John-Lewis Schonborn studied horses in the family farm, from his childhood. He stays in Paris in the studio of the painter Léon Bonnat, then specializes in equestrian paintings very fashionable at that time, under the leadership of  Géricault. He participated in a mission in Tunisia and went to Kairouan. During this stay, he painted many landscapes of Algeria and  Kabylia, on all kinds of supports he could find (oil on cardboard or on paper, watercolour, oil on fabric or on wood ...).
He is one of the American orientalist painters.

_______________________

2020 - Wandering Vertexes
Un blog de Francis Rousseau

GUNUNG MERAPI (4) PAINTED BY RADEN SALEH

 

RADEN SALEH (1811-1880)

Gunung Merapi or Mount Merapi (2,914m - 9,500 ft)

Indonesia (Java)

In Merapi-Eruption by Day, 1865, Oil on canvas, National Gallery Singapore

About the painting
The Merapi volcano is one of the most active in Indonesia and the ring of fire on which it is located. Its silhouette changes constantly, because its lava dome explodes regularly and changes its contours. The Merapi volcano is constantly erupting and counts in its very ancient history certain major eruptions which have modified the climate of the planet, and a cataclysmic eruption which almost exterminated the human species.


The mountain
Mount Merapi or Gunung Merapi (2,914m - 9,500 ft) is an active stratovolcano located on the border between Central Java and Yogyakarta, Indonesia. It is the most active volcano in Indonesia and has erupted regularly since 1548. It is located approximately 28 kilometres (17 mi) north of Yogyakarta city which has a population of 2.4 million, and thousands of people live on the flanks of the volcano, with villages as high as 1,700 metres (5,600 ft) above sea level.
Smoke can often be seen emerging from the mountaintop, and several eruptions have caused fatalities. Pyroclastic flow from a large explosion killed 27 people on 22 November 1994, mostly in the town of Muntilan, west of the volcano.Another large eruption occurred in 2006, shortly before the Yogyakarta earthquake. In light of the hazards that Merapi poses to populated areas, it has been designated as one of the Decade Volcanoes.
More about  Gunung Merapi....


The painter
Raden Saleh Sjarif Boestaman was a pioneering Indonesian Romantic painter of Arab-Javanese ethnicity. He was considered to be the first "modern" artist from Indonesia (then Dutch East Indies), and his paintings corresponded with nineteenth-century romanticism which was popular in Europe at the time. He also expressed his cultural roots and inventiveness in his work.
Raden Saleh Sjarif Boestaman was born in 1811 in Semarang on the island of Java into a noble Hadhrami family where his father was Sayyid Husen bin Alwi bin Awal bin Yahya, an Indonesian of Arab descent.
Young Raden Saleh was first taught in Bogor by the Belgian artist A.J. Payen. Payen acknowledged the youth's talent, and persuaded the colonial government of the Netherlands to send Raden Saleh to the Netherlands to study art. He arrived in Europe in 1829 and began to study under Cornelius Kruseman and Andreas Schelfhout. From Schelfhout, Raden Saleh furthered his skills as a landscape painter.
During his stay in Paris, Saleh met Horace Vernet whose painting frequently took themes of African wildlife. Compared to Vernet, Saleh's painting seems to be more influenced by the romantic painter Eugène Delacroix. This could be seen in one of Saleh's work, Hunting Lion, 1840, which has similar composition to Delacroix's La Liberté guidant le peuple. However, Werner Kraus, a researcher in the Southeast-Asian Art Center of Passau, German, said that Saleh "never mentioned Delacroix. Perhaps he saw Delacroix's, and possibly Vernet's, works during an exhibition."
While in Europe, in 1836 Saleh became the first indigenous Indonesian to be initiated into Freemasonry. From 1839, he spent five years at the court of Ernest I, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, who became an important patron.
Raden Saleh visited several European cities. Many of his paintings were exhibited at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. Several of his paintings were destroyed when the Colonial Dutch pavilion in Paris was burnt in 1931.
Raden Saleh returned to Dutch East Indies in 1852 after living in Europe for 20 years. He worked as conservator for the colonial collection of government art and continued painting portraits of the Javanese aristocracy, and many more landscape paintings.

___________________________

2020 - Wandering Vertexes
Un blog de Francis Rousseau

TOIRRES DEL PAINE PAINTED BY JAMES HART DYKE

 

JAMES HART DYKE (bn.1966)

Torres del Paine (2,500 m - 8,200 ft) 

Chile 

In Torres del paine and single cloud, oil on vanvas 2018, courtesy John Mitchell Gallery

The mountains
The Torres del Paine  (2,500 metres - 8,200 ft)  are the distinctive three granite peaks of the Paine mountain range or Paine Massif. They are known as Torres d'Agostini, Torres Central and Torres Monzino. They  are joined by the Cuernos del Paine. The area also boasts valleys, rivers such as the Paine, lakes, and glaciers. The well-known lakes include Grey, Pehoé, Nordenskiöld, and Sarmiento. The glaciers, including Grey, Pingo and Tyndall, belong to the Southern Patagonia Ice Field.
he landscape of the park is dominated by the Paine massif, which is an eastern spur of the Andes located on the east side of the Grey Glacier, rising dramatically above the Patagonian steppe. Small valleys separate the spectacular granite spires and mountains of the massif. These are: Valle del Francés (French Valley), Valle Bader, Valle Ascencio, and Valle del Silencio (Silence Valley).
The Southern Patagonian Ice Field mantles a great portion of the park.

The painter
James Hart Dyke’s work is centred on landscape painting, from the domesticity of paintings of country houses to paintings generated from physically demanding expeditions over remote mountains. James has also undertaken a series of projects including accompanying HRH The Prince of Wales as the official artist on royal tours, working as ‘artist in residence’ for The British Secret Intelligence Service, working as an artist embedded with the British Forces in war zones, working for the producers of the James Bond films and working as ‘artist in residence’ for Aston Martin. These projects required him to respond in many different ways and have allowed him to experiment with more graphic forms of painting influenced by his studies as an architect at the Royal College of Art. His portraits have been shown at the National Portrait Gallery and at the Royal Society of Portrait Painters exhibitions.

___________________________
2020 - Wandering Vertexes
Un blog de Francis Rousseau