THE WATZMANN PAINTED BY JOHAN CHRISTIAN DAHL

JOHAN CHRISTIAN DAHL  (1788-1857)
The Watzmann (2,713m - 8,901ft)
Germany (Bavarian Alps)

In The Watzmann (1825), Oil on canvas, 45 x 33 cm, Nasjonalgalleriet, Oslo

The mountain
The Watzmann (2,713m - 8,901ft) is a mountain in the Bavarian Alps south of the village of Berchtesgaden. It is the third highest in Germany, and the highest located entirely on German territory. Three main peaks array on a N-S axis along a ridge on the mountain's taller western half: Hocheck (2,651 m), Mittelspitze (Middle Peak, 2,713 m) and Sьdspitze (South Peak, 2,712 m).
The Watzmann massif also includes the 2,307 m Watzmannfrau (Watzmann Wife, also known as Kleiner Watzmann or Small Watzmann), and the Watzmannkinder (Watzmann Children), five lower peaks in the recess between the main peaks and the Watzmannfrau.
The entire massif lies inside Berchtesgaden National Park.
The Watzmann Glacier is located below the famous east face of the Watzmann in the Watzmann cirque and is surrounded by the Watzmanngrat arête, the Watzmannkindern and the Kleiner Watzmann. The size of the glacier reduced from around 30 hectares (74 acres) in 1820 until it split into a few fields of firn, but between 1965 and 1980 it advanced significantly again and now has an area of 10.1 hectares (25 acres). Above and to the west of the icefield lie the remains of a transport-bomber that crashed in October 1940.
Amongst the other permanent snow and icefields the Eiskapelle ("Ice Chapel") is the best known due to its easy accessibility from St. Bartholomä. The Eiskapelle may well be the lowest lying permanent snowfield in the Alps. Its lower end is only 930 metres high in the upper Eisbach valley and is about an hour's walk from St. Bartholomä on the Königssee. The Eiskapelle is fed by mighty avalanches that slide down from the east face of the Watzmann in spring and accumulate in the angle of the rock face. Sometimes a gate-shaped vault forms in the ice at the point where the Eisbach emerges from the Eiskapelle. Before entering there is an urgent warning sign that others have been killed by falling ice.
In the east face itself is another icefield in the so-called Schöllhorn cirque, called the Schöllhorneis, which is crossed by the Kederbach Way (Kederbacher-Weg). The cirque and icefield are named after the Munich citizen, Christian Schöllhorn, who was the first victim on the east face. On 26 May 1890 he fell at the upper end of the icefield into the randkluft and was fatally injured. Another small nameless snowfield is located several hundred metres below the Mittelspitze also in the east face. 

MONTE DEL FORNO PAINTED BY GIOVANNI GIACOMETTI

GIOVANNI GIACOMETTI (1868-1933)

Monte del Forno (3,214m -10,544 ft )

Italy - Switzerland border 

In Lake and mount  del Forno, watercolour,  Private collection  

The mountain
Monte del Forno (3,214m -10,544 ft )  not to be confused with  Monte Forno (Austrian, Slovenian Italian border)  is a mountain in the Bregaglia Range (Alps), located on the border between Italy and Switzerland. On its western side it overlooks the Forno Glacier and Lake.

The painter 
Giovanni Giacometti was a Swiss painter, the father of the famous painter and sculptor Alberto Giacometti, and of Diego Giacometti, the furniture designer as well as the father of the architect Bruno Giacometti ! In 1886, he studied painting at the School of Decorative Arts in Munich, where he met Cuno Amiet the following year. Both decide to pursue their studies in Paris, in October stood at the Académie Julian, where Giacometti remains until 1891.
In 1893, shortly after his return to Switzerland, to Bergell, he became friends with Giovanni Segantini, his eldest ten years, which has great influence on his work by opening it to the beauty of the mountain scenery and the rules of divisionism. After his sudden death in 1899, Giacometti met Ferdinand Hodler, who teaches him to create a rigorous and ornamental composition by appropriate use of shapes and colors.
He sees regularly Cuno Amiet, who after a year spent in Pont-Aven, shared his experience with him. In 1900 he exhibited in the Swiss Pavillon of the Universal Exhibition in Paris. From 1905, Giacometti works again in a great complicity with Amiet and begins to break free from the influence of Segantini. In 1906, held an exhibition of his work at Kunstlerhaus Zurich. In 1907 he went to Paris with Amiet to the Cézanne retrospective at the Salon d'Automne. They copy all the works of Van Gogh. In 1908, he exhibited with the French Fauves at the Richter Gallery in Dresden.
In 1909, the Tannhauser Gallery presents his works in Munich. He meets Alexi von Jawlensky, and in 1911 participates in the Berlin Secession. In 1912, Giacometti has a solo show at the Kunsthaus Zurich presents two works in the Sonderbund of Cologne. In 1918 after Hodler' s death, he began to be involved into the Swiss political world paying an important part as a committed artist, following int that way friend Amiet.

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2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

THE RIGI PAINTED BY TURNER

J.M.W. TURNER (1775-1851)

The Rigi or Rigi Kulm or Mount Rigi (1, 797m - 5,897ft)

Switzerland

In Lucerne by Moonlight - Sample Study, ca.1842/43, Watercolour on paper, 23.5 x 32.5 cm,

Tate London

The mountain
The Rigi (1, 797m - 5,897ft) is a mountain massif of the Alps, located in Central Switzerland.
The whole massif is almost entirely surrounded by the water of three different water bodies: Lake Lucerne, Lake Zug and Lake Lauerz. The range is in the Schwyzer Alps, and is split between the cantons of Schwyz and Lucerne, although the main summit, named Rigi Kulm, at 1,798 meters above sea level, lies within the canton of Schwyz. Technically, the Rigi is not a part of the Alps, and belongs instead to the Swiss plateau. It is mostly composed of molasse and other conglomerate, as opposed to the Bündner schist and flysch of the Alps.
The Rigi Kulm and other areas, such as the resort of Rigi Kaltbad, are served by Europe's oldest mountain railways, the Rigi Railways. Swiss Railways offer a special round-trip excursion, the “Rigi-Rundfahrt”, covering multiple segments by train, cog-railway, gondola (optional) and lake steamer. The whole area offers many activities such as skiing or sledging in the winter, and hiking in the summer.
The name Rigi is from Old High German "rîga" which means "row, stripe, furrow", after the stratification that is clearly visible on the north-side of the mountain. The name is first recorded in 1350 as Riginun. The name was interpreted as Regina montium "queen of mountains" by Albrecht von Bonstetten (1479), who however gives Rigena as alternative form.
Mt. Rigi has been featured in many works of art, including both paintings and literary publications. Perhaps the most famous paintings of the Rigi were the series by J.M.W. Turner , several of which are in the collection of the Tate Britain in London.
Mark Twain also visited Rigi during his tour of Central Europe in the late 1870s, and wrote about his travels in chapter 28 of his "A Tramp Abroad."

The painter
The english painter Joseph Mallord William Turner was considered a controversial figure in his day, but is now regarded as the artist who elevated landscape painting to an eminence in the history of painting. Although renowned for his oil paintings, Turner is also one of the greatest masters of British watercolour landscape painting. He is commonly known as "the painter of light" and his work is regarded as a Romantic preface to Impressionism.
More about Turner

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2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

THE WETTERHORN PAINTED BY KARL ANNELER

 

KARL ANNELER (1886 - 1957) 

 The Wetterhorn (3,692m-12,113ft)

 Switzerland

In The Wetterhorn, Grindelwald, Bernese Oberland, Switzerland, oil on canvas, c.1920, 

Courtesy John Mitchell Gallery London

The mountain
The Wetterhorn (3,692m-12,113ft) in the Bernese Alps, towers above the village of Grindelwald. Formerly known as Hasle Jungfrau, it is one of three summits of a mountain named Wetterhorn sensu lato, or the "Wetterhцrner", the highest summit of which is the Mittelhorn (3,704 m) and the most distant the Rosenhorn (3,689 m). The Mittelhorn and Rosenhorn are mostly hidden from view from Grindelwald. The Grosse Scheidegg Pass crosses the col to the north, between the Wetterhorn and the Schwarzhorn.
The Wetterhorn summit was first reached on August 31, 1844, by the Grindelwald guides Hans Jaun and Melchior Bannholzer, three days after they had co-guided a large party organized by the geologist Edouard Desor to the first ascent of the Rosenhorn. The Mittelhorn was first summitted on 9 July 1845 by the same guides, this time accompanied by a third guide, Kaspar Abplanalp, and by Stanhope Templeman Speer. The son of a Scottish physician, Speer lived in Interlaken, Switzerland.
Wetterhorn is neither a difficult, nor an easy mountain. Each access has its specialty. Since the Wetterhorn can be seen from most mountains within 100 miles, the view is unique. Although everything up there is snow and ice, looking perpendicularly down to the green pastures of Grindelwald provides an unforgettable contrast.

The painter
Although Anneler trained as a decorative painter for theatre companies in both his native Bern and then in Münich, by 1910 he had established himself as an independent landscape and portrait painter. He lived in the Lötschental Valley for nearly twenty years where he specialized in landscapes of the Bernese Oberland and recording traditional genre scenes from village life, specifically, weddings and processions. Despite the increase in the number of homes built today, thanks to strict building regulations in Grindelwald such views as shown here of chalets with the Wetterhorn as a backdrop are still common. Anneler’s work is represented in the Swiss Alpine Museum in Bern.
 

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2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
Un blog de Francis Rousseau

THE BREITHORN PAINTED BY JOHN J. REDMOND

JOHN J. REDMOND (1856-1929)
The Breithorn (4,165 m -13,664 ft) 

Switzerland - Italy border

In  Sunset on the Breithorn from Mürren, Bernese Oberland, Switzerland, oil on canvas, 

Courtesy John Mitchell Gallery, London 

The mountain
The Breithorn (4,165 m -13,664 ft) which means "broad horn" in german - is a mountain range of the Pennine Alps as well as its highest peak (also called Breithorn Western Summit). The Breithorn is located on the border between Switzerland and Italy. It lies on the main chain of the Alps, approximately halfway between the Matterhorn and Monte Rosa and east of the Theodul Pass. Most of the massif is glaciated and includes several subsidiary peaks, all located east of the main summit: the Western summit (4, 165m), the Middle summit (4,159m), the Eastern Breithorn-twin also called The Gendarm (4,106m), the Roccia Nera (Schwarzfluh) (4,075m). The main summit is sometimes distinguished by the name Western Breithorn (German: Breithorn (Westgipfel), Italian: Breithorn Occidentale). The nearest settlements are Zermatt (Valais) and St-Jacques (Aosta Valley).
The Breithorn was first climbed in 1813 by Henry Maynard (climber), Joseph-Marie Couttet, Jean Gras, Jean-Baptiste Erin and Jean-Jacques Erin.

The painter
John J. Redmond, was an american painter, active in late XIX and early XXth c. He belongs to the american impresssionism. His works were regularly exhibited in USA especially in Boston between 1888and 1909.
Born in Salem (Mass) he died in Switzerland.

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.
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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.

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2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

THE MONT BLANC BY J.M.W. TURNER

 

J.M.W. TURNER (1775-1851)

Mont Blanc (4,808.13 m - 15,776.7 ft)

  France - Italy  border

 In  Bonneville, Savoy, with Mont Blanc, 1803, Oil on Canvas,  92 x 123.2 cm, 

The Dallas Museum of Art (Gift of Nancy Hamon) 

The mountain 

Mont Blanc (in French) or Monte Bianco (in Italian), both meaning "White Mountain", is the highest mountain in the Alps and the highest in Europe after the Caucasus peaks. It rises 4,808.73 m (15,777 ft) above sea level and is ranked 11th in the world in topographic prominence.  The Mont Blanc is one of the Seven Summit, which includes the highest mountains of each of the seven continents. Summiting all of them is regarded as a mountaineering challenge, first achieved on April 30, 1985 by Richard Bass.  The 7 highest summit, (which are obviously 8 with 2 in Europe !) are :  

Mount Everest (8,848m), Aconcagua (6,961m), Mt Denali or Mc Kinley (6,194m),  Kilimandjaro (5,895m), Mt Elbrus (5,642m), Mount Vinson (4,892m) and Mount Kosciuszko  (2,228m) in Australia.

The mountain lies in a range called the Graian Alps, between the regions of Aosta Valley, Italy, and Savoie and Haute-Savoie, France. The location of the summit is on the watershed line between the valleys of Ferret and Veny in Italy and the valleys of Montjoie, and Arve in France. The Mont Blanc massif is popular for mountaineering, hiking, skiing, and snowboarding.

Moreabout Mont Blanc

The painter 

The english painter Joseph Mallord William Turner was considered a controversial figure in his day, but is now regarded as the artist who elevated landscape painting to an eminence in the history of painting. Although renowned for his oil paintings, Turner is also one of the greatest masters of British watercolour landscape painting. He is commonly known as "the painter of light" and his work is regarded as a Romantic preface to Impressionism.

More about Turner 

___________________________________

2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

THE AIGUILLE VERTE ( 2) BY JACQUES FOURCY

 

JACQUES FOURCY (1906-1990)
Aiguille Verte (4,122m - 13,525 ft)
France (Haute-Savoie)

In The Aiguille Verte from Chamonix, oil on canvas

The mountain
The Aiguille verte (4122 - 13,525 ft) ( The Green Needle) is a summit of the Mont-Blanc massif in Haute-Savoie,. It is one of 82 summits over 4,000 meters identified in the Alps. This vast mountain, difficult to access and long undefeated, is articulated on three slopes:
- the southern slope, where its normal ascent route develops, the Whymper corridor. Access is by the refuge of the cover (2,867 meters). The descent by this route is perilous and supposes to keep a tight schedule (go down before the corridor is too exposed to the sun) and excellent snow and ice conditions; a recently installed abseiling line currently allows for a less risky descent;
- the Nant-Blanc slope, which overlooks the Chamonix valley;
- the north side or Argentière side, where we notice in particular the Couturier corridor, a long snow and ice slide more than a thousand meters high.
Below and between these two slopes is the Grands-Montets ski resort.
None of the routes to the summit are easy

The painter
Jacques Fourcy was a French painter, member of the Société des peintres de montagnes.
Born in Paris, he studied engineering at Ecole Centrale Paris and then joined the railways firm Compagnie des Chemins de Fer de Paris à Lyon et à la Méditerranée (PLM), then the Société Nationale des Chemins de Fer. A prisoner of war for five years, he was repatriated as a result of the loss of one eye; he later receives the Croix de Guerre 1939-1945.
His training seems to be that of an self taught one. He began to paint very early, especially watercolors at first. He paints in his spare time and after his retirement. He joined the Société des peintres de montagnes in 1925 and exhibited at the Salon of French artists from 1926. Well known for his particularly lively and colorful watercolors, he also devoted himself, especially after the Second World War, to the oil painting most often done on panels (Isorel). He especially painted the high mountains; his works represent in particular the great peaks of the Chamonix Valley and Oisans but also the summits of the Swiss Alps. The Museum of Chamonix exhibits several of his works.

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2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

THE SCHÖNBERG PAINTED BY FERDINAND GEORG WALDMÜLLER

 

FERDINAND GEORG WALDMÜLLER (1793-1865)

Schönberg (2,104m -6,903 ft)

Lichtenstein 

In The Schönberg seen from the Hoisernradalpe, oil on canvas, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid

The mountain
Schönberg (2,104m -6,903 ft) is a mountain in Liechtenstein in the Rätikon range of the Eastern Alps north-east of the village of Steg. The Rätikon is a mountain range of the Central Eastern Alps, located at the border between Vorarlberg, Liechtenstein and Graubünden. It is the geological border between the Eastern and Western Alps and stretches from the Montafon as far as the Rhine. In the south, the Prättigau is its limit, and in the north, it is the Walgau. In the east, it borders the Silvretta groups. The Rätikon mountain range derives its name from Raetia, a province of the Roman Empire, named after the Rhaetian (Raeti or Rhaeti) people.

The painter
Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller was an Austrian writer and  one of the most important painters of the Biedermeier period. Whether it was the conquest of the landscape and thus the convincing rendering of closeness or distance, the accurate characterisation of the human face, the detailed and refined description of textures, or the depiction of rural everyday life: his works – brilliant, explanatory, moralising, and socially critical – influenced a whole generation of artists. Being an advocate of natural observation and plein air painting, as well as a critic of academic painting, Waldmüller was far ahead of his time.

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Wandering Vertexes 2020
A blog by Francis Rousseau

THE RIGI PAINTED BY J;M;W TURNER

 

JOSEPH MALLORD WILLIAM TURNER (1775-1851)

The Rigi or Rigi Kulm or Mount Rigi (1, 797m - 5,897ft)

Switzerland

In A Storm over the Rigi, c.1844, Watercolour on paper, 25 x 37,1cm,  Tate Britain

The mountain
The Rigi (1, 797m - 5,897ft) is a mountain massif of the Alps, located in Central Switzerland.
The whole massif is almost entirely surrounded by the water of three different water bodies: Lake Lucerne, Lake Zug and Lake Lauerz. The range is in the Schwyzer Alps, and is split between the cantons of Schwyz and Lucerne, although the main summit, named Rigi Kulm, at 1,798 meters above sea level, lies within the canton of Schwyz. Technically, the Rigi is not a part of the Alps, and belongs instead to the Swiss plateau. It is mostly composed of molasse and other conglomerate, as opposed to the Bündner schist and flysch of the Alps.
The Rigi Kulm and other areas, such as the resort of Rigi Kaltbad, are served by Europe's oldest mountain railways, the Rigi Railways. Swiss Railways offer a special round-trip excursion, the “Rigi-Rundfahrt”, covering multiple segments by train, cog-railway, gondola (optional) and lake steamer. The whole area offers many activities such as skiing or sledging in the winter, and hiking in the summer.
The name Rigi is from Old High German "rîga" which means "row, stripe, furrow", after the stratification that is clearly visible on the north-side of the mountain. The name is first recorded in 1350 as Riginun. The name was interpreted as Regina montium "queen of mountains" by Albrecht von Bonstetten (1479), who however gives Rigena as alternative form.
Mt. Rigi has been featured in many works of art, including both paintings and literary publications. Perhaps the most famous paintings of the Rigi were the series by J.M.W. Turner , several of which are in the collection of the Tate Britain in London.
Mark Twain also visited Rigi during his tour of Central Europe in the late 1870s, and wrote about his travels in chapter 28 of his "A Tramp Abroad."

The painter
The english painter Joseph Mallord William Turner was considered a controversial figure in his day, but is now regarded as the artist who elevated landscape painting to an eminence in the history of painting. Although renowned for his oil paintings, Turner is also one of the greatest masters of British watercolour landscape painting. He is commonly known as "the painter of light" and his work is regarded as a Romantic preface to Impressionism.
More about Turner 

_______________________________
2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

THE AIGUILLE VERTE PAINTED BY JACQUES FOURCY

  

 

JACQUES FOURCY (1906-1990) 

Aiguille Verte  (4,122m - 13,525 ft)

France  (Haute-Savoie)

 In  The Petite Aiguille Verte and the Aiguille Verte seen from the Aiguille des Grands Montets, Chamonix, France oil on panel, 57 x 77cm, Courtesy John Mitchell Gallery London 

 The mountain
The Aiguille verte (4122 - 13,525 ft) ( The Green Needle) is a summit of the Mont-Blanc massif in Haute-Savoie,. It is one of 82 summits over 4,000 meters identified in the Alps. This vast mountain, difficult to access and long undefeated, is articulated on three slopes: 
-   the southern slope, where its normal ascent route develops, the Whymper corridor. Access is by the refuge of the cover (2,867 meters). The descent by this route is perilous and supposes to keep a tight schedule (go down before the corridor is too exposed to the sun) and excellent snow and ice conditions; a recently installed abseiling line currently allows for a less risky descent;
- the Nant-Blanc slope, which overlooks the Chamonix valley;
- the north side or Argentière side, where we notice in particular the Couturier corridor, a long snow and ice slide more than a thousand meters high.
Below and between these two slopes is the Grands-Montets ski resort.
None of the routes to the summit are easy

 The painter
Jacques Fourcy was a French painter, member of the Société des peintres de montagnes.
Born in Paris,  he studied engineering at Ecole Centrale Paris and then joined the railways firm Compagnie des Chemins de Fer de  Paris à Lyon et à la Méditerranée (PLM), then the Société Nationale des Chemins de Fer. A prisoner of war for five years, he was repatriated as a result of the loss of one eye; he later receives the Croix de Guerre 1939-1945.
His training seems to be that of an self taught one. He began to paint very early, especially watercolors at first. He paints in his spare time and after his retirement. He joined the Société des peintres de montagnes in 1925 and exhibited at the Salon of French artists from 1926. Well known for his particularly lively and colorful watercolors, he also devoted himself, especially after the Second World War, to the oil painting most often done on panels (Isorel). He especially painted the high mountains; his works represent in particular the great peaks of the Chamonix Valley and Oisans but also the summits of the Swiss Alps. The Museum of Chamonix exhibits several of his works.

_______________________________ 

2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

THE MONT BLANC BY JULES-LOUIS-PHILIPPE COIGNET

 

JULES-LOUIS-PHILIPPE COIGNET (1798-1860)

 The Mont Blanc  (4,808m -15,777 ft)

 France Italy border

In Vue de Saint-Gervais,1843, Private collection 

The mountain 

Mont Blanc (in French) or Monte Bianco (in Italian), both meaning "White Mountain", is the highest mountain in the Alps and the highest in Europe after the Caucasus peaks. It rises 4,808.73 m (15,777 ft) above sea level and is ranked 11th in the world in topographic prominence.  The Mont Blanc is one of the Seven Summit, which includes the highest mountains of each of the seven continents. Summiting all of them is regarded as a mountaineering challenge, first achieved on April 30, 1985 by Richard Bass.  The 7 highest summit, (which are obviously 8 with 2 in Europe !) are :  

Mount Everest (8,848m), Aconcagua (6,961m), Mt Denali or Mc Kinley (6,194m),  Kilimandjaro (5,895m), Mt Elbrus (5,642m), Mount Vinson (4,892m) and Mount Kosciuszko  (2,228m) in Australia.

More about the Mont Blanc 

The painter  

Jules Louis Philippe Coignet was  was a noted french landscape painter who had studied under Jean-Victor Bertin. He travelled a good deal in his own country as well as elsewhere in Europe and the East, and produced a considerable number of views. A regular exhibitor at the Paris Salon exhibitions, he was awarded a gold medal there in 1824 and was given state recognition by being made a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour in 1836.
As a painter, Coignet holds a middle place between the Idealists and the Realists, and his work is remarkable for the combination of vigour and delicacy in the effects of light and shade, for poetical feeling, for a firm brush, and occasionally for grandeur of conception. This is particularly evident in "The Ruins of the Temple of Paestum", now in Munich's Neue Pinakothek. There are times too when his paintings have an atmospheric, almost Impressionist effect. One example is the coastal sunset in the Louvre;  another is the pastel "Grey weather over the sea" (1848) in the Dijon Fine Arts Museum.
Following the 1824 exhibition in Paris of John Constable's paintings, Coignet began painting outside in the forest of Fontainebleau and encouraged his students to do the same. One of his specialities was painting tree 'portraits', of which there are many examples, both as finished paintings and as sketches in oil paint. Two notable examples are the ancient oak, with a dolmen and meditating monk in the background, in the Quimper museum  and the dramatic "Oak tree and reeds" in the Musée Jean de La Fontaine at Château-Thierry.  As a pioneer of open air painting (la peinture de plein air), Coignet has been counted a member of the Barbizon school, the artists associated with the village of Barbizon, where he had painted long before they settled there. In fact one of the minor members of this school, the genre painter Ferdinand Chaigneau, was a pupil of Coignet's.
In addition to producing many water-colours, pastels and etchings, he wrote a book on landscape painting and published in 1825 a series of sixty Italian views.

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2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

GRAMMONT PAINTED BY ERNEST BIÉLER

 

ERNEST BIÉLER (1863–1948) 

The Grammont (2, 172 m - 7,126 ft) 

Switzerland (Valais) 

In Le Grammont, Tempera on panel, 50.5 × 109 cm, Private collection 

 

The mountain
The Grammont (2, 172 m- 7,126 ft) is a mountain located in the Valais Chablais, in the Canton of Valais, Savoy Alps, Switzerland. Its northern flank falls steeply to the French-Swiss border towns of Saint-Gingolph on the shores of Lake Geneva. To the south-east lies Lac de Tanay, a lake located in the municipality of Vouvry. In 1906, a concession was filed at Federal Authorities for the construction of a cogwheel railway from the Swiss Saint-Gingolph to the Grammont. Stations were provided on the slopes of Vignoles, in Fritaz and at 2,080 meters (6,824ft) at the top of the Grammont. An extension to the neighboring Cornettes de Bise was conceived. The deadline for submission of technical and financial documents was last extended in 1913. Because of the World War I, the train was never built.
During the Second World War, on July 13, 1943, an aircraft of the British Royal Air Force crashed on the northeast slope above Le Bouveret at an altitude of 900 meters on the slopes of the Grammont. Seven people were killed. The Swiss army announced that their air defense had fired the aircraft. The dead were buried in the English cemetery in Vevey.
The mountain has inspired the swiss painter Ferdinand Hodler quite a number of times. He painted the summit at every hour of the days and in every season...

The painter
Ernest Biéler was a multi-talented Swiss painter, draughtsman and printmaker. He worked in oil, tempera, watercolour, gouache, ink, charcoal, pastels, acrylic and pencil. He also created mosaics and stained glass windows. After completing his education in Lausanne, he studied at the Académie Julian in Paris. In 1900, he received the silver medal of the Exposition Universelle of Paris. He founded with Raphaël Ritz, Edouard Vallet and others, the Ecole of Savièse
] He was made a Knight of the Légion d'honneur.
Although he travelled widely, he remained attached to Savièse and often depicted scenes of peasant life with a remarkable degree of detail. Bieler also produced stained glass windows for the church and the federal building in Bern, and decorated a ceiling for the City Theatre in Berne.

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2020 - Wandering Vertexes
A blog by Francis Rousseau

LES DENTS BLANCHES PAINTED BY FERDINAND HODLER

FERDINAND HODLER (1853-1918)
Les Dents Blanches /  La Dent du Barme (2,759m - 9,051ft)
France - Switzerland border

In Les Dents Blanches in Champery, oil on canvas, 1916, Private collection

The mountain
Les Dents Blanches  (The White Teeth) is a mountain range made up of 9 peaks between Champery in Switzerland and  Sixt-Fer-à-Cheval  (France), in the Giffre massif and overlooking the Illiez valley. The highest peak,  Dent de Barme, rises to 2,759m.
Like its neighbor the Tour des Dents du Midi, the Tour des Dents Blanches takes place in stages and over several days. The complete loop covers 44.4 km and has a cumulative elevation of 8,400 meters. This tour exists since 1983 thanks to a collective work of different regions and huts. Together they carried out the tracing of the route, its markup and the securing of certain passages.
With its 4 mountain lakes, the Dents Blanches are the delight of nature lovers. The ibex have made Pas de l'Ours their privileged habitat and marmots are not lacking in appeal. Other treasures of fauna such as ptarmigan and bearded vulture can also be obs

The painter
Ferdinand Hodler is one of the best-known Swiss painters of the 19th century. His early works were portraits, landscapes, and genre paintings in a realistic style. Later, he adopted a personal form of symbolism he called Parallelism.
In the last decade of the nineteenth century his work evolved to combine influences from several genres including Symbolism and Art Nouveau. In 1890 he completed Night, a work that marked Hodler's turn toward symbolist imagery. It depicts several recumbent figures, all of them relaxed in sleep except for an agitated man who is menaced by a figure shrouded in black, which Hodler intended as a symbol of death. Hodler developed a style he called "Parallelism" that emphasized the symmetry and rhythm he believed formed the basis of human society. In paintings such as The Chosen One, groupings of figures are symmetrically arranged in poses suggestive of ritual or dance.
Hodler painted number of large-scale historical paintings, often with patriotic themes. In 1897 he accepted a commission to paint a series of large frescoes for the Weapons Room of the Schweizerisches Landesmuseum in Zurich. The compositions he proposed, including The Battle of Marignan which depicted a battle that the Swiss lost, were controversial for their imagery and style, and Hodler was not permitted to execute the frescoes until 1900.
Hodler's work in his final phase took on an expressionist aspect with strongly coloured and geometrical figures. Landscapes were pared down to essentials, sometimes consisting of a jagged wedge of land between water and sky

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2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
Un blog de Francis Rousseau

THE CERVIN / MATTERHORN (2) PAINTED BY CHARLES-HENRI CONTENCIN

 

CHARLES-HENRI CONTENCIN (1898-1955),
Mont Cervin / Mattherhorn (4,478m -14,691ft)
Switzerland

In The Matterhorn West face seen from the Stockji Glacier, Switzerland, Oil on canvas (39 x 46cm) Courtesy John Mitchell gallery

The mountain
The Mont Cervin (4,478m -14,691ft) (in french), Matterhorn in German is an alpine summit located on the Swiss-Italian border between the canton of Valais and the Aosta Valley in Switzerland. It has several other names: Cervino in Italian, Grand'Bèca in Arpitan, Matterhorn in German. The Cervin / Matterhorn is the most famous mountain in Switzerland, including the pyramidal shape that it offers from the village of Zermatt, in the German-speaking part of the canton of Valais.
Its four sides are joined about 400 meters below the summit in a summit pyramid, called "roof." Its summit is a broad ridge about two meters, on which stand actually two summits: one called "Swiss summit," the farther east, and the "Italian summit" slightly lower (4,476 meters), on the west side of the ridge. The two are separated by a notch in the hollow of which a cross was laid in September 1901.
Its north face is one of the three great north faces of the Alps with the Eiger and the Grandes Jorasses.
The most famous faces of the Matterhorn are the faces east and north, seen from Zermatt. The first
1, 000 meters high, has great risk of falling rocks, which makes it dangerous climb. The north face high of 1100 meters, is one of the most dangerous sides of the Alps, particularly because of the risks of landslides and storms. The south side, overlooking the Breuil (Valtournenche above) is high, it, 1 350 meters. This is the face that offers the most channels. And finally, the west face the highest with its 1400 meters, is the one that is the subject of fewer climbs attempts. Between the west side and the north side there is also the north-northwest side, which does not stretch to the summit but stopped Zmutt Nose, on the bridge of the same name. This is the most dangerous route for climbing the Matterhorn. There is also a south-facing southeast, deemed to be the most difficult of the south face route, which leads to the Pic Muzio, on Furggen Shoulder.

The painter
Charles-Henri Contencin  is a famous French painter who painted many landscapes of mountain and high mountain of the great Alpine peaks, Mont Blanc and Massif and the Écrins mainly. His palette is characteristic. He particularly used the effects of sunrise or sunset over snow or glaciers. Raised in the Bernese Oberland to the age of 10-12 years, it was a lifelong mountain lover. Good climber, he was a member of the French Alpine Club, where he made the connection with the Mountain Painters Society (SPM). He made the First World War in the infantry and he received the War Cross. He then worked in an architectural office and at the Compagnie des chemins de Fer du Nord before joining the french national railways company, the SNCF, where he was responsible for engineering structures. In addition to his professional designs it is also author of posters and handbills for the railways under the pseudonym "Charles-Henri." He is best known for its mountain paintings and leaves an important work.

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2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

LES COURTES PAINTED BY JACQUES FOURCY

JACQUES FOURCY 1906-1990)

Les Courtes (3 ,856 m-12, 650ft)

France (Auvergne Rhône-Alpes)

In Les Courtes vues des Petites Aiguilles Rouges du Dolent, Chamonix  huile sur toile, 1947

The mountain
Les Courtes (3 ,856 m-12, 650ft) meaning in french  The Short ones, are  a series of summits on the French side of the Mont-Blanc massif. They are located on the link which, from the Aiguille de Triolet to the Aiguille Verte, separates the Talèfre glacier to the south and the Argentière glacier to the north. Between Les Droites and the Ravanel and Mummery needles, they appear as a long ridge with several summits from the Col des Droites  (3,733 m- 12 247ft)) in the northwest to the Col des Cristaux  (3,601 m- 11,814 ft ) in the southeast :
- the Tour des Courtes (3,816 m- 12,519 ft), with the pass of the Tour des Courtes (3,720 m) where the normal route passes
- West Shoulder (3,841 m- 12,601 ft )
- Les Courtes  (3 ,856 m -12, 650 ft)
- Chenavier needle (3,799 m - 12,463 ft)
- Aiguille Croulante  (Falling Needle) (3,765 m - 12,352 ft)
- Aiguille Qui Remue (Moving Needle) (3,724 m -12, 217ft )
The northeast face, the crossing of Les  Courtes (followed by the Ravanel and Mummery needles), the north-northeast northeast spur, and the north face are respectively no 29, no 38, no 76 and no 94 among the 100  most beautifull races of the Mont-Blanc massif by Gaston Rébuffat.

The painter
Jacques Fourcy was a French painter, member of the Société des peintres de montagnes.
Born in Paris,  he studied engineering at Ecole Centrale Paris and then joined the railways firm Compagnie des Chemins de Fer de  Paris à Lyon et à la Méditerranée (PLM), then the Société Nationale des Chemins de Fer. A prisoner of war for five years, he was repatriated as a result of the loss of one eye; he later receives the Croix de Guerre 1939-1945.
His training seems to be that of an self taught one. He began to paint very early, especially watercolors at first. He paints in his spare time and after his retirement. He joined the Société des peintres de montagnes in 1925 and exhibited at the Salon of French artists from 1926. Well known for his particularly lively and colorful watercolors, he also devoted himself, especially after the Second World War, to the oil painting most often done on panels (Isorel). He especially painted the high mountains; his works represent in particular the great peaks of the Chamonix Valley and Oisans but also the summits of the Swiss Alps. The Museum of Chamonix exhibits several of his works.

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2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

THE MONT BLANC (2) BY GABRIEL LOPPÉ

GABRIEL LOPPÉ (1825-1913)

The Mont Blanc (4,808.13 m - 15,776.7 ft)

 France, Italy border

In Sur le col du Géant – Soleil levant sur le Mont Blanc,  oil on canvas, 51 x 35.5cm,   1890,   Courtesy William Mitchell Gallery, London

The painter 

Toussaint Gabriel Loppé was a French painter, photographer and mountaineer. He became the first foreigner to be made a member of the Alpine Club in London. His father was a captain in the French Engineers and Loppé's childhood was spent in many different towns in south-eastern France. Aged twenty-one Loppé climbed a small mountain in the Languedoc and found a group of painters sketching on the summit. He had found his calling and subsequently went off to Geneva where he met the reputed leading Swiss landscapist, Alexandre Calame (1810 -1864). Loppé took up mountaineering in Grindelwald in the 1850s and made friends easily with the many English climbers in France and Switzerland. Although he was frequently labelled as a pupil of Calame and his rival François Diday, Loppé was almost an entirely self-taught artist. He became the first painter to work at higher altitudes during climbing expeditions earning the right to be considered the founder of the peintres-alpinistes school, which became established in the Savoie at the turn of the nineteenth century.

Notable followers of Loppé include, Charles Henri Contencin (1875-1955) and Jacques Fourcy (1906-1990). Together with the first ascent of Mt Mallet in Chamonix’s Grandes Jorasses range, Loppé made over 40 ascents of Mont Blanc during his climbing career, which lasted until the late 1890s.  He frequently made oil sketches from alpine summits, including a panorama of the view from the summit of Mont Blanc.

His paintings became celebrated for their atmosphere and spontaneity and he soon found himself taking part in many exhibitions in London and in Paris.

By 1896 Loppé had spent over fifty seasons climbing and painting in Chamonix. As the valley’s unrivalled ‘Court painter’ his work was in constant demand with the majority of his pictures going to English climbers and summer tourists.

In his later years, Loppé became fascinated with photography and was quite an innovator in this field too. His long exposure photograph of the Eiffel Tower struck by lightning, now in the Musée d'Orsay in Paris remains one of his iconic images. 

The mountain 

Mont Blanc (in French) or Monte Bianco (in Italian), both meaning "White Mountain", is the highest mountain in the Alps and the highest in Europe after the Caucasus peaks. It rises 4,808.73 m (15,777 ft) above sea level and is ranked 11th in the world in topographic prominence.  The Mont Blanc is one of the Seven Summit, which includes the highest mountains of each of the seven continents. Summiting all of them is regarded as a mountaineering challenge, first achieved on April 30, 1985 by Richard Bass.  The 7 highest summit, (which are obviously 8 with 2 in Europe !) are :  

Mount Everest (8,848m), Aconcagua (6,961m), Mt Denali or Mc Kinley (6,194m),  Kilimandjaro (5,895m), Mt Elbrus (5,642m), Mount Vinson (4,892m) and Mount Kosciuszko  (2,228m) in Australia.

The mountain lies in a range called the Graian Alps, between the regions of Aosta Valley, Italy, and Savoie and Haute-Savoie, France. The location of the summit is on the watershed line between the valleys of Ferret and Veny in Italy and the valleys of Montjoie, and Arve in France. The Mont Blanc massif is popular for mountaineering, hiking, skiing, and snowboarding.

The three towns and their communes which surround Mont Blanc are Courmayeur in Aosta Valley, Italy, and Saint-Gervais-les-Bains and Chamonix in Haute-Savoie, France.  A cable car ascends and crosses the mountain range from Courmayeur to Chamonix, through the Col du Géant. Constructed beginning in 1957 and completed in 1965, the 11.6 km (7¼ mi) Mont Blanc Tunnel runs beneath the mountain between these two countries and is one of the major trans-Alpine transport routes.

Since the French Revolution, the issue of the ownership of the summit has been debated.

More about The Mont Blanc 

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2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

TRE CIME PAINTED BY KONRAD PETRIDES

KONRAD PETRIDES  (1864-1944)

Tre Cime di Lavaredo (2,999 m -  9,839 ft)

Italy   

In  Tre  Cime, Dolomiten,  oil on canvas

The mountain 

Tre Cime di Lavaredo (2,999 m -  9,839 ft)   (The three peaks of Lavaredo)  also called Drei Zinnen by Germans, are three distinctive battlement-like peaks, in the Sexten Dolomites of northeastern Italy. They are probably one of the best-known mountain groups in the Alps, and one of the most photographed in Italy. The three peaks are named, from east to west, "little peak" (Cima Piccola), "big peak" (Cima Grande) and "western peak" (Cima Ovest). The Cima Grande has an elevation of 2,999 metres (9,839 ft). It stands between the Cima Piccola, at 2,857 metres (9,373 ft), and the Cima Ouest, at 2,973 metres (9,754 ft).

Until 1919 the peaks formed part of the border between Italy and Austria. Now they lie on the border between the Italian provinces of South Tyrol and Belluno and still are a part of the linguistic boundary between German-speaking and Italian-speaking majorities. Both communities still battle today about the exact border line.

The surrounding around Tre Cime di Lavaredo and the path leading to the Three Peaks is popular among hikers. There are numerous routes leading from the surrounding communities to and around the peaks. The road that leads to the southern side of the Three Peaks was built during World War I as a transport road by pioneers to support the front troops in that war. Because of this there are a number of fortifications, man-made caves, and commemorative plaques in the area.

The peaks are also great for climbing. The first ascent of the Cima Grande was made in the early 1869 by Paul Grohmann, Franz Innerkofler and Peter Salcher. The Cima Ovest was first climbed exactly ten years later, in 1879. The Cima Piccola was conquered two years later on 1881. The partly overhanging northern face of the Cima Grande is considered by climbers to be one of the great north faces of the Alps, and was first climbed in 1933 after an ascent time of 3 days and 2 nights.

The artist 
Konrad Petrides  was a Viennese landscape and stage painter in the studio Hermann Burghart, where the painters Anton Brioschi, Josef Kautsky, Georg Jany and Leopold Rothaug also worked. He also painted many veduras, especially from Lower Austria and East Tyrol. Petrides was a member of the Dürer League, in whose exhibitions he participated and whose silver medal he received in 1919. In 1904 he also received the gold medal at the World's Fair in St. Louis, USA.

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2019 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

PIZ BERNINA BY CARL FRIEDRICH SEIFFERT

 

 

CARL FRIEDRICH SEIFFERT (1809-1891)

Piz Bernina (4, 049 m- 13, 283ft)

Switzerland - Italy border

In View of the Lago di Poschiavo with the Bernina Range, 1859 Oil on canvas, 50.5 x 87 cm Private collection

The mountain
Piz Bernina or Pizzo Bernina (4, 049m- 13, 283ft) is the highest mountain in the Eastern Alps, the highest point of the Bernina Range, and the highest peak in the Rhaetian Alps. It is located south of Pontresina and near the major Alpine resort of St. Moritz, in the Engadin valley with the massif partially in Italy. The mountain can be seen from different viewpoints with the use of ski-lifts from Diavolezza, Piz Corvatsch or Piz Nair. It is also the most easterly mountain higher than 4,000 m (13,000 ft) in the Alps, the highest point of the Swiss canton of Graubünden, and the fifth-most prominent peak in the Alps. The minor summit (4,020 m -13,190 ft) known as La Spedla is the highest point in the Italian Lombardy region. The mountain was named after the Bernina Pass in 1850 by Johann Coaz, who also made the first ascent. The prefix Piz comes from the Romansch language in Graubünden; any mountain with that name can be readily identified as being located in southeastern Switzerland.

The painter
Not a lot of informations about the german academic painter Carl Seiffert specialized in mountains of Switzerland and Italy,  His work has been offered at auction multiple times, with realized prices ranging from $445 USD to $9,530 USD  depending on the size and medium of the artwork. Since 2017 the record price for this artist at auction is $9,530 USD for Blick über die Ruinen des Amphitheaters von Taormina auf Sizilien auf den Ätna, sold at Bassenge in 2017 which one of his most famous.

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2019 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau