LE MONT SINAÏ/ JABAL MUSA PEINT PAR DAVID ROBERTS

 

DAVID ROBERTS ( 1796-1864)
Mont Sinaï / Jabal Musa (2,285 m)
Egypte

In " Ascent of the Lower Range of Sinai, February 18th 1839" , Lithographie de Louis Hague, 1849

La montagne
Le mont Sinaï (2 285 m  ou Jabal Mūsā ou Gabal Mūsā (en arabe : "Montagne de Moïse" ou "Mont Moïse"), également connu sous le nom de Mont Horeb ou Jebel Musa (une montagne du même nom au Maroc), est une montagne dans la péninsule du Sinaï en Égypte. Elle est considérée comme l'emplacement le plus probable du mont Sinaï ,la montagne sacrée décrite dans la Bible. Ce dernier est mentionné à plusieurs reprises dans le Livre de l'Exode (et d'autres livres de la Bible) ainsi que dans le Coran. Selon la tradition juive, chrétienne et islamique, le mont Sinaï est le lieu où Moïse a reçu les Dix Commandements, les Tables de la Loi.
Le mont Sinaï est une montagne modérément élevée près de la ville de Saint Katherine dans la région du Sinaï. Il est situé juste à côté du mont Katherine (2 629 m - 8 625 pieds), le plus haut sommet d'Égypte.
Les roches du mont Sinaï se sont formées à la fin de l'évolution du bouclier arabo-nubien (ANS). Le mont Sinaï présente un complexe annulaire composé de granites alcalins pénétrés dans divers types de roches, y compris des roches volcaniques. Les granites varient en composition du syénogranite au granit de feldspath alcalin. Les roches volcaniques sont alcalines à hyperalcalines et elles sont représentées par des coulées et des éruptions subaériennes et du porphyre subvolcanique. En général, la nature des roches exposées du mont Sinaï indique qu'elles proviennent de profondeurs différentes.
Il y a deux routes principales vers le sommet. La route la plus longue et la moins profonde, Siket El Bashait, prend environ 2, heures et demi à pied, bien que des chameaux puissent être utilisés. La route la plus raide et la plus directe (Siket Sayidna Musa) monte les 3 750 "marches de pénitence" dans le ravin derrière le monastère.
Le sommet de la montagne comporte une mosquée qui est encore utilisée par les musulmans. Il possède également une chapelle orthodoxe grecque, construite en 1934 sur les ruines d'une église du 16e siècle, qui n'est pas ouverte au public. La chapelle renferme le rocher qui est considéré comme l'endroit où furent remise à Moïse, les Tables de la Loi. Au sommet se trouve également la "Grotte de Moïse", où Moïse aurait attendu avant de recevoir les Dix Commandements. 

Le peintre
Son travail commence à être connu et apprécié. En 1824, il rencontre Charles Dickens qui le prend en sympathie et l’introduit dans le monde. Il fait la connaissance de William Turner qui lui conseille de voyager : « c’est à l’étranger qu’on apprend la peinture ». La peinture l’attire et il commence ses voyages
Il quitte Londres en août 1838, traverse la France, embarque à Marseille et parvient à Alexandrie, après une escale à Malte le 24 septembre. Il se rend immédiatement au Caire et il loue un bateau avec douze hommes d’équipage pour remonter le Nil. Il parvient à l’extrême Sud de son voyage, à Abou Simbel, en Nubie le 8 novembre. À l’aller comme au retour, il fait une grande quantité de dessins et d’aquarelles des grands sites égyptiens. La grande surprise vient de la taille gigantesque des monuments. Il ne manque pas de dessiner des personnages devant pour montrer l'échelle. Il note dans son journal « Nous sommes un peuple de nains visitant une nation de géants ». Certains temples sont encore ensablés quand il les dessine. L’ensablement était une méthode de construction. N’ayant pas de moyens de levage, on construisait des rampes de sable, pour monter les pierres sur des rondins, jusqu’à les poser sur les pierres précédentes. À la fin de la construction, on désensablait le temple et il apparaissait alors dans sa taille impressionnante. Le temple d’Edfou est un exemple de cet ensablement. Les vents de sable, depuis l’Antiquité ont aussi une part de responsabilité dans cet ensablement, l’extérieur du temple d’Abou Simbel en est un autre exemple.
Il revient au Caire le 21 décembre avec plus de cent dessins et aquarelles, et séjourne là jusqu’à son départ en Terre Sainte. Introduit dans le milieu arabe, il fait de nombreux croquis et aquarelles au Caire, y compris dans les mosquées.
Il écrit : « Je suis le premier artiste, du moins anglais, à être venu ici. Les travaux des Français ne donnent pas l’impression de ces vestiges admirables comme je le sais maintenant »
Avec deux compagnons anglais, il part pour la Terre Sainte le 7 février 1839. Ils sont accompagnés de cinq serviteurs armés. Ils portent tous un costume local et sont portés par des chameaux. Ils vont jusqu’à Baalbek, mais il tombe malade et décide le 8 mai de repartir pour Beyrouth, puis de gagner Alexandrie et revenir en Angleterre
Il arrive à Londres, après deux escales, à Malte et Gibraltar, le 21 juillet 1839. Il montre ses œuvres originales, en obtient un grand succès et il est élu membre de la Royal Academy (RA) le 10 février 1841.
Il se met ensuite au travail avec Louis Haghe pour son grand œuvre, un recueil de 247 lithographies, gravées par son ami Louis Hague, d’après ses croquis et aquarelles. Louis Hague est le fils d’un architecte et il a appris la gravure. Mais l’influence de son père est notable, les lithographies doivent beaucoup aux rendus des dessins d’architecture. Le trait a beaucoup d’importance et les œuvres ressemblent à des gravures aquarellées. 

 

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2024 - Gravir les montagnes en peinture
Un blog de Francis Rousseau

 

SINAÏ / JABAL MUSA PEINT PAR JOACHIM PATINIER

 

JOACHIM PATINIER (1484-1524) 

Mount Sinaï ou Jabal Musa (2,285 m - 7,496ft) 

Egypte

 

In Paysage de  la Fuite en Egypte, huile sur panneau, 1517, Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Antwerp 

 

A propos de la composition
Il s'agit évidement ici d'un Mont Sinaï imaginaire que l'on aperçoit à droite dans le loitain reproduit sur la foi de pèlerins de l'époque. Au cas où l'on aurait un doute, le petit village d'architecture flamande rassurerait tout de suite quant à la position géographique ! Ceci dit, hormis le ruisseau qui traverse ce désert du Sinaï plutôt hospitalier, la peinture des reliefs n'est pas si éloignée que cela de la réalité topographique. 

 

 Le peintre
Joachim Patinier, Patenier, ou Patinir, est un peintre et dessinateur flamand de la Haute Renaissance.  Il intégra en 1515 la Guilde de Saint-Luc des peintres d'Anvers comme franc-maître et travailla en collaboration avec différents peintres dont Quentin Metsys. Ce dernier devait être assez intime avec lui puisqu'à sa mort, il fut désigné comme l'un des tuteurs de ses enfants. Lors de son voyage aux Pays-Bas, Albrecht Dürer se lia d'amitié avec Joachim Patinier et réalisa son portrait. C'est « un bon peintre de paysage » nota-t-il dans son journal de voyage. Il lui emprunta des couleurs, un de ses élèves, et assista à son second mariage le 5 mai 1521.
Considéré comme l'un des initiateurs du genre « paysage » dans la peinture occidentale, Joachim Patinier est un peintre d'histoire. Il réalisa des peintures à l'huile sur panneaux de bois dans le genre pictural majeur qui s’inspire surtout de scènes issues de l’histoire chrétienne popularisée par La Légende dorée de Jacques de Voragine. Son style est caractérisé par l'utilisation fréquente de la perspective atmosphérique qui offre une vision panoramique en plongée. Ses compositions comportent généralement trois plans principaux distincts : un premier plan brun sur lequel sont disposés les figures principales et leurs accessoires ainsi que des éléments minéraux et végétaux (des rochers, des herbes, des fleurs, un arbre ou un arbuste presque mort), un plan moyen à dominante verte où sont représentés avec finesse et précision de nombreux personnages vaquant aux occupations les plus diverses, et un arrière-plan aux reliefs remarquables d'un bleu intense — on parle parfois de « bleu Patinir » —, qui rejoignent un ciel nuageux de même tonalité dans lequel semble surgir un orage menaçant.
Joachim Patinier semble avoir eu recours à divers collaborateurs pour exécuter les figures de premier plan de bon nombre de ses tableaux. La manière de Joachim Patinier fut reprise par bon nombre de peintres de la même génération ou de la suivante, parmi lesquels on peut citer Joos van Cleve, Corneille Metsys, Lucas Gassel, Henri Bles et le Maître des demi-figures féminines. Les emprunts thématiques et stylistiques furent parfois si importants que de nombreuses œuvres de ces continuateurs furent confondues avec celles de Joachim Patinier lui-même.

 

La montagne

Le mont Sinaï ou djebel Moussa (« montagne de Moïse ») est une montagne d'Égypte située dans le sud du Sinaï et culminant à 2 285 mètres d'altitude.
Le mont est surtout célèbre dans le récit biblique pour avoir été le lieu où Moïse rencontra Dieu pour la première fois au buisson ardent (Ex 3,1-4,17) et où il reçut les Dix Commandements (ou Dix Paroles, en Ex 20,1-17) et de nombreuses autres lois pour le peuple hébreu (Exode 19,1-31,18). Plusieurs autres localisations de cet épisode ont été proposées (voir Har Karkom et Sinaï (Bible)).
Le mont Sinaï est situé au Nord-Est de l'Égypte, dans le gouvernorat du Sinaï Sud, au niveau de la pointe sud de la presqu’île du Sinaï, à 50 kilomètres des côtes de la Mer Rouge et d'El-Tor, au sud-ouest, ainsi qu'à 75 kilomètres de Charm el-Cheikh, au sud-sud-est, et 160 kilomètres environ à vol d'oiseau du Caire. Le sommet s'élève à 2 285 mètres d'altitude, à quatre kilomètres au nord-nord-est du mont Sainte-Catherine (2 642 m), point culminant du massif et du pays. Les roches du mont Sinaï sont issues de la phase tardive du bouclier arabo-nubien. Elles sont constituées de granite avec des intrusions de roches volcaniques incluant du porphyre. La montagne s'est soulevée de 140 à 65 millions d’années BP, au cours du Crétacé.Deux chemins principaux mènent au sommet. Le plus long et le moins escarpé s’appelle Siket El Bashait ; il faut environ deux heures et demie à pied pour la gravir mais il est accessible aux chameaux. L’autre itinéraire, appelé Siket Sayidna Musa, passe dans le ravin derrière le monastère et est surnommé la route aux 3 750 « pas de la pénitence ».
Dans un registre spirituel, la montagne est à plusieurs reprises citée par les théologiens sous l’appellation « Sinaï mystique », comme étant un rite d’initiation, consacrant une spiritualité ascendante devant mener à la découverte d’un « moi supérieur » situé en son sommet qui devient alors la symbolique du but à atteindre demeurant au cœur de nombreuses pratiques initiatiques d’inspiration chrétienne, chiite et soufie. 

 

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2023 - Gravir les montagnes en peinture
Un blog de Francis Rousseau   

LE MONT SINAÏ PEINT PAR PIETER BRUEGEL L'ANCIEN

 

 

PIETER BRUEGEL L'ANCIEN (1525-1569)
Mount Sinaï / Jabal Musa (2,285 m - 7,496ft)
Egypte

In "Paysage avec La Fuite en Egypte", huile sur panneau , 1563, 37.1 × 55.6 cm, Courtauld Institute of Art, London 

A propos de ce tableau
Il s 'agit bien entendu d'une représentation imaginaire du Mont Sinai, Breughel comme tous les autres peintres de son temps s'inspirant des récits de voyageurs ou de témoignages de pèlerins pour en dresser la silhouette. D'où certaines erreurs. Ici la plus flagrante est la présence de l'eau. De beaucoup d'eau ! Beaucoup trop  d'eau lorsqu'on sait que c'est plutôt un désert aride qui entoure le Mont Sinaï. Mais la montagne elle-même (à gauche de la composition) est décrite avec un certain réalisme, ses  célèbres trois sommets y sont et la physionomie générale n'est pas très éloignée de ce que l'on peut observer dans la réalité.

La montagne
Le mont Sinaï (2 285 m - 7 496 ft) ou Jabal Mūsā ou Gabal Mūsā (en arabe : "Montagne de Moïse" ou "Mont Moïse"), également connu sous le nom de Mont Horeb ou Jebel Musa (une montagne du même nom au Maroc), est une montagne dans la péninsule du Sinaï en Égypte. Elle est considérée comme l'emplacement le plus probable du mont Sinaï ,la montagne sacrée décrite dans la Bible.  Ce dernier est mentionné à plusieurs reprises dans le Livre de l'Exode (et d'autres livres de la Bible) ainsi que dans  le Coran. Selon la tradition juive, chrétienne et islamique, le mont Sinaï est le lieu où Moïse a reçu les Dix Commandements, les Tables de la Loi.
Le mont Sinaï est une montagne modérément élevée près de la ville de Saint Katherine dans la région du Sinaï. Il est situé juste à côté du mont Katherine (2 629 m - 8 625 pieds), le plus haut sommet d'Égypte.
Les roches du mont Sinaï se sont formées à la fin de l'évolution du bouclier arabo-nubien (ANS). Le mont Sinaï présente un complexe annulaire composé de granites alcalins pénétrés dans divers types de roches, y compris des roches volcaniques. Les granites varient en composition du syénogranite au granit de feldspath alcalin. Les roches volcaniques sont alcalines à hyperalcalines et elles sont représentées par des coulées et des éruptions subaériennes et du porphyre subvolcanique. En général, la nature des roches exposées du mont Sinaï indique qu'elles proviennent de profondeurs différentes.
Il y a deux routes principales vers le sommet. La route la plus longue et la moins profonde, Siket El Bashait, prend environ 2, heures et demi à pied, bien que des chameaux puissent être utilisés. La route la plus raide et la plus directe (Siket Sayidna Musa) monte les 3 750 "marches de pénitence" dans le ravin derrière le monastère.
Le sommet de la montagne comporte  une mosquée qui est encore utilisée par les musulmans. Il possède également une chapelle orthodoxe grecque, construite en 1934 sur les ruines d'une église du 16e siècle, qui n'est pas ouverte au public. La chapelle renferme le rocher qui est considéré comme l'endroit où furent remise à Moïse, les Tables de la Loi. Au sommet se trouve également la "Grotte de Moïse", où Moïse aurait attendu avant de  recevoir les Dix Commandements.

Le peintre
Pieter Brueghel ou Bruegel dit l'Ancien, parfois francisé en Pierre Brueghel l'Ancien (est un peintre et graveur brabançon né vers 1525 et mort le 9 septembre 1569 à Bruxelles dans les Pays-Bas espagnols.
Avec Jan van Eyck, Jérôme Bosch et Pierre Paul Rubens, il est considéré comme l'une des grandes figures de l'École flamande, et l'une des principales de l'École d'Anvers. oujours selon van Mander, il fut l'élève de Pieter Coecke van Aelst, artiste cultivé, doyen de la guilde des artistes, à la fois peintre et architecte. En 1552, il fait un voyage en Italie, résidant à Rome où il a pu travailler avec le miniaturiste Giulio Clovio. Le Port de Naples, le décor de La Chute d'Icare et du Suicide de Saül ainsi que quelques dessins témoignent de son périple. Il est vraisemblable que Brueghel ait prolongé son voyage plus au Sud. À l'arrière plan du Combat naval dans le détroit de Messine, certains ont reconnu le village de Reggio di Calabria, face à la Sicile.
Entre 1555 et 1563, il est établi à Anvers et travaille pour l'éditeur Jérôme Cock, réalisant des dessins préliminaires pour des séries d'estampes.
À Anvers, il fréquente un cercle d'artistes et d'érudits humanistes, notamment le mécène Niclaes Jonghelinck qui possédait seize de ses œuvres. Il fut aussi l'ami du cartographe Abraham Orteliusqui écrivit quelques lignes émouvantes à sa mémoire14. Mais sa vie sociale déborde largement de ce milieu intellectuel. Il fréquente volontiers les noces paysannes auxquelles il se fait inviter comme « parent ou compatriote » des époux.
En 1562, à la demande de sa future belle-mère , il s'installe à Bruxelles dans le quartier des Marolles au 132, rue Haute, dans une maison à pignons à gradins de style médiéval flamand typique du 16e siècle. C'est à l'église Notre-Dame de la Chapelle qu'il épouse en 1563 Mayken Coecke, fille de son maître Pieter Coecke van Aelst et de Mayken Verhulst. Une étude de l'archiviste Jean Bastiaensen montre que le peintre résidait 16 rue des Bogards en face du couvent éponyme. À l'époque de la Réforme, les Calvinistes se réunirent en 1579 en la maison appelée "Schavershuyse", située en face de l'église des Bogards. Trois maisons classées de la rue de la Gouttière donnent une idée du bâti de l’époque. Un vestige de la chapelle construite en 1718 se trouve inséré dans les bâtiments de l'Académie royale des beaux-arts de Bruxelles. La rue des Bogards relevait de la paroisse de l'église Notre-Dame de la Chapelle.
En 1564 naît le premier de ses fils, Pieter Brueghel le Jeune, dit Bruegel d'Enfer. La situation politique et religieuse en Flandres se dégrade. En 1567 le duc d'Albe entreprend une campagne de répression sanglante contre les rebelles, et c'est l'année même de l'exécution des comtes d'Egmont et de Horn que naît en 1568 son second fils, Jan Brueghel l'Ancien, dit Brueghel de Velours. Il semble certain que Pieter Brueghel l'Ancien ait reçu la protection du gouverneur des Pays-Bas espagnols, Antoine Perrenot de Granvelle, collectionneur de ses œuvres.

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2022 - Wandering Vertexes ....
            Errant au-dessus des Sommets Silencieux...
            Un blog de Francis Rousseau

MOUNT SINAÏ / JABAL MUSA PAINTED BY EDWARD LEAR

EDWARD LEAR (1812-1888)
Mount Sinaï / Jabal Musa (2,285 m - 7,496ft)
Egypt

In View of Mount Sinai, Watercolor,with some white tempera, over pencil, on cream-colored wove paper.
(178 x 376 mm) Purchased as the gift of Mrs. Vincent Astor,  The Morgan Library & Museum

The mountain
Mount Sinaï (2,285 m - 7,496ft) or Jabal Mūsā or Gabal Mūsā (in arab : "Moses' Mountain" or "Mount Moses"), also known as Mount Horeb or Jebel Musa (a similarly named mountain in Morocco), is a mountain in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt that is a possible location of the biblical Mount Sinaï.
The latter is mentioned many times in the Book of Exodus (and other books of the Bible) and in the Quran. According to Jewish, Christian, and Islamic tradition, the biblical Mount Sinai was the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments (depicted in the Jean-Léon Gérôme painting above).
Mount Sinai is a moderately high mountain near the city of Saint Katherine in the Sinai region. It is next to Mount Katherine (2,629m - 8,625 ft), the highest peak in Egypt.
Mount Sinai's rocks were formed in the late stage of the Arabian-Nubian Shield's (ANS) evolution. Mount Sinai displays a ring complex that consists of alkaline granites intruded into diverse rock types, including volcanics. The granites range in composition from syenogranite to alkali feldspar granite. The volcanic rocks are alkaline to peralkaline and they are represented by subaerial flows and eruptions and subvolcanic porphyry. Generally, the nature of the exposed rocks in Mount Sinai indicates that they originated from differing depths.
There are two principal routes to the summit. The longer and shallower route, Siket El Bashait, takes about 2.5 hours on foot, though camels can be used. The steeper, more direct route (Siket Sayidna Musa) is up the 3,750 "steps of penitence" in the ravine behind the monastery.
The summit of the mountain has a mosque that is still used by Muslims. It also has a Greek Orthodox chapel, constructed in 1934 on the ruins of a 16th-century church, that is not open to the public. The chapel encloses the rock which is considered to be the source for the biblical Tablets of Stone. At the summit also is "Moses' cave", where Moses was said to have waited to receive the Ten Commandments

The painter
Edward Lear was an English artist, illustrator, musician, author and poet, and is known now mostly for his literary nonsense in poetry and prose and especially his limericks, a form he popularised. His principal areas of work as an artist were threefold: as a draughtsman employed to illustrate birds and animals; making coloured drawings during his journeys, which he reworked later, sometimes as plates for his travel books; as a (minor) illustrator of Alfred Tennyson's poems. As an author, he is known principally for his popular nonsense collections of poems, songs, short stories, botanical drawings, recipes, and alphabets. He also composed and published twelve musical settings of Tennyson's poetry.
Lear was already drawing "for bread and cheese" by the time he was aged 16.
In 1842, Lear began a journey into the Italian peninsula, travelling through the Lazio, Rome, Abruzzo, Molise, Apulia, Calabria, and Sicily. In personal notes, together with drawings, Lear gathered his impressions on the Italian way of life, folk traditions, and the beauty of the ancient monuments. Of particular interest in Lear was the Abruzzo, which he visited in 1843, through the Marsica (Celano, Avezzano, Alba Fucens, Trasacco) and the plateau of Cinque Miglia (Castel di Sangro and Alfedena), by an old sheep track of the shepherds.
Among his travels, he visited Greece and Egypt during 1848-49, and toured India and Ceylon during 1873–75. While travelling he produced large quantities of coloured wash drawings in a distinctive style, which he converted later in his studio into oil and watercolour paintings, as well as prints for his books. His landscape style often shows views with strong sunlight, with intense contrasts of colour. Between 1878 and 1883 Lear spent his summers on Monte Generoso, a mountain on the border between the Swiss canton of Ticino and the Italian region of Lombardy. His watercolor Mount Olympus dated 1849 in in the MET in New York City. His oil painting The Plains of Lombardy from Monte Generoso is in the Ashmolean Museum Oxford (UK).

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2022 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau 

MOUNT SINAÏ / JABAL MUSA PAINTED BY J.M.W. TURNER

J.M.W. TURNER  (1775–1851)
Mount Sinaï / Jabal Musa (2,285 m - 7,496ft)
Egypt 

In "Mount Sinai, the valley in which the Children of Israel were encamped",
pencil, pen, ink and watercolor on paper, 12.7 x 20.2 cm.
Private collection ( Christie's London/ 06/07/2010)

About this Painting
It descibes the moment Moses have waited to receive the Ten Commandments.

The mountain
Mount Sinaï (2,285 m - 7,496 ft) or Jabal Mūsā or Gabal Mūsā (in arab : "Moses' Mountain" or "Mount Moses"), also known as Mount Horeb or Jebel Musa (a similarly named mountain in Morocco), is a mountain in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt that is a possible location of the biblical Mount Sinai. The latter is mentioned many times in the Book of Exodus (and other books of the Bible) and the Quran. According to Jewish, Christian, and Islamic tradition, the biblical Mount Sinai was the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments.
Mount Sinai is a moderately high mountain near the city of Saint Katherine in the Sinai region.
It is next to Mount Katherine (2,629 m - 8,625 ft), the highest peak in Egypt.
Mount Sinai's rocks were formed in the late stage of the Arabian-Nubian Shield's (ANS) evolution. Mount Sinai displays a ring complex that consists of alkaline granites intruded into diverse rock types, including volcanics. The granites range in composition from syenogranite to alkali feldspar granite. The volcanic rocks are alkaline to peralkaline and they are represented by subaerial flows and eruptions and subvolcanic porphyry. Generally, the nature of the exposed rocks in Mount Sinai indicates that they originated from differing depths.
There are two principal routes to the summit. The longer and shallower route, Siket El Bashait, takes about 2.5 hours on foot, though camels can be used. The steeper, more direct route (Siket Sayidna Musa) is up the 3,750 "steps of penitence" in the ravine behind the monastery.
The summit of the mountain has a mosque that is still used by Muslims. It also has a Greek Orthodox chapel, constructed in 1934 on the ruins of a 16th-century church, that is not open to the public. The chapel encloses the rock which is considered to be the source for the biblical Tablets of Stone. At the summit also is "Moses' cave", where Moses was said to have waited to receive the Ten Commandments.

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.
In his thirties, Turner travelled widely in Europe, starting with France and Switzerland in 1802 and studying in the Louvre in Paris in the same year. He made many visits to Venice. Turner's talent was recognized early in his life. Financial independence allowed Turner to innovate freely; his mature work is characterized by a chromatic palette and broadly applied atmospheric washes of paint. According to David Piper's The Illustrated History of Art, his later pictures were called "fantastic puzzles." Turner was recognized as an artistic genius: influential English art critic John Ruskin described him as the artist who could most "stirringly and truthfully measure the moods of Nature."
Turner's major venture into printmaking was the Liber Studiorum (Book of Studies), seventy prints that he worked on from 1806 to 1819. The Liber Studiorum was an expression of his intentions for landscape art. The idea was loosely based on Claude Lorrain's Liber Veritatis (Book of Truth), where Lorrain had recorded his completed paintings; a series of print copies of these drawings, by then at Devonshire House, had been a huge publishing success. Turner's plates were meant to be widely disseminated, and categorized the genre into six types: Marine, Mountainous, Pastoral, Historical, Architectural, and Elevated or Epic Pastoral. His printmaking was a major part of his output, and a museum is devoted to it, the Turner Museum in Sarasota, Florida, founded in 1974 by Douglass Montrose-Graem to house his collection of Turner prints.
Turner placed human beings in many of his paintings to indicate his affection for humanity on the one hand (note the frequent scenes of people drinking or working or walking in the foreground), but its vulnerability and vulgarity amid the 'sublime' nature of the world on the other. 'Sublime' here means awe-inspiring, savage grandeur, a natural world unmastered by man, evidence of the power of God – a theme that romanticist artists and poets were exploring in this period. Although these late paintings appear to be 'impressionistic' and therefore a forerunner of the French school, Turner was striving for expression of spirituality in the world, rather than responding primarily to optical phenomena.
Turner used pigments like carmine in his paintings, knowing that they were not long-lasting, despite the advice of contemporary experts to use more durable pigments. As a result, many of his colours have now faded greatly.
John Ruskin says in his "Notes" on Turner in March 1878 : "His true master was Dr Monro; to the practical teaching of that first patron and the wise simplicity of method of watercolour study, in which he was disciplined by him and companioned by Girtin, the healthy and constant development of the greater power is primarily to be attributed; the greatness of the power itself, it is impossible to over-estimate. "

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2022 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

MOUNT SINAÏ/ JABAL MUSA IMAGINED BY FRA ANGELICO

 

FRA ANGELICO (1395-1455)
Mount Sinaï / Jabal Musa (2,285 m - 7,496ft)
Egypt

In Fuga in egitto, 1450, toile 38,5x37cm, Museo di San Marco, Firenze, 

 

The painter
Fra Angelico (born Guido di Pietro) was an Italian painter of the Early Renaissance, described by Vasari in his Lives of the Artists as having "a rare and perfect talent".  He earned his reputation primarily for the series of frescoes he made for his own friary, San Marco, in Florence. He was known to contemporaries as Fra Giovanni da Fiesole (Brother John of Fiesole) and Fra Giovanni Angelico (Angelic Brother John). In modern Italian he is called Beato Angelico (Blessed Angelic One);  the common English name Fra Angelico means the "Angelic friar".
In 1982, Pope John Paul II proclaimed his beatification in recognition of the holiness of his life, thereby making the title of "Blessed" official.  Fiesole is sometimes misinterpreted as being part of his formal name, but it was merely the name of the town where he took his vows as a Dominican friar,  and was used by contemporaries to separate him from others who were also known as Fra Giovanni. He is listed in the Roman Martyrology as Beatus Ioannes Faesulanus, cognomento Angelicus—"Blessed Giovanni of Fiesole, surnamed 'the Angelic' ".
Vasari wrote of Fra Angelico that "it is impossible to bestow too much praise on this holy father, who was so humble and modest in all that he did and said and whose pictures were painted with such facility and piety."

 

The mountain 

Mount Sinaï (2,285 m - 7,496ft) or Jabal Mūsā or Gabal Mūsā (in arab  : "Moses' Mountain" or "Mount Moses"), also known as Mount Horeb or Jebel Musa (a similarly named mountain in Morocco), is a mountain in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt that is a possible location of the biblical Mount Sinaï. 

The latter is mentioned many times in the Book of Exodus (and other books of the Bible) and in the Quran. According to Jewish, Christian, and Islamic tradition, the biblical Mount Sinai was the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments (depicted in the Jean-Léon Gérôme painting above).

Mount Sinai is a moderately high mountain near the city of Saint Katherine in the Sinai region. It is next to Mount Katherine (2,629m - 8,625 ft), the highest peak in Egypt. 

Mount Sinai's rocks were formed in the late stage of the Arabian-Nubian Shield's (ANS) evolution. Mount Sinai displays a ring complex that consists of alkaline granites intruded into diverse rock types, including volcanics. The granites range in composition from syenogranite to alkali feldspar granite. The volcanic rocks are alkaline to peralkaline and they are represented by subaerial flows and eruptions and subvolcanic porphyry. Generally, the nature of the exposed rocks in Mount Sinai indicates that they originated from differing depths.

There are two principal routes to the summit. The longer and shallower route, Siket El Bashait, takes about 2.5 hours on foot, though camels can be used. The steeper, more direct route (Siket Sayidna Musa) is up the 3,750 "steps of penitence" in the ravine behind the monastery.

The summit of the mountain has a mosque that is still used by Muslims. It also has a Greek Orthodox chapel, constructed in 1934 on the ruins of a 16th-century church, that is not open to the public. The chapel encloses the rock which is considered to be the source for the biblical Tablets of Stone. At the summit also is "Moses' cave", where Moses was said to have waited to receive the Ten Commandments.
___________________________________________

2021 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

MOUNT SINAÏ -JABAL MUSA PAINTED BY GIOTTO

GIOTTO (1266-1337)
Mount Sinaï or Jabal Musa (2,285 m - 7,496ft)
Egypt

In The flight into Egypt, fresco, Basilica inferiore di Assisi, 1308-10

 

About this work
The right transept of the Lower Basilica of Assisi has numerous frescoes by important fourteenth-century authors. On the large barrel vault there are the Stories of Christ's Childhood and the Crucifixion with Franciscan Saints by Giotto and collaborators, dated 1308-1311. The image depicts the scene of the Flight into Egypt already apunted by Giotto few years before in the interior frescoes of the Scrovegni Chapel in Padua, also known as the Arena Chapel. Inetrestirng to have a look at the differencies.

The mountain
Mount Sinaï (2,285 m - 7,496ft) or Jabal Mūsā or Gabal Mūsā (in arab : "Moses' Mountain" or "Mount Moses"), also known as Mount Horeb or Jebel Musa (a similarly named mountain in Morocco), is a mountain in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt that is a possible location of the biblical Mount Sinaï.
The latter is mentioned many times in the Book of Exodus (and other books of the Bible) and in the Quran. According to Jewish, Christian, and Islamic tradition, the biblical Mount Sinai was the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments (depicted in the Jean-Léon Gérôme painting above).
Mount Sinai is a moderately high mountain near the city of Saint Katherine in the Sinai region. It is next to Mount Katherine (2,629m - 8,625 ft), the highest peak in Egypt.
Mount Sinai's rocks were formed in the late stage of the Arabian-Nubian Shield's (ANS) evolution. Mount Sinai displays a ring complex that consists of alkaline granites intruded into diverse rock types, including volcanics. The granites range in composition from syenogranite to alkali feldspar granite. The volcanic rocks are alkaline to peralkaline and they are represented by subaerial flows and eruptions and subvolcanic porphyry. Generally, the nature of the exposed rocks in Mount Sinai indicates that they originated from differing depths.
There are two principal routes to the summit. The longer and shallower route, Siket El Bashait, takes about 2.5 hours on foot, though camels can be used. The steeper, more direct route (Siket Sayidna Musa) is up the 3,750 "steps of penitence" in the ravine behind the monastery.
The summit of the mountain has a mosque that is still used by Muslims. It also has a Greek Orthodox chapel, constructed in 1934 on the ruins of a 16th-century church, that is not open to the public. The chapel encloses the rock which is considered to be the source for the biblical Tablets of Stone. At the summit also is "Moses' cave", where Moses was said to have waited to receive the Ten Commandments.

The painter
Giotto di Bondone known mononymously as Giotto was an Italian painter and architect from Florence during the Late Middle Ages. He worked during the "Gothic or Proto-Renaissance" period.
Giotto's contemporary, the banker and chronicler Giovanni Villani, wrote that Giotto was "the most sovereign master of painting in his time, who drew all his figures and their postures according to nature" and of his publicly recognized "talent and excellence".
In his Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, Giorgio Vasari described Giotto as making a decisive break with the prevalent Byzantine style and as initiating "the great art of painting as we know it today, introducing the technique of drawing accurately from life, which had been neglected for more than two hundred years".
That Giotto painted the Arena Chapel and that he was chosen by the Commune of Florence in 1334 to design the new campanile (bell tower) of the Florence Cathedral are among the few certainties about his life. Almost every other aspect of it is subject to controversy: his birth date, his birth place, his appearance, his apprenticeship, the order in which he created his works, whether or not he painted the famous frescoes in the Upper Basilica of Saint Francis in Assisi and his burial place.

_______________________________

2021 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

MOUNT SINAI / JABAL MUSA PAINTED BY JAN ASSELIJN

Jan Asselijn (c.1610 – October 1, 1652)
Mount Sinaï / Jabal Musa (2,285 m - 7,496ft)
Egypt

In Flight into Egypt, c. 1640, oil on canvas, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

 

About the painting 

Flight into Egypt used to be a very popular subject. Hundreds of canvas were painted on this subject between the 14th and 19th centuries, showing Mary with the baby on a donkey, led by Joseph, borrowing older iconography from the rare Byzantine journey to Bethlehem. Nevertheless, Joseph sometimes holds the child on his shoulders. Prior to about 1525, it was generally part of a larger cycle, whether it was the Nativity, the Life of Christ, or the Life of the Virgin. The background of these scenes generally (until the Council of Trent tightened up on such additions to the Scriptures) included a number of apocryphal miracles and provided an opportunity for the emerging genre of landscape painting.  The mountain deputed is supposed to be Mount Sinaï,  each painter giving his own vision of the sacred mountain or taking inspiration from what had already been painted in the past. The painted mountain  has generally very little to do with what Mount Sinaï really is.

The mountain
Mount Sinaï (2,285 m - 7,496 ft) or Jabal Mūsā or Gabal Mūsā (in arab : "Moses' Mountain" or "Mount Moses"), also known as Mount Horeb or Jebel Musa (a similarly named mountain in Morocco), is a mountain in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt that is a possible location of the biblical Mount Sinai. The latter is mentioned many times in the Book of Exodus (and other books of the Bible) and the Quran. According to Jewish, Christian, and Islamic tradition, the biblical Mount Sinai was the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments.
Mount Sinai is a moderately high mountain near the city of Saint Katherine in the Sinai region.
It is next to Mount Katherine (2,629 m - 8,625 ft), the highest peak in Egypt.
Mount Sinai's rocks were formed in the late stage of the Arabian-Nubian Shield's (ANS) evolution. Mount Sinai displays a ring complex that consists of alkaline granites intruded into diverse rock types, including volcanics. The granites range in composition from syenogranite to alkali feldspar granite. The volcanic rocks are alkaline to peralkaline and they are represented by subaerial flows and eruptions and subvolcanic porphyry. Generally, the nature of the exposed rocks in Mount Sinai indicates that they originated from differing depths.
There are two principal routes to the summit. The longer and shallower route, Siket El Bashait, takes about 2.5 hours on foot, though camels can be used. The steeper, more direct route (Siket Sayidna Musa) is up the 3,750 "steps of penitence" in the ravine behind the monastery.
The summit of the mountain has a mosque that is still used by Muslims. It also has a Greek Orthodox chapel, constructed in 1934 on the ruins of a 16th-century church, that is not open to the public. The chapel encloses the rock which is considered to be the source for the biblical Tablets of Stone. At the summit also is "Moses' cave", where Moses was said to have waited to receive the Ten Commandments.

The painter

Asselijn was born at Dieppe from a French Huguenot family as Jean Asselin. He received instruction from Esaias van de Velde (1587–1630), and distinguished himself particularly in landscape and animal painting, though his historical works and battle pieces are also admired. He traveled in France and Italy, and modeled his style after Bamboccio (Pieter van Laer), also a member of the Bentvueghels. Nicolaes de Helt Stockade and Asselijn married two sisters in Lyons in 1645, both daughters of Houwaart Koorman of Antwerp. According to Houbraken, he heard this story from Abraham Genoels, who in turn heard it from Laurens Frank, an artist who was staying in the Koorman household with Artus Quellinus in Lyons at the time. Their marriages brought both Asselijn and Helt-Stockade back to the Netherlands after their travels. Asselijn had a withered hand and was small of stature, which gave him the nickname in France of petit Jean Hollandois, and which gave him the nickname Krabbetje (little claw) in the Bentvueghels. He seems to have befriended Rembrandt. In the etching that Rembrandt made of him, Asselijn appears in some states to be standing before an easel. His hands are not shown. Frederick de Moucheron, another Italianate landscape painter, was his pupil. He was one of the first Dutch painters who introduced a fresh and clear manner of painting landscapes in the style of Claude Lorrain, and his example was speedily followed byer artists. Asselijn's pictures were in high estimation at Amsterdam, and several of them are in the museums of that city. Twenty-four, painted in Italy, were engraved. One of his paintings, The Threatened Swan, which portrays a swan aggressively defending its nest, became a symbol of Dutch national resistance, although it is unknown if Asselijn intended it to be so.  The painting has been dated to the 1640s. It is considered to be Asselijn's most famous work  and was the Rijksmuseum's first acquisition.

__________________________________________
2021 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

MOUNT SINAÏ PAINTED BY JEAN-LÉON GERÔME

 

JEAN-LÉON GERÔME (1824-1904)
Mount Sinaï / Jabal Musa (2,285 m - 7,496ft)
Egypt

In La fuite en Egypte , oil and tempera on panel, 1897, Musée Georges Garret, Vesoul (France)

About the painting
Jean Leon Gérome painted Mount Sinai on several occasions and often for its historical religious content as on the canvas above or in his Moses at Mount Sinai. Each time the painter added details of miraculous appearances! Here, it is an white angel who guides in a halo of light Mary and Joseph on the way of the Flight into Egypt. The description of Mount Sinai (on the bacjground) and its surroundings, seen from above (from the point of view of the Angel) adds an additional element to the strangeness of this painting.


The painter
Jean-Léon Gérôme was a French painter and sculptor in the style now known as academicism. The range of his oeuvre included historical painting, Greek mythology, Orientalism, portraits, and other subjects, bringing the academic painting tradition to an artistic climax. He is considered one of the most important painters from this academic period. He was also a teacher with a long list of students.
In 1856, he visited Egypt for the first time. Gérômes recurrent itinerary followed the classic grand tour of most occidental visitors to the Orient; up the nile to Cairo, across to Fayoum, then further up the Nile to Abu Simbel, then back to Cairo, across the Sinai Peninsula through Sinai and up the Wadi el-Araba to the Holy land, Jerusalem and finally Damascus. This would herald the start of many orientalist paintings depicting Arab religion, genre scenes and North African landscapes. In an autobiographical essay of 1878, Gérôme described how important oil sketches made on the spot were for him: "even when worn out after long marched under the bright sun, as soon as our camping spot was reached I got down to work with concentration. But Oh! How many things were left behind of which I carried only the memory away! And I prefer three touches of colour on a piece of canvas to the most vivid memory, but one had to continue on with some regret.
He did not only gather themes, artefacts and costumes for his oriental scenes, but also made oil studies from nature for their backgrounds. Several of these quick sketches are filled with details that exceed his wished for three touches of colour.
Gérôme's reputation was greatly enhanced at the Salon of 1857 by a collection of works of a more popular kind : The Duel ; After the Masked Ball (Musée Condé, Chantilly); Egyptian Recruits crossing the Desert; Memnon and Sesostris and Camels Watering.

The mountain
Mount Sinaï (2,285 m - 7,496 ft) or Jabal Mūsā or Gabal Mūsā (in arab : "Moses' Mountain" or "Mount Moses"), also known as Mount Horeb or Jebel Musa (a similarly named mountain in Morocco), is a mountain in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt that is a possible location of the biblical Mount Sinai. The latter is mentioned many times in the Book of Exodus (and other books of the Bible) and the Quran. According to Jewish, Christian, and Islamic tradition, the biblical Mount Sinai was the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments.
Mount Sinai is a moderately high mountain near the city of Saint Katherine in the Sinai region.
It is next to Mount Katherine (2,629 m - 8,625 ft), the highest peak in Egypt.
Mount Sinai's rocks were formed in the late stage of the Arabian-Nubian Shield's (ANS) evolution. Mount Sinai displays a ring complex that consists of alkaline granites intruded into diverse rock types, including volcanics. The granites range in composition from syenogranite to alkali feldspar granite. The volcanic rocks are alkaline to peralkaline and they are represented by subaerial flows and eruptions and subvolcanic porphyry. Generally, the nature of the exposed rocks in Mount Sinai indicates that they originated from differing depths.
There are two principal routes to the summit. The longer and shallower route, Siket El Bashait, takes about 2.5 hours on foot, though camels can be used. The steeper, more direct route (Siket Sayidna Musa) is up the 3,750 "steps of penitence" in the ravine behind the monastery.
The summit of the mountain has a mosque that is still used by Muslims. It also has a Greek Orthodox chapel, constructed in 1934 on the ruins of a 16th-century church, that is not open to the public. The chapel encloses the rock which is considered to be the source for the biblical Tablets of Stone. At the summit also is "Moses' cave", where Moses was said to have waited to receive the Ten Commandments.

__________________________________________

2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

MOUNT SINAÏ / JABAL MUSA BY EDWARD LEAR

 

 EDWARD LEAR (1812-1888)

Mount Sinaï / Jabal Musa (2,285 m - 7,496ft)
Egypt

In Arabs Approaching Mount Sinai, pencil and watercolor, 1849, (17.8 x 36.8 cm.)

Private collection (Christie's London)

The mountain
Mount Sinaï (2,285 m - 7,496ft) or Jabal Mūsā or Gabal Mūsā (in arab : "Moses' Mountain" or "Mount Moses"), also known as Mount Horeb or Jebel Musa (a similarly named mountain in Morocco), is a mountain in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt that is a possible location of the biblical Mount Sinai. The latter is mentioned many times in the Book of Exodus (and other books of the Bible) and the Quran. According to Jewish, Christian, and Islamic tradition, the biblical Mount Sinai was the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments.
Mount Sinai is a moderately high mountain near the city of Saint Katherine in the Sinai region. It is next to Mount Katherine (2,629 m - 8,625 ft), the highest peak in Egypt.
Mount Sinai's rocks were formed in the late stage of the Arabian-Nubian Shield's (ANS) evolution. Mount Sinai displays a ring complex that consists of alkaline granites intruded into diverse rock types, including volcanics. The granites range in composition from syenogranite to alkali feldspar granite. The volcanic rocks are alkaline to peralkaline and they are represented by subaerial flows and eruptions and subvolcanic porphyry. Generally, the nature of the exposed rocks in Mount Sinai indicates that they originated from differing depths.
There are two principal routes to the summit. The longer and shallower route, Siket El Bashait, takes about 2.5 hours on foot, though camels can be used. The steeper, more direct route (Siket Sayidna Musa) is up the 3,750 "steps of penitence" in the ravine behind the monastery.
The summit of the mountain has a mosque that is still used by Muslims. It also has a Greek Orthodox chapel, constructed in 1934 on the ruins of a 16th-century church, that is not open to the public. The chapel encloses the rock which is considered to be the source for the biblical Tablets of Stone. At the summit also is "Moses' cave", where Moses was said to have waited to receive the Ten Commandments.

The painter
Edward Lear was an English artist, illustrator, musician, author and poet, and is known now mostly for his literary nonsense in poetry and prose and especially his limericks, a form he popularised. His principal areas of work as an artist were threefold: as a draughtsman employed to illustrate birds and animals; making coloured drawings during his journeys, which he reworked later, sometimes as plates for his travel books; as a (minor) illustrator of Alfred Tennyson's poems. As an author, he is known principally for his popular nonsense collections of poems, songs, short stories, botanical drawings, recipes, and alphabets. He also composed and published twelve musical settings of Tennyson's poetry.
Lear was already drawing "for bread and cheese" by the time he was aged 16.
In 1842, Lear began a journey into the Italian peninsula, travelling through the Lazio, Rome, Abruzzo, Molise, Apulia, Calabria, and Sicily. In personal notes, together with drawings, Lear gathered his impressions on the Italian way of life, folk traditions, and the beauty of the ancient monuments. Of particular interest in Lear was the Abruzzo, which he visited in 1843, through the Marsica (Celano, Avezzano, Alba Fucens, Trasacco) and the plateau of Cinque Miglia (Castel di Sangro and Alfedena), by an old sheep track of the shepherds.
Among his travels, he visited Greece and Egypt during 1848-49, and toured India and Ceylon during 1873–75. While travelling he produced large quantities of coloured wash drawings in a distinctive style, which he converted later in his studio into oil and watercolour paintings, as well as prints for his books. His landscape style often shows views with strong sunlight, with intense contrasts of colour. Between 1878 and 1883 Lear spent his summers on Monte Generoso, a mountain on the border between the Swiss canton of Ticino and the Italian region of Lombardy. His watercolor Mount Olympus dated 1849 in in the MET in New York City. His oil painting The Plains of Lombardy from Monte Generoso is in the Ashmolean Museum Oxford (UK).

_______________________________

2020 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

MOUNT SINAÏ / JABAL MUSA BY EL GRECO

EL GRECO  (1540-1614) 

Mount Sinaï / Jabal Musa (2,285 m - 7,496ft) 

Egypt

 

1. In Mount Sinaï, oil and tempera on panel,3 7cm x 23, 8cm , 1568, The Modena Triptych (back panels)
Galleria Estense, Modena, Italy 

2. In Mount Sinaï  oil and tempera on panel, 41 x 47,5 cm., c. 1570-72, 

 Historical Museum of Crete, Iraklion

About the painting

The first painting is the central back panel of the  Modena Triptych painted is 1568 triptych (three panel painting) by the artist El Greco, who was also known as Doménikos Theotokópoulos. This portable altarpiece is painted on both sides and has an Italian Renaissance frame. The front depicts the Adoration of the Shepherds, a Christian knight being crowned by Christ in glory, and the Baptism of Jesus. The back panels show the Annunciation to Mary, Mount Sinai, and Adam and Eve. The back panel shows pilgrims on the way to the Saint Catherine's Monastery in Egypt as if on their way to Heaven.

The second painting was probably made for the antiquarian Fulvio Orsini, librarian to Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, in whose palace the artist lived from 1570 to 1572. It shows the peaks of Mount Sinai, a place sacred to Judaism and Christianity, of special significance for Eastern Orthodoxy, and revered by Muslims. At the centre is Mount Horeb, where Moses received the tablets of the Ten Commandments from God. On the left is Mount Epistene. The peak on the right is St. Catherine's Mount, where the early Christian Martyr Catherine had been buried. The small citadel at the foot of Mount Horeb is the monastery that to this day bears her name.
The St. Catherine's Monastery is venerated as the spiritual home of Byzantine Orthodoxy and it was a great centre of pilgrimage. In the painting, on the left are three Western pilgrims, while on the right is a group of Eastern pilgrims with camels.
The view of the holy site is based on engravings of Mount Sinai which could be found in travel books. El Greco painted a similar view on the reverse of the Modena Triptych.

The painter 

Doménikos Theotokópoulos (Δομήνικος Θεοτοκόπουλος most widely known as El Greco ("The Greek"), was a famous Greek painter, sculptor and architect of the Spanish Renaissance, normally signing his paintings with his full birth name in Greek letters, Δομήνικος Θεοτοκόπουλος, (Doménikos Theotokópoulos), often adding the word Κρής Krēs, Cretan.

El Greco was born in the Kingdom of Candia, which was at that time part of the Republic of Venice, and the center of Post-Byzantine art. He trained and became a master within that tradition before traveling at age 26 to Venice, as other Greek artists had done. In 1570 he moved to Rome, where he opened a workshop and executed a series of works. During his stay in Italy, El Greco enriched his style with elements of Mannerism and of the Venetian Renaissance taken from a number of great artists of the time, notably Tintoretto.

 In 1577, he moved to Toledo, Spain, where he lived and worked until his death. In Toledo, El Greco received several major commissions and produced his best-known paintings.
El Greco's dramatic and expressionistic style was met with puzzlement by his contemporaries but found appreciation in the 20th century. El Greco is regarded as a precursor of both Expressionism and Cubism, while his personality and works were a source of inspiration for poets and writers such as Rainer Maria Rilke and Nikos Kazantzakis. El Greco has been characterized by modern scholars as an artist so individual that he belongs to no conventional school.  He is best known for tortuously elongated figures and often fantastic or phantasmagorical pigmentation, marrying Byzantine traditions with those of Western painting.

El Greco painted many of his paintings on fine canvas and employed a viscous oil medium. He painted with the usual pigments of his period such as azurite, lead-tin-yellow, vermilion, madder lake, ochres and red lead, but he seldom used the expensive natural ultramarine.
El Greco regarded color as the most important and the most ungovernable element of painting, and declared that color had primacy over form. Francisco Pacheco, a painter and theoretician who visited El Greco in 1611, wrote that the painter liked "the colors crude and unmixed in great blots as a boastful display of his dexterity" and that "he believed in constant repainting and retouching in order to make the broad masses tell flat as in nature".
In his mature works El Greco demonstrated a characteristic tendency to dramatize rather than to describe.] The strong spiritual emotion transfers from painting directly to the audience. According to Pacheco, El Greco's perturbed, violent and at times seemingly careless-in-execution art was due to a studied effort to acquire a freedom of style.  El Greco's preference for exceptionally tall and slender figures and elongated compositions, which served both his expressive purposes and aesthetic principles, led him to disregard the laws of nature and elongate his compositions to ever greater extents, particularly when they were destined for altarpieces.  The anatomy of the human body becomes even more otherworldly in El Greco's mature works; for The Virgin of the Immaculate Conception El Greco asked to lengthen the altarpiece itself by another 1.5 feet (0.46 m) "because in this way the form will be perfect and not reduced, which is the worst thing that can happen to a figure'". A significant innovation of El Greco's mature works is the interweaving between form and space; a reciprocal relationship is developed between the two which completely unifies the painting surface. This interweaving would re-emerge three centuries later in the works of Cézanne and Picasso.

The mountain
Mount Sinaï (2,285 m - 7,496 ft) or Jabal Mūsā or Gabal Mūsā (in arab : "Moses' Mountain" or "Mount Moses"), also known as Mount Horeb or Jebel Musa (a similarly named mountain in Morocco), is a mountain in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt that is a possible location of the biblical Mount Sinai. The latter is mentioned many times in the Book of Exodus (and other books of the Bible) and the Quran. According to Jewish, Christian, and Islamic tradition, the biblical Mount Sinai was the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments.
Mount Sinai is a moderately high mountain near the city of Saint Katherine in the Sinai region.
It is next to Mount Katherine (2,629 m - 8,625 ft), the highest peak in Egypt.
Mount Sinai's rocks were formed in the late stage of the Arabian-Nubian Shield's (ANS) evolution. Mount Sinai displays a ring complex that consists of alkaline granites intruded into diverse rock types, including volcanics. The granites range in composition from syenogranite to alkali feldspar granite. The volcanic rocks are alkaline to peralkaline and they are represented by subaerial flows and eruptions and subvolcanic porphyry. Generally, the nature of the exposed rocks in Mount Sinai indicates that they originated from differing depths.
There are two principal routes to the summit. The longer and shallower route, Siket El Bashait, takes about 2.5 hours on foot, though camels can be used. The steeper, more direct route (Siket Sayidna Musa) is up the 3,750 "steps of penitence" in the ravine behind the monastery.
The summit of the mountain has a mosque that is still used by Muslims. It also has a Greek Orthodox chapel, constructed in 1934 on the ruins of a 16th-century church, that is not open to the public. The chapel encloses the rock which is considered to be the source for the biblical Tablets of Stone. At the summit also is "Moses' cave", where Moses was said to have waited to receive the Ten Commandments.

__________________________________________
2019 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

JEBEL UWIENAT PAINTED BY SANFORD ROBINSON GIFFORD

SANFORD ROBINSON GIFFORD (1823-1880)

Jebel Uwienat (1,934m - 6,345ft) 

Egypt, Sudan, Lybia border

 In Siout, Egypt, 1874, oil on canvas, 53.3 x 101.6 cm, On view Gallery 67 National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

About the painting
Siout, Egypt, is the most important and the finest of Gifford's dozen or so known Egyptian works and ably demonstrates his mastery of both atmospheric and linear perspective. The glowing light serves both to give tonal unity and balance to the overall composition and to reveal the myriad details of the scene with exceptional clarity. The result is a work that is less about the physical facts of the scene it depicts and more about the very act of perceiving. As one of the artist's contemporaries wrote:" Gifford's art was poetic and reminiscent. . . It was nature passed through the alembic [a device that refines or transmutes through distillation] of a finely organized sensibility. "
Although many nineteenth-century American landscape painters traveled abroad in search of subjects, Sanford Gifford was one of the very few who ventured beyond England and the Continent. Early in 1869 he traveled the Nile from Cairo to the first cataract (actually rapids) and back. On March 4 he reached the village of Siout, which lay in the midst of an extensive and fertile plain below the Libyan Hills at the start of a great caravan route running through the Libyan Desert to the Sudan. The town was known for its picturesqueness and its history, having been the capital of the thirteenth nome (province) of Upper Egypt during antiquity and the birthplace of Plotinus, the great Neoplatonic philosopher. Gifford described the view that inspired this painting in his journal : "Looking westward, the town with its domes and minarets lay between us and the sun, bathed in a rich and beautiful atmosphere. Behind, on the right, were the yellow cliffs of the Libyan Mts., running back into the tender grades of distance. Between us and the town were fields of grain, golden green with the transparent light. On the right was a tent with sheep and beautiful horses, the sunlight sparkling on a splendid white stallion. On the left the road ran in, with a fountain and figures of men and women and camels. The whole glowing and gleaming under the low sun. "
(Text by Franklin Kelly, published in the National Gallery of Art exhibition catalogue, Art for the Nation, 2000)


The mountain 
Jebel Uwienat (1,934m - 6,345ft) ( جبل العوينات) literally is located where three countries are meeting : Egypt, Libya and Sudan. The Qattara Depression (Munkhafaḍ al-Qaṭṭārah) of Egypt descends to 436 feet (133 metres) below sea level. Jebel Uweinat literally "mountain of springs", also spelled Al Awaynat, Auenat, Ouenat, Ouinat, Owainat, Uweinat, Uwaynat, Uweinat, Uwenat, Uweynat is a mountain range ocated in the eastern Sahara, forty kilometers south-southeast of the similar mountain range, Jebel Arkanu, in Libya.

The main source of the massif, called Ain Dua, is on its western foothills. This slope is a cliff about six hundred feet high, the foot of which is covered with voluminous rocks falling under the effect of erosion. It is home to oases covered with shrubs and grasses. In total, three valleys are oriented towards the west: Karkur Hamid, Karkur Idriss and Karkur Ibrahim. To the east, the massif ends with the Karkur Talh valley. The highest point of the massif, in its eastern half, is at the top of the Italia plateau.
The western half of the massif is an intrusion of granite forming concentric rings, the largest of which is twenty-five kilometers in diameter. The eastern half consists of sandstones forming four separate trays. Egyptian graffiti from the third millennium BCE testifies to their exploration of the region from the time of the Old Kingdom, via the track of Abu Ballas.
The massif is officially discovered in 1923 by Ahmed Hassanein who, during his exploration, reports the existence of petroglyphs representing lions, giraffes, ostriches, gazelles or oxen, in a style reminiscent of the Bushmen. He tries to cross the mountains from west to east but turns around after traveling 40 kilometers without finding an exit.
In the 1930s, Ralph A. Bagnold and Captain Marchesi each built a cairn atop the highest point of the massif.

The painter
Like most Hudson River School artists, Gifford traveled extensively to find scenic landscapes to sketch and paint. In addition to exploring New England, upstate New York and New Jersey, Gifford made extensive trips abroad. He first traveled to Europe from 1855 to 1857, to study European art and sketch subjects for future paintings. During this trip Gifford also met Albert Bierstadt and Worthington Whittredge.
In 1858, he traveled to Vermont, "apparently" with his friend and fellow painter Jerome Thompson. Details of their visit were carried in the contemporary Home Journal. Both artists submitted paintings of Mount Mansfield, Vermont's tallest peak, to the National Academy of Design's annual show in 1859. Thompson's work, "Belated Party on Mansfield Mountain" is now owned by the MET in New York, according to the report.
Thereafter, he served in the Union Army as a corporal in the 7th Regiment of the New York Militia upon the outbreak of the Civil War. A few of his canvases belonging to New York City's Seventh Regiment and the Union League Club of New York are testament to that troubled time.
Gifford referred to the best of his landscapes as his "chief pictures". Many of his chief pictures are characterized by a hazy atmosphere with soft, suffuse sunlight. Gifford often painted a large body of water in the foreground or middle distance (see above) in which the distant landscape would be gently reflected. A catalog of his work published shortly after his death recorded in excess of 700 paintings during his career.

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2019 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

MOUNT SINAI / JABAL MUSA IMAGINED BY VITTORE CARPACCIO

VITTORE CARPACCIO (1465-1526) 

Mount Sinaï / Jabal Musa (2,285 m - 7,496ft) 

Egypt

 In The Flight Into Egypt,  1516 ,oil on panel ( 111 x 72cm), 

The National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. 

About the painting 

The flight to Egypt is a  religious  subject painted by many artists from the Middle Ages to the 18th century. It relates a famous episode of the Christian sacred history of which the painters have seized all the same moment: the passage of the border (if one may say) off  the land of Herod (Israël)  to Egypt, the so called border  being materialized, on all the paintings, by the Mount Sinai, nowadays set in Egypt. Those representations are ,of course, totally imaginary. None of these painters having had the opportunity to go there ! This is all the interest of these various representations of the Flight in Egypt presented in this blog: the one by Joachim Patinir or the so expressive version by Giotto.  

In the Carpaccio's version (above), the Mount Sinai is supposed to be the first (and the highest) mountain in the background, on the left of the frame... behind the tree !

The story related is the following :  forced to flee Bethlehem with the Infant Jesus to escape King Herod who ordered the death of all the male children under two-year-old, Joseph takes the Infant Jesus and his mother the Virgin Mary and take refuge in Egypt. They will remain three and a half years in Egypt, moving several times from city to city, until the death of Herod. They then came back to Nazareth by an other way. 

Nowadays  this  route (go and return), known as "The Way of the Holy Family" is in the process of becoming a World Heritage Site by UNESCO

The mountain 
Mount Sinaï (2,285 m - 7,496ft) or Jabal Mūsā or Gabal Mūsā (in arab  : "Moses' Mountain" or "Mount Moses"), also known as Mount Horeb or Jebel Musa (a similarly named mountain in Morocco), is a mountain in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt that is a possible location of the biblical Mount Sinai.  The latter is mentioned many times in the Book of Exodus (and other books of the Bible) and the Quran. According to Jewish, Christian, and Islamic tradition, the biblical Mount Sinai was the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments.
Mount Sinai is a moderately high mountain near the city of Saint Katherine in the Sinai region. It is next to Mount Katherine (2,629 m - 8,625 ft), the highest peak in Egypt.
Mount Sinai's rocks were formed in the late stage of the Arabian-Nubian Shield's (ANS) evolution. Mount Sinai displays a ring complex that consists of alkaline granites intruded into diverse rock types, including volcanics. The granites range in composition from syenogranite to alkali feldspar granite. The volcanic rocks are alkaline to peralkaline and they are represented by subaerial flows and eruptions and subvolcanic porphyry. Generally, the nature of the exposed rocks in Mount Sinai indicates that they originated from differing depths.
There are two principal routes to the summit. The longer and shallower route, Siket El Bashait, takes about 2.5 hours on foot, though camels can be used. The steeper, more direct route (Siket Sayidna Musa) is up the 3,750 "steps of penitence" in the ravine behind the monastery.
The summit of the mountain has a mosque that is still used by Muslims. It also has a Greek Orthodox chapel, constructed in 1934 on the ruins of a 16th-century church, that is not open to the public. The chapel encloses the rock which is considered to be the source for the biblical Tablets of Stone. At the summit also is "Moses' cave", where Moses was said to have waited to receive the Ten Commandments.

 The painter 
The italian painter of  the Venetian school, Vittore Carpaccio studied under Gentile Bellini. He is best known for a cycle of nine paintings, The Legend of Saint Ursula. His style was somewhat conservative, showing little influence from the Humanist trends that transformed Italian Renaissance painting during his lifetime. He was influenced by the style of Antonello da Messina and Early Netherlandish art. For this reason, and also because so much of his best work remains in Venice, his art has been rather neglected by comparison with other Venetian contemporaries, such as Giovanni Bellini or Giorgione. In 1516, he painted a Sacra Conversatione painting in then Venetian town of Capodistria (now Koper in Slovenia), which is hanging in its Cathedral of the Assumption. Carpaccio created several more works in Capodistria, where he spent the last years of his life and also died

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2018 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

MOUNT SINAÏ PAINTED BY JACQUES DE LÉTIN

JACQUES DE LÉTIN (1597-1661)

Mount Sinaï or Jabal Musa (2,285 m - 7,496ft) 

Egypt

In Moïse au Mont Sinai, oil on canvas (210 × 232 cm), 1655, Museum of Fine Arts, Troyes, France  

The painting 
This painting as nothing to do with a représentation of Mount Sinais  / Djebal Mussa the painter ould see at this time  IN this allegoric painting Moses poses with the Tables of the Law, on which the Ten Commandments were written (in French, according to de Létin ! ).
Behind him  is representation Mount Sinai (not very realistic!)  where he received the Commandments. The building in the background is Saint Catherine's Monastery, at the foot of Mount Sinai. It is one of the oldest monasteries in the world. A beam of light falls on the monastery, through an eye in the rock on the left.

The painter 
The French painter Jacques de Létin,  also known as Jacques Ninet de Lestin was born in a relatively wealthy family,  sensitized to the artistic activity that was still unfolding in Troyes in the early seventeenth century. His father, Jehan de Létin, runs a hotel called L'Image de Saint-Christophe. During his stay in Italy, The young Jacques de Letin  met Simon Vouet, with whom he became friend.
After his death and despite his  notoriety during his lifetime, Jacques de Letin was quickly forgotten. As early as the end of the seventeenth century, art historians cite him without further comment in the list of artists attached to the style of Simon Vouet. In one of these lists, the name of Jacques de Létin was transformed into "Nicolas de Lestin "by forgetting a comma between Ninet and Lestin. More than two centuries later, it is the  historian Albert Babeau who, in 1882, found the identity and right biography of Jacques de Létin.
Many of his works disappeared during the Revolution and since 1940. One can see what remains of his works, notably in the  churches of the city o fTtroyes in France :   Saint-Pantaléon, Saint-Remi, Sainte-Madeleine and  Our Lady of Aix-en-Othe. His Apparition of the Virgin to Saint Robert is kept at the church of Saint-Jean-Baptiste de Chaource, and Saint-Louis dying of the plague in Tunis in the right arm of the transept of the church Saint-Paul-Saint-Louis in Paris.
But since the beginning of the twenty-first century, when the painter is better known, new works of his hand have been identified. In 2011, the Bordeaux Museum of Fine Arts acquired two paintings by Jacques de Létin representing La Grammaire and La Géométrie. The museum of fine arts of Reims, retains a Lamentation on the dead Christ painted between 1640 and 1645.

The mountain 

Mount Sinaï (2,285 m - 7,496ft) or Jabal Mūsā or Gabal Mūsā (in arab  : "Moses' Mountain" or "Mount Moses"), also known as Mount Horeb or Jebel Musa (a similarly named mountain in Morocco), is a mountain in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt that is a possible location of the biblical Mount Sinaï. 

The latter is mentioned many times in the Book of Exodus (and other books of the Bible) and in the Quran. According to Jewish, Christian, and Islamic tradition, the biblical Mount Sinai was the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments (depicted in the Jean-Léon Gérôme painting above).

Mount Sinai is a moderately high mountain near the city of Saint Katherine in the Sinai region. It is next to Mount Katherine (2,629m - 8,625 ft), the highest peak in Egypt. 

Mount Sinai's rocks were formed in the late stage of the Arabian-Nubian Shield's (ANS) evolution. Mount Sinai displays a ring complex that consists of alkaline granites intruded into diverse rock types, including volcanics. The granites range in composition from syenogranite to alkali feldspar granite. The volcanic rocks are alkaline to peralkaline and they are represented by subaerial flows and eruptions and subvolcanic porphyry. Generally, the nature of the exposed rocks in Mount Sinai indicates that they originated from differing depths.

There are two principal routes to the summit. The longer and shallower route, Siket El Bashait, takes about 2.5 hours on foot, though camels can be used. The steeper, more direct route (Siket Sayidna Musa) is up the 3,750 "steps of penitence" in the ravine behind the monastery.

The summit of the mountain has a mosque that is still used by Muslims. It also has a Greek Orthodox chapel, constructed in 1934 on the ruins of a 16th-century church, that is not open to the public. The chapel encloses the rock which is considered to be the source for the biblical Tablets of Stone. At the summit also is "Moses' cave", where Moses was said to have waited to receive the Ten Commandments.

_______________________________

2018 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau 

MOUNT SINAÏ PAINTED BY JEAN-LEON GERÔME

JEAN-LEON GERÔME  (1824-1904) 

Mount Sinaï or Jabal Musa (2,285 m - 7,496ft) 

Egypt

 In Moïse au Mont Sinaï (Moses in Mount Sinaï), oil on canvas, 1895-1900, Private collection 

The mountain 

Mount Sinaï (2,285 m - 7,496ft) or Jabal Mūsā or Gabal Mūsā (in arab  : "Moses' Mountain" or "Mount Moses"), also known as Mount Horeb or Jebel Musa (a similarly named mountain in Morocco), is a mountain in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt that is a possible location of the biblical Mount Sinaï. 

The latter is mentioned many times in the Book of Exodus (and other books of the Bible) and in the Quran. According to Jewish, Christian, and Islamic tradition, the biblical Mount Sinai was the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments (depicted in the Jean-Léon Gérôme painting above).

Mount Sinai is a moderately high mountain near the city of Saint Katherine in the Sinai region. It is next to Mount Katherine (2,629m - 8,625 ft), the highest peak in Egypt. 

Mount Sinai's rocks were formed in the late stage of the Arabian-Nubian Shield's (ANS) evolution. Mount Sinai displays a ring complex that consists of alkaline granites intruded into diverse rock types, including volcanics. The granites range in composition from syenogranite to alkali feldspar granite. The volcanic rocks are alkaline to peralkaline and they are represented by subaerial flows and eruptions and subvolcanic porphyry. Generally, the nature of the exposed rocks in Mount Sinai indicates that they originated from differing depths.

There are two principal routes to the summit. The longer and shallower route, Siket El Bashait, takes about 2.5 hours on foot, though camels can be used. The steeper, more direct route (Siket Sayidna Musa) is up the 3,750 "steps of penitence" in the ravine behind the monastery.

The summit of the mountain has a mosque that is still used by Muslims. It also has a Greek Orthodox chapel, constructed in 1934 on the ruins of a 16th-century church, that is not open to the public. The chapel encloses the rock which is considered to be the source for the biblical Tablets of Stone. At the summit also is "Moses' cave", where Moses was said to have waited to receive the Ten Commandments.

The painter 

Jean-Léon Gérôme  was a French painter and sculptor in the style now known as academicism. The range of his oeuvre included historical painting, Greek mythology, Orientalism, portraits, and other subjects, bringing the academic painting tradition to an artistic climax. He is considered one of the most important painters from this academic period. He was also a teacher with a long list of students.
In 1856, he visited Egypt for the first time. Gérômes recurrent itinerary followed the classic grand tour of most occidental visitors to the Orient; up the nile to Cairo, across to Fayoum, then further up the Nile to Abu Simbel, then back to Cairo, across the Sinai Peninsula through Sinai and up the Wadi el-Araba to the Holy land, Jerusalem and finally Damascus. This would herald the start of many orientalist paintings depicting Arab religion, genre scenes and North African landscapes. In an autobiographical essay of 1878, Gérôme described how important oil sketches made on the spot were for him: "even when worn out after long marched under the bright sun, as soon as our camping spot was reached I got down to work with concentration. But Oh! How many things were left behind of which I carried only the memory away! And I prefer three touches of colour on a piece of canvas to the most vivid memory, but one had to continue on with some regret.
He did not only gather themes, artefacts and costumes for his oriental scenes, but also made oil studies from nature for their backgrounds. Several of these quick sketches are filled with details that exceed his wished for three touches of colour.
Gérôme's reputation was greatly enhanced at the Salon of 1857 by a collection of works of a more popular kind : The Duel ; After the Masked Ball (Musée Condé, Chantilly);  Egyptian Recruits crossing the Desert;  Memnon and Sesostris and Camels Watering.