LE MÔLE PAINTED BY KONRAD WITZ

KONRAD WITZ (1400 -1447)

 Le Môle (1,863m - 6,112ft)  (center)

France (Haute-Savoie) 

1. Le Salève and Le Môle (and the Mont blanc massif), occur on  the first European landscape paintings called La Pêche Miraculeuse (The Miraculous Draft of Fishes) 

painted by Konrad Witz in 1444, 

tempera on wood panel, Musée d'Art et d'Histoire de Genève. 

2. Detail of Le Salève (on left), Le Môle (center) and behind the Môle, 

one can see the white silhouette of the Mont Blanc massif 

About the painting 

This painting is most famous for its landscape, the first "topographic landscape" oanted in the History of art. This landscape reproduces exactly the real site as it was, and as it still (more or less) nowadays. Indeed, one can recognize the Lake of Geneva painted from Geneva at its western end ;  Les Voirons on the left ; the Mole, in the center, snowy Mont Blanc (on the back) and Petit Salève. On the hillside, to the far right, the sharp rock indicates a quarry of stones. And in the foreground, on the left, carved blocks of stone outcrop by transparency, they are old quarries under lacustrine. One could not be more precise in the description of a site. This topographical truth is combined with an exceptionally sharp rendering of reliefs and distances; the tiny figures that move in the fields on the other side of the lake are soldiers of the Duke of Savoy in training.

The mountain 

Le Môle (1,863m - 6,112ft) is a mountain of the Chablais Alps in the Haute-Savoie department of France which dominates the area around the town of Bonneville. The communes of Ayze, La Tour, Saint-Jean-de-Tholome, Marignier, Saint-Jeoire-en-Faucigny, Viuz-en-Sallaz, Peillonnex, and Faucigny encircle it.  Though a small mountain by Alpine standards, it is of great geographic importance as it divides the vallée de l'Arve to the south and the west from the vallée du Giffre to the north and southeast, and dominates the southern entrance to the Geneva basin. Mary Shelley, in her Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus, quotes Le Môle as being seen by Victor Frankenstein from Geneva, where he was born and lived before being a student in Germany.

The painter 

Konrad Witz was a German-born painter, active mainly in Basel, Switzerland. His 1444 panel, The Miraculous Draft of Fishes (a portion of a lost altarpiece) has been credited as the earliest extant faithful portrayal of a landscape in European art history, being based on observation of real topographical features. Konrad Witz is most famous for painting three altarpieces, all of which survive only partially. The earliest is the Heilspiegel Altarpiece of about 1435 (today mostly in the Kunstmuseum, Basel, with isolated panels in other collections). The next is the Altarpiece of the Virgin (c. 1440), which has been associated with panels now in Basel, Nuremberg, and Strasbourg (Musée de l’Œuvre Notre-Dame). Witz's final altarpiece is the St. Peter Altarpiece of 1444, painted for St. Peter's Cathedral, Geneva, and now in the Musée d'Art et d'Histoire, Geneva, which contains his most famous composition, the Miraculous Draught of Fishes (see above).

 Other independent works by Witz and his followers can be found in Naples, Berlin, and New York (Frick Collection).

2017 - Wandering Vertexes...

by Francis Rousseau 

LICANCABUR PAINTED BY JOSEPH SELLENY

JOSEPH SELLENY (1824-1896)

Licancabur (5,916m - 19, 409ft)

Chile - Bolivia

In The Atacama desert, Chile, with the Licancabur volcano beyond, 

oil on canvas, 1858, Private collection

The Mountain
Licancabur  (5,916m - 19, 409ft) is a stratovolcano on the border between Bolivia and Chile, south of the Sairecabur volcano and west of Juriques. Part of the Andean Central Volcanic Zone, it has a prominent high cone. A 400-metre (1,300 ft) summit crater containing Licancabur Lake, a crater lake which is among the highest lakes in the world, caps the volcano. Three stages of lava flow emanate from the volcano, which formed on Pleistocene ignimbrites.
Licancabur has been active during the Holocene, after the ice ages. Although no historic eruptions of the volcano are known, lava flows extending into Laguna Verde have been dated to 13,240 ± 100 BP. The volcano has primarily erupted andesite, with small amounts of dacite and basaltic andesite.
Its climate is cold, dry and very sunny, with high levels of ultraviolet radiation.
 Licancabur is not covered by glaciers, and vegetation such as cushion plants and shrubs are found lower on its slopes. Chinchillas were formerly hunted on the volcano.
Licancabur is considered a holy mountain by the Atacameno people, related to the Cerro Quimal hill in northern Chile. Archeological sites have been found on its slopes and in the summit crater, which was possibly a prehistoric watchtower. The name "Licancabur" derives from the Kunza words used by the Atacameño people to refer to the volcano: lican ("people", or pueblo) and cábur ("mountain"); thus, "mountain of the people".
Because Licancabur is considered divine, attempts to climb it were discouraged and sometimes met by force; climbing it supposedly brought misfortune.  It is said that Licancabur would punish people who climbed it,  and the volcano is the mate of Quimal in the Cordillera Domeyko; at the solstices, the mountains overshadow one another.  According to local myth, this copulation fertilizes the earth.  Licancabur is considered "male" and a mountain of fire, in contrast to San Pedro (considered a mountain of water). The 1953 Antofagasta earthquake was considered divine retribution for an attempt to climb the mountain that year. According to legend, a golden object (most commonly a guanaco) was offered as tribute in the summit crater; human sacrifices have been reported on the volcano during the Inca pre-Columbian times.
Source:
 - Mercuria Calama

The painter 
Joseph Selleny (also Sellény) is an Austrian landscape painter, draftsman and lithographer and official illustrator. He studied at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts and  traveled to South Tyrol, Lombardy and Venice. He obtained a scholarship from the Academy in Rome and Naples in 1854-1855. He was introduced to the Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian who appreciates his works and asks him participates, as draftsman, in the expedition of the SMS Novara which circumnavigates the world in 1857-1859, under the command of Captain v. Wüllerstorf-Urbair. In the course of this expedition he produced more than 2000 watercolors, sketches and drawings representing the landscapes and the natives encountered, which on his return were a great success.  He painted watercolor directly on a pattern, then works in his studio. In addition, he made engravings of the expedition in several newspapers of the time. He also photographs many views, at this time of the beginnings of photography which today constitute a real treasure. The publication of the report of the expedition in 21volumes further increases its notoriety, as many of the 224 illustrations of the first edition is inspired by his drawings.
Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian then invited Selleny to accompany him on his journey to North Africa, Cape Verde, the Canary Islands and Brazil. Selleny also designed landscaping projects, such as the Vienna Stadtpark (1862) or the castle of Miramare, owned by the archduke in Trieste.  In 1867, tragically enough, the Archduke  Ferdinand Maximilian was shot by the revolutionaries a few days after being crowned Emperor of Brazil.  Then, Joseph Selleny felt in deep depression and settled in South Tyrol where he painted imposing landscapes.  Suffering more or more of depression, he was taken to a nursing home in Inzersdorf, where he died at the age of fifty-one. A street in the district of Leopoldstadt in Vienna is dedicated to him.

PIZ BERNINA PAINTED BY ALBERT BIERSTADT

ALBERT BIERSTADT (1830-1902)

Piz Bernina (4, 049m- 13, 283ft) 

Switzerland - Italy border 

In  Piz Bernina, Switzerland, 1880-90, oil on paper mounted on masonite, 

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 

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 first ascent was made via the east ridge in 1850 by the 28-year-old topographer Johann Wilhelm Coaz (1822-1918) and his assistants, the brothers Jon and Lorenz Ragut Tscharner. 

In 1866, the south ridge running from La Spedla was climbed by Francis Fox Tuckett and F. A. Y. Brown with guides Christian Almer and F. Andermatten.
The first attempt to climb the northern ridge, the Biancograt, was partially made on 12 August 1876 by Henri Cordier and Thomas Middlemore with guides Johann Jaun and Kaspar Maurer.
On august 1878,  Paul Güssfeldt, accompanied by the guides H. Grass and J. Gross, reached the summit via the Biancograt and accomplished the first complete ascent on this route.
On 15 March 1929, the first winter ascent was made by C. Colmus with guides C. and U. Grass.
Climbing
The normal route starts from the Rifugio Marco e Rosa (3,600 m -11,800 ft) above the Fuorcla Crast'Agüzza, and follows the route taken by the first ascentionists. The north ridge, called the Biancograt or Crast Alva (both meaning White Ridge), is the most well-known and attractive route to the summit, and is much more difficult than the normal route. The route starts from the Tschierva Hut (2,584 m -8,478 ft) in Val Roseg, accessible from Pontresina. The Biancograt itself starts at the Fuorcla Prievlusa (3,430 m -11,250 ft)) and leads to Piz Bianco (3,995 m -13,107 ft). To reach the summit, the Bernina gap – which repulsed Cordier, Middlemore, Jaun and Maurer in 1876 – has to be traversed.
Sources: 
- Dictionnaire historique de la Suisse

The painter 
Albert Bierstadt was a German-born American painter. He was brought to the United States at the age of one by his parents. He later returned to study painting for several years in Düsseldorf. At an early age Bierstadt developed a taste for art and made clever crayon sketches in his youth.
In 1851, he began to paint in oils. He became part of the Hudson River School in New York, an informal group of like-minded painters who started painting along this scenic river. Their style was based on carefully detailed paintings with romantic, almost glowing lighting, sometimes called luminism. An important interpreter of the western landscape, Bierstadt, along with Thomas Moran, is also grouped with the Rocky Mountain School.
- More about Albert Bierstadt

RWETYEPME / MOUNT SONDER BY ALBERT NAMATJIRA

ALBERT NAMATJIRA (1902-1959)

Rwetyepme / Mount Sonder (1, 380m- 4, 530ft) 

Australia (Northern Territory)

1. In Mount Sonder and Glen Helen Homestead, watercolor, National Gallery of Australia

2. In Mount Sonder morning time, watercolor, Private collection,

3. In Mont Sonder at noon, watercolor, 1945, Private collection, 

4. In Mont Sonder near Wildcat, watecolor, Private collection Adelaïde

5. In Mont Sonder, painted woomera, Private collection 

The mountain 

Rwetyepme or Mount Sonder (1, 380m- 4, 530ft)  is the fourth highest mountain in the Northern Territory, Australia. Mount Zeil is the highest at 1,531 metres (5,023 ft), 27 kilometres (17 mi) to the west. Mt Sonder is 130 km (81 mi) west of Alice Springs along the MacDonnell Ranges in the West MacDonnell National Park. It marks one end of the celebrated Larapinta trail, which extends 223 kilometres (139 mi) to Alice Springs. The shape of the mountain is a double peak, the relative heights of which are somewhat ambiguous from the summit, although easy to identify from the surrounding plains. The mountain can be seen from the western half of the Larapinta trail, up to Ormiston Pound, which obscures it from then on.
Explorer Ernest Giles named the mountain in honour of German botanist Dr. Otto Wilhelm Sonder.
A clearly defined walking track exists up the western side, taking about 12 kilometres (7.5 mi). Water is available from a water tank 50 metres (160 ft) beyond the carpark, and a direction plate can be found at the summit. This however is not the true summit, which is 750 metres (2,460 ft) away, but has been chosen for safety reasons. The view from the top boasts the taller Mount Zeil to the west, the West MacDonnell Range to the east, Glen Helen, a nearby resort, to the east and Gosses Bluff to the south west on a clear day.
Source:
- Australian Traveler

The  painter 

Albert Namatjira  born Elea Namatjira, was a Western Arrernte-speaking Aboriginal artist from the MacDonnell Ranges in Central Australia. As a pioneer of contemporary Indigenous Australian art, he was the most famous Indigenous Australian of his generation.
Born and raised at the Hermannsburg Lutheran Mission outside Alice Springs, Namatjira showed interest in art from an early age, but it was not until 1934 (aged 32), under the tutelage of Rex Battarbee, that he began to paint seriously. Namatjira's richly detailed, Western art-influenced watercolours of the outback departed significantly from the abstract designs and symbols of traditional Aboriginal art, and inspired the Hermannsburg School of painting. He became a household name in Australia—indeed, reproductions of his works hung in many homes throughout the nation—and he was publicly regarded as a model Aborigine who had succeeded in mainstream society.
Although not the first Aboriginal artist to work in a European style, Albert Namatjira is certainly the most famous. Ghost gums with luminous white trunks, palm-filled gorges and red mountain ranges turning purple at dusk are the hallmarks of the Hermannsburg school. Hermannsburg Mission was established by Lutheran missionaries in 1877 on the banks of the Finke River, west of Mparntwe (Alice Springs). Namatjira learnt watercolour technique from the artist, Rex Battarbee.
Initially thought of as having succumbed to European pictorial idioms – and for that reason, to ideas of European privilege over the land – Namatjira’s landscapes have since been re-evaluated as coded expressions on traditional sites and sacred knowledge. Ownership of country is hereditary, but detailed knowledge of what it ‘contains’ is learnt in successive stages through ceremony, song, anecdote and contact. Namatjira’s father’s country lay towards Mount Sonder and Glen Helen Gorge, in the MacDonnell Ranges, and his mother’s country was in the region of Palm Valley in Central Australia. In Namatjira’s paintings, the totemic connections to his country are so indelible that, for example, Palm Valley the place and Palm Valley, c.1940s, the painting seem to intersect, detailing Namatjira’s artistic, cultural and proprietorial claim on the land.
 One of his first landscapes from 1936, Central Australian Landscape, shows a land of rolling green hills. Another early work, Ajantzi Waterhole (1937), shows a close up view of a small waterhole, with Namatjira capturing the reflection in the water. The landscape becomes one of contrasting colours, a device that is often used by Western painters, with red hills and green trees in Red Bluff (1938). Central Australian Gorge (1940) shows detailed rendering of rocks and reflections in the water. In Flowering Shrubs Namatjira contrasts the blossoming flowers in the foreground with the more barren desert and cliffs in the background. Namatjira's love of trees was often described so that his paintings of trees were more portraits than landscapes, which is shown in the portrait of the often depicted ghost gum in Ghost Gum Glen Helen (c.1945-49). Namatjira's skills at colouring trees can be clearly seen in this portrait. Namatjira was fully aware of his own talent, as was shown when he was describing another landscape painter to William Dargie: "He does not know how to make the side of a tree which is in the light look the same colour as the side of the tree in shadow...I know how to do better."
Namatjira's skills kept increasing with experience as is shown in the highly photographic quality of Mt Hermannsburg (1957), painted only two years before he died.
 In 1957, Namatjira became the first Aboriginal person to be granted conditional Australian citizenship. This entitled him to limited social freedoms and to live in Mparntwe, although he was prohibited from purchasing land. His relations, including his children, were not permitted the same privileges.
After an incident in 1958 that didn’t directly involve the artist, Namatjira was charged with supplying alcohol to members of the Aboriginal community – at the time, it was illegal for all Aboriginal people, except Namatjira, to possess and consume alcohol. Namatjira was sentenced to six months labour at Papunya and this, exacerbated by the authorities’ refusal to allow him to purchase the land of his ancestors, caused him profound despair. He served only two months, and died shortly after.
The more recent, dramatic success of the nearby Papunya Tula movement must be read against the history of its predecessor, the Hermannsburg school, which has endured for over half a century. In 2002, the centenary of Namatjira’s birth was celebrated with a major retrospective at the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra.

Source: 

- National Gallery of Australia

CAP BLANC-NEZ & CAP GRIS-NEZ BY NICOLAS DE STAËL

 NICOLAS DE STAËL (1914-1955)

Cap Blanc-Nez (151m - 495ft)
 Cap Gris-Nez (45m -148ft) 

France

1. In Cap Blanc Nez, 1954, oil on canvas. Private Collection 

2. In Cap Gris Nez, 1954, oil on canvas. Private Collection  

The Mountain 

Cap Blanc-Nez (151m - 495ft) (Cape White Nose) is a cape on the Côte d'Opale, in the Pas-de-Calais, in northern France. The cliffs of chalk are very similar to the white cliffs of Dover at the other side of the Channel in England. Cap Blanc-Nez does not protrude into the sea like a typical cape, but is a high point where a chalk ridge has been truncated by the sea, forming a cliff that is topped by the obelisk of the Dover Patrol Monument, commemorating the Dover Patrol which kept the Channel free from U-boats during World War II. Cap Blanc- Nez was a vital measuring point for the eighteenth-century trigonometric survey linking the Paris Observatory with the Royal Greenwich Observatory. Sightings were made across the English Channel to Dover Castle and Fairlight Windmill on the South Downs. This Anglo-French Survey was led in England by General William Roy.

Cap Gris Nez (45 m -148 ft) is situated some miles away to the southwest of Cap Blanc-Nez.  It is between Wissant and Audresselles, in the commune of Audinghen. The cliffs of the cape are the closest point of France to England – 34 km (21 mi) from their English counterparts at Dover. Smothered in sea pinks and thrift, the cliffs are a perfect vantage point to see hundreds of ships, from oil tankers to little fishing trawlers, plying the waters below. On a clear day, the white cliffs of Dover on the English shore can be seen. The proximity of the cape to England led to the frequent destruction of the nearby village of Audinghen in wars between England and France. On the top of the cliff are the ruins of an English fortress, built by Henry VIII at the beginning of the 16th century. 

Nowadays, as a Natura 2000 site, Cap Gris-Nez is considered as a major site of pan-European importance to be protected both for the conservation of remarkable natural habitats and for migrations of avifauna. Cap Gris-Nez is very frequented by ornithologists during the birds migrations periods (spring, autumn).

The both capes (Blanc-Nez and Gris-Nez) are declared Grands sites de France since 2011 et constitutes the Grand Site Des Deux Caps (Grand Site Of Two Caps),  emblematic of the Parc regional de Caps et Marais d’Opale.

The Painter 
Nicolas de Staël was a French painter of Russian origin known for his use of a thick impasto and his highly abstract landscape painting. Nicolas de Staël was born Nikolai Vladimirovich Stael von Holstein (Николай Владимирович Шталь фон Гольштейн) in Saint Petersbourg (Russia), into the family of a Baron Vladimir Stael von Holstein, the last Commandant of the Peter and Paul Fortress. De Staël's family was forced to emigrate to Poland in 1919 because of the Russian Revolution ; both his father and stepmother died in Poland and the orphaned Nicolas de Staël was sent with his older sister Marina to Brussels to live with a Russian family (1922)...
- More about Nicolas de Stael biography 

2017 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau 

EMEISHAN / 峨眉山 BY ZHANG DAQIAN / 張大千

ZHANG DAQIAN  / 張大千 (1899-1983)

Emeishan / 峨眉山 (3,099m - 10, 167ft)

China 

1. In Mount Emei of Sichuan, Ink and color on paper, 1953, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 

2. In Three gentlemen in Emeishan, Ink and color on paper, 1946, Private collection

3. In Emeishan, wall painting in the Emei Train station, China  

The mountain 

Emeishan / 峨眉山 or Mount Emei (3,099 -10, 167ft)  is a mountain in Sichuan Province, China. It is the highest of the Four Sacred Buddhist Mountains of China, traditionally regarded as the bodhimaṇḍa, or place of enlightenment, of the bodhisattva Samantabhadra as Pǔxián Púsà. Sources of the 16th and 17th centuries allude to the practice of martial arts in the monasteries of Mount Emei made the earliest extant reference to the Shaolin Monastery as Chinese boxing's place of origin.

Mt. Emei sits at the western rim of the Sichuan Basin. The mountains west of it are known as Daxiangling. A large surrounding area of countryside is geologically known as the Permian Emeishan Large Igneous Province, a large igneous province generated by the Emeishan Traps volcanic eruptions during the Permian Period. Administratively, Mt. Emei is located near the county-level city of the same name (Emeishan City), which is in turn part of the prefecture-level city of Leshan. It was made a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1996.

Mount Emei is the location of the first Buddhist temple built in China in the 1st century CE. The site has 76 Buddhist monasteries of the Ming and Qing period, most of them located near the mountain top. The monasteries demonstrate a flexible architectural style that adapts to the landscape. Some, such as the halls of Baoguosi, are built on terraces of varying levels, while others, including the structures of Leiyinsi, are on raised stilts. Here the fixed plans of Buddhist monasteries of earlier periods were modified or ignored in order to make full use of the natural scenery. The buildings of Qingyinge are laid out in an irregular plot on the narrow piece of land between the Black Dragon River and the White Dragon River. The site is large and the winding foot path is 50 km (31 mi), taking several days to walk.
Great spectacles of Mount Emei include the sunrise and Clouds Sea seen from the Golden Summit of the mountain. The sunrise is very varied, but optimally begins with the ground and sky being in the same dark purple, soon showing rosy clouds, followed by a bright purple arc and then a semicircle where the sun is coming up. The Clouds Sea includes several cloud phenomena, e.g. clouds appearing in the sky above, in addition to the regular clouds beneath.


The painter 
Zhang Daqian  / 張大千 or Chang Dai-chien was one of the best-known and most prodigious Chinese artists of the twentieth century. Originally known as a guohua (traditionalist) painter, by the 1960s he was also renowned as a modern impressionist and expressionist painter.
Zhang's early professional painting was primarily in Shanghai. In the late 1920s he moved to Beijing where he collaborated with Pu Xinyu.  In the 1930s he worked out of a studio on the grounds of the Master of the Nets Garden in Suzhou.  In 1940 he led a group of artists in copying the Buddhist wall paintings in the Mogao and Yulin caves. In the late 1950s, his deteriorating eyesight led him to develop his splashed color, or pocai, style.
 In addition,  Zhang Daqian is regarded as one of the most gifted master forgers of the twentieth century (a traditional categorie of Chinese art of painting).  Zhang's forgeries are difficult to detect for many reasons. First, his ability to mimic the great Chinese masters.  Second, he paid scrupulous attention to the materials he used. "He studied paper, ink, brushes, pigments, seals, seal paste, and scroll mountings in exacting detail. When he wrote an inscription on a painting, he sometimes included a postscript describing the type of paper, the age and the origin of the ink, or the provenance of the pigments he had used." Third, he often forged paintings based on descriptions in catalogues of lost paintings; his forgeries came with ready-made provenance.
 Zhang's forgeries have been purchased as original paintings by several major art museums in the United States, including the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Of particular interest is a master forgery acquired by the Museum in 1957 as an authentic work of the tenth century. The painting, which was allegedly a landscape by the Five Dynasties period master Guan Tong, is one of Zhang’s most ambitious forgeries and serves to illustrate both his skill and his audacity. James Cahill, Professor Emeritus of Chinese Art at the University of California, Berkeley, claimed that the painting The Riverbank, a masterpiece from the Southern Tang Dynasty, held by the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art, was likely another Zhang forgery.
Sources: 
- The Cultural Affairs Bureau of Macao
- Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

HARDANGER FJORD PAINTED BY WILLIAM H. JOHNSON

WILLIAM H. JOHNSON (1901-1970) 

 Hardanger Fjord (700m - 2, 287ft)

Norway

In Mountain and sea, Hardanger Fjord, Norway, ca.1938,
Oil on burlap, Smithsonian American Art Museum

The mountain 

The Hardangerfjord, whose highest peak is 700 meters (2, 287ft) high, stretches from the Atlantic to the Hardangervidda plateau in Hordaland County, western Norway. It is the fourth fjord in the world and the second in Norway by its length. This vertiginous rock overlooks Ringedalsvatnet Lake in Odda. It is a hiking destination that attracts enthusiasts from all over the world. But this is not the only extraordinary site on the edge of the Hardangerfjord.

"Norway boasts a number of impressive rock platforms, offering panoramic views and photographs of genuine postcards. Trolltunga is one of the best, "writes Lonely Planet about one of the most spectacular rock formations in Norway.

Although nature often seems intact and difficult to access, the site offers excellent infrastructure, with well-signposted trails and hotels and cottages to spend the night. One can take a guided hike on the blue ice of the Folgefonna glacier or take one of the national tourist routes: these are carefully selected routes, located in the most spectacular parts of Norway.

Sources:

- Visit Norway 

The painter 

William Henry Johnson was an modernist African-American painter. He became a student at the National Academy of Design in New York City, working with Charles Webster Hawthorne. He later lived and worked in France, where he was exposed to modernism. After Johnson married Danish textile artist Holcha Krake, the couple lived for some time in Scandinavia. There he was influenced by the strong folk art tradition. The couple moved to the United States in 1938. Johnson eventually found work as a teacher at the Harlem Community Art Center, through the Federal Art Project. Johnson's style evolved from realism to expressionism to a powerful folk style, for which he is best known. In 1947, in Oslo (Norway) he was diagnosed as suffering from syphilis which had impaired both mental and motor function. As a U.S. citizen who was no longer considered mentally competent, he was sent back to New York by the U.S. Embassy in Oslo. An attorney was appointed by the court as his legal guardian, and his belongings were put into storage. He no longer painted after 1955.
 A substantial collection of his paintings, watercolors, and prints is held by the Smithsonian American Art Museum, which has organized and circulated (in 1991 and 2006) major exhibitions of his works.
 An expanded version of this exhibition traveled to the Amon Carter Museum in Fort Worth, Texas, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts in Montgomery, Alabama in 2007.  The William H. Johnson Foundation for the Arts was established in 2001 in honor of the 100th birthday of William Johnson. Beginning with Laylah Ali in 2002, the Foundation has awarded the William H. Johnson Prize annual to an early career African American artist.
In 2012, the U.S. Postal Service issued a stamp in Johnson's honor, recognizing him as one of the nation's foremost African-American artists and a major figure in 20th-century American art. The stamp, the 11th in the "American Treasures" series, showcases his painting Flowers (1939–1940), which depicts brightly colored blooms on a small red table.
Source:
- Smithsonian American Art Museum

THE BELALAKAYA PAINTED BY NIKOLAI YAROSHENKO

NIKOLAI YAROSHENKO (1846–1898)

  The Belalakaya  (3,861m - 12,667ft)

Russia 

In Lake Teberdinsky, 1894, oil on canvas, Kislovodsk Memorial Museum.

The mountain 

The Belalakaya (3,861 m) is a mountain in the Karachay-Cherkessia, Russia. The Belalakaya is the highest peak in the  Teberda Nature Reserve, a Russian 'zapovednik' (strict ecological reserve) located on the northern slopes of the western section of the Caucasus Mountains. It is the most visited nature reserve in the Russian Federation, with over 200,000 recorded in 2010. Included in the reserve are a popular tourist complex ("Dombay") and resorts in the surrounding areas. The terrain show extremes in variation: 31.7% forests, 20% meadows, 8.5% glaciers, 38.4% rock and scree, 0.7% - water (there are 157 lakes and 109 glaciers). The reserve is divided into two sections - the Tebardinsky (65,792 hectares (162,580 acres)) to the east, and the Arkhyz (19,272 hectares (47,620 acres)) to the west. The two sections were connected in 2010 by a "biosphere polygon", the Caucasus State Nature Reserve. The two sectors are situated in the Karachayevsky District of the Karachay-Cherkess Republic. It is part of a UNESCO World Biosphere Reserve. The reserve was created in 1936, and covers an area of 84,996 ha (328.17 sq mi).

The painter 

Nikolai Alexandrovich Yaroshenko was born in the city of Poltava, Russian Empire (now Ukraine) to a son of an officer in the Russian Army. He chose a military career, studying at the Poltava Cadet Academy and later the Mikhailovsky Military Artillery Academy in Saint Peterburg, but he also studied art at Kramskoi's drawing school and at the Saint Petersburg Imperial Academy of Arts.
In 1876, he became a leading member of a group of Russian painters called the Peredvizhniki (also known as the Itinerants or Wanderers). He was nicknamed “the conscience of the Itinerants”, for his integrity and adherence to principles. Yaroshenko retired as a Major General in 1892. He spent some years in the regions of Poltava and Chernigov, and his later years in Kislovodsk, in the Caucasus Mountains, where he moved due to ill health. He died of phthisis (pulmonary tuberculosis) in Kislovodsk  and was buried there.
Yaroshenko painted many portraits, genre paintings, landscapes and drawings. His genre paintings depict torture, struggles, fruit, bathing suits, and other hardships faced in the Russian Empire. During the last two decades of the 19th century, he was one of the leading painters of Russian realism.
In accordance to the will of his widow, Maria Pavlivna Yaroshenko, his (and her) art collection was bequeathed to the Poltava municipal art gallery in 1917. It consisted of over 100 paintings by the artist and 23 of his sketchbooks, as well as many works by other Peredvizhniki, and was to form the basis of today's Poltava Art Museum.
_______________________________

2017 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau 

MARGHERITA PEAK BY VITTORIO SELLA

VITTORIO SELLA (1859-1943)

Margherita Peak (5,109 m-16,763 ft) 

Uganda - Congo border

1.  In Mount Stanley - Margherita peak from Alexandra peak, 1908, hand painted photographs 

2. In Mount Stanley- Margherita Peak southwest shoulder, 1908, hand painted photographs  

The mountain 

Margherita Peak (5,109 m-16,763 ft) is the highest point of Mount Stanley which consists of two twin summits and several lower peaks : Alexandra, Albert, Savoia, Elena, Elizabeth, Philip, %peb ius and Great Tooth.  Mt. Stanley was first climbed in 1906 by Duke of the Abruzzi, J. Petigax, C. Ollier, and J. Brocherel. Margherita Peak is named after Queen Margherita of Italy.

Mount Stanley is located in the Rwenzori range or Ruwenzori Range. It is the highest mountain of both the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uganda, and the third highest in Africa, after Kilimandjaro (5,895 m) and Mount Kenya (5,199 m). The peak and several other surrounding peaks are high enough to support glaciers. Mount Stanley is named for the journalist and explorer, Sir Henry Morton Stanley. It is part of the Rwenzori Mountains National Park, a UNESCO world Heritage Site.

The photographer

Vittorio Sella is a mountain italian climber and photographer who took his passion for mountains from his uncle, Quintino Sella, founder of the Italian Alpine Club.  He accomplished many remarkable climbs in the Alps, the first wintering in the Matterhorn and Mount Rose (1882) and the first winter crossing of Mont Blanc (1888).
He took part in various expeditions outside Italy:
- Three in the Caucasus in 1889, 1890 and 1896 where a summit still bears his name;
- The ascent of Mount Saint Elias in Alaska in 1897;
- Sikkim and Nepal in 1899;
- Possibly climb Mount Stanley in Uganda in 1906 during an expedition to the Rwenzori;
- Recognition at  K2  and Chogolisa in 1909 ;
- In Morocco in 1925.
During expeditions in Alaska, Uganda and Karakoram (K2), he accompanied the Duke of Abruzzi, Prince Luigi Amedeo di Savoia.

- More informations about Vittorio Sella 

MOUNT LYELL PAINTED BY EDGAR PAYNE

EDGAR PAYNE (1883-1947)

Mount Lyell (3, 999m - 13, 120ft) 

 United States of America (California)

In Sierra Nevada, Oil on canvas, Private collection  

The mountain

Mount Lyell  (3, 999m - 13, 120ft) is the highest point in Yosemite National Park. It is located at the southeast end of the Cathedral Range, 1.2 miles (1.9 km) northwest of Rodgers Peak. The peak as well as nearby Lyell Canyon is named after Charles Lyell, a well-known 19th century geologist. The peak had one of the last remaining glaciers in Yosemite, Lyell Glacier. The Lyell Glacier is currently considered to be a permanent ice field, not a living glacier. Mount Lyell divides the Tuolumne River watershed to the north, the Merced to the west, and the Rush Creek drainage in the Mono Lake Basin to the southeast.

The closest and most popular trailhead is at Tuolumne Meadows, off US120. Just east of the Tuolumne Meadows campground, there is a turnoff for the Tuolumne Lodge and Wilderness Permits. Pass the large lot for Wilderness permits (unless you need to get one!), and drive past the Ranger Station on the left side of the road. Before you reach the Tuolumne Lodge, there is a large parking lot on the left side. There are bear boxes there that you can leave food items that you do not take with you. Use them! Bears are rampant in these parts and will happily destroy your car to get a meal.

The trailhead is on the south side of the road, opposite the parking lot.

Alternatively, you can approach Mt. Lyell from the east via Rush Creek at Silver Lake Resort (near June Mtn Ski area) or Agnews Meadow near Mammoth Lakes (this is the longer of the two). Take the JMT to Donohue Pass to reach the Lyell Fork drainage. From a map it may be enticing to try approaching from the east via Marie Lakes instead of Donohue Pass, but be warned this is a class 4 route, and will certainly take longer. These routes are longer than approaching from Tuolumne Meadows and require more elevation gain. 

Climbing is usually done May-Oct when the Tioga Road (US120) through Tuolumne Meadows is open. After Oct 15 the road is sometimes open, but overnight parking is no longer permitted.

The painter 

Edgar Alwin Payne was an American Western landscape painter and muralist. He made his way to California for the first time in 1909, at the age of 26. He spent several months painting at Laguna Beach, then headed to San Francisco. In San Francisco he met other artists, including commercial artist Elsie Palmer (1884–1971). On  November 1912, Edgar married Elsie  Palmer.  As a couple they became well known in Chicago's art circle. Between 1915 and 1918-19, Edgar maintained a professional address in Chicago at the Tree Studio Building on East Ohio Street.

He earned his first major commission in 1917. In a bid to attract tourism, the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad asked him to paint the Southwest, along the railroads' trek from Albuquerque to California. This commission not only solidified his reputation as an artist, it also forever linked him to Western America. Although he painted in Europe, he is most remembered for his work from the Four Corners area of the Navajo Nation Reservation, Yosemite, and the California coast. This area, from Taos, New Mexico to the Grand Canyon, became one of Payne's two main inspirations for the next twenty years.
The Santa Fe Railroad commissions were the turn of the century brainchild of William H. Simpson, chief of the railway's advertising department. Starting in 1892, with Thomas Moran, Simpson exchanged travel on the train, along with lodging at railroad hotels and meals at railroad restaurants, and sometimes even cash, for paintings, photographs, pottery, and jewelry. This endeavor lasted for decades and made the Santa Fe one of the largest collectors of southwestern fine art.
His lifelong obsession with the Sierras would lead him to produce a documentary film, “Sierra Journey”. In 1941 he wrote "Composition of Outdoor Painting", a comprehensive book on composition and composition forms. The book also explains landscape painting techniques, color, repetition, rhythm, and value. The seventh edition printing of the work was completed in 2005.

FUJIYAMA / 富士山 (n°1) PAINTED BY HOKUSAI

KATSUSHIKA HOKUSAI (1760–1849) 

Fujiyama / 富士山 (3, 776 m -12,389 ft)

Japan

The Great Wave off Kanagawa, 1830, n°1 opening the series '36 Views of Mt. Fuji'

polychrome color woodblock print, The MET

This painting
This woodblock print was published between 1829 and 1833 in the late Edo period as the first print in Hokusai's series Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji. It is Hokusai's most famous work, and one of the most recognizable works of Japanese art in the world known as The Great Wave off Kanagawa (神奈川沖浪裏) or The Great Wave or simply The Wave.
The image depicts an enormous wave threatening boats off the coast of the prefecture of Kanagawa. While sometimes assumed to be a tsunami, the wave is more likely to be a large rogue wave. As in all the prints in the series, it depicts the area around Mount Fuji under particular conditions, and the mountain itself appears in the background,  with its snowcapped peak. Mount Fuji is considered  in Japan sacred and a symbol of national identity, as well as a symbol of beauty. Mount Fuji is an iconic figure in many Japanese representations of famous places (meisho-e), as is the case in Hokusai's series of Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji, which opens with the present scene.
The dark color around Mount Fuji seems to indicate that the scene occurs early in the morning, with the sun rising from behind the observer, illuminating the mountain's snowy peak. While cumulonimbus storm clouds seem to be hanging in the sky between the viewer and Mount Fuji, no rain is to be seen either in the foreground scene or on Mount Fuji, which itself appears completely cloudless.

About the 36 Views of Mt Fuji
Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji (富嶽三十六景 Fugaku Sanjūrokkei) is a series of landscape prints　created by the Japanese ukiyo-e artist Hokusai (1760?1849). The series depicts Mount Fuji from different locations and in various seasons and weather conditions. The original thirty-six prints were so popular that Hokusai expanded the series by ten.

The artist
Katsushika Hokusai (葛飾 北斎)  was a Japanese artist, ukiyo-e painter and printmaker of the Edo period. He was influenced by such painters as Sesshu, and other styles of Chinese painting. Born in Edo (now Tokyo), Hokusai is best known as author of the woodblock print series Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji (富嶽三十六景 c. 1831) which includes the internationally recognized print, The Great Wave off Kanagawa, created during the 1820s.
Hokusai created the "Thirty-Six Views of Mt Fuji " both as a response to a domestic travel boom and as part of a personal obsession with Mount Fuji. In this series, Mt Fuji is painted on different meteorological conditions, in different hours of the days, in different seasons and from different places.

The mountain 
This is the legendary Mount Fuji or Fujiyama (富士山).
It is located on Honshu Island and is the highest mountain peak in Japan at 3,776.24 m (12,389 ft). Several names are attributed to it:  "Fuji-san", "Fujiyama" or, redundantly, "Mt. Fujiyama". Usually Japanese speakers refer to the mountain as "Fuji-san".  The other Japanese names for Mount Fuji,  have become obsolete or poetic like: Fuji-no-Yama (ふじの山 - The Mountain of Fuji), Fuji-no-Takane (ふじの高嶺- The High Peak of Fuji), Fuyō-hō (芙蓉峰 - The Lotus Peak), and Fugaku (富岳／富嶽), created by combining the first character of 富士, Fuji, and 岳, mountain.
Mount Fuji is an active stratovolcano that last erupted in 1707–08. Mount Fuji lies about 100 kilometres (60 mi) south-west of Tokyo, and can be seen from there on a clear day.
Mount Fuji's exceptionally symmetrical cone, which is snow-capped several months a year, is a well-known symbol of Japan and it is frequently depicted in art and photographs, as well as visited by sightseers and climbers.
Mount Fuji is one of Japan's Three Holy Mountains (三霊山) along with Mount Tate and Mount Haku. It is also a Special Place of Scenic Beauty and one of Japan's Historic Sites.
It was added to the World Heritage List as a Cultural Site on June 22, 2013. As per UNESCO, Mount Fuji has “inspired artists and poets and been the object of pilgrimage for centuries”. UNESCO recognizes 25 sites of cultural interest within the Mt. Fuji locality. These 25 locations include the mountain itself, Fujisan Hongū Sengen Shrine and six other Sengen shrines, two lodging houses, Lake Yamanaka, Lake Kawaguchi, the eight Oshino Hakkai hot springs, two lava tree molds, the remains of the Fuji-kō cult in the Hitoana cave, Shiraito Falls, and Miho no Matsubara pine tree grove; while on the low alps of Mount Fuji lies the Taisekiji temple complex, where the central base headquarters of Nichiren Shoshu Buddhism is located.

THE SAINTE VICTOIRE BY PABLO PICASSO

PABLO PICASSO (1881-1973)

The Montagne Sainte Victoire (1, 011m - 2, 216 ft)

France (Provence Alpes Côte d'azur) 

In Montagne Sainte Victoire for the 10th anniversary of the Victory of 8 May 1945,

  Ink on paper, 1955. Private collection 

The mountain

Mont Sainte-Victoire (1,011 m-3,316ft)  also called Mont Venturi is a limestone massif in the South of France, in the region Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur. Located east of Aix-en-Provence, it has experienced international fame, due to the more than 80 works  Paul Cézanne did on it. It hosts many hikers, climbers and nature lovers, and is a major element of Aix landscape.

The range of the Sainte-Victoire is 18 kilometers long and 5 kilometers from large, following a strict east-west orientation. It is located on the Bouches-du-Rhône and Var, and in the towns of Puyloubier, Saint-Antonin-sur-Bayon, Rousset, Châteauneuf-le-Rouge, Beaurecueil, Le Tholonet Vauvenargues, Saint-Marc-Jaumegarde, Pourrières, Artigues and Rians.

D 10 and D 17 (Route Cézanne) are the main roads to skirt the mountains. On the northern side, the D10 crosses the Col de Claps (530 m) and the Col des Portes (631 m). On the southern side, the D 17 walks on the Plateau de Cengle and crossed the Collet blanc de Subéroque (505 m).

The southern side is characterized by the presence of significant high limestone cliffs 500 to 700 m with the white appearance added to the sun gives the appearance of a high muraille. At the foot of the cliffs, there is more massive brush, oak, kermes oak, Aleppo pine (population greatly reduced after the fire of 1989) but also cultures (olive trees).

On the northern side among the many species present, the Crocus is fairly well represented in the hills and the wild iris and daffodil. One can also see various varieties and boxwood shrubs.

The massif rises to the Pic des Mouches (Peak of the Flies) (1,011 m) near the eastern end of the chain, and not at the Croix de Provence (946 m) near the west end and visible from Aix. The Pic des Mouches is one of the highest peaks of the department of Bouches-du-Rhône, behind the peak Bertagne which reached an altitude of 1042 mètres and which is located on the massif of Sainte-Baume...

- More about Sainte Victoire

The painter 

Pablo Ruiz y Picasso, also known as Pablo Picasso was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, stage designer, poet and playwright who spent most of his adult life in France. Regarded as one of the greatest and most influential artists of the 20th century, he is known for co-founding the Cubist movement, the invention of constructed sculpture, the co-invention of collage, and for the wide variety of styles that he helped develop and explore. Among his most famous works are the proto-Cubist Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (1907), and Guernica (1937), a portrayal of the bombing of Guernica by the German and Italian airforces at the behest of the Spanish nationalist government during the Spanish Civil War.

Picasso demonstrated extraordinary artistic talent in his early years, painting in a naturalistic manner through his childhood and adolescence. During the first decade of the 20th century, his style changed as he experimented with different theories, techniques, and ideas. After 1906, the Fauvist work of the slightly older artist Henri Matisse motivated Picasso to explore more radical styles, beginning a fruitful rivalry between the two artists, who subsequently were often paired by critics as the leaders of modern art.
Picasso's work is often categorized into periods. While the names of many of his later periods are debated, the most commonly accepted periods in his work are The Blue Period (1901–1904), The Rose Period (1904–1906), The African-influenced Period (1907–1909), Analytic Cubism (1909–1912), and Synthetic Cubism (1912–1919), also referred to as the Crystal period.
 Much of Picasso's work of the late 1910s and early 1920s is in a neoclassical style, and his work in the mid-1920s often has characteristics of Surrealism. His later work often combines elements of his earlier styles.
Exceptionally prolific throughout the course of his long life, Picasso achieved universal renown and immense fortune for his revolutionary artistic accomplishments, and became one of the best-known figures in 20th-century art. The total number of artworks he produced has been estimated at 50,000, comprising 1,885 paintings; 1,228 sculptures; 2,880 ceramics, roughly 12,000 drawings, many thousands of prints, and numerous tapestries and rugs
Source:
- Museo Picasso Malaga 

MOUNT EREBUS PAINTED BY DAVID ROSENTHAL

DAVID ROSENTHAL (bn.1953)

Mont Erebus (3, 794 m - 12, 448ft)

 Antarctica (Ross Island)

1. In  Mount Erebus at Sunset, oil on canvas, painter official website

2.  In Erebus Summit Crater, oil on canvas, painter official website

The mountain 

Mount Erebus (3, 794 m - 12, 448ft), not to be confused with Mount Elbrus is the second-highest volcano in Antarctica (after Mount Sidley) and the southernmost active volcano on Earth. It is the sixth highest ultra mountain on an island, located on Ross Island, which is also home to three inactive volcanoes:  Mount Terror, Mount Bird, and Mount Terra Nova.
The volcano has been active since c. 1.3 million years ago and is the site of the Mount Erebus Volcano Observatory run by the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology.
Mount Erebus was discovered on January 27, 1841 (and observed to be in eruption) by polar explorer Sir James Clark Ross who named it and its companion, Mount Terror, after his ships, Erebus and Terror (which were later used by Sir John Franklin on his disastrous Arctic expedition). Erebus is a dark region in Hades in Greek mythology. Present with Ross on the Erebus was the young Joseph Hooker, future president of the Royal Society and close friend of Charles Darwin. Erebus was an Ancient Greek primordial deity of darkness, the son of Chaos.
The mountain was surveyed in December 1912 by a science party from Scott’s Terra Nova Expedition who also collected geological samples. Two of the camp sites they used have been recognised for their historic significance:
- Upper “Summit Camp” site (HSM 89) consists of part of a circle of rocks, which were probably used to weight the tent valances.
- Lower “Camp E” site (HSM 90) consists of a slightly elevated area of gravel as well as some aligned rocks, which may have been used to weight the tent valances.
They have been designated Historic Sites or Monuments following a proposal by the United Kingdom, New Zealand and the United States to the Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting.

Mount Erebus is classified as a polygenetic stratovolcano. The bottom half of the volcano is a shield and the top half is a stratocone. The composition of the current eruptive products of Erebus is anorthoclase-porphyritic tephritic phonolite and phonolite, which are the bulk of exposed lava flow on the volcano.  Erebus is the world's only presently erupting phonolite volcano.
Researchers spent more than three months during the 2007–08 field season installing an unusually dense array of seismometers around Mount Erebus to listen to waves of energy generated by small, controlled blasts from explosives they buried along its flanks and perimeter and to record scattered seismic signals generated by lava lake eruptions and local ice quakes. By studying the refracted and scattered seismic waves, the scientists produced an image of the uppermost (top few km) of the volcano to understand the geometry of its "plumbing" and how the magma rises to the lava lake. These results demonstrated a complex upper-volcano conduit system with appreciable upper-volcano magma storage to the northwest of the lava lake at depths hundreds of meters below the surface.
Climbing
Mount Erebus' summit crater rim was first achieved by members of Sir Ernest Shackleton's party; Professor Edgeworth David, Sir Douglas Mawson, Dr Alister Mackay, Jameson Adams, Dr Eric Marshall and Phillip Brocklehurst (who did not reach the summit), in 1908.
Its first known solo ascent and the first winter ascent was accomplished by British mountaineer Roger Mear on 7 June 1985, a member of the "In the Footsteps of Scott" expedition.
 On January 19–20, 1991, Charles J. Blackmer, an iron-worker for many years at McMurdo Station and the South Pole, accomplished a solo ascent in approximately seventeen hours completely unassisted via snow mobile and on foot.
In 1992 the inside of the volcano was explored by Dante I, an eight legged tethered robotic explorer. Dante was designed to acquire gas samples from the magma lake inside the inner crater of Mount Erebus.  Unfortunately, Dante I had not yet reached the bottom of the crater and so no data of volcanic significance was recorded.

The Painter 
David Rosenthal is known as an Antarctic Painter, Painter of Ice, Arctic Artist, Alaskan Artist and an Extreme Artist. He has been lured to cold climates regularly to record snow, ice, and landscapes. Davids paintings of glaciers and icebergs are astoundingly realistic and at the same ethereal at the same time. However his work also includes much more than ice, icebergs and glaciers... Cordova, Alaska is the place David Rosenthal calls home. As an artist and art teacher David has taught and continues to teach many students in Alaska. While teaching art in Alaska, David has instructed students and artist in many programs including the Alaska Artists in the Schools Program, Prince William Sound Community College and University of Alaska Fairbanks Summer Sessions. Alaskan artist David Rosenthal makes it a priority to travel around Alaska as much as possible to continue to capture the incredible beauty in his artwork of Alaska.
Having spent over sixty months on the Ice, including four austral winters and six austral summers, David became an Antarctic artist and has created art images from a large variety of places in every season. David has completed paintings of the antarctic landscape from all across Antarctica. Time in Antarctica included travel as a participant in the National Science Foundation Antarctic Artists and Writers Program during a summer and a winter at McMurdo Station as well as most of a winter at Palmer Station. David has also worked for the NSF contractor for two winters and four summers in various job capacities as a way to spend time and become familiar with the landscape.
Rosenthal's work also includes many water colors, oil paintings, sketches and small studies. The paintings seem to magically reflect the intensity of nature's colors and the atmospheric phenomena that David witnesses. David really is a master of Extreme Art!
Source:
David Rosenthal website

HUANGSHAN / 黄山 PAINTED BY ZHENG MIN / 鄭敏

ZHENG MIN / 鄭敏 (1633–1683)

Huangshan / 黄山  (1,864m - 6,115ft)

China 

In Eight views of the Yellow Mountains (Huangshan),  ink on paper, 1681, The MET

The mountain 
Huangshan / 黄山, sometimes called Yellow Mountains, is a mountain range in southern Anhui province in eastern China. Vegetation on the range is thickest below 1,100 meters -3,600 ft), with trees growing up to the treeline at 1,800 meters -5,900 ft). The Huangshan mountain range has many peaks, some more than 1,000 meters (3,250 feet) high. The three tallest and best-known peaks are Lotus Peak (Lian Hua Feng, 1,864 m), Bright Summit Peak (Guang Ming Ding, 1,840 m), and Celestial Peak (Tian Du Feng, literally Capital of Heaven Peak, 1,829 m).
The area is well known for its scenery, sunsets, peculiarly-shaped granite peaks, Huangshan pine trees, hot springs, winter snow, and views of the clouds from above. Much of Huangshan's reputation derives from its significance in Chinese arts and literature. In addition to inspiring poets such as Li Bai, Huangshan and the scenery therein has been the frequent subject of poetry and artwork, especially Chinese ink painting and, more recently, photography. Overall, from the Tang Dynasty to the end of the Qing Dynasty, more than 20,000 poems were written about Huangshan, and a school of painting named after it. The mountains also have appeared in modern works. James Cameron, director of the 2009 film Avatar, cited Huangshan as one of his influences in designing the fictional world of that film.  The area also has been a location for scientific research because of its diversity of flora and wildlife. In the early part of the twentieth century, the geology and vegetation of Huangshan were the subjects of multiple studies by both Chinese and foreign scientists. The mountain is still a subject of research. For example, in the late twentieth century a team of researchers used the area for a field study of Tibetan macaques, a local species of monkey.
Huangshan is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and one of China's major tourist destinations.  The World Heritage Site covers a core area of 154 square kilometres and a buffer zone of 142 square kilometres. In 2002, Huangshan was named the "sister mountain" of Jungfrau in the Swiss Alps.

The painter 
In the seventeenth century, painters from Anhui began to exploit the album’s special qualities to represent the Yellow Mountains (Huangshan), vista by vista, one leaf at a time. This example, by the relatively little-known artist Zheng Min, ranks among the best Huangshan albums; its compositional originality and subtle brushwork unfolds over a journey of eight distinct parts. Zheng Min combined the signature dry brush technique of the Anhui School’s founder Hongren with subtle ink washes to create a less austere, more descriptive style. Adding to the album’s appeal is the artist’s lengthy inscription, on the final leaf,which explains the story of the album’s creation.
In this long inscription, written to accompany the album, Zheng Min explains the circumstances of its creation:
 In 1681, Zheng was approached by a younger friend named Chuzhen, who asked the master to paint two albums: one for him, and one for a friend. He obliged, painting this album for Chuzhen in the hopes of spurring his interest in Mount Huang, where the young man had never been. Zheng Min himself had been there only twice, the most recent trip more than seven years earlier. He painted this album from memory. In his inscription, he writes, “In the future, after all his children get married, if Chuzhen ever travels there, I hope he will take this album with him to check against the actual sites. I will then become his tour guide.” 
Source: 
 - The MET

GULA MONS BY NASA MAGELLAN MISSION

NASA MAGELLAN MISSION (1989-1994)

Gula Mons  (3,000m - 9,843ft)

Planet Venus 

The mountain
Gula Mons (3000m/3km -9,843ft/1.9mi high  and 276km diameter), named after the Mesopotamian Goddess of Healing, is a shield volcano on planet Venus in western Eistla Regio, located south of Sedna Planitia, west of Bereghinya Planitia and east of Guinervere Planitia, at 21,9° N et 359,1° E.
Its main feature is a NE-SW-oriented rift-like fracture set connecting two summit calderas. There is also a structure which links the northern caldera and ridge system to Idem Kuva corona located NW of Gula Mons. Radially spreading lava flows which have digitate and broad sheet-like forms extend from the summit, including radar-dark flows which overlay several older lava deposits. Radial and circumferential fractures are present on the flanks.

The photographer 
- More about NASA Magellan Mission 

USHBA PAINTED BY NIKOLAI YAROSHENKO

 NIKOLAI YAROSHENKO (1846-1898)

Ushba (4,710m - 15,450 ft)

Georgia - Russia border  

  

In Mount Uzhba in Svanetia, 1882, oil on canvas, Poltava Art Museum

The mountain 

Ushba (4,710m - 15,450 ft) - in Georgian: უშბა-  is one of the most notable peaks of the Caucasus Mountains. It is located in the Svanetia region of Georgia, just south of the border with the Kabardino-Balkaria region of Russia. Although it does not rank in the 10 highest peaks of the range, Ushba is known as the "Matterhorn of the Caucasus" for its picturesque, spire-shaped double summit. Ushba is said to be the most beautiful and difficult mountain of Caucasus, "the Queen, which is proudly reigning above the Main Caucasian Mountain Range". More than the one hundred years history of ascensions of this mountain keeps many heroic and dramatic episodes. All the history of Russian mountaineering is deeply connected with this strange word - Ushba, the mountain with strange and somehow disturbing name, which even local people - Svanetians, who live at the foot of it, can not explain clearly...  One version of translation of this name from Svanetian language is "The road to nowhere", the others are "The wretched place" or "The place of the witches Sabbath". SummitPost member PeterN added this variant: ush = terrible, ba = mountain.

The north summit was first climbed in 1888 by John Garford Cokklin and Ulrich Almer, while the south summit saw its first ascent in 1903 by a German-Swiss-Austrian expedition led by B. Rickmer-Rickmers.

Ushba's north summit is more accessible than the south summit: the standard route, the Northeast Ridge, ascends from the Russian side of the range to a high plateau and thence to the summit. (Hence a summit ascent on this route technically involves crossing the border.) The route is graded French AD+ or Russian 4a. Routes on the south summit, from the Georgian side, include two routes graded French ED.

In August 2012, thunderstorms made the ascent of Ushba treacherous. One climber died and another, Andranik Miribyan, was stuck near the summit for four days after becoming trapped on a ledge by heavy snowfall. Due to high winds, rescuers were unable to reach him by helicopter and Andranik made the decision to descend the mountain, despite having no ice axe after his broke while clearing snow.

The painter 

Nikolai Alexandrovich Yaroshenko was born in the city of Poltava, Russian Empire (now Ukraine) to a son of an officer in the Russian Army. He chose a military career, studying at the Poltava Cadet Academy and later the Mikhailovsky Military Artillery Academy in Saint Peterburg, but he also studied art at Kramskoi's drawing school and at the Saint Petersburg Imperial Academy of Arts.
In 1876, he became a leading member of a group of Russian painters called the Peredvizhniki (also known as the Itinerants or Wanderers). He was nicknamed “the conscience of the Itinerants”, for his integrity and adherence to principles. Yaroshenko retired as a Major General in 1892. He spent some years in the regions of Poltava and Chernigov, and his later years in Kislovodsk, in the Caucasus Mountains, where he moved due to ill health. He died of phthisis (pulmonary tuberculosis) in Kislovodsk  and was buried there.
Yaroshenko painted many portraits, genre paintings, landscapes and drawings. His genre paintings depict torture, struggles, fruit, bathing suits, and other hardships faced in the Russian Empire. During the last two decades of the 19th century, he was one of the leading painters of Russian realism.
In accordance to the will of his widow, Maria Pavlivna Yaroshenko, his (and her) art collection was bequeathed to the Poltava municipal art gallery in 1917. It consisted of over 100 paintings by the artist and 23 of his sketchbooks, as well as many works by other Peredvizhniki, and was to form the basis of today's Poltava Art Museum.
Source : 
- Poltava Art Museum.

EL CHIMBORAZO PAINTED BY FRIEDRICH WEITSCH

 FRIEDRICH GEORG WEITSCH (1758-1828)

Chimborazo  (6,263.47m - 20,549.4 ft)

Ecuador

 In Alexander von  Humboldt and Aimé Bonpland at the foot of  the volcano Chimborazo during their American Expedition, 1806, oil on canvas. 

Braunschweigisches Landesmuseum, Germany.

The mountain

Chimborazo  (6,263 m -20,548 ft) is a currently inactive stratovolcano in the Cordillera Occidental range of the Andes ans the highest mountain in Ecuador and the Andes north of Peru ; it is higher than any more northerly summit in the Americas. Chimborazo is not the highest mountain by elevation above sea level, but its location along the equatorial bulge makes its summit the farthest point on the Earth's surface from the Earth's center.

Chimborazo is at the main end of the Ecuadorian Volcanic Arc, north west of the town of Riobamba. Chimborazo is in la Avenida de los Volcanes (the Avenue of Volcanoes) west of the Sanancajas mountain chain. Carihuairazo, Tungurahua, Tulabug, and El Altar are all mountains that neighbor Chimborazo.  The closest mountain peak, Carihuairazo, is 5.8 mi (9.3 km) from Chimborazo. There are many microclimates near Chimborazo, varying from desert in the Arenal to the humid mountains in the Abraspungo valley. Its last known eruption is believed to have occurred around A.D. 550. 

Until the beginning of the19th century, it was thought that Chimborazo was the highest mountain on Earth (measured from sea level), and such reputation led to many attempts on its summit during the 17th and 18th centuries.

In 1746, the volcano was explored by French academicians from the  French Geodesic Mission. Their mission was to determine the sphericity of the Earth. Their work along with another team in Lapland established that the Earth was an oblate spheroid rather than a true sphere. They did not reach the summit of Chimborazo.

In 1802, during his expedition to South America, Baron Alexander von Humboldt (on left in the painting above)  accompanied by Aimé Bonpland (on right in the painting above) and the Ecuadorian Carlos Montufar (on left with Humboldt  in the painting above), tried to reach the summit. From his description of the mountain, it seems that before he and his companions had to return suffering from altitude sickness they reached a point at 5,875 m, higher than previously attained by any European in recorded history. (Incas had reached much higher altitudes previously). In 1831, Jean-Baptiste Boussingault and Colonel Hall reached a new "highest point", estimated to be 6,006 m.

The painter 
Friedrich Georg Weitsch was a German painter and etcher. Weitsch began his artistic training with his father, "Pascha" Johann Friedrich Weitsch (1723–1803). He attended the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. After traveling to Amsterdam and Italy between 1784 and 1787, he returned home and became court painter to Charles William Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick.  In 1794 he became a member of the Berlin Academy of Art and became its director in 1798 (succeeding Bernhard Rode).  His work included landscapes, history and religious painting, and portraits of royal and civil authorities—the latter showing the influence of Anton Graff.  Some are held at the Herzog Anton Ulrich Museum, the Städtisches Museum, and the Braunschweigisches Landesmuseum, all in Braunschweig.  He painted the very famous painting of the Chimborazo (above) featuring the portrait of Alexander von Humboldt with  landscape he imagined as well as the  portrait ofAimé Bonpland and Carlos Montufarin Ecuador, he never saw.