CINQUE TORRI PAINTED BY EDWARD H. COMPTON

EDWARD H. COMPTON (1881-1960)
Cinque Torri (2,361 m  -7,746 ft)
Italy

In "Cinque Torri, Bei Cortina,Süd Tirol", 1930, oil on canvas

The mountains
Cinque Torri  (2,361 m  -7,746 ft) (sometimes named also Cinque Torri di Averau) comprise a small rock formation belonging to Nuvolao group in the Dolomiti Ampezzane (part of the Eastern Dolomites) north-west of San Vito di Cadore and south-west of Cortina d'Ampezzo.  Cinque Torri, as all the other mountains in the area, are made of dolomite, with a particular pale grey colour. The group is formed by five towers (which give the name to the mountain) with a maximum elevation of 2,361 m (Torre Grande). Every "tower" has its own name:Torre Grande, the highest one has three very appealing peaks for rock climbers: Cima Nord, Cima Sud e Cima Ovest. They are located in the south-west area of the valley of Cortina d'Ampezzo, north of the Averau mountain, of which Cinque Torri can be considered a part. In the Cinque Torri area there are the following mountain huts :Rifugio Cinque Torri, m 2,137. During summer it is possible to make excursions in the woods and on paths, among which are the Alta Via 1 of the Dolomites, the "Muraglia di Giau". The towers also provide good and popular rock climbing with various routes at a range of grades up all of the towers.  In winter, Cinque Torri belong to an important ski area, whose tracks are part of the wider Dolomiti Superski area. They are thus linked to the nearby mountains Lagazuoi and Col Gallina. Until a few years ago it was possible to ski only towards Lagazuoi - Col Gallina - Cinque Torri, but beginning in the winter season of 2008–2009, it has been also possible to ski downhill from the Cinque Torri area to the higher area of Falzarego Pass by means of the "Croda Negra" lift and the corresponding track beyond Averau mountain. This area was theater of conflict between Italian and Austro-Hungarian troops during World War I; countless testimonies of the fighting and of the war shelters built by the Italian army are present and have been recently rebuilt, to create an open-air museum with historical itineraries.

The painter
Edward Harrison Compton (1881–1960) not to be confused with his father Edward Theodore Compton (1849-1921) was a German landscape painter and illustrator of English descent. Compton was born in Feldafing in Upper Bavaria, Germany, the second son of notable landscape painter Edward Theodore Compton. He received his early art training from his father, and after a period of study in London at the Central School of Arts and Crafts settled back in Bavaria. Like his father he was inspired by the Alps to become a mountain painter ("bergmaller") working in both oils and watercolour. However, an attack of Polio at the age of 28 meant that he had to find more accessible landscapes to paint in Germany, England northern Italy and Sicily. He also provided illustrations for several travel books published by A & C Black. Compton exhibited at galleries in Munich and Berlin, and also in England at the Royal Academy in London and in Bradford. He died in Feldafing in 1960.
He had two sisters, both of whom were artists: Marion Compton, the flowers and still-life painter, and Dora Keel-Compton, flower and mountain painter.

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2022 - Wandering Vertexes...
Un blog de Francis Rousseau

THE TITLIS IN VINTAGE POSTCARDS 1890

VINTAGE POSCARDS
Titlis (3,238 m -10,623ft)
Switzerland

In " Titlis Spitze, Unterwald - La Suisse en Couleur " postcard, 1890,
The Library of Congress Photographs Division, Washington DC

The mountain
Titlis  (3,238 m - 10,623 ft) is a mountain of the Uri Alps, located on the border between the cantons of Obwalden and Bern. It is the highest summit of the range north of the Susten Pass, between the Bernese Oberland and Central Switzerland. It is mainly accessed from Engelberg (OW) on the north side and is famous as the site of the world's first rotating cable car.  The cable car system connects Engelberg (996 m (3,268 ft)) to the summit of Klein Titlis (3,028 m (9,934 ft)) through the three stages of Gerschnialp (1,262 m (4,140 ft)), Trübsee (1,796 m (5,892 ft)) and Stand (2,428 m (7,966 ft)), although somewhat recently, a newer, direct route was created that bypassed Gerachnialp, going directly to Trübsee.
The last part of cable car leads above the glacier. At Klein Titlis, it is possible to visit an illuminated glacier cave from an entrance within the cable-car station, which also includes shops and restaurants. The Titlis Cliff Walk, the highest elevation suspension bridge in Europe, opened in December 2012, giving views across the Alps. Many people use Titlis as a cheaper and easier option than Jungfraujoch.
In earlier times, Titlis was known under the names Wendenstock or Nollen. The Reissend Nollen and the Wendenstöcke are the nearest western neighbours to the mountain, slightly lower than Titlis, but with sharp rugged peaks. In a document of 1435 the mountain is called Tuttelsberg(Tutilos mountain), referencing to a man named Tutilos, who was probably a local farmer. The name, from Tutilos Berg, became Titlisberg and later Titlis.
The first ascent of Titlis was probably made in the year 1739. It was done by Ignaz Hess, J. E. Waser and two other men from Engelberg.  The first written evidence of an ascent is found in the Engelberger Dokumente. They mention a party of four men that reached the summit in 1744.
 On 21 January 1904 the first ski ascent of Titlis was made by Joseph Kuster and Willi Amrhein. In March 1967 the cable car to Klein Titlis (3,032 m) was inaugurated. In December 2012, the Titlis Cliff Walk opened to commemorate the 110th anniversary of the Engelberg-Gerschnialp cableway.

Vintage postcards
Postcards were colorized as soon as they appeared on the market at the end of 19th century ; the photos were then repainted by hand by women with very fine brushes, then a varnish was applied to fix these colors which were always very contrasting... and sometimes very far from reality!
Postcards became popular at the turn of the 20th century, especially for sending short messages to friends and relatives. They were collected right from the start, and are still sought after today by collectors of pop culture, photography, advertising, wartime memorabilia, local history, and many other categories. Postcards were an international craze, published all over the world. The Detroit Publishing Co. and Teich & Co. were two of the major publishers in the U.S, and sometimes individuals printed their own postcards as well. Yvon were the most famous in France. Many individual or anonymous publishers did exist around the world and especially in Africa and Asia (Japan, Thailand, Nepal, China, Java) between 1920 and 1955. These photographer were mostly local notables, soldiers, official guides belonging to the colonial armies (british french, belgium...) who sometimes had rather sophisticated equipment and readily produced colored photograms or explorers, navigators, climbers (Vittorio Sella and the Archiduke of Abruzzi future king of Italy remains the most famous of them).
There are many types of collectible vintage postcards.
Hold-to-light postcards were made with tissue paper surrounded by two pieces of regular paper, so light would shine through. Fold-out postcards, popular in the 1950s, had multiple postcards attached in a long strip. Real photograph postcards (RPPCs) are photographs with a postcard backing.
Novelty postcards were made using wood, aluminum, copper, and cork. Silk postcards–often embroidered over a printed image–were wrapped around cardboard and sent in see-through glassine paper envelopes; they were especially popular during World War I.
In the 1930s and 1940s, postcards were printed on brightly colored paper designed to look like linen.
Most vintage postcard collectors focus on themes, like Christmas, Halloween, portraits of movie stars, European royalty and U.S. presidents, wartime imagery, and photos of natural disasters or natural wonders. Not to mention cards featuring colorful pictures by famous artists like Alphonse Mucha, Harrison Fisher, Ellen Clapsaddle, and Frances Brundage.

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2022 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

LUSHAN / 庐山 or MOUNT LU SKETCHED BY JEAN-BAPTISTE NÉE

 

JEAN-BAPTISTE NÉE (b.1986)
Lushan / 庐山 or Mount Lu (1,474m- 4,834ft)
China

In Lushan ,Chine, Lavis 2018, 19x 28cm , Collection privée ©Jean-Baptiste Née
@jeanbaptiste.nee

The artist
Jean-Baptiste Née, born in 1986. is a french painter, scenographer and visual artist, graduated from Arts-Décoratifs of Paris in 2012. Jean-Baptiste Née works in the mountains and high mountains, always in situ, in direct confrontation with the movements of the earth and water and wind. He gives a growing place for the action of the elements on the work in progress (rain, snow, frost, etc.). He established his "large workshop" in the Swiss Alps or in the Vercors massif - especially in winter -, as well as during long hikes in the Italian Alps. In the winter of 2018, he worked in the massifs of Wudangshan and Lushan, in China, (see above) and became interested in the Taoist notion of "Sky" (t’ien 天).
Since 2016, Jean-Baptiste Née exhibits regularly in galleries in France and Switzerland. His workshop is in Montreuil, France.

The mountain
Mount Lu or Lushan (庐山) ( (1,474m- 4,834ft) is situated in the northern part of Jiangxi province in southeastern China, and is one of the most renowned mountains in the country. Mount Lushan is one of the spiritual centres of Chinese civilization. Buddhist and Taoist temples, along with landmarks of Confucianism, where the most eminent masters taught, blend effortlessly into a strikingly beautiful landscape which has inspired countless artists who developed the aesthetic approach to nature found in Chinese culture.
The oval-shaped mountains are about 25 km long and 10 km wide, and neighbors Jiujiang city and the Yangtze River to the north, Nanchang city to the south, and Poyang Lake to the east. Its highest point is Dahanyang Peak (1,474m- 4,834ft) and is one of the hundreds of steep peaks that towers above a sea of clouds that encompass the mountains for almost 200 days out of the year. Mount Lu is known for its grandeur, steepness, and beauty, and is part of Lushan National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1996, and a prominent tourist attraction, especially during the summer months when the weather is cooler.
Lushan was a summer resort for Western missionaries in China. Absalom Sydenstricker, the father of Pearl Buck was one of the first five missionaries to acquire property in the Kuling Estate on the mountain.
More about Mount Lu

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2022- Wandering Vertexes.
A blog by Francis Rousseau

THE K2 PEAK PHOTOGRAPHED BY VITTORIO SELLA IN 1909

VITTORIO SELLA (1859-1843)  

 The K2  peak (8,611m - 28,251 ft) 

China - Pakistan border

Photographed during the 1909 expedition 

led by Prince Luigi Amedeo, Duke of the Abruzzi 

The artist

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  in 1909 (aAbove)
- In Morocco in 1925.
During expeditions in Alaska, Uganda and Karakoram (K2), he accompanied the Duke of Abruzzi, Prince Luigi Amedeo di Savoia.
Sella continues the practice of climbing into his old age, completing his final attempt in the Matterhorn at the age of 76; a climb he had to interrupt the rise following an accident in which one of his guides injured. He died in his hometown during World War II.  His photographic collection is now managed by the Sella Foundation.
His photos mountain are still  considered today to be among the finest ever made.
Jim Curran believes that "Sella remains probably the greatest photographer of the mountain.  His name is synonymous with technical perfection and aesthetic refinement. "
The quality of the pictures of Vittorio Sella is partly explained by the use of a view camera 30 × 40 cm, despite the difficulty of the transportation of such a device, both heavy and fragile in places inaccessible; to be able to transport it safely, he had to make special pieces that can be stored in saddle bags.  His photographs have been widely distributed, either through the press or in the galleries, and were unanimously celebrated; Ansel Adams, who was able to admire thirty-one in an exhibition that was organized at Sella American Sierra Club, said they inspired him "a religious kind of sense of wonder."  Many of his pictures were taken in the mountains for the very first time in the History, which give them a much artistic, historical  but also scientific value ; for example, one could measure the decline in the Rwenzori glaciers in Central Africa.

The mountain 

K2 peak (8,611m - 28,251 ft)  also known as Mount Godwin-Austen or Chhogori is the second highest mountain in the world, after Mount Everest. It is located on the China-Pakistan border between Baltistan, in the Gilgit–Baltistan region of northern Pakistan, and the Taxkorgan Tajik Autonomous County of Xinjiang, China.

The name K2 is derived from the notation used by the Great Trigonometric Survey of British India. Thomas Montgomerie made the first survey of the Karakoram from Mount Haramukh, some 210 km (130 miles) to the south, and sketched the two most prominent peaks, labeling them K1 and K2.

The policy of the Great Trigonometric Survey was to use local names for mountains wherever possible and K1 was found to be known locally as Masherbrum. K2, however, appeared not to have acquired a local name, possibly due to its remoteness. The mountain is not visible from Askole, the last village to the south, or from the nearest habitation to the north, and is only fleetingly glimpsed from the end of the Baltoro Glacier, beyond which few local people would have ventured. The name Chogori, derived from two Balti words, chhogo ("big") and ri ("mountain")  has been suggested as a local name, but evidence for its widespread use is scant. It may have been a compound name invented by Western explorers or simply a bemused reply to the question "What's that called?" It does, however, form the basis for the name Qogir (simplified Chinese: 乔戈里峰; traditional Chinese: 喬戈里峰; pinyin: Qiбogēlǐ Fēng) by which Chinese authorities officially refer to the peak. Other local names have been suggested including Lamba Pahar ("Tall Mountain" in Urdu) and Dapsang, but are not widely used.

Lacking a local name, the name Mount Godwin-Austen was suggested, in honor of Henry Godwin-Austen, an early explorer of the area, and while the name was rejected by the Royal Geographical Society, it was used on several maps, and continues to be used occasionally.

The surveyor's mark, K2, therefore continues to be the name by which the mountain is commonly known. It is now also used in the Balti language, rendered as Kechu or Ketu (Urdu: کے ٹو‎). The Italian climber Fosco Maraini argued in his account of the ascent of Gasherbrum IV that while the name of K2 owes its origin to chance, its clipped, impersonal nature is highly appropriate for so remote and challenging a mountain. He concluded that it was ...

K2 is the highest point of the Karakoram range and the highest point in both Pakistan and Xinjiang.

RAS DASHAN SKETCHED BY HENRY SALT

HENRY SALT (1780-1827)
Ras Dashen (4,550 m - 14,930 ft)
Ethiopia

In Mucculla in Abyssinia (Ethiopia), Handcolored aquatints 1809.
King Geroge III topographical collection

The mountain
Ras Dashan (4,550 m - 14,930 ft) also known as Ras Dashen or Ras Dejen, is the highest mountain in Ethiopia and fourteenth highest peak in Africa. Located in the Simien Mountains National Park in the Amhara Region North Gondar, The English form, "Ras Dashen" is a corruption of its Amharic name, "Ras Dejen", the term used by the Ethiopian Mapping Authority (EMA) which alludes to the traditional head or general who fights in front of the Emperor.
According to Erik Nilsson, Ras Dashan is the eastern peak of the rim of "an enormous volcano, the northern half of which is cut down about [a] thousand metres by numerous ravines, draining into the Takkazzi River." Its western counterpart is Mount Biuat (4,437 meters), separated by the valley of the Meshaha river. The mountain often sees violent snowfalls during the night, but given that day and night temperatures vary greatly, the snow is almost completely melted in a few hours (during the hottest period of the year), for the temperature may be over 5 degrees Celsius by midday. In winter snow falls rarely, since the majority of Ethiopia's yearly rainfall is in the summer, but if it does it usually lasts for weeks or months. The first recorded ascent by a European was in 1841, by French officers Ferret and Galinier. There is no verifiable evidence of earlier ascents by locals, but the summit climate and conditions are relatively hospitable, and there are nearby high altitude pastoral settlements. A small fort is still partially standing at around 4,300 metre SRTM data.

The artist
Henry Salt was an English artist, traveller, collector of antiquities, diplomat, and Egyptologist.
After a time as a portrait painter, Salt was permitted to travel with the English nobleman George Annesley, Viscount Valentia as his secretary and draughtsman after being recommended by Thomas Simon Butt. They started on an eastern tour in June 1802, traveling on the British East India Company's extra (chartered) ship Minerva to India via the Cape Colony. In 1805, Valentia sent Salt on a journey into the Abyssinian area (now Ethiopia) to meet with the ras of Tigré to open up trade relations on behalf of the English. While visiting there, Salt gained the respect of the ras. He returned to England on 26 October 1806. His journey home took him through Egypt where he met the pasha Mehmet Ali. Salt's paintings from the trip were used in Valentia's Voyages and Travels to India, published in 1809. The originals of all the drawings were kept by Valentia, as also the copper plates after Salt's death. The format and style of the plates is similar to Thomas and William Daniell's work, "Oriental Scenery" (1795-1808).
Salt returned to Ethiopia in 1809 on a government mission to explore trade and diplomatic links with the Tigrayan warlord Ras Wolde Selassie. Upon arrival, he was unable to meet with the king due to unrest in the country, so instead he went to stay with his friend the ras of Tigré. During this venture, Salt took on the side mission of verifying and correcting the information about the region reported by the Scottish traveler, James Bruce many years earlier. Salt came back to England in 1811 with numerous specimens of both plants and animals.

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2022 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

FUJIYAMA / 富士山 BY KOYO OKADA / 岡田紅陽

 

 

KOYO OKADA / 岡田紅陽 (1895- 1972)
Fujiyama / 富士山 (3, 776 m -12,389 ft) Japan

In Mount Fuji with clouds 1950, photo

The mountain
The legendary Mount Fuji or Fujiyama (富士山) 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 artist
Kōyō Okada (岡 田紅陽) is a Japanese photographer, winner of the 1954 edition of the Japan Photography Society Award. Koyo Okada devoted his whole life to photographing Mt.Fuji.
He used to be photographing Mt.Fuji, wearing wadded kimono from his favorite Japanese style hotel, and neighbors called him ‘Koyo-san’ with intimacy. He was born in Uonuma of Nigata prefecture, and his great-grandfather, grandfather, and father were artists. He got interested in taking photos when he was in Waseda University, and he met Mt.Fuji seen from Oshino village when he was 21 years old. Since that time, the relationship with Mt.Fuji of more than 50 years had started. The life of Japanese people of those days with Mt.Fuji and the rural scenery at the foot of Mt.Fuji, which are in the picture, reminds us of the time and nature which Japan is losing. You should absolutely go to see his photos.

BLACKHEAD PAINTED BY EDWARD HOPPER

 

EDWARD HOPPER (1882-1967)

Blackhead (50 m-150 ft) 

United States of America (Maine)

1. In Blackhead, Monhegan, 1916-19,oil on canvas,  Whitney Museum of American Art, 

The mountain 

Blackhead (50m-150 ft) are northside cliffs situated on Monhegan, Manana Island, that have drawn the interest of  many artists.  The beginnings of the art colony on Monhegan date to the mid-19th century; by 1890, it was firmly established. Two of the early artists in residence from the 1890s, William Henry Singer (1868–1943) and Martin Borgord (1869–1935), left Monhegan to study at the Académie Julian in Paris in 1901. Among many early members who found inspiration on the island were summer visitors from the New York School of Art and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, such as Robert Henri, Frederick Waugh, George Bellows, Edward Hopper and Rockwell Kent. The Monhegan Museum celebrated more the continuing draw of the island for artists in a 2014 exhibit entitled, “The Famous and the Forgotten: Revisiting Monhegan’s Celebrated 1914 Art Exhibition.

Monhegan is a plantation in Lincoln County, Maine, United States, about 12 nautical miles (22 km) off the mainland. The population was 75 at the 2000 census. The plantation comprises its namesake island and the uninhabited neighboring island of Manana. The island is accessible by scheduled boat service from Boothbay Harbor, New Harbor and Port Clyde. It was designated a National Natural Landmark for its coastal and island flora in 1966.[

The name Monhegan derives from Monchiggon, Algonquian for "out-to-sea island." European explorers Martin Pring visited in 1603, Samuel de Champlain in 1604, George Weymouth in 1605 and Captain John Smith in 1614. The island got its start as a British fishing camp prior to settlement of the Plymouth Colony. Cod was harvested from the rich fishing grounds of the Gulf of Maine, then dried on fish flakes before shipment to Europe. A trading post was built to conduct business with the Indians, particularly in the lucrative fur trade.  It was Monhegan traders who taught English to Samoset, the sagamore who in 1621 startled the Pilgrims by boldly walking into their new village at Plymouth and saying: "Welcome, Englishmen." 

The painter
Edward Hopper was a American realist painter and printmaker.

Conservative in politics and social matters (Hopper asserted for example that "artists' lives should be written by people very close to them"), he accepted things as they were and displayed a lack of idealism. Cultured and sophisticated, he was well-read, and many of his paintings show figures reading. He was generally good company and unperturbed by silences, though sometimes taciturn, grumpy, or detached. He was always serious about his art and the art of others, and when asked would return frank opinions.

Hopper's most systematic declaration of his philosophy as an artist was given in a handwritten note, entitled "Statement", submitted in 1953 to the journal, Reality:

"Great art is the outward expression of an inner life in the artist, and this inner life will result in his personal vision of the world. No amount of skillful invention can replace the essential element of imagination. One of the weaknesses of much abstract painting is the attempt to substitute the inventions of the human intellect for a private imaginative conception.

The inner life of a human being is a vast and varied realm and does not concern itself alone with stimulating arrangements of color, form and design.

The term life used in art is something not to be held in contempt, for it implies all of existence and the province of art is to react to it and not to shun it.

Painting will have to deal more fully and less obliquely with life and nature's phenomena before it can again become great."

 
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2022 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

LE PILON DU ROI - MASSIF DE L'ÉTOILE PAINTED BY PAUL CÉZANNE

PAUL CÉZANNE (1839-1906)
The Pilon du Roi - Massif de l'Etoile (710 m - 2,200 ft)
France 

                     La Chaîne de l'Etoile avec le Pilon du Roi, 1885–1886,  Barnes Foundation


The mountain
The Massif de l'Etoile (Range of the Star) is a small mountain range located north of Marseille. Covering an area of ​​10,000 hectares, it culminates at 779 meters at Grand-Puech. Its other highest points are: to the west, the summit of Grande-Étoile (590 metres) and l'Étoile (652 metres, the highest point in the municipality of Marseilles), to the east, besides the Tête du Grand-Puech, the Mont Julien (647 meters), while the center of the massif is dominated by the Pilon du Roi (710 meters) whose name is a deformation of the Provençal Pieloun dóu Roure, or the “peak of the oak”.
With the Garlaban massif, it forms a chain of mountains in coastal limestone Lower Provence in the south of Bouches-du-Rhône. They constitute a vast natural space of approximately 20,000 hectares which emerge at the heart of an urban complex of more than one million inhabitants with the agglomerations of Marseille, Aix-en-Provence, Aubagne and Gardanne.
The massif crosses 18 communes of the Bouches-du-Rhône.
On the northern edge of the Marseille agglomeration, this massif offers a beautiful image of the non-coastal hills of limestone Basse-Provence with typical flora, including endemic and rare species, including one from Appendix II of the plant protection system. (Arenaria provincialis), a typical vegetation of coppice, scrubland, lawns and rock habitats belonging to the Meso-Mediterranean level with even, thanks to a clear shade, an outline of a supra-Mediterranean level (coppice - high oak forest pubescent holly and pine forests of Scots pine) and a Mediterranean fauna whose current studies show for the moment typicality and originality.


The Painter
If mount Sainte-Victoire appears to have been the subject of a true love story with the painter Paul Cezanne, it is not the only one mountain he painted.
Aix-en Provence (France) painter Paul Cezanne still remains closely linked to his hometown. His studio in Les Lauves remains a place to visit, as if the painter was coming back from one second to the other. But the eternal bond is undoubtedly the series of paintings he did of the Montagne Sainte-Victoire. A hobby, a passion, a thread in the painter's work that took place in the latter part of his life, between 1882 and 1906 when he died in Aix. History says that the painter had contracted a nasty pneumonia during a working session on the mountain. This is what can be called 'die on stage'.
Cézanne had a considerable influence on the art of the late nineteenth and the early twentieth century. Acknowledged master of his time, he attended during stays in Paris between 1862 and 1882, the Impressionist band: Camille Pissarro, Auguste Renoir (who also ended his life in the Provencal brightness), Claude Monet, Alfred Sisley and others. He participated in the Impressionist adventure while keeping his personality: it is the time of the shock of the en plein air, easels in the grass, looking for natural light and emotion.
The influence of the Aix painter is recognized in the history of art since it would be the cause of the Cubist movement embodied in 1906 by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque. The first historically so called Cubist painting ' Les Demoiselles d'Avignon' would, a true artistic shock shown by Picasso in 1907 (one year after the death of Cézanne) is today one of the masterpieces of the MoMA in New York.
It is the search of volumes around which leads to the appearance of geometry in landscapes or still lifes of Cézanne.In 20 years, Cézanne pushes his style to express the emotion of the landscape, suggesting the wind, involving movement just like if we can breathe the air of the scene. In his first paintings pf the Sainte Victoire,(in the 1880’s) he expresses the giant aspect of the mountain that dominates the area with his characteristic e way of painting at the time, with a juxtaposition of linear brushstrokes and a range of soft, natural colors. In the last paintings of the Sainte Victoire, view from Les Lauves, between 1904 and 1906, he shows shots less accurate brushes allowing the shape of the mountain emerge from the canvas like an apparition. That is the whole intention of the artist, show nature as it is without fail to convey emotion.

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2022 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

LE MONT AGEL PAINTED BY CLAUDE MONET

 

 

CLAUDE MONET (1840-1926)
Mont Agel (1,151m - 3,776 ft)
France - Principauté de Monaco - Italy border

In "La Corniche near Monaco, Le Mont Agel", oil on canvas, 65 x 82cm, Private Collection

About this painting
Claude  Monet  painted the Mont Agel quite a number of times, but in ecah painting colors and  general impression are totally different.  One can compare the different paintings of that mountain he done. this one is supposed to have been painted at 1the sunset.  Monet, like the japanese painters ,and particularly Hokusai who painted the 36 views of Mount Fuji, reproduced the same artistic behavior by painting series of the same mountains, in the same place, at different hours of the day or different seasons. At Cap Martin and Mont Agel, Monet painted about ten of them.

 The mountain
Mont Agel (1,151m - 3,776 ft) is a summit of the Alps located in the South of France, overlooking part of the French Riviera, Monaco, Beausoleil, Roquebrune-Cap-Martin... exactly as shwon in the Monet's painting above !
It has held a historic strategic position since Antiquity and still houses military aerial detection installations today. Mount Agel is precisely located in the French commune of Peille, ( Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region). It rises in the Prealps of Nice and constitutes the highest point of the Monegasque watershed. The highest point of the principality, of Monaco, on the slopes of this mountain, can be reached by the Chemin des Révoires. A massive summit, Mount Agel is visible from a great distance: from certain districts of Nice as well as from a large part of the French Riviera between Cannes, Antibes, Nice, Antibes, and the Principality of Monaco and likewise from the Italian Riviera to around Vintimiglia and Bordighiera.
The history of Mount Agel begins with the Celto-Ligurian tribes who occupied the site and some of whose members were involved in the boarding and looting of boats engaged in cabotage. They are submitted from 23 to 13 BC. BC by the Romans who restored the old coastal route passing through the slopes of Mount Agel to link Ventimiglia to Narbonne Gaul and forming part of the Via Aurelia.
From 1931, new elements of fortification were built within the framework of the Maginot line.
Mount Agel now houses a large work of artillery equipped with turrets, linked together by deeply buried galleries. During the fighting of June 1940, his shots participated in the defense of Menton and supported the outpost of Pont-Saint-Louis and the work of Cap-Martin.
Until 2012, the 943 Capitaine Auber air base of the French Air Force was located there.
Today, only radars remain, which continue their watch in automatic mode, the information being transmitted and used by the Detection and Control Center at 942 Lyon-Mont Verdun air base.
Mount Agel also shelters on its slopes, the Monte-Carlo Golf Club, a very selective club. A little to the east of the golf course is the transmitter center of Fontbonne. Until its recent redevelopment, there were various protohistoric constructions.
Close to Mount Agel and the golf course is also the summer residence of Princes of Monaco (Rocagel site).

The painter
The painter Oscar-Claude Monet better known as Claude Monet was a founder of French Impressionist painting, and the most consistent and prolific practitioner of the movement's philosophy of expressing one's perceptions before nature, especially as applied to plein-air landscape painting. The term "Impressionism" is derived from the title of his painting « Impression, soleil levant » (Impression, Sunrise), which was exhibited in 1874 in the first of the independent exhibitions mounted by Monet and his associates as an alternative to the Salon de Paris.
Monet's ambition of documenting the French countryside led him to adopt a method of painting the same scene many times in order to capture the changing of light and the passing of the seasons exactly like the japanese artist Hokusai (1760-1849) did with his 36 views of Mount Fuji.
Monet repeated this kinf of "exercise de stylee with his series on Les Petites Dalles. and Kolsass mountain.
Monet has been described as "the driving force behind Impressionism". Crucial to the art of the Impressionist painters was the understanding of the effects of light on the local colour of objects, and the effects of the juxtaposition of colours with each other. Monet's long career as a painter was spent in the pursuit of this aim.
In 1856, his chance meeting with Eugene Boudin, a painter of small beach scenes, opened his eyes to the possibility of plein-air painting. From that time, with a short interruption for military service, he dedicated himself to searching for new and improved methods of painterly expression. To this end, as a young man, he visited the Paris Salon and familiarised himself with the works of older painters, and made friends with other young artists.[54] The five years that he spent at Argenteuil, spending much time on the River Seine in a little floating studio, were formative in his study of the effects of light and reflections. He began to think in terms of colours and shapes rather than scenes and objects. He used bright colours in dabs and dashes and squiggles of paint. Having rejected the academic teachings of Gleyre's studio, he freed himself from theory, saying "I like to paint as a bird sings."
In 1877 a series of paintings at Gare St-Lazare had Monet looking at smoke and steam and the way that they affected colour and visibility, being sometimes opaque and sometimes translucent. He was to further use this study in the painting of the effects of mist and rain on the landscape. The study of the effects of atmosphere were to evolve into a number of series of paintings in which Monet repeatedly painted the same subject in different lights, at different hours of the day, and through the changes of weather and season. This process began in the 1880s and continued until the end of his life in 1926.
His first series exhibited as such was of Haystacks, painted from different points of view and at different times of the day. Fifteen of the paintings were exhibited at the Galerie Durand-Ruel in 1891. In 1892 he produced what is probably his best-known series, Twenty-six views of Rouen Cathedral. In these paintings Monet broke with painterly traditions by cropping the subject so that only a portion of the facade is seen on the canvas. The paintings do not focus on the grand Medieval building, but on the play of light and shade across its surface, transforming the solid masonry.
Other series include Peupliers, Matins sur la Seine, and the Nenuphars that were painted on his property at Giverny. Between 1883 and 1908, Monet traveled to the Mediterranean, where he painted landmarks, landscapes, and seascapes, including a series of paintings in Antibes (above) and Venice. In London he painted four series: the Houses of Parliament, London ; Charing Cross Bridge ; Waterloo Bridge, and Views of Westminster Bridge. Helen Gardner writes: "Monet, with a scientific precision, has given us an unparalleled and unexcelled record of the passing of time as seen in the movement of light over identical forms."
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2022 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

LE SIGNAL DE LA SAUVETTE - MASSIF DES MAURES PAINTED BY DAVID HOCKNEY

 

DAVID HOCKNEY (bn. 1937),
Le Signal de la Sauvette / Massif des Maures (776m - 2,546 ft)
France (Var)

In Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures), acrylic-on-canvas. 2.1 m × 3.0 m, 1972

About the painting
This very famous painting was done durin summer 1972, by the pool of Tony Richardson's house "Le Nid du Duc"  looking at the Massif des  Maures mountain range, near La Garde-Freinet close to Saint Tropez.

The mountain
The Signal de la Sauvette (776m - 2,546 ft) is the highest point of the Massif des Maures. It is located in the South-East of France, in the Var department, in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region.
The Massif des Maures (in Provençal: lei Mauras or lei Mauro) is a small mountain range in the south of France, located i between Hyères and Fréjus. It is one of the natural regions of France.


The painter
David Hockney (born 9 July 1937) is an English painter, draughtsman, printmaker, stage designer and photographer. An important contributor to the pop art movement of the 1960s, he is considered one of the most influential British artists of the 20th century. At the Royal College of Art, Hockney featured in the exhibition Young Contemporaries—alongside Peter Blake—that announced the arrival of British Pop art. He was associated with the movement, but his early works display expressionist elements, similar to some works by Francis Bacon. When the RCA said it would not let him graduate in 1962, Hockney drew the sketch The Diploma in protest. He had refused to write an essay required for the final examination, saying he should be assessed solely on his artworks. Recognising his talent and growing reputation, the RCA changed its regulations and awarded the diploma. After leaving the RCA, he taught at Maidstone College of Art for a short time.  A visit to California, where he subsequently lived for many years, inspired him to make a series of paintings of swimming pools in the comparatively new acrylic medium rendered in a highly realistic style using vibrant colours. The artist moved to Los Angeles in 1964, returned to London in 1968, and from 1973 to 1975 lived in Paris. Hockney has a home and studio in Kensington, London and two residences in California, where he has lived on and off for over 30 years: one in Nichols Canyon, Los Angeles, and an office and archives on Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood, California. 

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2022 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

 

KILAUEA VOLCANO PAINTED BY CHARLES FURNEAUX

CHARLES FURNEAUX (1835-1913)
Kilauea (1,247 m - 4,091 ft) 
United States of America (Hawaii)

 

The mountain 

Kīlauea (1,247 m-4,091 ft) is a currently active shield volcano in the Hawaiian Islands, and the most active of the five volcanoes that together form the island of Hawaiʻi. Located along the southern shore of the island, the volcano is between 300,000 and 600,000 years old and emerged above sea level about 100,000 years ago. It is the second youngest product of the Hawaiian hotspot and the current eruptive center of the Hawaiian–Emperor seamount chain. Structurally, Kīlauea has a large, fairly recently formed caldera at its summit and two active rift zones, one extending 125 km (78 mi) east and the other 35 km (22 mi) west, as an active fault of unknown depth moving vertically an average of 2 to 20 mm (0.1 to 0.8 in) per year.

Kīlauea's eruptive history has been a long and active one; its name means "spewing" or "much spreading" in the Hawaiian language, referring to its frequent outpouring of lava. The earliest lavas from the volcano date back to its submarine preshield stage, samples having been recovered by remotely operated underwater vehicles from its submerged slopes; samples of other flows have been recovered as core samples. Lavas younger than 1,000 years cover 90 percent of the volcano's surface. The oldest exposed lavas date back 2,800 years. The first well-documented eruption of Kīlauea occurred in 1823 (Western contact and written history began in 1778), and since that time the volcano has erupted repeatedly. Most historical eruptions have occurred at the volcano's summit or its eastern rift zone, and are prolonged and effusive in character. The geological record shows, however, that violent explosive activity predating European contact was extremely common, and in 1790 one such eruption killed over 80 warriors; should explosive activity start anew the volcano would become much more of a danger to humans. Kīlauea's current eruption dates back to January 3, 1983, and is by far its longest-duration historical period of activity, as well as one of the longest-duration eruptions in the world; as of January 2011, the eruption has produced 3.5 km3 (1 cu mi) of lava and resurfaced 123.2 km2 (48 sq mi) of land.

In 2018, Kilauea enters in a new important phase of eruptions.

 

The painter 
Charles Furneaux was born in Boston and became a drawing instructor in that area. For many years he lived in the town of Melrose, Massachusetts. In 1880, Furneaux moved to Hawaii, where he cultivated the friendship of King Kalakaua and other members of the Hawaiian royal family, from whom he later received several commissions. In the late 1880s, he was commissioned in Honolulu by Alexander Joy Cartwright, widely credited as the "father of baseball" and another dear friend of King Kalakaua, to paint the only oil portrait of his 72-year life. While living in Honolulu he taught at the private schools Punahou and St. Albans (now known as Iolani School). In 1885, he received the order of Chevalier of Kapiolani from King Kalakaua in 'recognition of his services in advancing Hawaiian art'. He died in Hawaii in 1913.
His reputation is mainly based on the paintings he executed in Hawaii, especially those of erupting volcanoes. The Bishop Museum (Honolulu), the Brooklyn Museum, the Honolulu Museum of Art, Iolani Palace (Honolulu) and Mount Holyoke College Art Museum (South Hadley, Massachusetts) are among the public collections holding works by Charles Furneaux.

 

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2022 - Wandering Vertexes
A blog by Francis Rousseau
 

MOUNT EBAL PHOTOGRAPHED BY FELIX BONFILS

 

FÉLIX BONFILS (1831-1885)
Mount Ebal (940m - 3, 080 ft)
Palestine (Cisjordanie)

In Vue de Naplouse et du Mont Ebal postcard, 1878, Hallwylska Museet.

 
The mountain
Mount Ebal or Har ʿĒyḇāl or Jabal ‘Aybāl (940m - 3, 080 ft) is one of the two mountains in the immediate vicinity of the city of Nablus in the West Bank (biblical Shechem), and forms the northern side of the valley in which Nablus is situated, the southern side being formed by Mount Gerizim. The mountain is one of the highest peaks in the West Bank. Mount Ebal is approximately 17 km2 (6.6 sq mi) in area ] and is composed primarily of limestone. The slopes of the mountain contain several large caverns which were probably originally quarries, and at the base towards the north are several tombs.
In 1980, a structure on Mount Ebal was discovered by Israeli archaeologist Adam Zertal during the Manasseh Hill Country Survey.  The University of Haifa and the Israel Exploration Society excavated the structure over eight seasons from 1982 to 1989, and uncovered scarabs, seals, and animal bones dating to the Iron Age I period.  Today, most archeologists agree that the structure was a site of an early Israelite cultic activity. Zertal suggested that the structure was possibly the altar described in the Book of Joshua as where Joshua built an altar to Yahweh and renewed the Covenant in a large ceremony. This identification is controversial and has been disputed by a number of archaeologists. In February 2021 a portion of the site was destroyed by the Palestinian Authority and the stones were ground up and used to pave a nearby road.
In the Book of Joshua, after the Battle of Ai, Joshua built an altar of unhewn stones there, the Israelites then made peace offerings on it, the Law of Moses was written onto the stones, and the Israelites split into the two groups specified in Deuteronomy and pronounced blessings and cursings as instructed there.

The photographer
Félix Bonfils was born in Saint-Hippolyte-du-Fort (France).  He moved to Beirut in 1867 where he opened with his wife and his son Adrien, the photographic workshop Maison Bonfils, he renamed in 1878 F. Bonfils and Co.
Bonfils photographed in Lebanon, Egypt, Palestine, Syria and Greece as well as in Constantinople from 1876.  He was very active as soon as he arrives in Lebanon: his catalog mentions more than 15,000 prints in the early 1870s, made from nearly 200 negatives, and 9,000 stereoscopic views.
His works became famous thanks to tourists from the Middle East who brought his photographs as souvenirs. His views could be purchased individually, but they were also available as albums.
However, these photographs, produced by the workshop, could sometimes be the work of his son Adrien or assistants of the company.
In 1876 he returned to Alès (France), where he opened another studio around 1881. The one of Beirut was not closed. His wife Marie-Lydie and his son kept it opened and active after this death in 1885. This establishment was still very active in 1905, when a fire destroyed it.  The Bonfils business continued for several decades after the death of its founder. It was bought in 1918 by Abraham Guiragossian, a partner since 1909, who kept its name. It is mentioned in the Blue Guide in 1932.

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2022 - Wandering Vertexes
A blog by Francis Rousseau

PAO DE AÇUCAR PAINTED BY CHARLES LANDEER

 

 

CHARLES LANDEER (1799-1879)
Pao de Açucar / Sugarloaf Mountain / (396 m - 1299 ft)
Brazil

In View of Sugarloaf Mountain from the Silvestre Road 1827, oil on canvas, 61,5 x 91 cm,
Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo, Brazil

The painter
Charles Landseer (RA) was an English painter, mostly of historical subjects. He was born the second son of the engraver John Landseer, and the elder brother of the animal painter, Sir Edwin Landseer. He trained under his father, and the painter Benjamin Robert Haydon. He was awarded the silver palette of the Royal Society of Arts for a drawing of Laocoon in 1815, and in 1816 he entered the Royal Academy Schools where he was taught by Henry Fuseli. In 1823 he accompanied Sir Charles Stuart de Rothesay on a diplomatic mission to Portugal and Brazil. Many of the drawings he made on the journey were shown at the British Institution in 1828. He became an associate in of the Royal Academy in 1837, and a full academician in 1845. In 1851, he was appointed Keeper of the Royal Academy, a post requiring him to teach in the "Antique School". He remained in the position until 1873.  Most of his pictures were of subjects from British history, or from literature. He paid close attention to the historical accuracy of the accessories and details in his paintings. His works included The Meeting of Charles I. and his Adherents before the Battle of Edgehill, Clarissa Harlowe in the Prison Room of the Sheriff's Office (1833, now in the collection of the Tate Gallery), The Pillaging of a Jew's House in the Reign of Richard I (1839, Tate Gallery) and The Temptation of Andrew Marvel (1841). While under Haydon's instruction he also made a series of detailed anatomical drawings.  He died in London on 22 July 1879, leaving  quite generously 10,000 guineas to the Royal Academy to fund scholarships.

The mountain
Sugarloaf Mountain (396 m - 1299 ft), Pao de Açucar in Portuguese, Pain de Sucre in French, is a isolated peak (Inselberg) situated in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, at the mouth of Guanabara Bay on a peninsula that sticks out into the Atlantic Ocean. Rising above the harbor, its name is said to refer to its resemblance to the traditional shape of concentrated refined loaf sugar. It is known worldwide for its cableway and panoramic views of the city. The name "Sugarloaf" was coined in the 16th century by the Portuguese during the heyday of sugar cane trade in Brazil. According to historian Vieira Fazenda, blocks of sugar were placed in conical molds made of clay to be transported on ships. The shape given by these molds was similar to the peak, hence the name.
Climbing routes:
1907 – The Brazilian engineer Augusto Ferreira Ramos had the idea of linking the hills through a path in the air.
1910 – The same engineer founded the Society of Sugar Loaf and the same year the works were started. The project was commissioned in Germany and built by Brazilian workers. All parts were taken by climbing mountains or lift by steel cables.
1912 – Opening of the tram. First lift of Brazil. The first cable cars were made of coated wood and were used for 60 years.
1972 – The current template trolley was put into operation. This increased the carrying capacity by almost ten times.
2009 – Inauguration of the next generation of cable cars that had already been purchased and are on display at the base of Red Beach.
Visitors can watch rock climbers on Sugarloaf and the other two mountains in the area: Morro da Babilônia (Babylon Mountain), and Morro da Urca (Urca's Mountain). Together, they form one of the largest urban climbing areas in the world, with more than 270 routes, between 1 and 10 pitches long.

THE GREAT SUGAR LOAF PAINTED BY GEORGE BARRET Sr.

GEORGE BARRET Sr. (1730-1784)
The Great Sugar Loaf (501 m-1,644 ft)
Ireland

In Powerscourt House, Co. Wicklow with the Great Sugarloaf mountain, 1760, oil on canvas, 

73,3 x 97,1 cm, Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon collection

The mountain
The Great Sugar Loaf  (501 m-1,644 ft),  not to be confused with Sugar Loaf  in Brazil or with Sugar Loaf Mountain in USA neither with  the Pain de Sucre in France...  is the 404th–highest peak in Ireland on the Arderinscale, however, being below 600 m it does not rank on the Vandeleur-Lynam or Hewitt scales].  The mountain is in the far northeastern section of the Wicklow Mountains, in Ireland, and overlooks the village of Kilmacanogue. The profile of the mountain means it can be mistaken for a dormant volcano. It owes its distinctive shape, however, to the erosion-resistant metamorphosed deep-sea sedimentary deposit from which its quartzite composition was derived.
According to Irish academic Paul Tempan, the term "sugarloaf" is widely applied in Britain and Ireland to hills of conical form, in much the same way that the name pain de sucre is used in France. Tempan also notes that there is a widespread misconception that the term refers to a kind of bread, when it refers in fact to the stalagmite-like form in which sugar was sold up until the 19th-century, prior to the advent of granulated sugar. The traditional method for making a sugarloaf was complex, involving repeated purifications, moulding and a leaching process gradually to refine the mass of sugar, by ridding it of its associated molasses and eventually all trace of colour, leaving it a glistening white. This form of sugar is still used in the German alcoholic drink, Feuerzangenbowle. Tempan notes that a 1935 article by Eoin MacNeill in the Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland (JRSAI), on placenames mentioned in the Togail Bruidne Dá Derga, suggested that Irish: Ó Cualann could refer to "sheep of Cualu", but considered it unlikely.

The Painter
George Barret Sr. RA was an Irish landscape artist best known for his oil paintings, but also sometimes produced watercolours. He left Ireland in 1762 to move to London where he soon gained recognition as a leading artist of the period. He exhibited at the Society of Artists of Great Britain and was able to gain patronage from many leading art collectors. Barrett with other leading members left the Society in 1768 to found the Royal Academy, where he continued to exhibit until 1782. Barrett appears to have travelled extensively in England including the Lake District and the Isle of Wight, Wales, and Scotland to undertake commissions for his patrons. He suffered from asthma and this caused him to move in 1772 to Westbourne Green, at the time a country village to the west of Paddington. While he earned considerable quantities of money from his paintings, he has been described as being ‘'feckless'’ with money. He was helped in 1782 by Edmund Burke, with whom he had become friends when Burke attended Trinity College, Dublin. On Burke's recommendation he obtained the appointment of master painter of Chelsea Hospital, a post he held until his death in 1784. At the time of his death his widow and children were left destitute, but the Royal Academy granted her a pension of thirty pounds a year.

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2022 - Wandering Vertexes...
by 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 

LA TABLE DE L'OISEAU SKETCHED BY CHARLES HAMILTON SMITH

CHARLES HAMILTON SMITH (1776-1859)
La Table de l'Oiseau (403m - 1,322 ft)
Antarctica - France

 In Christmas Harbour,  Kerguelen's Land, watercolor

The hill
The Table de l'Oiseau (403m - 1,322 ft) (Table ot the Bird) is a hill overlooking Port-Christmas by the north. Port-Christmas is one of the most isolated and difficult to reach points in the archipelagok.  Given the distance and especially the rugged topography, the site is almost never reached by land. However, it can be reached by sea after sailing for at least 100 nautical miles (190 km). The baie de l'Oiseau, at the bottom of which it is located, forms the first indentation at the northeast end of the Loranchet peninsula. The bay is closed to the north by Cap Français, to the south by Pointe de l'Arche (seen in the foreground).
While the shores of the bay are mostly rocky and often steep, the bottom is occupied by a strike, about 350 meters long, of black sand resulting from the erosion of the surrounding basaltic rocks. pours into the sea, after having collected runoff water from Mount Havergal on the one hand, and that from the outlet of Rochegude Lake on the other. This lake, located about 500 m from the shore and 40 m above sea level, marks the shoulder that separates Port-Christmas from Ducheyron Bay, to the west.
The anchorage at Port-Christmas allows you to anchor at a depth of 11 meters. It offers relatively safe shelter to sailors who frequent this particularly turbulent ocean sector of the Roaring Forties.

The artist
Lieutenant-Colonel Charles Hamilton Smith, was an English artist, naturalist, antiquary, illustrator, soldier, and... spy as well !. His military career began in 1787, when he studied at the Austrian academy for artillery and engineers at Mechelen and Leuven in Belgium (his native country). Although his military service, which ended in 1820 and included the Napoleonic Wars, saw him travel extensively (including the West Indies, Canada, United States, Southern and Northern Europe and ...Antarctica).
As a prolific self-taught illustrator (over 38,000 drawings!) He left quite an important number of books of beautifully watercolored landscapes taken all around the world. those nooks of watercolors are nowadays in the collections of the Yale Center From British Art. Among them :
- Views of France, Volume I (81 watercolors), Views of France, Volume II (93 watercolors),
- Views of England and Wales, Volume I (82 watercolors), Views of England and Wales, Volume II (74 watercolors),
- Views of Northern Europe, Volume I (68 watercolors), Views of Northern Europe, Volume II (78) watercolors),
- Views of Polar Regions (75 watercolors) (see above)
- Views of Spain, Volume I (69 watercolors), Views of Spain, Volume II (72 watercolors), But one of his noteworthy achievements was an 1800 experiment to determine which color should be used for military uniforms. He is also known in military history circles for Costume of the Army of the British Empire, produced towards the end of the Napoleonic Wars and an accurate depiction of contemporary British uniform.
As an antiquarian, he also produced, in collaboration with Samuel Rush Meyrick, Costume of the Original Inhabitants of the British Islands, 1815, and The Ancient Costume of England, with historical illustrations of medieval knights, ladies, shipsm and battles.
He also wrote on the history of the Seven Years' War and The Natural history of dogs.
Quite a productive fellow !
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2022 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau

DJEBEL TOUKBAL (4) PAINTED BY SIR WINSTON CHURCHILL

SIR WINSTON CHURCHILL (1874-1965)
Jebel Toubkal (4,167 m - 13, 671 ft)
Morocco

In Atlas mountains viewed from Marrakech, oil on canvas, 1949.

The mountain 

Jebel Toubkal (4,167 m - 13, 671 ft)  is the high point of the High Atlas as well as Morocco and North Africa . It is located 63 km south of Marrakech, in the province of Al Haouz, inside the national park that bears its name.
The word Toubkal would be a deformation of French origin of the same Amazigh name Tugg Akal or toug-akal  which means "the one who looks up the earth". The people of this region still use this name.  The Toubkal massif is made up of rocks of various natures. Dark rocks of volcanic origin are found on the summits of andesite and rhyolite. Glaciers have left characteristic marks of their passage in the form of valleys in trough. During the Würm glaciation, the present valley of Assif n'Ait Mizane  was occupied by the longest glacier in the Atlas, about 5 km long.
The climate at Jebel Toubkal  is mountainous. The snow falls in winter and covers the summit.
In the nineteenth century, the interior of Morocco was still terra incognita for the Europeans and for a long time the Jebel Ayachi (3,747 m -12,293ft) ) passed for the highest summit of the High Atlas. In fact, the Toubkal was officially climbed for the first time only on 12 June 1923 by the Marquis de Segonzac, accompanied by Vincent Berger and Hubert Dolbeau. The cairns which they found on the summit had been built by the Berbers of the environs for whom the Toubkal is a holy place dedicated to Sidi Chamarouch (or Chamharouch). A sanctuary is dedicated to him on the way from Imlil to Toubkal.
The ascent of the roof of North Africa attracts a large number of followers of the trekking. This ascent attracts the crowd as much as it does not present great technical difficulties and that the assistance of the muleteers and their mules reduces the physical efforts. The altitude is relatively high (3,200 meters at the shelter and 4,167 meters at the summit).

The artist
Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill was forty before he discovered the pleasures of painting. The compositional challenge of depicting a landscape gave the heroic rebel in him temporary repose. He possessed the heightened perception of the genuine artist to whom no scene is commonplace. Over a period of forty-eight years his creativity yielded more than 500 pictures. His art quickly became half passion, half philosophy. He enjoyed holding forth in speech and print on the aesthetic rewards for amateur devotees. To him it was the greatest of hobbies. He had found his other world -- a respite from crowding events and pulsating politics.
Encouragement to persevere with his hobby stemmed from an amateur prize (his first) which he won for "Winter Sunshine, Chartwell" a bright reflection of his Kentish home. He sent five paintings to be exhibited in Paris in the 1920s.
Modesty shone through that self-estimate. Modesty - and warm sympathy --were undeniably evident in what Churchill told a fellow painter, Sergeant Edmund Murray, his bodyguard from 1950 to 1965. Murray had been in the Foreign Legion and the London Metropolitan Police. Interviewing him to gauge his suitability, Churchill said: "You have had a most interesting life. And I hear you even paint in oils." After Murray had his work rejected by the Royal Academy, Churchill told him: "You know, your paintings are so much better than mine, but yours are judged on their merit."
Churchill's progressive workmanship demonstrates that a pseudonym employed at a crucial stage shrewdly enabled him to find out where he stood before moving on to fine-tool his talent.Churchill again favoured a pseudonym (Mr. Winter) in 1947 when offering works to the Royal Academy, so his fame in other spheres was not exploited. Two pictures were accepted and eventually the title of Honorary Academician Extraordinary was conferred on him. He earned it. That is borne out by the conclusion of the renowned painter Sir Oswald Birley: "If Churchill had given the time to art that he has given to politics, he would have been by all odds the world's greatest painter." Connoisseurs of Sir Winston's art stoutly defend their individual preference, but there are convincing arguments for bestowing highest praise on "The Blue Sitting Room, Trent Park" which was sold in 1949 to aid charity.
Despite outward flippancy, Churchill had a true craftsman's dedication when he took up a paint brush. He consulted teachers admired for their professionalism. He was fond of citing Ruskin's Elements of Drawing and readily accepted Sir William Orpen's suggestion that he should visit Avignon, where the light can verge on a miracle. He recalled an encounter on the Côte d'Azur with artists who worshipped at the throne of Cezanne and gratefully acknowledged the inspiration he derived from their exchange. Marrakech, Morocco -- irresistible and productive -- always brought out the best in him.
Churchill sought and found tranquillity in his art. His much quoted words, summing up expectations of celestial bliss, retain their lustre: "When I get to heaven I mean to spend a considerable portion of my first million years in painting, and so get to the bottom of the subject..."
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2022 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau