Recovering in Paris

I don't think I've quite recovered from Venice yet. I was cruising online this morning for the first time in what feels like weeks (must be 10 days), and I had to look at this lovely bit of dreaming.

Apparently the population of Venice is falling: fewer and fewer people will actually live there full-time, it being so full of tourists, the upkeep on a palace (should you happen to have a palace darlings), being extortionate as the place slowly sinks, taking your fortune with it....

But a gal can dream.


I mentioned that we were over at the Giudecca having our picnic, and I found this site about John Singer Sargent's sketching trips in Venice and out to the Giudecca.

John Singer Sargent was an interesting painter: when I first came across his work, it was easy to dismiss it as chocolate-boxy portraits of the upper class. And then I went to an exhibition in London and I decided on the spot that the man was a genius. He'll dob on dashes and lines of paint, and a quick strip down the middle, and from a normal viewing distance you would swear it's a fold of silk. It's lush, and so talented as well as skilled.

I love the use of contrast in this portrait, now in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge UK.

There are paintings in many collections worldwide: too many to list here, but here are some of the sites I looked at.
- Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, UK
- Harvard University Art Museums, US
- Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, US