mouthful of dirt

objektum

There's something quite charming about relatively small objects that are way heavier than they look. ooohh you're one dense little freak aren't you

owlservice

I wish I was taller. I wish I was a baller. I wish my cat had a phone I would call her.

aristoteliancomplacency

Guys.

Y’all.

I…

I just. I just… i have discovered something. And I have laughed too much. I have laughed every time I have tried to explain it to someone. I cannot get through this.

Look. Okay.

There are two things you need to know, here.

First: There’s a style of Greek pottery that was popular during the Hellenic period, for which most of the surviving examples are from southern Italy. We call them ‘fish plates’ because, well, they’re plates, and they’re decorated with fish (and other marine life).

Like this one, currently in the Met:

photo of a fish plate from above. it is a black disk with fish designs in red. There are two bream and a torpedo fish around a central divot in the plate. there are also smaller illustrations of a mussel, a murex, and a articulately impressively executed shrimp.

Or this one, currently in the Cleveland Museum of Art:

another fish plate from above. It had a large octopus, several large bream fish decorated with dots and stripes, as well as tiny details such as shells and even some tiny octopuses.

They’re very cool. We’re not 100% sure what they were for, because most of the surviving ones were found as grave goods, but that’s a different post.

The second thing you need to know is that when we (Classics/archaeology/whatever as a discipline) have a collection of artefacts, like vases, sculptures, paintings, etc. and we do not know the name of the artist, but we’re pretty sure one artist made X, Y and Z artefacts, we come up with a name for that artist. There are a whole bunch of things that could be the source for the name, e.g. where we found most of their work (The Dipylon Master) or the potter with whom they worked (the Amasis Painter), a favourite theme (The Athena Painter), the Museum that ended up with the most famous thing they did (The Berlin Painter) or a notable aspect of their style. Like, say, The Eyebrow Painter.

Guess what kind of pottery the Eyebrow Painter made?

photo of a fish plate depicting two fish and an eel. they all have eyebrows. The fish have arched eyebrows that make them look angry, the eel's eyebrows give it a slightly confused appearance.

a fish plate with a torpedo fish and two other fish. They all have eyebrows that make them look angry. The torpedo fish also has an open mouth, making it look like it is shouting about something.

another fish plate. this one had an eel, a torpedo fish, and another fish. The fish looks angry, but the eel and the torpedo fish both have open mouths full of teeth and appear to be grinning, with eyebrows that make them look like they're gonna cause some trouble.

midiport

she is so strange i love her so much..

princehendir

Yeah you're right. It WOULD be pretty fucked up if you were a swan but you were raised by ducks and you grew up never seeing another swan or even knowing that such a thing as a swan even existed so you just thought you were a duck with something super wrong with it.

classicalcanvas

Title: La Carmencita

Artist: John Singer Sargent

Date: 1890

Style: Realism

Genre: Portrait

john singer sargent art

boykeats

fluentisonus

rothko in the turner gallery???

fluentisonus

A photo of a gallery with a Turner painting next to a Rothko painting. They share similar yellow, orange, and green colors.

I can't get it right in the photo but going absolutely bonkers over the way the colors just like. blur across from the rothko (1950) to the turner (1845). this whole room is full of these abstract colors it's like they're bleeding between the picture frames with no regard for time

fluentisonus

A museum description of a painting reading: "Mark Rothko 1903-1970 Born Daugavpils, Latvia, lived Daugavpils, Portland (Oregon), New York Untitled c.1950-2 Oil paint on canvas North American artist Mark Rothko greatly admired Turner. He famously remarked in 1966: 'This man Turner, he learnt a lot from me'. The works in this room - unfinished paintings from late in Turner's life - appealed to Rothko. Late in his own career, he created paintings like this one which use rectangles of intense colour to convey emotion. In 1969 Rothko gave a group of paintings to Tate, hoping they would be displayed near those of Turner."

wait wait hold on a second.

hearditinapastlife2019

389

Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. Devour old films, new films, music, books, paintings, photographs, poems, dreams, random conversations, architecture, bridges, street signs, trees, clouds, bodies of water, light, and shadows. Select only things to steal from that speak directly to your soul. If you do this, your work (and theft) will be authentic. Authenticity is invaluable; originality is non-existent. And don’t bother concealing your thievery — celebrate it if you feel like it. In any case, always remember what Jean-Luc Godard said: ‘It’s not where you take things from — it’s where you take them to.’

Jim Jarmusch, Five Golden Rules of Cinema