Happy Holidays!

A Cradle Song - William Blake

Sweet dreams, form a shade,
O'er my lovely infant's head;
Sweet dreams of pleasant streams
By happy, silent, moony beams.

Sweet sleep, with soft down.
Weave thy brows an infant crown.
Sweet sleep, Angel mild,
Hover o'er my happy child.

Sweet smiles, in the night,
Hover over my delight;
Sweet smiles, mother's smiles,
All the livelong night beguiles.

Sweet moans, dovelike sighs,
Chase not slumber from thy eyes.
Sweet moans, sweeter smiles,
All the dovelike moans beguiles.

Sleep, sleep, happy child,
All creation slept and smil'd;
Sleep sleep, happy sleep,
While o'er thee thy mother weep.

Sweet babe in thy face,
Holy image I can trace.
Sweet babe once like thee,
Thy maker lay and wept for me,

Wept for me, for thee, for all,
When he was an infant small.
Thou his image ever see,
Heavenly face that smiles on thee,

Smiles on thee, on me, on all;
Who became an infant small.
Infant smiles are His own smiles;
Heaven and earth to peace beguiles.



William Blake's words seem especially apropos for me this holiday season. My daughter is over a year old now, and I feel very lucky to be able to observe her divine little smiles!

The past few weeks have flown by at such a crazy pace that it's hard to believe that Christmas is almost here. I am looking forward to taking the next few days to enjoy celebrating the holidays with my family. I hope everyone is enjoying this festive season of the year. Best wishes to all!

Image: The Adoration of the Shepherds by Bartolome Esteban Murillo, 1650

January Issue of the Art History Carnival

I hope that everyone is enjoying the holiday season!  

The January issue of the Art History Carnival  will be posted on January 3, 2011 You can submit articles for inclusion in the carnival until 48 hours before the issue comes out (in this case, January 1, 2010). 

What kind of blog articles will be included? 
Posts covering all periods and art mediums are welcome, as are posts discussing art criticism, architecture, design, theory and aesthetics. All submissions will be carefully reviewed. 

What is a Blog Carnival? 
According to Wikipedia, a blog carnival is "a type of blog event...similar to a magazine, in that it is dedicated to a particular topic, and is published on a regular schedule, often weekly or monthly. Each edition of a blog carnival is in the form of a blog article that contains permalinks links to other blog articles on the particular topic." 

Blog Carnivals are a great way to help your blog reach a new audience and to make new friends in the blogosphere! 

Who can submit? 
Anyone, as long as you have a blog! And If you don't blog, you can submit one of your friend's articles (except they better be good--I'll be reading them!). 

Can I host a carnival? 

Absolutely! Please let me know if you'd be interested in hosting the next issue of the carnival. 

How to submit articles
You have two options:

1. Send me an email. Include the title and permalink URL of the post you are nominating for inclusion in the carnival, along with the name of the blog. Please put "Art History Carnival" in the title of your email to help me recognize it in my inbox!

2. Use the submission form provided by Blog Carnival (this is probably the easiest!). 

One final thing to keep in mind: 
To keep things current, posts should have been written after the date of the last Carnival.

Thank you for your participation! Share the news if you know someone who likes to write about art!

William Morris' Kelmscott Chaucer on Display in Buffalo, NY

If you are in Buffalo, New York, this month, be sure to check out the Central Library at Lafayette Square, which will be presenting an exhibit of entitled "The Ideal Book--William Morris and the Kelmscott Press." Included in the exhibit is an original copy of William Morris' Kelmscott Chaucer, along with books produced by the Roycroft Press.

My University library has a facsimile copy of the Kelmscott Chaucer, but I've never seen an original up close. The facsimile itself is nothing to sneeze at - it's a gorgeous book. It never hurts to add it to your Christmas list, though $650 for the gorgeous Folio Society edition might be a bit steep (though it pales in comparison to the real deal - the genuine article recently sold in New York for $160,000 USD). There are some nice editions available on Amazon.com for considerably less, though. I got my sister this very pretty edition (which only includes the Canterbury Tales, but it's a lovely hardbound edition) for under $20 a couple of years ago. I'm afraid I would dissolve into tears if my daughter tore up a folio edition, but at less than $20, this copy is probably just the ticket for a family with small children.



The Kelmscott Chaucer gives readers a sensual experience. I still remember the first time I picked it up and thought "this is what a book should be like." Sir Edward Burne-Jones illustrations are stunning, and the borders have exquisite details that the eye can follow for hours. In general, I'm a bit of a minimalist when it comes to my books. I know that there have been many tomes written on decorating with books, etc., but I personally believe most books really aren't that attractive. They take up too much space! As a result, I tend to either borrow from the library or read eBooks. There are not that many books I consider worth having physical copies of, but this is one of them. As Morris said, "have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful." This is certainly an item that any fan of William Morris and Pre-Raphaelites would be thrilled to find under the tree.

For more information on the Kelmscott Chaucer, visit the Buffalo Library's exhibition website. The Kelmscott Chaucer will be on display until January 30, 2011

Art History Carnival December 2010

Welcome to the December 1, 2010 edition of the Art History Carnival!

As the year draws to a close, I am struck by the art history community's growing online presence. When I started this blog back in 2007, I was surprised by the paucity of art history blogs on the net. I'm sure there were plenty of people out there blogging, but in those days it was difficult to find blogs unless they were ranked highly by search engines. I started the art history carnival as an attempt to connect to others with an interest in art history. A casual glance at those early carnivals will give you some indication of how few submissions I received back then! When I brought the carnival back this September, I could immediately tell how much things had changed. Over the past few months I have consistently received informative and engaging submissions. I was also pleased to have the November issue of the carnival hosted by Monica at Alberti's Window(thank you again, Monica!).

Art history - and the humanities in general - clearly have a growing presence, not only in the blogosphere, but also in new social medial like Facebook and Twitter. The art history community is thriving on Twitter, as evidenced by Dr. Ben Harvey's recent post examining the impact Twitter on art history Art History in the age of Twitter, posted at his academic blog Emanata, at Mississippi State University.

H Niyazi often uses his blog Three Pipe Problem to draw attention to the way the web can function as a transformative tool for the arts. His recent post Online Collaboration in the Humanities examines how RSS feeds and Twitter have changed the way we connect with each other to share ideas and inspiration.

It's a whole new web 2.0 world out there, and if things can change this much in three years, I can't wait to see what the future holds for the online art history community!

architecture

In this guest post for Arttrav, architectural historian Agnes Crawford takes us on a fascinating tour or the Chapel of Saint Zeno at Santa Prassede in Rome.The Chapel of Saint Zeno at Santa Prassede: mosaic revival and survival is posted at Arttrav.com

art history

H Niyazi explores the theme of the mystical landscape in Romantic art in Caspar David Friedrich and the Primordial Landscape posted at his art history blog Three Pipe Problem.

Art historian Monica Bowen, author of Alberti's Window explores the impact of art history blogging as a viable medium for teaching, collaboration and engaging the general public in her post examining art history bloggers as "les indépendents."

Just in time for Hanukkuh, Helen Webberley has written a beautiful post on Jewish silver art: filigree work posted at her blog ART and ARCHITECTURE, mainly. She writes that "many communities that could not, for various reasons, create large scale architecture, paintings and sculptures; nonetheless they could still create beautiful, small art objects. For Jewish communities after the expulsion from Spain in 1492, the art was often on religious books and ritual objects. And the medium was often silver filigree."

Susan Benford from Famous Paintings Reviewed - An Art History Blog takes her readers back in time to the art of the Aztec empire in Art History Beyond Europe: Coatlicue. This post takes a closer look at the somewhat terrifying Aztec statue of Coatlicue, a figure revered by the Aztecs, discarded by the Spaniards and revived by Frida Khalo and the Mexicana movement. It's a fascinating saga!

For a bit of fun, Corinne Reidy has created a list of the 10 Most Imitated Artists of All Time posted at Web Design Schools Guide. Can you guess which artists made the cut?

art news

Public art is seemingly everywhere, but it's abundance can also make it easy to miss. I've often been in towns I thought I knew well, only to one day "discover" a mural that I never existed before. Apparently, I'm not the only person who's had this problem! Will from Mural Locator has developed a Map of Murals to help people locate murals around the world. "Our goal is to find locations of amazing public art wall murals to share them with you and to help archive the history and importance of murals. We connect with artists, muralists, and art foundations to expand the knowledge of art." What a great idea!

Have you ever wondered about the size of the stolen art industry? (As fan of CNBC's American Greed, I confess I have). For those of you who are slightly skeptical of some of the wilder statistics on art theft that are thrown around, Mark Durney has done a post Art Theft: The 6 Billion Dollar Question that takes a closer look at where the numbers come from.

exhibits

Paul Doolan reflects on the life and works of Pablo Picasso after a visit to the museum in Picasso Visits Zurich, Again posted at ThinkShop.

Finally, a humorous musical treat in time for the holidays. Read a tribute to the Danish pianist and humorist in Piano Humour: A Victor Borge Tribute posted at Piano Street's Classical Piano Blog.

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of
art history carnival
using our
carnival submission form.
Past posts and future hosts can be found on our

blog carnival index page.

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