Visual Arts Education
Art of Living Well – Antiquity to a Residence Australia
Today our art of living well has evolved since antiquity in Europe to a residence in Australia through a diverse and special mix of peoples and their cultures.
A Passion for Gothic Decoration
The decorative arts were never considered secondary by Augustus Welby Pugin. As an architect he might design the structure of a house, church or institution, but he conceived of the building, its fittings and furnishings as a ‘complete work of art.’
Fashion, is it more than a Frock?
From skinny self sacrificing super models to those demanding the use of ‘real people’, costume accommodates a desire to be noticed. It is the look at me, look at me syndrome, which has been in play for thousands of years. Today it collectively reflects a western society in which privacy has been stripped completely bare. But is fashion about more than a frock?
A ‘Compleat’ Gentleman, more than a leader of style
In London much of the development in the eighteenth and early nineteenth century was in the hands of aristocratic landowners. But were they ‘compleat’ gentlemen?
Martha Nussbaum’s Call – Hug the Dragon for Social Profit
American Philosopher Martha C. Nussbaum is the Ernst Freund Distinguished Service Professor of Law and Ethics in the Philosophy Department, Law School, and Divinity School at the University of Chicago. In her short and powerful new book called Not for Profit: Why Democracy Needs the Humanities she makes a passionate case for the importance of the liberal arts at all levels of education. She challenges us all to strive be truly human – ‘to remain childlike, to keep an open mind, to refine an ability to remain humble, to eschew pride and arrogance and to be reverent towards other people and towards the natural world’.
What is a Mirror, more than just Glass?
The mirror, more than just glass, has occupied a unique place in his imagination as a site of the divine or demonic, of lucidity or madness. It is the ‘matrix of the symbolic’ and accompanies the human quest to know and understand our identity.
Favourite Books – Andrea Palladio, The Architect in his Time
Professor Bruce Boucher’s scholarly and accessible work, Andrea Palladio, The Architect in his Time was first published in 1994 in a ‘user friendly version’…to fit comfortably into a suitcase or backpack for a quick trip to Vicenza, the scene of many of Palladio’s triumphant works in architecture. Don’t know about you but I have always [...]
Towers – Symbols of Hope and Freedom
Prior to the twentieth century towers were built as symbols to the heights of material wealth and prosperity the western world had yet achieved.
WHAT IS: Art Deco
Art Deco was the perfect expression of the salons at Paris during the 20’s to the 30’s. It embraced every area of design and the decorative arts including architecture, interiors, furniture, jewellery, painting and graphics, bookbinding, costume, glass and ceramics. Art Deco was about integrating contemporary living with art, and turning life into art, against those consciously working for the undoing of art and its purpose was enjoyment.
Finding Paradise on Earth
From the earliest times gardens were associated with shade, running water; fragrance and fresh produce and therefore represented peace and prosperity. Each visit to a garden is a unique experience because its plants, ornaments, views and garden buildings appear in a sequence that can never exactly be repeated ever again. Another quality, not possessed by [...]
Love Jewellery – Regency to Revival
England’s Prince Regent George, Prince of Wales, later George IV (1762 – 1830) scandalized the nation with his reckless and lavish living habits. He gave an impressive love gift a diamond riviére (a necklace of precious stones, generally set in one strand) to his mistress Elizabeth, Lady Conyngham, who reputedly received gifts of jewels valued at the time in the region of 80,000 pounds.
On Beauty, and thought provoking works
Writer, philosopher and musical theorist from Geneva (now the capital of Switzerland) Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) believed beauty had a common source in ‘well ordered nature’ and that ‘taste is perfected with the same means as wisdom’…and what ‘must be done therefore…is…to cultivate taste.
Masterpiece London – A Stroke of Genius?
In facing the crisis of the global economic downturn a brave group in London have come up with Masterpiece London, a whole new way of marketing fine quality wares by showcasing the most covetable objects in the world: traditional and modern, old and new, from the finest of fine and decorative art to the best of wines, classic cars, jewellery and contemporary design.
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