Art Study

Every now and then, an exhibition comes along that hits you in the solar plexus. The compact Daumier show at the Royal Academy in London is one of those. It is housed in the moderately sized Sackler Galleries on the top floor of the building, not in the main exhibition rooms below, where it would be swallowed up. Most of the works on view are quite small. Very few are more than medium sized. For the most part, the color is subdued. Indeed, some of the paintings seem monochromatic until you examine them more closely, The range of subjects is, if not exactly restricted, not hugely wide.

When Beryl Cook died, she was the subject of a large number of obituaries. Some of them were predictably condescending, which I suspect she would not have minded a bit. The really telling thing, however, is what has happened since then on the web. If you go to the site maintained by The Times, still regarded as the British paper of record, and look for the paper’s obituary archive, you will find a section within it devoted to "Artistic Genius". The subtitle is "Artists and makers who changed the way we see".

Art in Puerto Rico occupies a kind of bridge position, between the North American art world one the one hand and the various Latin American and Caribbean art worlds on the other. Puerto Rican artists have easy physical aspects to the United States, and large Puerto Rican colonies in major American cities, notably New York and Chicago, have led to the birth of mixed vernacular cultures. The one in New York is sometimes referred to as Nuyorican, and has a populist downtown vibe that swings the spotlight toward it every time graffiti art returns to fashion.

Andrea Palladio is the most influential architect who ever lived - much more so than those heroes of the Modern Movement - Frank Lloyd Wright, Le Corbusier and Mies van der Rohe. It is significant that buildings we call "Palladian" are still being built today - for example, by the British architect Quinlan Terry. Palladio’s ideas were disseminated not only by his buildings, but also, even more effectively, by his writings, most notably by his didactic masterpiece, I Quattro Libri dell’Architettura (The Four Books of Architecture), published in 1570.

It is understandable that, in current circumstances, major arts institutions should try to ally themselves with the more anarchic, contrarian elements in contemporary culture. Perhaps this is especially true of those dealing with the contemporary visual arts, committed as these still are to the myth of avant-gardism. One problem that immediately presents itself, of course, is that this myth is not itself contemporary - it is rooted in the very earliest years of the century before ours.

The first thing to be said about the new exhibition at the British Museum, Defining Beauty: The Body in Ancient Greek Art, is that it is genuinely spectacular and deserves the hosannas it has already been greeted with in the press. The second thing is that it is highly political. It is political in all sorts of ways. The most obvious of these can be found in the fact that it plucks a number of the so-called "Elgin marbles".

The term avant-garde continues to be used, in my opinion with far too much frequency, in discussions of contemporary art. It derives, of course, from military terminology, and implies that the art to which it is applied is somehow ahead of the game. It’s worth taking a look at how this assumption works in practice. Essentially, Western and now world art has witnessed the emergence of a series of avant-gardes since just before the third quarter of the 19th century.

Byzantine art has a slightly odd reputation. It is regarded, on the one hand, as something remote, hieratic, and difficult. On the other hand, the word Byzantium has a very romantic ring - it lives in our minds as the name of a citadel of civilization, a place that preserved for posterity both intellectual and material treasures that would otherwise have vanished forever. The remarkable exhibition now at the Royal Academy in London touches on both of these aspects.

In the early years of the 20th century, Paris became the center for an international community of artists. Some of them were French, but the city also offered its hospitality to artists from an increasingly wide range of other nationalities. Some, like Marc Chagall, came from communities that had never produced artists of international note before. The result was a mixture between a stewpot and a laboratory.

The current agitation about the restitution of artistic treasures of all kinds to their original locations is usually presented as overdue justice for faults committed by European colonialism. In fact, this is a serious oversimplification. Conquering armies have always regarded works of art as legitimate spoil. Modern attitudes to the legitimate or illegitimate possession of famous artworks can be traced to the European Enlightenment that blossomed in the late 18th century.

Works of art have often been endowed by their audience with talismanic force. Their impact exceeds the visual impression they make. This seems natural enough when we consider the fact that the most ambitious works of art produced by ancient civilizations were religious. To those who originally encountered them, they seemed to speak directly from the gods. Their makers were very seldom recorded, though the names of those who ordered them to be made - pharaohs, emperors and kings - quite frequently survive.

Of the three great Italian High Renaissance masters, Raphael is now the most problematic. Leonardo and Michelangelo continue to fascinate, even though some of the modern audience - myself included - find some of Leonardo's output faintly creepy. Raphael is a different matter. In his own lifetime, he was perhaps the most admired of the three, successful with every type of patron and every type of audience. Where his rivals delayed, Raphael delivered, unflappable and omnicompetent.

This is not an exhibition about ‘Realist’ art, as will be immediately apparent from some of the works included. Instead, it is an exhibition that invites the spectator to consider what his, or her, vision of reality truly is. The philosophical debate about the nature of realism in art began in earnest quite late in the history of Western painting and sculpture. The trigger was the invention of photography. When Louis Daguerre announced his new process in 1839 there were many people who thought that it might, in due course, make the visual artist superfluous.

Alex Katz is one of the great survivors of a heroic period in American art. He is also one of the great unclassifiables. At various times he has been described both as a Pop artist and as a classic American Realist, though critics admit that he does not fit comfortably into either of these categories. What most people admit, however, is that he reflects and presents aspects of American culture and American landscape in a uniquely skillful and economical way.

This audio study guide of Surprised by Joy by C.S. Lewis includes detailed summary and analysis of each chapter and an in-depth exploration of the book’s multiple symbols, motifs, and themes such as joy, teaching and learning, and pride and humility. Featured content also includes commentary on major characters, 25 important quotes, essay questions, and discussion topics.

Reiki is a type of oriental therapy in which treatment is carried out by touching the palms of the hands. The most understandable explanation of the principle of Reiki work may be a comparison of technology with work on the biofield in the esoteric practices of the West. The Reiki master essentially works on “holes” - holes in the patient’s biofield, suturing them with the omnipresent and invisible "ki" energy.

The Art of HealingArt is a powerful tool to transform your life and to unveil your Light, which is so critical in these challenging times. Each lesson guides to a revelation that is life-transforming for all who dare to uncover their shadows, thus mastering their lives. This audiobook encompasses our life's journey. It is a call to raise our consciousness and vibrations. Its purpose is to guide us to reunite with Spirit. Awakening inner wisdom, it helps you to transcend limiting thoughts, beliefs, and habits.

Flying into Sarajevo is no big deal nowadays. Customs and immigration are quick. You don't need a visa if you hold an EEC passport. Perhaps the only noticeable difference between this and other flights within Europe is a slightly increased degree of airport security. Hand luggage goes through a scanner at two different points, before you board the aircraft. Nor is arrival at the hotel any different from arriving at big chain hotels in other European cities. The Holiday Inn is transatlantic in style, with a big fountain outside and a soaring atrium within. Things are busy - the receptionist leafs through lots of different pieces of paper before finally, and rather reluctantly, locating our reservations. "Do you mind having a room that overlooks the big boulevard? It might be a bit noisy." But when I get there, it's double-glazed, so there is no problem.

In literary circles of the mid-twentieth century, father and son, Ikbal and Idries Shah, spread seductive accounts of a mystical Middle East. Pitching themselves as the authentic voice of the Muslim world, they penned travelogues and exotic potboilers alongside weighty tomes on Islam and politics.

Here can be no doubt that the Chinese exhibition at the Royal Academy in London is more than a merely artistic event. It represents a new stage in the burgeoning relationship between contemporary China and the West. The opening, originally scheduled for January, was brought forward to coincide with a State Visit to Britain by the Chinese president, Hu Jintao. The "Three Emperors" of the title were the second, third, and fourth rulers of the Qing Dynasty, and their period in power spanned nearly a century-and-a-half, from the mid-17th century until the end of the 18th.