The Walters Art Museum: Artwork of the Day

Sake Ewer from a Portable Picnic Set

Saturday, March 13, 2010

This is an example of Hirado ware.

Before the Race

Friday, March 12, 2010

Throughout the latter half of his career, Degas was obsessed with the restless beauty of the thoroughbred racehorse. Given his commitment to representing modern life, horse racing, which drew together throngs of people from various levels of society, was a singularly appropriate subject. Degas typically painted several versions of a composition, making slight variations in each. Here, a number of riders and horses are shown in varying poses of quiet and agitated movement. The pigment is so thinly laid down that the grain of the wood is clearly visible. Degas allows the composition to respond to the lines of the wood grain and the sheen of its surface. By the 1880s, Degas was probably aware of Eadweard Muybridge's stop-action photographs, which captured movement too fleeting to be perceived by the naked eye and which increased the artist's understanding of the horse in motion, as is evident in the convincing naturalism of their varied positions.

Pendant with a Man Riding a Sea Monster

Thursday, March 11, 2010

This wonderfully flamboyant design is close to the model on the title page of the second part of Hans Collaert's stunning series of pendant designs published in Antwerp in 1582: "Virtuosic Designs for Golden Ornaments." In the engraving, it is the god Apollo riding a sea monster, but the similarities remain strong.

Head of a Guardian King

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

This stone head is Buddhist in inspiration. It is carved with bulging features, almost as if it had been kneaded out of clay. There is a patterned beard and neat mustache; the eyebrows, bridge of the nose, and cheeks all swell outward. In the Buddhist cosmological system, conceived in India, a mountain stands in the center of our world. On the middle slopes of this mountain dwell four heavenly kings, who guard the four directions. Which of the four kings this head represents is not certain, but he may be Virudhaka (in Sanskrit; Cengchang [Tseng-ch'ang] in Chinese), the regent of the south. He has been given a beard and mustache like those of the Central Asian traders found in contemporaneous tomb sculpture. Intact sculptures of Cengchang [Tseng-ch'ang] show him with one foot on the head of a demon; his raised right arm holds a lance, his left hand is on his waist. The statue from which this head came was probably part of an ensemble in one of the Buddhist cave temples of Tang [T'ang] China. It would have flanked an image of the Buddha standing at the center of the world. Ceramic images of heavenly kings were also placed in tombs as guardians; their facial features are as vigorously modeled as those of this stone head.

Aquamanile in the Form of a Dwarf Centaur

Tuesday, March 09, 2010

This aquamanile or water container is one of the few surviving examples to fill two purposes: holding water and providing light. The centaur's outstretched hands of the centaur (half man, half horse) would have held two candlesticks. The design of the faucet and its little mythological animal handle is of Syrian origin.

Hollow Seated Figure

Monday, March 08, 2010

Tokyo meisho sanjuroku gisen

Sunday, March 07, 2010

At Nihonbashi (the main bridge), a rickshaw runner slips in a puddle of spilled sake, causing him to lose his passenger and kick a passer-by.

Kali as the Supreme Deity

Saturday, March 06, 2010

The terrifying goddess Kali, wearing a necklace of skulls and holding a severed head in one of her hands, is here worshiped by the great gods. From the left, we see Indra, Brahma (the creator), Vishnu (the preserver), and Shiva (the destroyer). Kali stands for the forces of destruction, but she is also a life-giver. Her posture is that of a woman giving birth.

Relief from a Temple with Divine and Symbolic Figures

Friday, March 05, 2010

This limestone sunk relief includes three scenes. The first depicts Hapi with offerings, the second Osiris and Isis before an offering table, and the third shows Osiris before an offering table.

Hydria with the Fight of Achilles and Memnon

Thursday, March 04, 2010

This "hydria", a water-jug, depicts a battle from the Trojan War in which two of the war's greatest heroes, Achilles and Memnon, clash in the presence of their mothers, the goddesses Thetis and Eos. Each warrior has his chariot standing by, with charioteers at the ready. Inscriptions, in the Corinthian alphabet, identify the figures. The painter was obviously proud of his ability to write, a skill that was not widespread.