The Work, of Art

I had no idea, until last year, that so many museums now allow us to photograph works of art without interference, as long as there's no noise and no flash; discovering this, I went into overdrive at the Met and Philadelphia during my last visit; and have gone on from there. So this is an album devoted purely to iPhone snapshots of works of art that I've seen that I think should be seen, and talked about as to what the work of art - that is, art's work - really is; which is the only reason I'm posting them here.

William Blake (1757-1827), The Nativity, Tempera on copper, 
ca.1800, 27.3x38.3cm., Philidelphia Museum of Art.

An astonishingly wonderful little painting by William Blake, at Philadelphia, which I had never seen nor even seen reproduced; and it's really hard to imagine a more enlightened understanding of the virgin birth of the Christ Child, surely one of the most vexed points of Christian dogma. Here it seems beautiful and credible, somehow; Joseph isn't a doddering old fool, but a passionate and powerful participant; and the child is a spiritual emanation perhaps from Mary's DNA, but not from some idiot notion of God somehow having immaculate sex with her. And the absolute beauty of Ste. Anne on the right, so passionately welcoming the newborn spiritual child...!

Close up of the Child, so beautiful, and being so beautifully welcomed...

click to zoom
[Cézanne quince] Artist, title of work here, date here,
medium and support here, size here, collection and whereabouts here.

What a pleasure to be able to study painting so closely, as in this magnificent Cézanne quince at Philadelphia, and then to be able to preserve so simply an image of how it truly looks in the flesh of its actual paint, not in the ruinous flat lighting of art book reproductions!

Paint as seen in the flesh, 2: 
Van Gogh's shoes, at the Met

Paint as seen in the flesh, 3: 
detail of poppies in a field of wheat: 
Van Gogh, at the  Met.

Paint, as seen in the flesh, 4: 
Van Gogh, Roses, at the Met.