Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Met's featured work of the day...


The Met Museum's Featured Work of Art for the Day:

The Unicorn Is Attacked is one of a series of seven tapestries that have been displayed at The Cloisters since its opening in 1938. Probably designed in Paris and woven in the southern Netherlands around 1500, the tapestries are among the greatest works to survive from the period and they are a favorite of visitors to The Cloisters. Peter Barnet, Michel David-Weill Curator in Charge of Medieval Art and The Cloisters, recently spoke with Met News editor Jennette Mullaney about this beloved tapestry.

"The seven tapestries were once thought to constitute a single series, but they seem to break down into smaller groups. The Unicorn Is Attacked is one of four tapestries that belong to the largest of these. They all depict a unicorn hunt set in a landscape with a stream in the foreground below and the sky above. … In The Unicorn Is Attacked, sometimes called The Unicorn Leaps across the Stream, the unicorn is trying to escape the hunters who surround it with lances and a variety of weapons. The hunters are accompanied by realistically depicted hunting dogs. The unicorn was associated with Christ in the Middle Ages and the four tapestries in this group can be understood as an allegory of the Passion of Christ. Late medieval Passion literature, for example, describes the tormenters of Christ as dogs."


This is what I received via email today. You can also sign up for the artwork of the day on the Met website, or just read and see more about this piece here.

Jennifer, from Finding the Real Me honored me with a Kreative Blogger award. Thanks, Jennifer! So I am supposed to let you know about eight more creative blogs that inspire me. So here they are, in no particular order (kinda like my house right now, which is in no kind of order at all!):


Woolgathering and Karen Blados' Sketch Blog both amaze me with their persistent and consistent sketching disciplines. Bedlam Farm has the most amazing photos, and often touching tales of farm life and many other things. The Earthly Paradise has interesting posts about all things relating to the romantic Pre-Raphaelite and Arts and Crafts eras, which I love. Daily Paintworks always inspires me with amazing little paintings, created daily by incredible artists. Karen Jurick's work also inspires me. Mason-Dixon Knitting inspires the knitter in me, and often just gives me a good chuckle. And the tapestries of Cornelia Forster amaze and delight me. And, of course, all of the links I already have on my blog, to the right, are ones I visit regularly to get a creative boost. I hope you have a few minutes to visit some of these blogs, and maybe find a few new favorites among them!

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