URL photos on Flickr

The Virgin kneels on a crescent moon with her hands in an attitude of prayer. Her head is uncovered, and her hair falls down her back and in tresses over her shoulders. In rendering the folds of the garments, little concession has been made to anatomy.

This piece, like 71.342, was apparently carved in the Portuguese colony of Goa, on the west coast of the Indian subcontinent by a native artist.

Devotional statuettes carved in ivory celebrating the immaculate purity of the Virgin were popular in the 1600s in Europe and this taste spread to the colonies established by Catholic countries in Asia and the Americas. The three most important locations for production of these ivories were the portuguese colonies on the Indian subcontinent (Goa, where the present piece as well as Walters 71.407 were made), the island of Sri Lanka (see Walters 71.341) and the Spanish colony of the Philippines (see for example Walters 71.322).

A square paper label with blue borders on the under surface of the statuette is inscribed in ink: "123."

H: 5 3/16 in. (13.2 cm)

medium: ivory, traces of gilding

Walters Art Museum, 1931, by bequest.

art.thewalters.org/detail/5423

Heart Scarab of Bak-en-Djehuti 1186-718 BCE (Late New Kingdom-Third Intermediate Period) by museado

The ancient Egyptians believed that the dung beetle, the Scarabaeus sacer, was one of the manifestations of the sun god. Representations of these beetles were used as amulets, and for ritual or administrative purposes.

This scarab is a so-called Heart scarab which was used for the deceased. The linearly incised bottom inscription contains spell 30 B of the Book of the Dead. The left reading text is displayed in ten lines, separated by nine, very straight text-divider, and framed by an oval line. The hieroglyphs are less detailed and slightly irregular. The layout is well organized, and the signs evenly spaced. The back of the scarab is very high, and the highest point at the partition between pronotum (dorsal plate of the prothorax) and elytron (wing cases). Both parts have incised borderlines, a slightly curved double partition lines, and a triple division line between the wing cases. The rectangular head is flanked by quarter-spherical, two-stage eyes with lid markings. The side plates and the clypeus (front plate) are trapezoidal. On the left wing case is an inscription with name and title of the owner: "the priest of Amun: Bak-en-Djehuti," and on the right wing case a crossed lines pattern and a formula wishing him life. The style of the inscription on the back differs from that on the bottom, and it is most likely that the text on the back with the individualization was added later by another hand. The crossed lines on the right wing case are less deeply incised, and might have been added later, only the ankh-sign (meaning "life") looks similar to the inscription on the left wing case. The extremities have natural form, and vertical and diagonal hatch lines for the tibial teeth and the pilosity (hair). The low, oval base is slightly asymmetrical and has a smaller head.

The scarab was produced to be placed in the wrappings of a mummy. It was individualized by his name of the deceased: Bak-en-Djehuti. Such funerary amulet should cause the renewal of the deceased, and support him in the Weighing of the Heart procedure in the Judgement hall of the underworld.

Egyptian

H: 11/16 x W: 1 1/16 x L: 1 1/2 in. (1.8 x 2.7 x 3.8 cm)

medium: grey-green greywacke

culture: Egyptian

dynasty: 18th-19th Dynasty

Walters Art Museum, 1931, by bequest.

art.thewalters.org/detail/5996

Paw Patrol Party URL 2/23/24 by Frederick County Public Libraries

url by 小Q 程

Painting URL by PENCIL PORTRAIT

1

January 02, 2016 at 09:32PM

Birds and Flowers in a Landscape of the Four Seasons second half of the 1500s by museado

The monk-painter Sesshp is revered today, as he was in his own time. While he left Kyoto's sophisticated intel-lectual and cultural environment to live in a provincial village in a far western province, he seems never to have severed contacts with the monastic communities of his young adulthood. His residence in Yamaguchi proved fortuitous because his patron, the region's military lord, enjoyed considerable freedom in conducting trade missions overseas with Korea and China. Sesshp went to China in 1467 and traveled about the country, visiting well-known historical sites and Chan (Zen) temples before returning two years later. Thus he became familiar with contemporary painting practices, materials, formats, and subject matter. His assimilation and then transmission of these elements had a profound impact on the following generations of ink painters, patrons, and Zen communities throughout Japan. Despite the presence on these byøbu of the name "Sesshp," they are from the hand of another accom-plished but as yet anonymous follower active in the middle of the sixteenth century. Sesshp's name here, as on a handful of similar bird-and-flower byøbu, attests to the master's identification at that time with the colorful mural paintings on the same theme emanating from Ming dynasty China. This genre had heretofore been relegated to hanging scroll compositions, so the intro-duction into temple and daimyo residences of such an attractive theme surely caused considerable excitement in the later fifteenth century, when in all likelihood Sesshp introduced it into the Japanese painting reper-toire. Subsequently, artists of varying backgrounds and training tried their hands at these large, dramatic scenes. From right to left the composition portrays an array of flowering plants in the near distance that indicate the passage of the seasons. Birds, usually paired, occupy this setting, engaged in various activities that lend naturalism and an air of peacefulness. The world they inhabit may be characterized pictorially by expansive middle-ground waterscapes that end where the far distant mountains rise as backdrops. These features appear consistently in other bird-and-flower byøbu attributed to Sesshp. Also noteworthy is the absence of any birds of prey such as the samurai's beloved hawks, emblems of fierceness and graceful strength that appear often in the byøbu of sixteenth-century Kano and Soga school painters.

Japan, Muromachi period (1392–1573)

Six-panel folding screen, ink and color on paper

Image: 158.5 x 359.4 cm (62 3/8 x 141 1/2 in.); Overall: 175.2 x 374.4 cm (69 x 147 3/8 in.)

Gift of Mrs. A. Dean Perry

clevelandart.org/art/1960.173

url by mr.nguyenhnss

url-1 by amyerrtibi

Saint John the Evangelist Dictating to Prochorus; the Annunciation 16th century (Early Modern) by museado

At the center of this small-scale triptych, Saint John and the deacon Prochorus sit in a cave on the island of Patmos where John transcribed the Book of Revelation. With one hand on his text, John looks over his shoulder to receive the Word of God from heaven above. The saint conveys the text inscribed on the page, “In the beginning was [the Word],” to Prochorus, who copies it onto a scroll. This is the opening line of the Gospel of John, also composed by the Evangelist. The outer wings depict the Annunciation, when the Archangel Gabriel, at left, told the Virgin Mary, at right, that she would give birth to Christ. The angel blesses Mary, and she raises her right hand in acceptance of his message. Their gestures and direct eye contact suggest that they converse across the painting. The Virgin also holds a thread that she spins from the hank of wool in her left hand. This detail alludes to a story from the apocryphal Protoevangelium of James, which describes how Mary was among eight virgins selected to weave cloth for the Temple veil. When the Archangel arrived to deliver his message to the Virgin, he found her spinning the purple thread assigned to her. This scene of Mary spinning appears frequently in Byzantine art, both in grand frescoes and mosaics found in churches, and in smaller panel paintings and illuminated manuscripts. The diminutive size of this triptych indicates that it was used for individual, private devotion. The hinged wings fold inward over the central panel, making it compact and portable. The outside of the wings are painted with a large cross that spans the two wings, set against a red background. The abbreviation for “Jesus Christ is victorious” (IC XC NIKA) is written above and below the arms of the cross.

Orthodox Eastern

H: 5 13/16 x W: 8 1/4 in. (14.7 x 21 cm)

medium: tempera and gold on panel

style: Post-Byzantine

culture: Orthodox Eastern

by bequest to Walters Art Museum, 1931.

art.thewalters.org/detail/4001

IMG_1431 by Frederick County Public Libraries