Alfred Sisley – The Flood on the Road to Saint Germain
This piece of art is one of the best pieces of Alfred Sisley in which he demonstrated the flood scene on the road to Saint-Germain in 1876 in the form of western art. Alfred Sisley at that time was located in France. According to the description in the museum, it is an oil painting and the artist aimed to show the impact of light on the water. He didn’t figure out the objects or the figure but the landscape of France at that time. It developed an aesthetic beauty that made him famous among art lovers.
The portrait included realism and impressionism concepts. In this picture, he has shown the particular time in which the area is facing a heavy flood. It has rows of trees on both sides of the road and there are no cars but boats which is explaining that the flood is long-lasting. Some buildings are also shown in the painting. Skyline is established in which there is a dusty background and a cloudy sky. The water level is so high that it even covered some of the grass as well. The trees have very less leaves. The painter have placed his signature on the left bottom corner which is also included as a piece of art and the identification of Alfred Sisley.
The main aim of the Sisley was to develop a scene in which he would be able to create some realistic effect showing the condition of France that the flood is damaging and due to lack of development and infrastructure there were no bridges but the greenery is to a great level. The picture is located in the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston and its accession number is 74.146. I have understood the picture according to the lecture as it is comparatively a great design presentation of the natural beauty of France at the time of the 17th century.
Dirck van Baburen – Apollo Flaying Marsyas
Apollo Flaying Marsyas is one of the best oil paintings of Dirck van Baburen. The painting dates go back to 1623. The painting is from the baroque period, a perfect piece of western art. The work has aesthetic appeal and the painter tried to demonstrate the era of sixteen seventeenth century in which the grisly take of Apollo Flaying Marsyas was purified and concentrated in a specific way. In this picture, Titian depicted the doomed satyr in an upside-down way, hung from a tree.
This painting is a demonstration of one of the known ancient methodologies. In the picture Satyr, Marsyas challenged the god Apollo to a musical contest for a competition. He claimed that the winner will have absolute power over the loser and by no choice, anyone would be tolerated. The musical contest is also available in the Gallery 217 of the same museum where this painting is available to view.
This specific compositional approach was highly favored by the Spanish master, Jusepe de Ribera (1591-1652). He painted two wonderful and magnificent canvases of Apollo Flaying Marsyas in which one of that is available in the Museo Nazionale di San Martino where it is hung with a great identity. There is a violin on the floor that looks like it’s thrown and it is painted in a beautiful way. Nudity is prominent and the light seems to be coming from the left side as a clarification of the scene.
The painting has a great naturalism and a display of lights and shadows, for the audience in the Netherlands. His naturalistic depiction could be juxtaposed with the much more mannered way of Marsyas. I have understood the picture according to the lecture as it is comparatively a great scheme of the demonstration of the light beauty in paintings at the time of the 15th century.
Works Cited
Andrews, Malcolm. Landscape and western art. Vol. 10. Oxford History of Art, 1999.
Janson, Horst Woldemar, and Anthony F. Janson. History of art: the Western tradition. Prentice Hall Professional, 2004.
Kleiner, Fred S. Gardner’s art through the ages: The western perspective. Vol. 1. Cengage Learning, 2016.
