the new emotional blackmailer's handbook

Monday, March 25, 2024

self-portraits ... part iv ...

giovanni benedetto castiglione, 1648 and 1650

rembrandt, 1636 and 1655

richard muller, 1942 and ???1927

shirin neshat, maybe mid-1990s

nadia waheed, contemporary

dorothy kay, 1950s

ronald searle, 1940s and the 2000s

william orpen, 1903, 1924

fedini, 2015ish

tatiana parcero

gertrud arndt

louise fenne

conrad felixmuller, 1897 to 1977

tove jansson, 1939 and 1975

francien krieg, 2020s

gesina ter borch, 1660

tintoretto, 1546-ish and 1588

cornelia hernes, 2017 and ????

hans baldung, 1505 and after

... to be continued ...

Saturday, March 23, 2024

Circe,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circe

https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/object/103RB8

https://www.rct.uk/collection/publications/castiglione/circe

https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_W-6-37

there are some books, not many ...

https://archive.org/details/castiglione-lost-genius.-royal-collection-trust./mode/2up?view=theater

and there are poems, even in our lifetimes ...

and as for music ... jun miyake's LILLIES OF THE VALLEY ... isn't about Circe ... but it's fluent rhythms and counterpoints suggest that feeling of being irresistably drawn towards a mystery ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=je0lFe0MHjU

of course, as the culture of humanity evolves, so the old myths may lose their relevance ... there are always new minds ready and willing to pillage the old myths for shoddy new variants ...

Wednesday, March 13, 2024

In England, and wherever people speak that same language, the myth about Ganymede tends to be glossed over ... he is abducted by Jove in the form of an Eagle to live amongst the immortals as Jove's cup-bearer ... the bit that gets left out is the messy bit about forced sex between a male adult and a male child, or youth. This kind of sex was acceptable to the Greeks in ancient times, and remains a "fact of life" universally, although it is quite properly unacceptable to most people.

The THEOI website states ...

"GANYMEDES (Ganymede) was a handsome Trojan prince who was carried off to heaven by Zeus in the shape of an eagle where he was appointed as cup-bearer of the gods. Ganymedes was also placed amongst the stars as the constellation Aquarius, his ambrosial mixing cup as Crater, and the eagle as Aquila. Ganymedes was often portrayed as the god of homosexual love and as such appears as a playmate of the love-gods Eros (Love) and Hymenaios (Hymenaeus) (Marital Love).

Ganymedes was depicted in Greek vase painting as a handsome youth. In scenes of his abduction he holds a rooster (a lover's gift), hoop (a boy's toy), or lyre. When portrayed as the cup-bearer of the gods he pours nectar from a jug. In sculpture and mosaic art Ganymedes usually appears with shepherd's crock and a Phrygian cap.

The boy's name was derived from the Greek words ganumai "gladdening" and mêdon or medeôn, "prince" or "genitals." The name may have been formed to contain a deliberate double-meaning."

In comparitively recent times the mythical stereotypes have morphed, so that Ganymede is no longer snatched from innocence to debauchery by an Eagle ... in 20th Century Spain, on the roof of several insurance offices, he became a triumphant and heroic figure perched on the shoulder of ... wait for it ... the PHOENIX.

What were the Spaniards thinking ? And should we see it as symptomatic of the decadence of people whose notion of heroism was tainted with Imperialism and with deeply embedded cultural beliefs of racial superiority ? I would guess that the people who commissioned this sculpture lived in hope of the revival of Spain as a global power.