Flemish art, art of the 15th, 16th, and early 17th centuries in Flanders and in the surrounding regions including Brabant, Hainaut, Picardy, and Artois, known for its vibrant materialism and unsurpassed technical skill. From Hubert and Jan van Eyck through Pieter Bruegel the Elder to Peter Paul
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At first glance Jacob van Ruisdael’s
View of Haarlem with Bleaching Grounds (
c. 1670–75) depicts a pleasant pastoral scene. Half of the painting – one of a series of popular
Haerlempjes, or ‘Haarlem views’, for which Ruisdael was well known – is filled with sky, the billowing clouds emphasising the stark flatness of the Dutch landscape beneath. On the horizon lies the busy market town of Haarlem, dominated by the solid 15th-century Grote Kerk, which looms over the surrounding houses like a ship. In the foreground are a lake, trees and fields, on one of which bolts of linen have been laid out to bleach in the sun. It’s a beautiful detail. The bright white sheets cutting across the green and brown of the field give the painting an almost abstract geometry. Yet this formal beauty obscures one of the things that many contemporary viewers would have most associated with the bleaching fields: their overpowering, unavoidable stench.
Michal Osmenda
People love gardens and to garden. They go on tours of famous gardens all over the world, including our own world-renowned Missouri Botanical Gardens.
Nancy Kranzberg
Gardens are depicted in works of art going back to ancient times as well as in works of art being made to this day.
The Garden of Eden is the most famous of all gardens. Great masters such as Jan Bruegel the Elder, Michelangelo and Lucas Cranach have painted their interpretations of that magical, mystical garden.
Just recently there have been art exhibitions in St. Louis in which the garden is the central focus. The Contemporary Art Museum (CAM) is featuring work by Ebony Patterson, a Jamaican-born artist who studied at Washington University and now resides in Chicago. Sheâs had exhibitions all over the country in prestigious museums and galleries.