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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Moving Pictures
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
Nope, not cinema. I was thinking still images that move you.
Have you got a photograph, or a drawing, or a painting, that takes your breath away? The kind of picture that you can stare at for a long time and not get tired of? The kind of image that you find yourself getting drawn into, lost in?
Can I suggest that, in the interests of not getting completely link-happy and wearing out the poor Hosts of Heaven, we stick to discussing just one image per post, and also not getting around this by posting a whole string of posts of our own in quick succession without giving others a turn.
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Right, so, the image that prompted me to start this thread... is a photograph of the singer Brandon Flowers taken by German photographer Erik Weiss.
Now yes, to me Brandon Flowers is a good-looking man. I won't deny that's fairly essential to the image's power for me. But I've seen other photos of him (and after coming across this one without initially knowing who it was, I've looked at quite a few more - even one of him on stage in the exact same shirt), and they're often very appealing, but they don't hit me between the eyes like this one. They don't make me weak at the knees.
Similarly, I've looked at Weiss' website and found lots of quality shots. He's clearly talented. But this... for me this is something sublimely beautiful.
It's not just a single thing. It's a combination. The framing for one thing. The church as backgroud - not really recognisable as anything as an architectural element, but vital in drawing the eye. The contrast of that pale frame and the dark shirt. The whole colour palette.
And the face in the centre. The tousled hair on top, the stubble at the bottom. The minute raise of an eyebrow. The slightly parted lips. The gaze...
...I'm sorry, I stopped typing for a moment. ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
But seriously, that's what the picture DOES to me. It makes time slow down. There's this incredibly beautiful figure, gazing straight at me, and other things just fade away for a while.
What image has that kind of effect on you?
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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Lyda*Rose
Ship's broken porthole
# 4544
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Posted
I've posted this before.
It's the goat. I completely identify with the goat. It has a combination of defiance and desperation, and Jesus holds it securely with a serene look on his face. None of this separating the sheep from the goats crap. This is the physician who came to heal the sick.
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"Dear God, whose name I do not know - thank you for my life. I forgot how BIG... thank you. Thank you for my life." ~from Joe Vs the Volcano
Posts: 21377 | From: CA | Registered: May 2003
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Firenze
Ordinary decent pagan
# 619
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Posted
Rembrandt, Woman Bathing.
Firstly, there's the paint: scrumbled, slicked, almost unfinished in places, yet so expressive, so exact. It is also the most erotic of images without being in the least objectifying; if anything, it is adoring.
Posts: 17302 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Jun 2001
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Adeodatus
Shipmate
# 4992
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Posted
Captive Andromache by Frederic Leighton.
It's not my usual style of painting at all, but what moves me is how the artist has handled the narrative. Andromache was the wife of Hector of Troy. Hector and their child were both killed in the Trojan War, and Andromache was taken to Greece as a slave.
In the painting, she's still dressed in mourning black. On her way to get water at the well, it looks like she has stopped in her tracks at the sight of the young family - woman, husband, child - at the bottom right of the picture. Around her is all the bustle of a city in which she is alone and a foreigner, but there's a space around her into which nobody intrudes: a zone of loneliness. It seems as if those who aren't ignoring her because she's a slave are staring at her because she's a stranger. It's a very poignant painting.
(Last time I checked, it wasn't on display at Manchester City Gallery, because about a year ago someone fell though it ![[Eek!]](eek.gif) and it's being restored.)
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"What is broken, repair with gold."
Posts: 9779 | From: Manchester | Registered: Sep 2003
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
Ooh, nice one Adeodatus. I've never seen that picture before.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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Earwig
Pincered Beastie
# 12057
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lyda*Rose:
I've posted this before.
It's the goat. I completely identify with the goat. It has a combination of defiance and desperation, and Jesus holds it securely with a serene look on his face. None of this separating the sheep from the goats crap. This is the physician who came to heal the sick.
YES! And the artist has got something of its goat-y nature in the icon - you know that animal isn't going to be easily lead.
I love this picture from Stanley Spencer's Christ in the Wilderness series. It's the first time I've seen a painting of a fat Christ. He's really big. As someone who carries a bit of weight, it was a powerful image to see. And he's really focussing on those little daisies - e really cares about them. Like he's checking to see the Creator did a good job making them.
Posts: 3120 | From: Yorkshire | Registered: Nov 2006
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Pine Marten
Shipmate
# 11068
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Posted
I love this picture of Nijinsky as the Golden Slave from Scheherazade. The look of ecstasy on his beautiful face, the arms flung out, the sensuality, the shimmering gold costume, all make for a sublime image. Especially sad knowing his unhappy future life and the mental illness that afflicted him until his death.
I am very fond of Nijinsky and love the many photos there are of him, but this is definitely one of my favourites.
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Keep love in your heart. A life without it is like a sunless garden when the flowers are dead. - Oscar Wilde
Posts: 1731 | From: Isle of Albion | Registered: Feb 2006
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monkeylizard
Ship's scurvy
# 952
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Posted
Defying Himmler is one of my favorites.
Himmler's indifference to the deffiance. He knows he has the man's life in his hands. The standing prisoner has no impact on him.
The standing soldier. His intensity. His determination not to let the wire or the men that put them there stop him. His will to overcome. I can't tell if he's staring at Himmler or through Himmler.
I notice that the senior officers and the prisoners all seem to be looking at the standing prisoner, but the junior officers in the rear appear to be looking at Himmler and the generals.
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The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly is to fill the world with fools. ~ Herbert Spencer (1820 - 1903)
Posts: 2201 | From: Music City, USA | Registered: Jul 2001
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Ariel
Shipmate
# 58
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Posted
Here's one of my favourite photos. It's taken in Jerusalem by a National Geographic photographer and is a view of the Mount of Olives.
This one says so much to me: the monk standing there as the people leave the heights and descend down into the valley to where the busy city awaits with all the bustle of everyday life, but across the valley, on the other side, the hills of Jerusalem in a blaze of light.
It's something I can look at for a long time and still find meaning and beauty in.
Posts: 25445 | Registered: May 2001
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
Gorgeous, Ariel.
Here's another one for me. Hopefully, this link will take you to a picture called Alone in a Crowd. If it doesn't, you should be able to search for it on the site (one of those funny sites where it's all done with Flash or something).
I nearly bought a large, expensive print of this photo several years ago, before circumstances intervened (long story). There were lots of photos in Rodney Lough Jr's gallery, but this was the one I just stared and stared at.
I respond to the title as much as anything. As well as the rhythm of the trunks. In some ways it reminds me of a Klimt painting.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
This picture of Grey Owl (alias Archie Belaney) on this page attending to a beaver. There are larger versions of it, and I used to have one on my wall half a lifetime ago. What else is there if you're feeding a baby, whatever species?
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
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Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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Mullygrub
Up and over
# 9113
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Posted
[Xpost with no prophet...]
ETA: no prophet, I find Grey Owl's story to be SO intriguing! There is so much in all the pictures I've seen of him... so much.
Yeah -- wow, orfeo. It's a stunning work (his others are amazing, too).
Quite apart from the fact that this artist is a friend of mine, his work genuinely stirs me. And I'm cold and dead inside, so that's saying something.
Anyway, painting number three here is the one I particularly want to link to. And while there was much discussion around whether the man was grasping at the woman's fragile inner self or her boobies (you know you thought it) when this painting appeared in my friend's loungeroom straight from the studio, it surely mesmerised me every time I sat in front of it on his couch.
Something in the man's hunger, an almost single-mindedness, is both distressing (as a woman with a not-always-safe history with fellas) and engaging, strangely alluring; her openness and warmth -- with which I identify strongly -- disarms me, makes me feel concern for her (is she protecting herself? Is she safe?) AND delight in her (she's beautiful to me).
But yes, so much in a picture, hey.
[ 04. December 2012, 02:10: Message edited by: Mullygrub ]
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Smurfs are weird. And so am I.
Posts: 634 | From: Melbskies | Registered: Feb 2005
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Hilda of Whitby
Shipmate
# 7341
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Posted
Captive Daughter of Zion brought me up short and gave me much to 'ponder in my heart.'
I have several cards by this icon artist. I really like his vision. I believe the Good Shepherd icon noted might be by the same artist (Robert Lentz).
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"Born with the gift of laughter and a sense that the world is mad."
Posts: 412 | From: Nickel City | Registered: Jun 2004
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Huntress
Shipmate
# 2595
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Posted
The Little Girl at the Door by Harriet Halhead painted in 1910 and currently in Canterbury Art Gallery. It is roughly life-size and I spent an age just looking at it in the Gallery, before visiting the shop and buying the greetings card reproduction - which is now on the wall above my desk.
Who is she? Why is she dressed in black? Is she leaving, or entering, the room? Is her facial expression sad, hopeful or something else? What is her relationship to the unseen person she is looking at - or is she looking straight at us? It's a magnetic painting, especially when you can view the life-size one.
[ 06. December 2012, 15:48: Message edited by: Huntress ]
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The Amazing Chronoscope
Posts: 431 | From: Lancashire / Nottingham | Registered: Apr 2002
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Jengie jon
Semper Reformanda
# 273
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Posted
Not quite sure why but I keep comin back to Mary meets Elizabeth. I think partly because it is set somewhere I know to be not very far from where I live but also because at the time it captured something of a particular friendship.
Jengie
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"To violate a persons ability to distinguish fact from fantasy is the epistemological equivalent of rape." Noretta Koertge
Back to my blog
Posts: 20894 | From: city of steel, butterflies and rainbows | Registered: May 2001
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Ariel
Shipmate
# 58
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Huntress:
The Little Girl at the Door by Harriet Halhead painted in 1910 and currently in Canterbury Art Gallery.
This is lovely - very enigmatic, and it does draw the viewer in. I imagine she's probably in mourning, but the picture could tell a variety of stories.
Posts: 25445 | Registered: May 2001
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Niminypiminy
Shipmate
# 15489
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Posted
Pictures that move people is something that I'm very fascinated by - I've written about it in my professional life, and I helped to put together a small exhibition about Victorian sentimentality.
But the picture I'm choosing now isn't Victorian, it this Cup and Saucer by Fantin-Latour.
It moves me because it is so simple, and apparently banal, and yet, the more I look at it the more profound it grows. The white of the porcelain is luminous against the dark background, and it says something both poignant and hopeful about the power of light against darkness. It's moving because it speaks so poetically about the power of made things, of human skill and creativity (both in the skill that makes a porcelain tea cup, and that that depicts it) against chaos and decay and despair. It's moving because it speaks of hospitality, and of the sharing of food and drink; it's moving because it evokes both the comfort and the darkness of domesticity. It's moving because it speaks of singleness and aloneness, both as loneliness and as sufficiency. It's moving because it points to the transfiguration of the ordinary, and grace that is waiting for us in the everyday. And it is moving because it is simply, achingly beautiful.
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Lives of the Saints: songs by The Unequal Struggle
http://www.theunequalstruggle.com/
Posts: 776 | From: Edge of the Fens | Registered: Feb 2010
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Firenze
Ordinary decent pagan
# 619
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Niminypiminy:
And it is moving because it is simply, achingly beautiful.
The highlights on the spoon and the bend of its handle particularly. I have a print of one of his flower pieces: it has that same inwardness.
Posts: 17302 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Jun 2001
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Huntress
Shipmate
# 2595
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Posted
Why War? by Charles Spencelayh is a painting I have grown up with, as it hangs in the Harris Museum and Art Gallery, Preston and my parents have a small print in their house.
It was voted 'Picture of the Year' at the Royal Academy exhibition of 1939. The title could be the thoughts of the old soldier who is contemplating the news of the new conflict (WW2) - see the newspaper and also the gas mask on the table. The painting has always moved me, particularly as the old man closely resembles my late grandfather. ![[Tear]](graemlins/tear.gif)
[ 07. December 2012, 15:37: Message edited by: Huntress ]
Posts: 431 | From: Lancashire / Nottingham | Registered: Apr 2002
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Hedgehog
Ship's Shortstop
# 14125
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Posted
I have found the art of Jerome Witkin to be profoundly moving. They are not necessarily "pretty"--in fact, they are frequently unsettling and disturbing. He tends to use harsh colors and harsh subjects (there is a lot of Holocaust imagery).
He also tends to do "narrative" paintings--several panels of varying sizes/shapes telling a story. The first work of his that I saw was the five-panel "A Jesus For Our Times." First panel is of a young man in a tenement who is inspired to become a evangelistic preacher. He then goes to Lebanon (IIRC), preaching (panel 2). There is then a car bomb explosion (panel 3). Panel 4 has him kneeling by a dying victim of the bomb. Panel 5 shows him back in his tenement room where he started. It is a violent and disturbing work--but profoundly moving as you study the details.
Unfortunately, I have been unable to find an internet link for just that one work. However,here is a link to Witkin's own website. WARNING: Many of his works are NOT WORKPLACE SAFE. Seriously, he does a lot of brutal nudity. Be careful!
The site shows a large number of his works. The panels for "A Jesus For Our Times" are included on the site, but the site is designed to keep a slideshow running so that you can't pause on just them, nor are they well identified to find just them. But I find virtually all of his works to be moving in that disturbing/unsettling way. I could watch the slideshow for hours.
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"We must regain the conviction that we need one another, that we have a shared responsibility for others and the world, and that being good and decent are worth it."--Pope Francis, Laudato Si'
Posts: 2740 | From: Delaware, USA | Registered: Sep 2008
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Ariel
Shipmate
# 58
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Posted
Back in the year dot, my single-colour green screen IBM pc was taken away, and a computer with a colour screen was installed instead. It had Netscape 1, and for the first time I connected to the internet and saw what it looked like in colour.
I explored some astronomy photos, and this picture of Neptune filled my screen, and I was left silent and awestruck, looking at the face of a different planet, so close, so clear. It felt as if I was looking at it from a spaceship window, passing by on a journey away from home. And what lay beyond? The enormity of space was disconcerting - daunting, even.
I'd seen Moon photographs before but they had never had the same impact on me. For whatever reason, the Moon always seems creepy and I never want to spend much time looking at photos of it. This wasn't: it was mysterious, beautiful, awe-inspiring.
YMMV. But I still get something of that feeling when I look at this photo, years on.
Posts: 25445 | Registered: May 2001
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Huntress:
Why War? by Charles Spencelayh is a painting I have grown up with, as it hangs in the Harris Museum and Art Gallery, Preston and my parents have a small print in their house.
It was voted 'Picture of the Year' at the Royal Academy exhibition of 1939. The title could be the thoughts of the old soldier who is contemplating the news of the new conflict (WW2) - see the newspaper and also the gas mask on the table. The painting has always moved me, particularly as the old man closely resembles my late grandfather.
I love the expression on his face. He seems so lost in thoughts and memories, and I get this sense he's angry at the same time.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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