Docent Note: Egyptian Cosmetics and Hygiene, To Live Forever: Egyptian Treasures from the Brooklyn Museum

by Joan Elder


Egyptian Cosmetics
Cosmetics, discovered in tombs and on the bodies of both men and women, have been found dating back to 4,000 B.C. They served ornamental as well as spiritual and medicinal purposes.

Implements: Combs, hairpins, mirrors, makeup boxes/pots/bowls, tubes for kohl, applicators, etc.

Ingredients: Most cosmetics were mixed in fats, oils (especially from nuts), bees wax and similar compounds. The minerals used were from a variety of colored earth, stones and ores. Costly lapis lazuli and malachite were imported. Some ingredients were questionable, such as fly dung. Oils were used, with or without added ingredients, to protect the skin and to treat skin diseases.

The rich employed "face painters" to apply their makeup. They did not like dark skin, which was natural to them, and often used white foundation. There were special anti-aging creams, oil based with various infusions from plant materials. Most Egyptians didn't live much past their 40's, but their skin tended to wrinkle from the sun.

Eyes: The most widely used eye makeup was kohl, a compound of galena, a grey lead sulfide ore, combined with soot, burnt almonds and other ingredients. Black eye liner protected from glare. Also used was a green makeup madefrom imported malachite. Unadorned eyes were considered vulnerable to the evil eye. The adorned eye was also believed sacred to the gods.
Lips/Cheeks: Lips were colored blue-black or red. Red ochre for rouge.
Feet, hands and nails: Evidence of henna, a plant-derived dye used today on hair and skin, was discovered in tombs in about 1500 B.C. It was used to tint the nails and also to adorn the feet of royalty with various designs.

Egyptian Hygiene [Source: Herodotus, a Greek historian who lived in the fifth century B.C.]

Bathing: The rich bathed often; we don't really know too much about the poorer classes, but there were canals and, of course, the Nile, where one might bathe. One had to watch for crocodiles. Those who did bathe used natron for soap or a paste of ash or clay mixed with oils. A papyrus from 1500 B.C. tell of mixing vegetable oils with alkaline salts to cure and/or prevent skin diseases.

Most people walked barefoot and floors of homes were compacted dirt. Many homes had foot baths and some of the rich actually had bathtubs. Wash basins were commonplace. There would often be a jug of salt solutions nearby for cleansing as well as sand for scouring. Herodotus claimed that most people washed upon arising as well as before and after meals. Lice were a problem and the entire body was often shaved. Oils were also used to kill body lice. Physician's recipes for deodorants have been found. One recommends mixing incense, myrrh, lettuce and fruit of the n(?) plant and rubbing it all over the body.

Herodotus also tells us that the white linen garments commonly worn were carefully washed and bleached in the sun.

Incense and Perfumes
The Egyptians loved pleasant smells which they associated with the gods. Perfumes were a large export item. They were oil based and scented with roots, spices such as cinnamon, flowers and bitter almond. Balls of perfumed wax were sometimes worn on women's heads and allowed to melt in the heat. Incense was widely used, mostly frankincense, myrrh and fragrant woods.

Docent Note: A Very Very Brief Egyptian Timeline, To Live Forever: Egyptian Treasures from the Brooklyn Museum

by Kathleen Durham

“Egypt is a gift of the Nile.”

 – Herodotus, 450 BCE

Egypt is a desert country with only a tiny percentage of habitable land. The Nile River, beginning in the highlands of Central Africa, flows north for over 4,000 miles to the Mediterranean Sea. Its yearly flooding determined the patterns of the lives of the ancient Egyptians. The floodwaters receded between November and March, leaving rich silt ideal for planting. Around 7,000 years ago settlements rose up along the banks of the Nile. Eventually canals and terraces were built to use the water more effectively. The ancient Egyptians felt that the river was a gift of the gods, but since they made no distinction between river and god, they used the word Hapy (Hapi) to mean the river, the flood and the God of the Nile. They grew crops, especially wheat and barley, and raised livestock. Eventually Egypt divided into two parts. The South was known as Upper Egypt, and the Northern Delta of the Nile, where it meets the Mediterranean Sea, was called Lower Egypt. In what is now known as the Early Dynastic Period (3000-2675 BCE) the first Pharaoh, Narmer, (or Menes) unified Upper and Lower Egypt.

EARLY DYNASTIC PERIOD (3000-2675 BCE) Unification of Upper and Lower Egypt. First Pharaoh Narmer. Brick tombs. Capital Memphis.

OLD KINGDOM (2675-2170 BCE) Pyramid Age, Giza, Sphinx, Saqqara, Cheops. Toward end of period Nile failed to flood for several years. Just one of the factors leading to dissolution of central government.

FIRST INTERMEDIATE PERIOD (2170-2008 BCE) Central government dissolved. Last days of royal house in Memphis, rivals in Herakleopolis and Thebes.

MIDDLE KINGDOM (2008-1630 BCE) Central government renewed in 11th Dynasty, Mentuhotep II, capital Thebes.

SECOND INTERMEDIATE PERIOD (1650-1550 BCE) Foreigners (Hyksos) dominant in Lower Egypt (Delta), local princes in Thebes.

NEW KINGDOM (1550-1075 BCE) Egypt expands into Syria, Euphrates. Amun is national god. Temples at Luxor, Karnak, rock tombs in Valley of the Kings. Under Amenhotep II and III kingdom and culture at its peak. Amenhotep IV changed religion to worship god Aten, changed own name to Akhenaten, built capital at Tel-el Amarna, married to Nefertiti. On Akhenaten’s death, Tutankhamun restored old gods. In 19th and 20th Dynasties there were 11 Pharaohs named Ramesses. Ramesses II built great temples Abu Simbel, Karnak.

THIRD INTERMEDIATE PERIOD (1075-656 BCE) Foreign rulers from Libya, Nubia.

LATE PERIOD (664-332 BCE) Foreign rule by Persians, Libyans, Ethiopians, alternated with Egyptian rule.

PTOLEMAIC PERIOD (332-30 BCE) Alexander the Greek conquers Egypt, establishes great center of learning at Alexandria. On his death his general, Ptolemy, takes over. Dynasty continues until Cleopatra’s death in 30 BCE.

ROMAN PERIOD (30 BCE-395 CE) Egypt is a Roman Province

BYZANTINE ERA (395-642 CE)

ARABIC_MUSLIM (642- to present) Byzantines expelled, Egypt was a province of caliphate

Docent Note: A Glossary of Terms, To Live Forever: Egyptian Treasures from the Brooklyn Museum

by Kathleen Durham

AMDUAT A New Kingdom funerary text which names the friends and allies to be found in each of the twelve hours of the night. It translates as “That which is in the Underworld”, and serves as a guide for the soul.

AMULET A small sculptured object which can be worn as a charm, but more importantly, is bound into the wrappings of a mummy. The ankh, wadjet-eye, tyt, Bes, scarab are some of the amulets which are placed on the mummy to heal and protect.

ANTHROPOID COFFIN A coffin shaped like a human being with an idealized portrait of the deceased with wig or headdress. Often richly decorated with scenes of the afterlife and the gods. The coffin would be placed in one or more protective sarcophagi.

BALDACHIN A canopy placed over a sacred or honorific place, such as a throne or altar

BOOK OF THE DEAD Compilations of various spells, prayers and incantations to help the soul of the deceased navigate past dangers in the netherworld. Originally they were chiseled onto walls of royal tombs, but eventually they were made available to well-off people in the form of papyri. These scrolls were often rolled up and placed between the legs of the mummy.

CALCITE A crystalline form of limestone used in sculpture.

CANOPIC JARS Four jars, often of calcite, used to store internal organs removed from the deceased in the mummification process. The jar with a jackal head stopper stored the stomach, a baboon stored the lungs, a falcon the intestines, and a human the liver. They were often called the Four Sons of Horus.

CARTONNAGE Linen soaked in plaster, modeled and painted to create mummy masks.

CHERT A compact rock consisting of a microcrystalline quartz.

CROOK AND FLAIL Osiris and the Pharaohs are generally shown with a shepherd’s crook to show that he is shepherd of his people, and a flail, a hinged tool used for harvesting grains, to signify Pharaoh’s role as provider for his people.

DESCRIPTION DE L’EGYPTE A 20-volume work developed by a corps of artists, technicians, geographers and architects brought by Napoleon in 1798. Still used today as reference and especially for those monuments and artifacts which have been destroyed.

DJED COLUMN A column with a wide base and four horizontal bands at the top. It is said to represent the backbone of Osiris. It stands for stability and strength. Often painted on the inside of coffins where body would lie. As an amulet it is placed on the throat of the deceased. Also associated with the creator god Ptah, ‘the Noble Djed’.

DUAT The Egyptian Land of the Dead. Regarded as similar to Egypt in climate and nature. Duat is located under the earth. At night the Duat is illuminated by the Sun God Re as he travels through.

ENCAUSTIC A painting technique using pigments mixed with hot wax as a medium. Popular in Egypt, Greece and Rome. (See mummy Demetrios)

ENNEAD A Greek word for a group of nine gods—Atum, Shu, Tefnut, Geb, Nut, Osiris, Nephthys, Isis, Seth.

FAIENCE A glazed ceramic technique that produces a smooth, lustrous, impenetrable texture. A fairly inexpensive way to produce quantities of beads or shabtys.

FALSE DOOR A stone imitation of a real door which only the deceased could use. They alone could ‘walk through’ the false door to receive the offerings left for them. As time went on, it was possible that priests and family could forget to leave offerings. For this reason the doors were often carved with depictions of food offerings.

FUNERAL PROCESS A series of rituals including, processions, incantations, dances, animal sacrifice. The process begins with the delivery of the corpse to the Hall of Embalming and ends with the final ceremony in the tomb. The body was carried on a boat in a canal or on land on a sledge, accompanied by professional mourners and priests. The coffin was shaded with a baldachin. After the seventy day mummification process, the funeral procession visited ritual stations on the way to the tomb. At the tomb the ritual Opening of the Mouth was performed (see Peseh-Kef below), the canopic jars and furniture were brought in, the tomb was sealed and offerings were left for the deceased.

HEART The heart was the only major organ which was left in the body during the mummification process. The brain was taken out and thrown away, and the major organs were stored in canopic jars. It was believed that the heart had knowledge and emotion. In the afterlife the heart was weighed against a feather to determine the fate of the deceased. Inscriptions were written on scarab amulets placed on the body, asking that the heart not testify against the deceased!

KOHL Finely ground antimony sulfate, a black powder used as eyeliner for men and women. Some say it was to avoid glare of the sun or to ward off infection.

MASTABA A flat-topped one-story structure with sloping sides over an underground tomb.

NATRON A natural salt that occurs in a dried lake bed in the delta, today called Wadi Natrun. Primarily sodium chloride, but about 17% sodium bicarbonate. It absorbs the body fluids in the mummification process, resulting after around 40 days in a stable shell no longer affected by decay.

OFFERING TABLE Food and drink and other offerings were placed on tables or stands for the deceased by priests and/or family. Even a sacred mummified bull would have an offering table!

PARTS OF THE BODY A living body is known as a khat, a dead body is a sah. The parts of the person aside from the body itself are: the ka: a spirit double, born when the person is formed on the potter’s wheel. The ba, was in the form of a human-headed bird which could travel in and out of the tomb and could consume offerings. The person’s shadow and his name combined with the ba and the ka to make a perfect spirit, known as the akh, for the life in the next world.

PESEH-KEF A ritual implement used in a crucial step of the funerary process, the Opening of the Mouth. When the coffin arrives at the tomb, it is held upright while an officiating priest, usually in an Anubis jackal mask, touches the tool to the mouth and other parts of the body to ‘reanimate’ it in the afterlife.

PHARAOH In New Kingdom Thutmose III was first to refer to himself as ‘Pharaoh’, a term that means ‘great house’.

PYRAMIDION A pyramid-shaped block set as the finishing element on an obelisk or a column, or as an independent tomb sculpture.

SARCOPHAGUS The outer rectangular or oval stone container in which a coffin and mummy were placed. Less expensive sarcophagi could be of wood, terra cotta or wicker.

SCARAB Named for a beetle which pushes around a ball of dung containing its eggs. When the eggs hatched, the Egyptians thought it was spontaneous generation, and likened it to the appearance of the sun at sunrise. Also known as Khapri (Khepri).

SENET A very popular board game with thirty squares and pawns in various shapes. The rules are unknown, but it is believed that the goal was to reach the end of the board and the Kingdom of Osiris.

SHABTY (also Ushabty) A mummiform statuette placed in tombs to perform work on behalf of deceased in the afterlife. Often there were thousands in a wealthy tomb. An ideal was to have 365 shabtiess, plus 36 more to serve as overseers. A less wealthy person could have 40 shabties, 30 to do the work and 10 to supervise.

SISTRUM An ancient Egyptian percussion instrument with a loop of metal set in a handle, fitted with loose crossbars which make noise when shaken.

STEATITE Soapstone, a form of compressed talc. Often used as a base for faience.

STELA A stone slab placed vertically, a monument. Generally incised with inscriptions and reliefs. Used originally in First Dynasty, to individualize a tomb with the name of the deceased.

TEKENU A bundle carried on a funerary sledge or barque, resembling a wrapped body. Sometimes it is covered with an animal skin, sometimes wrapped in linen and bound with red cord. It may represent a fetus being reborn in next world.

TERRA COTTA A medium made from clay fired over low heat and sometimes left unglazed.

TYT Often translated as welfare, eternal life, resurrection. Associated most with Isis. It resembles a knot used to secure garments of the gods. As early as Third Dynasty it appears with ankh and djed column. Also known as Blood of Isis, used as a funerary amulet of red stone or glass.

WADJET EYE In the shape of a human eye with falcon markings. It represents the eye of the god Horus which was torn out by the god Seth and was restored by Thoth (or Isis). It is used in amulets to represent healing. In the mummification process it is placed in the mummy wrappings over the site of the incision, to heal it. It is often painted on coffins as a protection, but also so the deceased can see out.

Docent Note: A Partial List of Egyptian Gods, To Live Forever: Egyptian Treasures from the Brooklyn Museum

By Kathleen Durham

Note: Listed here are only gods who are mentioned in the exhibition catalog. There were hundreds of gods in ancient Egypt, some local, some universal. There were various creation myths, and sometimes gods changed forms and/or merged with other gods. But there was a remarkable consistency over all those centuries, so that we see the same gods depicted in funerary art from the beginning through to Roman times. Since many of the gods developed from animals, many are shown as animals, or with animal heads. Anubis, the jackal-headed god of funerary matters, is thought to have taken that form because jackals were always seen around burial sites. The hippo is seen as a benign female god as Taweret, and as a god of Chaos in the person of Seth.

AMMIT – Devourer of hearts judged to be wicked in underworld—can take form of crocodile, hippo and/or leopard.
AMUN -- The hidden God, at one point considered King of Gods—sometimes merges with Re, becomes very powerful. Represents air. Temple at Thebes.
ANUBIS -- Jackal-headed god of mummification, and of judgment in underworld. Said to have helped Isis reassemble and bind together the parts of Osiris’ body.
APOPHIS -- Terrible creature who menaces Re on his trip through the underworld. Can take form of dragon, snake, cat.
ATEN -- During reign of Akhtenaten he was made King of Gods, the only god. Generally represented by a sun disc with rays ending in hands. When Tutankhamen became King, he restored the old gods.
ATUM -- Primeval creator god. Arose from the waters of Chaos and created the first gods, Shu and Tefnut. Merges with Re at sunset, representing the setting sun. Known then as ‘He who is Completed’.
BES -- Dwarf god, one of several variations, perhaps associated with Pataikos. Sometimes has lion’s ear and tail. Is always ugly, in order to frighten spirits which threaten homes. Protector of households, childbirth. Very popular amulet.
GEB -- Earth God, always pictured lying down, as the Earth, with his sister-wife Nut arched over him as the sky. Egyptians believed earthquakes were his laughter.
HAPY (HAPI) -- God of Nile. He is the river, the flood and the god. Represented as a man with a little pot belly and plants on his head.
HATHOR -- Goddess of love, fertility, joy, music. Shown as a cow, or woman with cow’s ears and horns, with a sun disk. Known as ‘Mistress of the West’, welcoming the dead into the next life.
HORUS -- Falcon-headed god of the sky and sun. Son of Isis and Osiris. Horus means ‘He who is from above’. Became king after defeating uncle Seth. Throughout Egyptian history is the protector of kings. It was thought that each Pharaoh was the living Horus.
ISIS -- Wife of Osiris, mother of Horus. Goddess of healing, magic, marriage, motherhood. Her crown is usually a throne to show she was mother to a king. Often shown with Horus on her lap (because her lap is the first throne he sat on). She is sometimes shown with wings.
KEBEHSENEUF -- Funerary god, associated with falcons and canopic jars. His is used for storing intestines. A son of Horus.
KHAPRI (KHEPRI) -- Scarab beetle, or man with beetle head, rising sun. This is the name Re takes when he re-appears from the underworld at sunrise. It means ‘he who is coming into being. Connected with scarab because that beetle pushed around a ball of dung filled with its eggs, like sun coming up.
KHNUM -- Ram or ram-headed man. One of the creator gods. He molded people on a pottery wheel.
MAAT -- Goddess of truth and justice. She is present at judging of souls in the underworld. Single feather headdress. Heart is weighed with her feather.
MONT (MONTU) -- God of war, valor. Falcon head, sun disk and double plumes. Associated with cult of Buchis (bull which was venerated, mummified).
NEFERTEM -- God in form of a man with lotus headdress. He is personification of lotus which keeps sun god Re alive with its fragrance.
NEITH -- Goddess of hunting and war. Shown as a woman with red crown.
NEPHTHYS -- Daughter of Geb and Nut, sister of Osiris and Isis, sister-wife to Seth. Headdress has her name in hieroglyphics. Sometimes shown with wings.
NUT -- Goddess of Sky, mother of Osiris, Isis, Seth and Nephthys. Shown as a naked woman arched over the reclining body of her brother-husband Geb (Earth).
OSIRIS -- King of Netherworld, God of Re-birth. Son of Geb and Nut, husband-brother to Isis. Father of Horus. Was king of Egypt until killed by brother Seth. After his body was put back together by Isis he became king of the netherworld. Shown as a mummy with green face, atef crown (a combination of the hedjet, the white crown of Upper Egypt, with ostrich plumes). Carries crook, flail.
PATAIKOS -- A dwarf protector of household, similar to Bes. Has scarab on head, he strangles snakes, stands on crocodiles. Often seen with Isis and Nephthys.
PTAH -- Creator god, Memphis. Father of Pataikos.
RE (RA) -- Sun god. Creator god. Hawk head with sun disk. Has seventy-five names. Binds together the darkness and light with his 24 hour journey through the sky and the underworld. Merges at times with Atum, Amun and Horus.
SETH -- God of Chaos. Son of Geb and Nut. Brother of Osiris and Isis, brother-husband to Nephthys. Sometimes shown as a hippo, but more often as a ‘Seth animal’, an undetermined animal with a long snout. Was King, defeated by Horus, now defends Re in the underworld.
SHU -- God of Air, father of Osiris, Isis, Nephthys and Seth.
SOBEK -- Crocodile or Crocodile-headed man. River god.
TAWERET -- Hippo goddess. Patron of household and childbirth.
TEFNUT -- Goddess of Moisture, mother of Geb and Nut. Cobra or lion head.
THOTH -- Ibis-headed (sometimes baboon), holding a writing palette. Scribe of Gods. Recorder of judgment in netherworld, also connected to the Moon. Egyptians thought that he gave them the gift of hieroglyphic writing. He restored Horus’ eye after Seth tore it out.

Thinking about the Altered Landscape

Patricia Nelson Limerick’s essay in NMA’s 1999 book The Altered Landscape considers the meaning of the word ‘altered’ as it is used to describe the work of the ‘New Topographics’ artists and their followers. Limerick is an accomplished writer and historian who deals with issues of the American West. About ‘altered’ she writes:

“This flexible and hardworking word supplies three rich meanings for the price of one. After two hundred years of American colonization, the West has indeed been altered, in the sense of changed, made different, modified. In cheerful and positive terms, it has been reshaped and resewn in order to make a better fit for the needs and habits of the humans who have colonized it. And in the glummest of terms, the West has been castrated, neutered, and robbed of its power.”

Limerick looks at the validity of all three definitions and leaves the answers to the viewer. She asks, “Can one celebrate and admire these photographers and still find much of their work irritating? You bet! A photograph can attract and still scrape and scratch at the viewer’s mind.” She points out that this work can irritate us because it doesn’t come with packaged answers. We have to figure it out ourselves – ultimately a satisfying task! And she believes that whatever the passion and convictions a photographer may have, “taking a photograph requires the photographer to calm down, think, plan, and hold still – a discipline, regrettably, forced on few other professions.”

She talks about walls of buildings – “the most easily recognized lines between the human sphere and the natural sphere” – and how the different photographers consider them. She talks about light: “And light, artificial light, just as much as natural light, is a wonder and a miracle, as a number of these photographs remind us. Over the last century, night has been transformed; starlight and moonlight may hold onto a magic that a light bulb will not match, but starlight and moonlight nonetheless dim when they compete with the radiance of electrical light. Lewis Baltz’s photograph of a construction site at night returns us to the familiar slippage of the border between inside and outside and suggests that anything may happen in this luminous place; a prophet might come upon a vision; hope might get a new life; a new life might be conceived and born. Of course, it is a construction site; of course it is an artifact of the despoliation of a more-or-less intact Western landscape; of course it is an imposition of sovereign, arrogant human will on the earth. The house is also quite a beautiful arrangement of line and light.”

“ The West has been altered, adapted to a better fit with human activity, and one element of that adaptation is that the nights are a lot brighter. It is a great deal easier after sunset to read, write, cook, sew, and look at one another than it was a century ago, to spend the evening watching TV or using a computer. Dams, coal-fired plants, and nuclear power plants made this possible. And now some people tap into these omnipresent power lines, turn on their computers, and write impassioned denunciations of the injuries inflicted on the West by the production of cheap electrical power.” But as a counterpoint to that she points out that, “All the exercises of power recorded in these photographs, exercises in earth-moving, dam building, house-constructing, road making, and power distributing have trashed landscapes that someone loved.”

Limerick feels that whether or not we are religious, we do subscribe to the story of the loss of Eden; as if we, through our relentless development, have lots our chance to live in Paradise. “By altering the Western landscape, by neutering it and stripping it of its power, we arranged for our departure from Eden. Americans themselves barred their own way back to Eden, and barred it not with a dramatic flaming sword, but with the sheer prosaic passage of time and the even more prosaic development of business and real estate. We locked the door back to Eden – not with swords, cherubim, and many-headed beasts, but with subdivisions, parking lots, commercial shopping strips, dams, highway interchanges and power lines.”

She speaks of some of the Altered Landscape photographs that depict places where nature truly has been savaged by development. And yet she reminds us that Nineteenth-Century America, with its civil wars, slavery, mistreatment of Native Americans and widespread poverty was not a paradise. “The great consolation of the historian’s life comes in the dozens of reminders that the past holds no golden age. Life today is a mess. Fortunately, life in the past was also a mess...Let me put this gently; those who see in the desecration of Western nature a ratification of the legend of the Fall, those who think that we are now living in desperate and declined times, would find some relief for their terrible sense of loss if they put down the newspaper and read a little history.”

Limerick speaks of two Wests: “ the out-of-doors, wide-open-spaced, dirt-dominated rural West, and the enclosed-spaced, walled-off, indoors, asphalt-covered urban West.” They are “trying, not very successfully, to work out a virtually agreeable zoning code. The loudest voices from the rural West ask for the freedom to make a living from the land; they demand their right to continue to practice ‘traditional’ land uses that are, in fact, barely a century old. The most audible requests from the city, meanwhile, ask for the rural West to be defined primarily as a place for urbanites to drive, hike, ski, ride mountain bikes, camp, romp, stay in bed-and-breakfasts, admire views, and recover from the pressures of life in the city. She points out that so many in the cities never consider where their food comes from, where their lumber comes from, or how it is that heat and light appear in their homes. “There is a chance that these fine-tuned urbanites would starve, or freeze, or spend their evenings in the dark if they succeeded in imposing their standards on rural America.”

Lastly, Limerick writes about aerial photography which shows “the surface of the planet as a canvas marked by geological and biological forces and by acts of the human will. Viewed from the vantage point of the sky, the transformation of the world by patterns of electric light at night leaves one stunned and speechless. Viewed from above, roads become hieroglyphics carved into the earth. In their arbitrariness and cryptic logic the roads become riddles in dirt.”

“The photographs in the Altered Landscape collection permit us to respond to ourselves, and to the messages we have marked into the earth. The photographers themselves do not pose a detached and omniscient group of observers. They admit, instead, to being part of the species that does both the looking and the marking.”

--Kathleen Durham

Docent Note: A Timeline for Raphael's Life

A Timeline for Raphael

• 1483 – Raphael is born in Urbino, Northeastern Italy, on Good Friday.. His father, Giovanni Santi, is an artist and poet attached to the very sophisticated court there.

• 1491 – His mother dies

• 1494 – His father dies. Raphael is apprenticed to Perugino at some point in his teens.

• 1495 (Leonardo da Vinci completes Last Supper, Michelangelo completes Pieta)

• 1499 – (Michelangelo completes Vatican Pieta)

• 1500 – At 17, Raphael is a master in his own right. Does commissions and collaborations in Perugia, Siena, Citta di Castello

• 1503-6 – (Leonardo - Mona Lisa).

• 1504 – Raphael moves to Florence. (Michelangelo installs David )
  

• 1505-7 – Raphael works in Florence and Perugia

• 1506 (Pope Julius II hires Bramante to rebuild Saint Peter’s)

• 1508 –Raphael moves to Rome, starts work on frescos for the Vatican Stanze (rooms) for Pope Julius II. (Michelangelo starts on the Sistine Ceiling)

• 1509- (Albrecht Durer does woodcut of Christ Driving the Moneychangers from the Temple)

• 1510 – Raphael meets Agostino Chigi who will commission architectural projects as well as painting.

• 1512 – Raphael does Portrait of Julius II and the Sistine Madonna

• 1513 –Pope Julius II dies, is replaced by Leo X, a Medici

• 1514 – Raphael works on Stanze, appointed architect of Saint Peter’s on Bramante’s death, does private architectural work

• 1514-15 –Raphael does portraits of Castiglione, La Velata,

• 1515- Raphael is appointed by Pope to oversee all archaeological excavations, and to use what he wants in the restoration of St Peter’s

• 1517- Martin Luther posts his Theses in reaction to the excessive amounts Pope was levying ( through indulgences), to pay for restoration of St Peter’s – start of Reformation!

• 1518 –Raphael works on plans for St. Peter’s with asst architect Sangallo. Raphael does a portrait of Pope Leo X. He is by this time running a large workshop with many artists.

• 1518-19 –Raphael paints La Fornarina

• 1519 – Leonardo dies in France

• 1520 – Raphael, works on panel of Transfiguration. He dies on Good Friday, April 6. His fiancee, Maria Bibbiena, preceded him in death earlier this year. They are both buried in the Pantheon. His leaves money for the woman who was said to be his true love (and maybe his wife?) – Margherita Luti, known as the Fornarina, (the baker’s daughter). In August of this year a woman of the same name, listed as a widow, enters the protection of the convent of S. Apollonia

• 1550 – Vasari writes the first true art history, The Lives of the Artists, and is thus Raphael’s first biographer.

• 1564 – Michelangelo dies.

-- Kathleen Durham

Docent Note: Getting to Know La Velata

Getting to Know La Velata

Suppose someone finds a picture of you 500 years from now. What could they figure out about you? This picture is almost 500 years old. It is a portrait . Do you know what a portrait is? Let’s try to figure out something about this lady. She is called La Velata, which means ‘The Veiled One’, and sometimes she is called Incognita, the ‘Unknown One’..

• What can you tell us about her?

• Who painted her?

• Where did they live? Where is that?

• Did they have electric lights? TV? Computers?

• How old is she?

• Is she wealthy, or poor? Why?

• Why do you think she is wearing a veil?

• How much of her can we see?

• Does she look happy?

• What words would you use to describe her?

• Why do you think she had her portrait made?

• Do you think she has a job?

• Would she wear those clothes to work?

• Do you think she ever wore jeans?

• Why is this painting special?

• Have you ever had a portrait made?

• Did you wear something special?

• Can a photograph be a portrait?

-- Kathleen Durham

Docent Note: La Velata

LA VELATA

We have only one painting to consider here, but it is probably Raphael’s crowning achievement in the field of portraiture. Raphael was known in the 1500s as he is today for the beauty of the madonnas he painted. He often spoke of an ideal conception of beauty that he used in his earlier madonnas. While in Florence he perfected ‘sfumato’, that soft smoky transition between colors that was developed by Leonardo. In another nod to Leonardo, Raphael began to do his portraits in half-length, which shows the sitter’s hands, instead of the old bust-length style. Once in Rome his portraits (and madonnas) reached a new level. They were no longer paintings of what people looked like. They were paintings that showed the inner essence of the sitter. Notable among these was the portrait of his friend Baldassare Castiglione, the painting that so impressed Rembrandt. The quiet direct gaze of the courtier, the soft colors and transitions, and the amazing fabrics – all worked together to set a new standard for portraiture.

The same year Raphael painted La Velata. Almost five hundred years later we can feel her warm gaze, and marvel at the perfectly modelled face and neck, the colors of her skin. We see her exactly as Raphael did. What amazing care he gave to her clothing! Julia Addison, a Victorian writer, felt that La Velata is holding her loose bodice with one hand, as if it were being removed. The texture of the flimsy gathered chemisette contrasts with the crisp damask of the slashed sleeve with its gold lining and trim, and with the long sheer veil. So much tender detail!

So who is she? Most people believe she is Raphael’s long-time lover, his true love, Margherita Luti, also known as the ‘Fornarina’,( the baker’s daughter.). Raphael was engaged for years to Maria Bibbiena, a niece of a Cardinal, but this portrait is not of Maria. There is no doubt that Raphael was fond of women. Giorgio Vasari, his first biographer, felt that Raphael’s early death came from an excess of romantic activity!

Raphael always put off his marriage to Maria. There is speculation that because of her uncle Cardinal Bibbiena, it would not have been wise politically for Raphael to break off the engagement. At any rate, Maria died in 1520 shortly before Raphael himself. In his will he specified that he should be buried with Maria at the Pantheon, but he also left an amount of money to Margherita. Several months after Raphael’s death, a woman who called herself ‘ Margherita Luti, widow’, entered the convent of S. Appollonia

Many critics believe that it is obvious from the depth of feeling in the portrait of La Velata that she was indeed Raphael’s true love. A German scholar, Oskar Fischel, called it a “commission of his (Raphael’s) own, in the midst of the great frescoes and orders for altarpieces.......a love-prompted improvisation”. There are those who feel that he was secretly married to Margherita Luti. Some say that since La Velata wears a veil as married Roman women did, that she could even be the new wife of his patron Agostino Chigi. Others say that he painted his love with a veil because they were married!

Whoever she was, Raphael used her face for the Sistine Madonna and for the Madonna of the Chair. In another portrait, La Fornarina, Raphael painted a woman who resembles La Velata. But here she wears nothing but a flimsy veil covering the lower half of her body. On her arm is a band with his name on it, and in her hair is a jeweled pearl ornament which appears to be the same jewel that La Velata wears. Recent cleaning has revealed a ring on her finger, setting off another round of speculation about the possibility that Raphael was secretly married to Margherita. It appears that no one will ever know the truth about La Velata’s identity. But does it matter? A Victorian poet, William Allen Butler, wrote a long poem about La Incognita (The Unknown One), another title often used then for La Velata. Here are the first few lines:

“Long has the summer sunlight shone
on the fair form, the quaint costume;
Yet, nameless still, she sits, unknown,
A lady in her youthful bloom.

Fairer for this! No shadows cast
Their blight upon her perfect lot,
Whate’er her future or her past
In this bright monument matters not.


La Velata remains a favorite at the art-filled Pitti Palace. It is such a privilege for us to be able to see her here, all by herself.

Raphael’s influence has continued through the years. We know, of course, that he influenced Rembrandt. The ongoing delicious gossip about La Velata/La Fornarina inspired Ingres to do a painting showing Margherita Luti on Raphael’s lap in front of an easel with the portrait of La Fornarina. Raphael was hugely popular in the Victorian era – much more so than his contemporaries, Leonardo and Michelangelo. The Victorians idolized him -Whittier, Browning, Butler, and Longfellow wrote poems about him, and engravings of Raphael’s paintings were everywhere. Manet used figures taken directly from an engraving after Raphael for his famous Dejeuner. And Picasso revived the mystery by drawing Raphael and his lover, with the Pope watching, and Michelangelo under the bed!

For a large part of the Twentieth Century Raphael was marginalized, probably as a result of way too many bad reproductions of his work, along with renewed interest in Michelangelo and Leonardo. But in recent years there has been renewed scholarly respect and popular interest in his work. A drawing of Raphael’s just sold at auction for the highest price ever paid for a work on paper.

--Kathleen Durham

Docent Note: Raphael and the Renaissance

RAPHAEL AND THE RENAISSANCE

Art historians will forever argue about when the Renaissance began, and exactly what it was. They are all in agreement, however, about its culmination in the ‘High Renaissance’, a period beginning about 1495 and ending roughly with Raphael’s death in 1520. The three stellar artists of the High Renaissance were Leonardo, Michelangelo and Raphael. (Michelangelo outlived Raphael by forty-four years, but the work of his later years changed in style and is not properly classified as ‘Renaissance’ but rather as Mannerism.)

So what does this term meaning ‘re-birth’ say to us? Many feel that this period began with Giotto (1267-1337) who brought life to painting with figures who had weight, and movement and real emotion. And his contemporary Duccio, in Siena (1278-1319), changed traditional stylized Byzantine painting into an Italian Gothic form with movement and real narrative. But it was not until the 1400s in Florence that these innovations flowered into an amazing period of growth in art and literature. In art, with Masaccio, Donatello, Lippi, Gozzoli, Botticelli, Fra Angelico, to name just a few, there was a new interest in naturalism, in perspective, in how to depict a figure in real space, and in the classical models of Greece and Rome. This period from 1420 to 1500 is generally known as the Early Renaissance.

So – Leonardo was born in 1452, Michelangelo in 1475, and Raphael in 1483 in Urbino. Raphael’s father was a poet and painter and was connected to the court of Urbino. Both of Raphael’s parents died when he was very young, and he was apprenticed as a teenager to Perugino, a painter of exquisite altarpieces. Raphael learned his style, as was the custom then, and executed many commissions with other painters and on his own. By the time he was seventeen, he was a master in his own right. In 1504 he moved to Florence, where he saw the work of Leonardo and Michelangelo. He must have known how difficult it would be to reach their levels of knowledge and powerful work. But he did just that. His career spanned only twenty years, but in that time he was able to assimilate the best of his contemporaries’ work and form his own distinct style.

In 1508 he moved to Rome and began to work for Pope Julius II, painting the walls of the Vatican Stanze (rooms). The paintings on these walls are a testament to Raphael’s achievement of perfect form and composition, the hallmarks of the High Renaissance . In these paintings one sees his ability to combine a large number of beautifully painted figures harmoniously, in a believable space, so that it is as pleasing to view the entire composition as it is to examine the beautiful details. If he had done just one of these frescoes – The School of Athens, for example, it alone would have earned him the right to be named in the same breath as Leonardo and Michelangelo.

In the next twelve years, until his death at 37, he continued to do frescoes for the Popes, but was also a portrait painter, an architect, and an archaeologist. He had been given a Papal commission to restore Saint Peter’s, and was also named archaeologist in charge of Roman excavations. And, unlike Leonardo and Michelangelo, he was able to transcend the position of artist as craftsman, and move freely as an equal in the Vatican court and social circles. He was apparently universally loved and appreciated. His first biographer, Giorgio Vasari, wrote: “As excellent as he was graceful, Raphael was modest and good...in Raphael the rarest qualities of the heart shown forth.”

When he died in 1520, The Transfiguration, his last panel painting, was displayed at his funeral, and he was buried in the Pantheon, a signal honor.

--Kathleen Durham

Frank Stella, "Agua Caliente"

FRANK STELLA

Agua Caliente
Print, Silkscreen, 1972

Frank Stella is one of America’s leading contemporary artists. He was a pioneer of the Minimalist art movement of the 1960s, a type of art that stressed the reduction of the image to its most basic elements of color, shape, and design. Minimalists strove to create artwork that was devoid of symbolism, representation, or opinion. Stella is famous for saying “What you see is what you get”. In the 1970s he deviated from Minimalist designs to incorporate sculpture as a third dimension in his work. By the 1990s he had progressed toward more complex imagery, creating elaborate, vivid works that paid homage to his extensive cultural and literary knowledge.. Stella’s abstract prints in lithography, screen printing, etching, and offset lithography ( a technique he introduced) have had a strong impact on printmaking as art.

Frank Stella was born in Malden, Mass, in 1936. He studied painting at the Phillips Academy in Andover and later at Princeton University. He moved to New York City in 1958 and has spent most of his life living and working in the city, though his art projects have taken him around the globe. He has done large scale outdoor sculpture, mural projects, and has done architectural designs for pavilions and museums. He did set design for dancer Merce Cunningham for the musical Pajama Game. He is a printmaker of the subjects and styles of his paintings. His series called “Indian Bird” is derived from one of his favorite pastimes, bird watching. He has won numerous awards, grants, and honors and has taught and lectured at universities and museums in America and abroad. Never one to rest on his laurels, Frank Stella is constantly evolving, changing, and responding to the world around him.

This biographical information is from several internet sites including AskART, Art Cellar Exchange, MetroArtWork, Hollis Taggart Galleries and Answers.com.

Submitted by Lois Smalley

Hans Meyer-Kassel, "Nevada Landscape"

HANS MEYER-KASSEL

Nevada Landscape
Oil on canvas, 1945

From the Nevada Historical Quarterly, by Jeff Nicholson:

"Hans Meyer-Kassel, a native of Germany, arrived in Nevada in 1937 at the age of 65. Prior to his moving to Nevada, he had enjoyed success and honors as an artist in Germany and had exhibited throughout Europe. Born Hans Meyer in 1872, he studied art at the University of Munich, choosing portraiture as his field of art. At the age of nineteen he was already welcoming clients to his first professional studio and received many important commissions in the years following. He became a professor at Germany’s Royal Academy of Art and was a founding member of the International Art Society of Munich. In recognition of his early achievements, his native city, following longstanding tradition, bestowed upon him the high honor of adding its name, Kassel, to his."

"A classically trained and accomplished painter, Meyer-Kassel produced a steady stream of landscapes, still lifes, nautical scenes, and portraits. In Nevada he had studios in Genoa, Reno, and Carson City. During the 1940s he did portraits of four of Nevada’s past governors as well as several Nevada dignitaries. Working in oils, pastels and tempera, he was a prolific artist and many of his works are in public and private collections throughout Nevada. Hans Meyer-Kassel maintained his vigorous painting until the last day of his life in 1952, when he simply laid down his brushes for an afternoon nap and never awoke."

Robert Swain Gifford, "Landscape with Cattle"

ROBERT SWAIN GIFFORD

Landscape with Cattle
Etching, 1888

Robert Swain Gifford was born in 1840 on Naushon Island, Massachusetts. He studied art with a Dutch artist, Albert Van Beest, in Bedford. In the early 1860s he had studios in New York and Massachusetts. By 1866 he had made New York City his permanent home, although he returned regularly to Massachusetts and other parts of New England to sketch and paint. In 1869 he traveled and sketched extensively in the Western States. In 1870 he began a series of trips to Europe and the Middle East. He was especially taken with the work of the Barbizon artists, especially those whose work he saw on a trip to Marseilles. Peter Bermingham in American Art in the Barbizon Mood, (Smithsonian Institution Press, 1975) notes the change in Gifford’s style as a result of that exposure to the different palettes of some European artists: “...after that his style evolved from an overblown romanticism,....to stark, simpler compositions, wide spacious vistas, and, most typically, a cold, somber mood drawn from the barren dunes and rugged cedars of the New England coast.”

In 1877 Gifford began teaching at Cooper Union School in New York City. He remained there for thirty years, the last nine years as director. He helped establish the New York Etching Club in 1877 and was a founding member of the American Society of Painters in Watercolors. He won medals at Expositions in Philadelphia, Buffalo, Charleston, and Paris. He was a friend of Thomas and Mary Moran, both accomplished etchers. His work is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Smithsonian American Art Museum. He died in New York City in 1905.

-- Kathleen Durham

Harold Joe Waldrum, "Morning Light"

HAROLD JOE WALDRUM

Morning Light
Aquatint etching, 1991

Joe Waldrum is best known for his paintings, aquatint etchings, and linocuts of the adobe churches and mud-hewn moradas of New Mexico. His color-saturated paintings have minimal lines, but he has mastered the use of light and shadow to portray these sacred places. For several years Waldrum made his “window series:, which were works with the “painting as a window” type of composition. Just as Matisse, Magritte, and other artists have been drawn to that format, so was Waldrum. The churches of New Mexico proved to be a passionate subject for him as he depicted the spiritual and mysterious aspects of these earthy structures in his works.

Harold Joe Waldrum was born in Savoy, Texas on August 23, 1934. He earned a college degree in music from Western State College in Gunnison, Colorado, and a master’s degree in studio painting from Fort Hays State College in Kansas. Waldrum taught art and music in the public schools of Kansas for sixteen years. In 1970 he moved to the hill country of Texas and then in 1971 to Santa Fe, New Mexico. After he killed a man during a break-in in his studio, Waldrum moved to New York for a time to escape the man’s angry relatives. By 1979 he had returned to New Mexico and began painting the churches. He lived on a remote ranch and raised mules. In 1994 Waldrum had a book published with provocative essays, photographs of his “Mountain Ranch” mules, and color reproductions of his work. Joe Waldrum died in 2003 in his beloved New Mexico.

Quotes from the artist:
“There is a beautiful place in the United States of America. It is in northern New Mexico between the two mountain ranges. This place is called “The Cradle”. Its people, the land, and its elements are special and peculiar. I find the genius of this place reflected in the churches”.

“When my analyst in New York identified me as socially schizophrenic, I felt better knowing that my malady had a name; and when I first saw the mountain range of the thieves...I felt better knowing there was a place for the socially schizophrenic to live.”

This information compiled from articles from Artspace Quarterly, the online gallery of Rio Bravo Fine Arts, and the online archives of AskART.

-- Lois Smalley

Harold Lukens Doolittle, Morning in Yosemite

HAROLD LUKENS DOOLITTLE

Morning in Yosemite
Aquatint (no date)

Harold Doolittle (1883-1974) was an etcher, furniture maker, and civil engineer from Southern California. Though he worked in all the graphic processes including photography and collotype, he is most known for his beautiful aquatints. Doolittle was an inventive man who built his own press and mezzotint rocker, and preferred to make his own linen paper.

Doolittle was born in Pasadena and studied at Cornell University and Throop Polytechnic Institute, now known as Caltech. He worked for many years as chief design engineer for the Southern California Edison Company.

He served as President of the California Print Makers in the 1940s and 1950s. Other memberships that he held included Pasadena Society of Artists, Society of American Graphic Artists, and several chapters of the Society of Etchers. Doolittle is represented in the Library of Congress, California State Library, and public libraries of the cities of New York and Los Angeles.

This biographical info provided online by two galleries representing Doolittle’s works: The Blue Heron Gallery and the Annex Galleries.

--Lois Smalley and Kathleen Durham

William Dassonville, Yosemite Valley

WILLIAM DASSONVILLE

Yosemite Valley
Photograph, Platinum Print, 1906

The following is from the book Dassonville, with a biographical essay by Peter Palmquist.

William Dassonville’s photographic legacy is considerable, including an outstanding body of fine photographs in the pictorialist tradition. During his lifetime his photographs were widely published and he won numerous prizes and honors. He was an innovative craftsman and self-taught chemist, a perfectionist who developed and marketed his own line of photgraphic printing paper: Charcoal Black.

Born in Sacramento, CA, in 1879, William Dassonville was given a camera as a youth and made photos of his friends and relatives. In 1900 he opened a portrait studio in San Francisco, and about that time he joined the California Camera Club. In addition to portraits he did landscapes and seascapes. His favorite areas to photograph included Yosemite, the High Sierra, the Pacific Coast around Monterey and Carmel, and Marin County north of San Francisco. Dassonville exhibited at the San Francisco Photography Salons of 1901, 1902, and 1903. His works traveled the nation with the American Photography Salon. In 1906 the San Francisco earthquake and fire destroyed his studio and all negatives of his pre-1906 work were lost, but he continued to exhibit his photographs. By 1910 his portrait business had grown and he had many customers of significant financial means. When World War I caused a critical shortage of platinum printing papers which Dassonville’s work depended on, he began to experiment with a silver bromide emulsion to coat high quality paper. This led to his Charcoal Black paper and in 1924 he sold his portrait studio to concentrate on the manufacture and marketing of Charcoal Black. He had good success with this as it was popular with photographers such as Ansel Adams. In 1941, at age 62, Dassonville sold the business. He continued to be active in photography, and worked as a medical photographer at Stanford University’s Hospital in San Francisco. William Dassonville died July 15, 1957, in San Francisco.

-- Lois Smalley

Jeff Nicholson, Sunset Down South

JEFF NICHOLSON

July Down South
Oil on canvas, 1979

Jeff Nicholson has been painting landscapes for 35 years, working primarily in oil and watercolor, making art that captures the beauty of Nevada and the Great Basin. He has been described as the “consummate Nevada realist painter”, and his works are in several permanent collections, including the Nevada Museum of Art, the University of Nevada Reno, and the Governor’s Mansion in Carson City.

Nicholson was born in 1947 in Arcata, moved to Reno in 1962, and graduated from Reno High School in 1966. He attended the University of Nevada Reno, completing his studies there in 1978. Nicholson has been involved in art-related employment for many years; he served as a draughtsman in the U.S. Army in the Panama Canal Zone (1967-68), and has worked as a commercial silkscreener and layout artist. He has taught art at Truckee Meadows College and is founder and co-owner of Great Basin Gallery in Carson City. Over the years his art has been exhibited at several Reno and Carson City galleries, and the Nevada Museum of Art has twice honored him with one-man shows. Nicholson states the inspiration for his art is drawn from noted artists Maynard Dixon, Robert Caples, and Craig Sheppard.

Quote from the Artist (from the late 1970s):

“I’d like to pay tribute to Maynard Dixon, whose works I have studied so intensely. One day I hope it can be said that I accomplished as much in capturing that mystical, spiritual quality of the high desert as he did.”

Biographical information from Scenic Nevada.org and Renown Health Center Online Art Gallery.

--Kathleen Durham and Lois Smalley

Frank de Haven, Sunset Landscape

FRANK DE HAVEN

Sunset Landscape
Oil on canvas, 1910

Frank DeHaven was born in Bluffton, Indiana (date unknown). He came to New York in 1886 and studied with George Henry Smillie. He was one of several artists who painted shoreline scenes on Long Island and in Massachusetts. In his father’s obituary in 1915 there were flowery descriptions of the rest of the family. Frank DeHaven was described as “the well-known landscape painter of New York City”. In another amazing passage the unknown author states: “It is not surprising to find latter-day Hudson River School influences, and an intense Barbizon, or more specifically, Tonalist sensibility in much of DeHaven’s work.” DeHaven was also known as an accomplished violin maker. He and his wife traveled extensively through the United States always searching for new places to paint.

--Kathleen Durham and Lois Smalley

Edwin M. Dawes, Fields of May

EDWIN M. DAWES
1872-1945

Fields of May
Oil on canvas, ca. 1915

Edwin Dawes was born in Boone, Iowa in 1872. He studied art in Pennsylvania with William Lathrop and the New Hope school of American Barbizon painters. He supported himself as a sign painter in Minneapolis for several years, but continued to paint and study art in his spare time. He exhibited with the Minneapolis Artists’ League and his work was shown at the 1913 Chicago Art Institute show.

In 1914 Dawes moved West, traveling and painting in Montana, Arizona, Missouri and Nevada. He worked for the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway Company, painting the Grand Canyon and Glacier National Park. He settled in California in 1915, but left frequently to explore mining possibilities in gold and silver. He lived for a time in Fallon and in Reno. Dawes died in Los Angeles in 1945.

--Kathleen Durham and Lois Smalley

Suzanne Kanatsiz, Ceremonial Cloak II

SUZANNE KANATSIZ

Ceremonial Cloak II
Mixed Media, 1994

Suzanne Kanatsiz works in sculpture, installation, and drawing. Her forms are wide-ranging; relief panels, earthworks, steel sculptures, and more. Her experimental and conceptual work makes use of diverse combinations of organic and manufactured/machined materials. Many of these works have primitive features, and are created via slow, laborious processes. Concentric rings, circles, and spheres done in repetition are prominent in her designs. Ceremonial Cloak is an example of that type of work. The principal material of the cloak is from pine cones, which were an important part of the Washoe Paiute Indian culture, and the pattern of the piece is repetitive and concentric. It was made during a time when Kanatsiz was living in Nevada.

Born in Detroit, Suzanne Kanatsiz grew up in San Diego and earned a BFA in painting from San Diego State University on 1984 and an MFA in sculpture from San Jose State University in 1988. Arabic text has long been a part of her work due to her Turkish heritage; Kanatsiz is one of two daughters born to an American mother and a Turkish father. She has lived and traveled extensively in Europe and the Middle East, including a teaching appointment at Sabanci University in Istanbul. She has also traveled to Australia, Canada, Mexico, Scotland, Korea, and other places in order to observe/learn the culture of the native peoples of the region and incorporate that into her artwork. She has taught sculpture at the University of Nevada Reno and at Weber State University in Utah. She currently lives in Ogden with her husband and son.

Quotes from an interview by a writer and friend of hers, Jordan Clary:

Question by Clary: “A lot of your art seems to be inspired by tribal societies. What is it about that that you try to convey with your work?”

Kanatsiz: “Indigenous peoples had a highly sophisticated relationship to the arts and its transformative powers. I am interested in imbuing that power in my work. Also different landscapes reflect my inner landscape. I love the ancient feel of a dry desert, the expansiveness of that is powerful.”

Information from “A” Gallery of Salt Lake City, The Utah Artists Project, and artist-at-large.com interview, 2007.

--Lois Smalley and Kathleen Durham

Mildred Bryan Brooks, Twilight

MILDRED BRYAN BROOKS
1901-1995

Twilight
Etching, 20th Century

Mildred Brooks was born in Missouri and came with her family to Long Beach, California in 1907 when she was six years old. She graduated with honors from USC. She went on to study at Otis and Chouinard Art Institutes. Her teachers/mentors were Tolles Chamberlin (also in this show), and Arthur Millier, who steered her toward printmaking, with an emphasis on etching. She began her career designing Christmas cards but soon acquired her own printing press and began working on her own. She taught at Stickley Art School in Pasadena, the Los Angeles Art Institute, and Pomona College. Her work won awards nationally, including one from the Chicago Society of Etchers – their first ever awarded to a woman or a Westerner! During the Depression she was able to support her family completely with her printmaking. She is best known for her etchings of trees.

--Lois Smalley and Kathleen Durham