Services 1 — Renée Farrington in Words and Pictures

OLLI Meetings with the Masterpieces

Renée has been continuing a series of Meetings with the Masterpieces at the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at California State University Monterey Bay (OLLI @ CSUMB). The classes showcase Renée’s connections between the art she loves and everything else she loves — and Renée loves everything. Connections include books, music, pop culture, movies, comics, and more.

All previous Meetings with the Masterpieces are available to peruse below with the recording and slides in PDF. Meetings with Masterpieces is returning in the Spring Term of OLLI @ CSUMB and the details are below.

OLLI @ CSUMB provides a dynamic community for those aged 50 and better living in the Monterey Bay Peninsula (and beyond to those with access to Zoom) in many fields including (but not limited to) science, history, music, and art.

Meetings with Even More Masterpieces (Upcoming!)

Meetings with Even More Masterpieces Experiencing the masterpieces brings a deeper connection with the artists—and often with ourselves and how we see our world. Each session will focus on a theme and how it was communicated by several different artists. First, we'll look at art of the land, sea and air, and the animals that inhabit them. Next, we'll explore how artists view society across time, cultures and countries. In our final session, we'll examine the various ways artists of different eras use color. Throughout, our emphasis won’t be on scholarly and technical facts, but rather on enjoying what we see in the work itself.

Dates: Tuesdays, May 14, 21, 28

Time: 10:00 – 11:30 a.m.

Place: Livestream Zoom + Recorded

Meeting With Even More Masterpieces: May 14

A Forum will appear here after the first session with the PDF of the slides and any other relevant notes from Renée. As a taster for what’s to come, here is a piece written by Chris Wood who took Renée’s Writing with the Masterpieces course last Fall Term. Other classmate work can be seen in the Writings with Masterpieces tab of the website.

Below Chris Wood’s piece are also some supplementary videos from the first class.

No Horse Paintings

by Chris Wood

I have no horse paintings or photographs hanging in my house, which is a bit odd for a horse person. I started riding horses at age eight, studied horsemanship with excellent teachers, and wanted to be an equine veterinarian. I rode horses six days a week, sometimes seven horses in a day. I rode over 100 different horses, trained some, and taught many riding students. Sixty-four years of experience. Not one image of a horse.

I set out on a quest to find an artwork I would choose to display in my home if money were no object. I searched the internet for the most prominent museum-quality horse artworks.

“Napoleon Crossing The Alps” by Jacques-Louis David

So many portraits of horses are in a military rearing position, a levade, with their famous riders like “Napoleon Crossing The Alps” by Jacques-Louis David. Napoleon, known for being a relatively inexperienced rider, toes pointed down, legs swinging back freely, seat loose in the saddle, sits astride a diminutive grey Arabian. Most likely, Marengo, his favorite mount of his fifty-two horses – a horse that could gallop 80 miles in 5 hours. This horse carried Napoleon into battle more than any other, was wounded in war, recovered and was stolen by the British at Waterloo. You would think his name would merit listing in the title. War-mongering images not particularly appealing. Not for my home.

“The Horse Fair” (1852) by Rosa Bonheur is a grand painting, 8 feet by 16 feet. Handlers lead or ride numerous horses at the horse market in Paris. Painted in a realist-naturalist style, the blue-collar workers barely have control of their steeds. Three of the horses rear, one has two handlers, others are darting forward out from under their riders or side-stepping – muscles bulge in men’s forearms. The painting exudes a whirling storm of activity. Dust flies in the air. Some horses demonstrate better behavior. A pair of Percherons jog in perfect unison – a beautiful team, but overall, it is quite a chaotic scene. Although Bonheur succeeded in rendering stunning animals anatomically, I can feel the nervous energy. Besides, my kitchen wall, the largest wall in my house, is not long enough to accommodate it.

For a few years after college, I took art classes in drawing, figure drawing, painting, printmaking, watercolor, and color and design. But no art history. That was twenty-five years ago. I know nothing about Picasso, but his “Boy Leading a Horse”, an unfinished work, represents his rose period, before he embarked on a journey into Cubism. The boy is naked. The horse, a pig-eyed bridle-less grey walks beside him. The boy leads him with an empty, reinless fist. Both look hungry and dirty to me. Done in browns and greys, this work makes me sad.

“The Blue Rider” by Wassily Wassilyevich Kandinsky

Surely, Kandinsky’s impressionistic “The Blue Rider” would suffice. A grey horse gallops across a large meadow ridden by a blue-caped rider. Freedom. Autumnal trees stand their ground firmly in the distance on the crest of a grassy hill. However, the horse’s gait is incorrect. It should be three beats not two. Kandinsky painted both front legs together and both hind legs together. I look at it and wonder what invisible water jump is that horse clearing. Although I do love this painting, I would always see the improper gallop.

A chestnut with flaxen mane and tail, Arabian-thoroughbred, beautifully proportioned, well-fed and cared for. In a coat of golden highlights, his hooves oiled, he rears and you can see the white sclera in a turned eye.

Horse sculpture in driftwood by Deborah Butterfield

I am looking for an ideal horse, a Vitruvian horse perhaps a composite, drawn from the hand of Leonardo Da Vinci and possessing the inner Chi or energy of Xu Beihong’s galloping horses with flared nostrils. A horse with personality constructed by Deborah Butterfield, including gestures of impending motion shown by exquisite head and curving neck articulation. A horse with a curled lip. An animal that makes me want to stretch out my fingers flat and give it a sugar cube or a bite of carrot.

I want a horse painting that represents a blend of anatomical correctness, equine knowledge and imagination. Am I asking for too much? Does such horse artwork exist?

A desire for the real. Our last horse died four years ago. I can no longer swing my leg over the saddle, but I reach over to pet my dog, scratch behind his ears and set off on a walk down Corral de Tierra into Steinbeck Country looking for a model, a horse. Maybe, it’s time to pick up a brush once again.