Category: Advent Calendar
Twenty-five days of Christmas, Holiday, and Winter-related art – a present from me to my readers. No matter what holidays you are or are not celebrating this season, I hope you enjoy all the beautiful art!
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Ball at the Russian Imperial Court (December 13th)
If you are seeing this (and I set the timer correctly), it means I am currently at a holiday ball. I figured the Advent Calendar should get in on the action, too. Interestingly, it is far easier to get a ticket to a glamorous and elegant holiday party than an artistic representation of one. It took me…
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Santa with Elves by Norman Rockwell (December 12th)
Painter and The Saturday Evening Post illustrator Norman Rockwell (1894-1978) is beloved in the United States for his images of American life during and after World War Two – soldiers, Boy Scouts, school children, mid-twentieth century family life, and, of course, Santa Claus. My family owns an entire set of Christmas ornaments featuring his Santas in a variety of scenes at rest, work, and…
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The Magi by Joseph Binder (December 11th)
I looked at a lot of Magi/Three Wise Men paintings today, but something about this one particularly stood out for me. It is by Austrian artist Joseph Binder (1798–1864). I think it’s a combination of things – the clarity of the image, the colors (particularly the blues in the sky), the varying reactions of the…
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Christmas Eve by George Inness (December 10th)
Nineteenth-century Tonalist landscape painter George Inness (1825-1894) is one of my favorite American artists. Many of his paintings feature locations in the northeastern United States that I’m familiar with. That’s one of the reasons I feel connected to his works, although most of these places look quite different today. There’s no indication of where Christmas Eve…
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Skating Carnival Montreal by William Notman (December 9th)
I’ve seen this image before, in a book about ice skating history. This work by Scottish-Canadian photographer William Notman (1826-1891) depicts an elaborate gala at Montreal’s Victoria Rink in 1870. The event was to honor Prince Albert of the UK. It looks like a painting or print, but it’s actually a colored albumen photographic print. I can’t get…
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Annunciation by Fra Angelico (December 8th)
Today is the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, so it seems appropriate to feature this Annunciation by Fra Angelico for the Advent Calendar. I have known that I wanted to use this painting since the beginning of the month, it was just a question of when. I love the work of Italian monk Guido di Pietro,…
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Winter in Switzerland by Jasper Cropsey (December 7th)
Day seven of the Advent Calendar features a winter-themed landscape painting by Jasper Cropsey – a member of the Hudson River School.
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Saint Nicholas of Bari by Carlo Crivelli (December 6th)
December 5th’s Advent Calendar post is a painting of Saint Nicolas (the forefather of Santa Claus) by Italian Renaissance painter Carlo Crivelli.
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Flight into Egypt by Henry Ossawa Tanner (December 5th)
Henry Ossawa Tanner, Flight Into Egypt, 1923. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. When I decided I wanted to do a flight into Egypt painting today, I expected to pick a famous one. This common subject for religious paintings, involving Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus fleeing their persecutors on the back of a donkey has been represented by artists such…
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Late Afternoon, New York, Winter (December 4th)
Frederick Childe Hassam, Late Afternoon, New York, Winter, 1900. Brooklyn Museum, Dick S. Ramsay Fund, 62.68. I think we’ve already established how much I love paintings of New York City in the snow, since I’ve written two previous posts on the topic (Snow falls softly on the city: the paintings of Guy C. Wiggins and Snow in…
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Santa Claus according to Thomas Nast (December 2nd)
The image of Santa Claus is pretty much omnipresent in the month of December, but how many people actually know where it comes from? Santa has his origins in numerous characters from the myths, legends, and stories of many different cultures; Saint Nicholas is his best-known but not only antecedent. As such, Santa Claus takes many diverse forms and personalities…
