Tag: animals
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Art is a Tyrant: an Entertaining Biography of Rosa Bonheur
Art is a Tyrant: The Unconventional Life of Rosa Bonheur is Catherine Hewitt’s really enjoyable new biography of French animal painter Rosa Bonheur.
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William the Hippopotamus Makes a New Friend
The Met’s famous mascot, William, gets paired with a 1936 adaptation by Carl Walters. As a William fan, I was so excited to see the two hippos together.
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The Green Animals Topiary Garden (My Newport Adventures)
Brayton Hall, the Brayton family’s former home, is located about 20 minutes outside Newport in the nearby town of Portsmouth. The primary attraction of this site isn’t the house, but the garden, popularly known as the Green Animals Topiary Garden. It has more than 80 topiaries shaped of like animals and objects alongside may other trees and flowers. My favorite topiaries were the owl,…
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More Gargoyles and Grotesques of Reims Cathedral
This gargoyle on Reims Cathedral seems to have had a head transplant some time since the Middle Ages! The concept is actually not that unusual, since centuries of running water often erode functioning gargoyles over time. It’s difficult to tell from this photo if the replacement was done in metal or a differently-colored stone. Either way, the end result…
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Gargoyles and Grotesques of the Pohjola Building, Helsinki
The 1901 Pohjola building in Helsinki, Finland is decorated with many grotesques representing figures from Finland’s mythology. The word “Pohjola” itself refers to a place in the myth Kalevala,which is Finland’s national epic, and the people and animals on the building are presumably from that epic. Pohjola may also refer to the name of the insurance company…
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Gargoyles and Grotesques of Chartres Cathedral
This grotesque is on the west portal of Chartres Cathedral – among the grandest and most famous of all French Gothic churches. While its close cousin in Paris is famous for its gargoyles, Chartres is celebrated for its beautiful stained glass and profuse sculptural decoration. Much of this sculptural work is clustered around its nine arched doors (portals);…
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Gargoyles and Grotesques of Santa Maria del Fiore, Florence
Today’s grotesque came to my attention via Atlas Obscura, a fantastic place to find fun, quirky facts and interesting locations to visit. This little bull figure lives on one side of the cathedral Santa Maria del Fiore in Florence, Italy. The church is heavily-laden with sculptural decorations of many styles and subjects, but this bull has a story separate…
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Gargoyles and Grotesques of the Anheuser-Busch Brewery, Saint Louis
I don’t come across either gargoyles or grotesques on commercial buildings very often in my research, which is why I so greatly appreciate them on the rare occasions that they do come along. You don’t typically think of history and important architecture when someone mentions the word “Budweiser”, but the Anheuser-Busch Brewery and headquarters in Saint Louis, Missouri is…
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Gargoyles and Grotesques of Chateau de Pierrefonds, France
A crocodile gargoyle on the Chateau de Pierrefonds in France.
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Gargoyles and Grotesques of St. Vitus, Prague
The rooster is one of early Italian St. Vitus’s attributes, so it’s quite fitting that a rooster gargoyle can be found on his beautiful Gothic church in Prague. Some people think that this figure depicts an eagle. I disagree, but I can understand how one might come to that conclusion without knowing about the saint’s association to the rooster.…
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Worksop Bestiary – Day 9
Bestiaries – books about animals and their qualities – are my favorite kind of medieval illuminated manuscript because of their great imagery.
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Gargoyles and Grotesques in Quito, Ecuador
You guys should know by now that I love non-European gargoyles, particularly when they take forms distinctly different from what we’re used to seeing. These Ecuadorean gargoyles representing local wildlife certainly fit that bill. Above, we can see several species of bird gargoyles, and below are some other creatures including a pair of alligators. This post on…
