Foundation in a small Indiana town sells its Monet for 81 Million

Early California Landscapes
from the Sonoma County Museum Collection

A stunning array of masterful California landscapes awaits you at the Sonoma County Museum.

Disney Family Museum being built in an old barracks
in San Francisco's Presidio

The Walt Disney Family Museum is dedicated to the achievements, dreams, and wonder of Walt Disney, a man who had the had the wisdom to surround himself with talented and creative minds, and the energy to encourage young and old alike to allow their imaginations to breathe and thrive.

Transforming two of the Presidio's barracks into the Disney Family Museum is the dream of the Disney family, headed by Walt's daughter, Diane Disney Miller. It will be opening soon.

Among items to be on display are objects and artifacts recalling the times and life of Walt Disney. Many of these items were collected by Walt himself, while others were collected in recent years by the Disney family. See a Red Cross Ambulance similar to the one driven by a young Walt in the years just after World War I in northern France. Come and

understand how animation was done before computers, the old fashioned way, including an animator's "backlit" desk from the "Mouse Factory" in Burbank, and learn how an optical printer was used to allow for the blending of character cells against painted backgrounds. Walt was fascinated by miniatures, and his collection of them will be on hand. Also on display, perhaps the most unique special Academy Award Statue ever, given to Walt Disney in 1938 for Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

View their website and learn more about the items which will be on display. Back to the Top

A new Houston exhibit explains the roots of plein air painting, the Barbizon School and Impressionism

Gustave Courbet, 1819-1877 "The Gust of Wind"

Beginning in 1820 and lasting for the next fifty years before trends changed, inspired Parisian artists traveled to the nearby Fontainebleau Forest to capture its light. They laid the foundations of impressionism, of landscape photography, and even nature conservancy.

The National Gallery, in association with the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, have organized this exhibit, seeking to trace the dual tracked evolution of landscape painting and photography. Included in the exhibit are works by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Claude Monet, Jean-Francois Millett, Theodore Rousseau. and Auguste Renoir.

Corot was among the first in this movement to visit the Fontainebleau Forest, experimenting with open-air painting, capturing nature's beauty in ever-changing light and shadow in different seasons and weather conditions. These roots of plein air painting would spread throughout Europe and the United States. By the 1830s, an artistic colony was established in the town of Barbizon. By the 1840's, the introduction of paper negatives allowed photographers to join the painters.

The exhibition is divided into sections, each devoted to an aspect of the forest and its role in the development of naturalistic landscape painting and landscape photography. The sections are Discovery of the Forest, Trees and Rocks, Nature and Observation, Fontainebleau on a Grand Scale, and Village Life. More than 56 private and institutional lenders contributed works to the show, including the MFAH. The museum´s Great Oaks of the Vieux Bas-Bréau (1864) by Rousseau, Gustave Courbet´s Gust of Wind (1865), and two photographs by Le Gray, Tree, Forest of Fontainebleau (c. 1856) and Le Pavé de Chailly (1852) are among the highlights.
http:// www.mfah.org Back to the Top

The Leaning Tower is Stabilized

After eighteen years of heroic engineering prowess, La Torre Di Pisa will continue as one of Italy's most endearing icons. Michele Jamiolkowski, a professor emeritus of the Turin Polytechnic, confidently states that the tower will "rest easy" for the next three hundred years. Through a complex system of anchored cables and counterweights, and extensive measures to fortify the foundation, the tower's stability is better than it has ever been. Construction of the tower began in 1173 at the height of Pisa's military and economic power. The tower began its life on the level, but began to lean in 1178. Yet, over the next two centuries, construction continued, adding uneven floors to compensate for the tilt. After interruptions for various wars, the bell chamber was finally added in 1372, and may have been the scene of the tower's most famous "fabled" event. It was from the bell chamber that Galileo Galilei held his now famous gravity experiment of dropping two different sized cannon balls showing that their mass had nothing to do with their rate of fall.

In the mid twentieth century, Benito Mussolini ordered that concrete be poured into the foundations, but this only caused the structure to sink even more. During World War II, the Nazi Army used it as an observation post, and after being put under the control of the Americans, it was saved from allied artillerymen because an American sergeant decided not to call for the attack. By 1990, the structure was four meters off vertical, and estimates were made that the 14,500 ton structure would tip over between 2030 and 2040.

The tower is a campanile or bell tower of Pisa's neighboring cathedral, and a must see on any visitor's tour list. At the end of this summer, a ceremony will be held celebrate the end of restoration. Visit the tower's website. Back to the Top

Perhaps the most striking commentary coming from this exhibition is that Rockwell's artistic form was pretty good for his time and even now. And even if these contemporary parodies were half as poignant and true as Rockwell's original work, the real artist here is Rockwell. It was his form. It was his art. And as these contemporary artists make their efforts, Rockwell is still the one setting the table. In any objective or subjective assessment, Rockwell's work is superior -- but this is the world of art and as we all know, interpretations and opinions range wildly.

The "Thoughts on Democracy" exhibit at the Wolfsonian Museum in Miami Beach seeks to borrow Rockwell's work to address issues of contemporary America. Reviews of this exhibit maintain that this is not Rockwell's America. The sixty participating artists readily state that their works bear little resemblance to Rockwell's works. They contain no folksy citizens exercising their dearly held freedoms.

The participating artists say they are offering an artistic statement which goes beyond a mere reinterpretation of Rockwell. These artists are attempting to speak to an America in crisis, delivering a message that America's ideals are being eroded and exploited by way of fear. The artists interviewed said that now is not the time to celebrate America's greatness but to warn against complacency. They want Americans to break free from anxiety and the convenient avoidance of today's challenges by just looking the other way.

You may learn more from the links below, and decide for yourself. “Thoughts on Democracy” is on view through Dec. 7 at the Wolfsonian museum at Florida International University, 1001 Washington Avenue, Miami Beach; (305) 531-1001, http://www.wolfsonian.org . Examples of the exhibit may be seen in the July 9 NY Times article, Rockwell Re-enlisted for a Nation’s Darker Mood. Back to the Top