Fra Angelico’s First Major Altarpiece Gets a Groundbreaking Repair

 

From Artnet:

Antonella Ranaldi, director of Florence and Prato’s cultural heritage office, called the restoration “a case study of the greatest interest that will serve as a model for restorers in the years to come.”

The work is considered Fra Angelico’s first major large-scale work. In the early 1420s, the budding painter-friar, née Guido di Pietro, entered the convent of San Domenico in Fiesole, a complex just north of Florence, where he was tasked with creating an altarpiece for the newly built monastery. In keeping with the fashions of the age, Fra Angelico created a late Gothic style triptych with a liberal use of gold, centering a serene depiction of the Virgin and Child alongside adoring angels and four haloed saints.

Time has not been kind to the San Domenico altarpiece. By 1501, 50 years after the artist’s death, the painter Lorenzo di Credi was commissioned with updating the work to contemporary tastes. He removed the partitions, downsized the Virgin’s throne, and replaced the gold grounding with a naturalistic landscape. Over the coming centuries, the altarpiece was broken up, its parts looted or sold on the antiques market—the original predella, for instance, now belongs to London’s National Gallery. Fra Angelo’s central panel remained at the convent, albeit damaged by haphazard restorations and eaten by wood-boring insects. (Read more.)

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Counterrevolution: Thirty Years of the Conservative Press

 From Mark Judge at Hot Air:

Conservative media has been engaging in hand-to-hand combat with the left for so long that sometimes we forget to pull the lens back and fully appreciate how much we have leveled the playing field. Thirty years ago, if a conservative got destroyed in the media, the only recourse was to submit a letter to the editor of the local Stasi press outlet, where it would be ignored or edited and buried in the paper a week later. Now conservative journalists can actually dismantle lies and even collapse things like a book launch by a major publisher for leftist journalists. 

    Part of what got me thinking about this was reading an advanced copy of the great new book by Victor Davis Hanson, The Counterrevolution: The Fall and Rise of Donald Trump and the MAGA Movement. The book doesn’t come out for a month, and I will have a fuller review then, but in terms of its overall message and how it diagnoses the media, it is a bull’s-eye. Hanson argues that Trump has been the most effective counterforce to the slow crawl of “progressive” politics over the last century - and that kneecapping the media was a crucial part of that. (Read more.)

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The American Revolution in Louisiana and West Florida

From Fellowship and Fairydust:

A few years ago, I was having lunch with my uncle when he said he had joined the Sons of the American Revolution. “But in the 1770s, our ancestors were already in Louisiana,” I said. “It belonged to Spain. How did we have an ancestor who fought for America?”

It turns out, we didn’t. We had an ancestor—a French immigrant to Louisiana—who fought for Spain. From 1779-1781, Spain aided the American cause by ousting the British from their holdings in West Florida, which included Pensacola and Mobile as well as the eastern bank of the Mississippi River from Manchac to Natchez. The name of the colony still resonates today in the “Florida Parishes,” the eight parishes of the State of Louisiana that were once part of West Florida. 

After the outbreak of the American Revolution in 1775, the fledgling United States campaigned to secure the support of European allies, especially Britain’s longtime enemies, France and Spain. Though the King of Spain was unwilling to form an alliance, the Spanish governor of Louisiana, Bernardo de Galvez, privately supported the American cause. He granted loans to American traders shipping military provisions northward from New Orleans and provided covert support to their convoys, which had to pass the British-held settlements on the eastern bank in order to reach American territory.

In 1777, the U.S. Congress rejected a plan to launch a full-scale assault against West Florida. But the Committee of Commerce (formerly the Secret Committee, the first American organization devoted to espionage) knew they had the tacit support of Governor Galvez in New Orleans. So they decided to send a small party of men down the Mississippi under the command of Captain James Willing, ostensibly to convey “public dispatches” to officials in Louisiana.

His real mission was to secure the river. (Read more.)

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Chemise à la Reine vs. Grande Robe Française

This simple style was introduced by Marie-Antoinette and, although she did not wear such a low neckline as shown in the fashion plate above, it still upset many people. The Queen intended the dress for quiet times at Trianon. Via Tiny Librarian:

Chemise à la Reine with bound sleeves, the neckline trimmed with a frill, Marlborough Hat wrapped with a wide ribbon striped in black and colour. (1784)

“Chemises” belonged to the category of simple and comfortable dress which was in vogue from about 1781 overall due to Marie Antoinette.

At the time, one said that an upper-body garment was made en chemise when “the beginning of the sleeves ended in two pieces which were added” (Dictionary of the abbé Jaubert, 1778).  One frequently finds in the notes of Mlle Bertin mentions such as “a piece en chemise of Italian gauze”, “a fichu-chemise* of Italian gauze”, etc.  On the date of the appearance of the “chemises à la reine”, Bachaumont fixes it for us in writing about the portraits of the Queen and Madame, by Vigée-Lebrun, shown in 1783: “The two princesses are en chemise, a costume invented recently for women.”

And he added, “Many people have found it inappropriate that these august personages are offered to the public in a garment reserved for the interior of their palace.”

(Read entire post.)

This gown is an example of the most formal attire possible, which the Queen was trying to get away from. However, people were more displeased by her simple attire than by her grand formal costume. More HERE. Share

Dictators for Life

From Tierney's Real News:

For the past decade, the fake news and liberals in America have been proclaiming that President Trump is trying to be a dictator for life, a King that can never be removed. That is a lie. That is BS propaganda from our enemies. The truth is that the REAL dictators are on the left and part of the Islamo-Communist Red-Green axis and this newsletter will PROVE that.

On Sunday night, in Nicaragua, Communist President Daniel Ortega stood in front of thousands of Sandinista loyalists at the 47th anniversary of the 1979 revolution and said what everyone already knew was true: there will be no more elections in Nicaragua. He finally admitted out loud that Nicaragua is a Communist dictatorship!

 “There won’t be any more elections here for them to try to seize the government and seize power. The days when parties backed by the Yankees and the Somocistas would return to power are over — never again.” (Read more.)

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Sacred Geometry and Gothic Rose Windows

 From  Laboratorio Fiore Scriptorium via Hilary White at The Sacred Images Project:

Geometry in the Middle Ages was not just calculation and measurement, but a sacred language capable of uniting heaven and earth, the visible and the invisible. Every line and proportion thus brought to life a prayer in stone, a tangible testimony of faith carved in numbers.

"Sacred Geometry and Gothic Rose Windows, from Architecture to Miniature": a course designed for those more comfortable with technical drawing than with hand-drawn. Originally offered a few years ago, it is now available again—upon request—for small groups of at least three people. (Read more.)

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"Beautiful Love Story"

Henrietta Maria with two of her Children

Charles I and Henrietta Maria with Charles Prince of Wales and Mary the Princess Royal

The Queen doing Penance at Tyburn

A glowing review from Pursuing Stacie:

I have a huge love for classics. Little Women, Jane Eyre, Anne of Green of Gables…I will reach for these novels again and again, and then sigh happily about 3, 428 times throughout the story. This was exactly my experience while reading My Queen, My Love: A Novel of Henrietta Maria. It just has that rare classic, cozy, wholesome feel. Mind you, there’s plenty of suspense and intrigue. But the story is just so good!

The author skillfully fleshes out the characters and story of Charles and Henrietta, allowing her readers to sink into the novel. When I was about three chapters in, I realized with a start that I had not only completely missed my bedtime, but had forgotten altogether that I was reading a book, so engrossed was I in the story. (Have you ever read a book that feels like a movie?) (You’re about to.)

While the author set a scene masterfully, she also brought these historical characters to life in rich detail. (Might I suggest Googling their names as you meet them, by the way? So fun to put a face to the new friend that you’ve just made.) I adored Henrietta and will carry her with me always. But truly, each character was dynamic and real. From the beautiful love story to the suspense that only villainy can bring, this novel is perfect from beginning to end. (Read more.)

Another review from History From A Woman's Perspective:

Because the two of them worked hard to make their marriage work, they ended up deeply in love with each other which made it satisfying. There is plenty of drama, politics, and courtly intrigue that will engage the reader to keep turning the page! I can’t wait to read the next book in the series to learn what comes next for Queen Henrietta Maria of England! I recommend this for fans of Jean Plaidy, Alison Weir, and Philippa Gregory! My Queen, My Love is a promising start to an enthralling series on one of England’s most tragic queens! (Read more.)

My Queen, My Love and Generalissima are available from Amazon.
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Trump Announces Plan to Replace Illegal Alien Truckers with American Veterans

 From The Western Journal:

President Donald Trump kicked off a new initiative on Thursday designed to fast-track veterans into truck driving jobs.

Trump called the program “Freedom Haulers.”

“We’re taking action to replace these unqualified, migrant drivers with highly qualified American veterans,” Trump said at the White House event, flanked by a military transport truck on one side and a civilian big rig on the other.

“Under our brand new Freedom Haulers initiative, any American who has driven a heavy truck for our military will automatically be eligible for a commercial driver’s license. And it’s good-paying jobs, too,” the president added.

“We’re going to make it as easy as possible for the veterans,” Trump said.

He also noted that those who did not drive trucks in the military will still be eligible to participate in the Freedom Haulers program.

They will receive the necessary training to drive trucks in a matter of weeks. (Read more.)

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The Lamp that Burns Forever

 From Public Discourse:

In one of his most underrated but magisterial works, Perictione in Colophon: Reflections on the Aesthetic Way of Life (2000), Roger Scruton provides a blueprint of what constitutes true and timeless architecture. This is not a book of conventional philosophy, but a literary masterpiece that, in fictional form, describes the world in which we now live. Elsewhere, he describes that world as one of “normal nihilism.” Who, gazing around our city streets, would not agree with him? We have, as it were, normalized nihilism to the point where alienation from the world has become the rule for most people.  

There are many reasons for this, but one of the primary causes, according to Scruton, is that we have forgotten how to build in accordance with time-honored values. He goes further, arguing that we must understand the human urge to build in religious rather than in secular terms. That is because, as he writes:  

The stone of the temple is the earthly translation of God’s immortality, which is in turn the symbol of a community and its will to live. The temple, like the liturgy, is forever, and the community contains not the living only, but also the dead and the unborn. And the dead are protected by the temple, which immortalises them in stone. This is what you understand instinctively when you see religious architecture. And it is the sentiment from which cities grow—the tribe’s will to permanence. 

In glaring contrast, architectural functionalism “hurts both the eye and the soul, for it speaks not of us and our right of dwelling.” Hence, functional buildings “are perceived as a desecration: nothing of the sacred remains in them.” Scruton’s point is that the way we build has consequences far beyond those of conflicting tastes. Whereas innovation in music, painting, and poetry does not directly affect how we live, architecture most certainly does. It is very much a public art centrally bound up with our self-understanding. Put simply, change the way you build, and you change the self-image and values of a people.   (Read more.)

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