From the Royal Parks in London at the turn of the 19th century, through the parks of Paris, Rome, Vienna, New York City and Brooklyn.
painting
The sound of music from Vermeer, Menzel, James Tissot, Hanna Pauli, Edouard Vuillard and others, from palaces to the homes of the middle class.
Ultramarine blue for Mary’s cloak, red for the Passion, cardinals and the scarlet woman. Other colour codes, including their importance in multiplex narrative.
How ancient Egyptians painted women white and men more swarthy in colour. Separately, colour coding of devils brought similar distinctions.
The faithful king turned into a woodpecker, Aeneas’s long war against Turnus, his founding of the city of Alba, and promotion to deity on his death.
He turned to painting the waters and coasts of the English Channel, with acclaim at the Royal Academy and rich rewards, sufficient to pay for the boats he used as studios.
A relatively latecomer, he started painting Pre-Raphaelite landscapes in 1856, with stunning results in the Alps, and his monumental view of Florence, but those proved unsuccessful.
Crowds in the cities of Paris, Berlin with its new electric trams, and the rush hour in New York City. People, horse cabs, trams and early cars everywhere.
Keeping the aspidistra flying in the homes of the respectable middle classes, in paintings from Carl Larsson to Paul Signac and Harriet Backer.
More secular stories from Belgian coal mines, the Kalevala, Nabi public gardens, family life, to the 12 panels of the Ghent Altarpiece and Japanese woodblock prints.
The Eclectic Light Company 