Thought for the Day (Oct 29)

Subject: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: Peter T.
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 09:41 AM

oct 29 - The great art critic, John Ruskin, once said that people seemed not to know that there was the world's best art gallery in the sky every moment, and on some days the exhibitions change through all periods and styles. Where I live, the early morning is almost always and inevitably the crisp blues of the Early Renaissance in the Florence hills, the Fra Angelicos and the Piero della Francescas. Later in the morning, like yesterday, everything becomes the heavier blues of a Dutch landscape. A bright noon is almost always one of those hot blue Moroccan Matisses. Yesterday, around 2:30, the high sky was filled with altocirrus clouds going one way, low cirrus going another, and some high jets with their contrails going a third, and we were all for five minutes in a drippy Jackson Pollock. Most sunsets, teetering on the edge of garish, are Turners, inevitably; but last night, the sky was darkly violet, holding the light and the impending darkness together, and so it was the last brooding Mark Rothkos. And the pale black night sky in the city closes down on Edward Hopper and his lonely cast of characters.

And then sometimes, as Andrei Bolkonsky discovers as he lies dying on the battlefield of Borodino in War and Peace, it is just the sky. "How could I have never seen it before, this sky, this infinite, this secret openly displayed of the unfathomable mystery of things?" (p.t.)

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: Bert
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 09:47 AM

Ah yes, I look here a couple of times a day.

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: Patrish(inactive)
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 09:52 AM

It is amazing, the intoxicating beauty of the things we take for granted.

Patrish

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: annamill
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 10:04 AM

I was thinking just this morning as I was going into work, with the beautiful feathery blue sky, and the brilliant colors of the trees as they reflected on the water, and the birds were flocking their way North, what a very beautiful planet we chose to live on. None of the others could possibly be this beautiful or inviting. I see these paintings every day, every season, every time. How f**king lucky we are!

Love, annap

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: katlaughing
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 10:28 AM

A few years ago, my youngest and I, both who love Maxfield Parrish's works, were driving east on a high loop road to the south of town, up against the mountain sort of. It was getting towrds sunset. There were huge, roiling clouds ahead of us, with blue and rosy light reflecting off of them behind them and through them. We both noticed them at the same time and both exclaimed, "Look, it a Maxfield Parrish sky!" Never saw those back East; only seen them here a handful of times.

Last night, as I was trying to go to sleep, I had an overwhelming panic and fear about moving away from the wide and open skies and spaces of the Rocky Mountain West and their great claps of thunder and spears of lightening which brighten the entire sky. They are always dramatic, which suits my passionate nature.

kat

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: JedMarum
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 11:29 AM

I like this thought for the day. I put these thoughts down many years ago.

Ulman's Field

I love the way your earth moves
When the sun is low in the sky and the shadows are long.

I love the way your fields roll
and hills swell
like waves on the ocean,
Their long grass swaying in response to a gentle breeze.
Their long grass flowing in the gentle breeze.

I love the way you move me
Touch me
Warm my heart.

In your wisdom, you have waited until the end of the day
To share this moment
With those who care to notice.

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: katlaughing
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 11:33 AM

Beautiful, Liam!

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: kendall
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 12:41 PM

Hey Annap, what kind of birds fly NORTH in October?

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: Freddie Fox
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 12:45 PM

Birds in the southern hemisphere, maybe...

I can remember one hallowe'en when I was still nobbut a lass - we were traipsing round the side of a mountain on the edge of a little mining town in South Wales. I happened to look up, and I was almost hypnotised. I hadn't realised what a difference a few hundred feet of altitude could make [I lived in a valley at the time]. Absolutely amazing.

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: annamill
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 01:00 PM

kendall, I just put that in to see if you were really reading this. ;-) Don't your birds fly North? Picky, picky!

Liam, that was beautiful.

Love, (feeling silly) annap

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: Peter T.
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 01:49 PM

Fine poem, liam. Who is Ulman? yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: Lonesome EJ
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 02:20 PM

Peter. You are lucky. I had a Hell of a day yesterday. Breakfast was straight out of Dali. I had Breughel til lunch, then a half hour of Warhol. After lunch it was pretty much Edvard Grieg the rest of the afternoon.

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: Lonesome EJ
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 04:18 PM

I meant Edvard Munch, of course, not Grieg.

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: Peter T.
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 04:29 PM

Trolls on the brain, eh, LEJ?

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: catspaw49
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 06:38 PM

The weather changes of autumn are so often the most spectacular as the frost and warm breezes share the day. No sky for me is ever more beautiful. But I look skyward now and wonder how to dress the kids!

Spaw - BTW Peter, the heron needs a duster over the vest now in the late evening.

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: katlaughing
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 06:42 PM

Needs some waders, in that cold, cold swamp water, too!

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: Art Thieme
Date: 29 Oct 99 - 11:26 PM

I always loved the fantastic white cumulous clouds floating in the bright, sunlit, blue sky over a nightime scene in a town that Renee Magritte's fantastc visions of the world produced.

Art

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day (Oct 29)
From: kendall
Date: 30 Oct 99 - 09:46 PM

sorry annap, didnt mean to be a snot.. but, compass points are critical to sailors