‘Writers know, the first sentence is always the hardest.’
A quote from ‘Keep the Words Coming’ ‘The Writers Guide to Life’ by Pauline Luke and Julie Capaldo.
Monthly Archives: March 2012
Bianca in a Field of Summer Flowers
My friend Bianca in a field of summer flowers many years ago…
Filed under A Writer’s Notebook
The Handwriting Exhibition
.
Handwritten
ten centuries of manuscripts from staatsbibliothek zu berlin
Date:
26 November 2011 – 18 March 2012
Opening hours:
Open daily
10am to 5pm
Extended hours 2012
Open until 9pm on Thursdays
19 January to 15 March 2012
Open until 11pm on Fridays and Saturdays
2 and 3, 9 and 10 March 2012
Location:
Exhibition Gallery
Cost:
Free
free exhibition tickets
This extraordinary exhibition features 100 unique manuscript treasures from the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin (Berlin State Library). Spanning more than 1000 years of history, the exhibition includes exquisite illuminated manuscripts, rare letters, sketches and documents and priceless musical scores, each handwritten by major figures in literature, religion, science, music, exploration and philosophy. Beethoven, Galileo, Goethe, Kafka, Michelangelo and Napoleon are just some of the many names represented in this exhibition.
From Dante’s Divine Comedy and a manuscript by Einstein, to Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro, this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to explore some of the most significant moments in thought and human endeavour.
The exhibition is being shown only in Canberra.
Filed under A Writer’s Notebook
The Handwriting Exhibition in Canberra, Australia
An email from my dear friend Bianca who lives in New South Wales, Australia.
I went firstly to see the Handwriting Exhibition with exhibits going back as far as The Venerable (Saint) Bede (673-635) to early 1900s. Michelangelo’s handwriting was so beautiful and Marie Curies was perfectly formed. Napoleons was terrible. It was really exciting to see the handwriting of so many historically famous people. On Friday we went to see the Renaissance exhibition. The works were from the early period right through to the late period of the Renaissance. I found it most interesting to see the development from the stiff, flat expressionless figures of the early works, to the full rounded and expression filled figures of the final period. The richness of colour in the later works is amazing.
Of all the masterpieces, my favourite was by a lesser known painter, Cosme Tura ‘Madonna and Child’ (stylish in its composition, but the subtle expression of suffering on both faces reflects what is to come), plus Carlo Crivelli ‘Madonna and Child’ with all its symbolism, Bernardino Di Mariotto ‘The Lamentation of Christ’ (which(for me) could almost be a modern painting) and Jacopo Bassano ‘Madonna and Child with the young Saint John the Baptist’ so full of tenderness and love. Andrea Solario’s ‘Ecce homo’ (Behold the man) is a small scale painting, which held me transfixed for quite some time.
The portraits of Giovan Battista Moroni left me without words to describe them. If you can Google them, look up his painting ‘Portrait of a child of the house of Redetti’ and ‘Portrait of an old man seated’. The exhibition is well worth seeing.
I then was able to take in an exhibition by the Australian photographer, Frank Hurley from his Antarctic collection.
Filed under A Writer’s Notebook
what elise wrote 