ANIMAL ART OF THE DAY for World Parrot Day: Two Majolica Cockatoos
May 31st is World Parrot Day!
To celebrate, here are two cockatoos seen at the recent Majolica Mania exhibition at the Walters Art Museum:
Category: Museum Visit
ANIMAL ART OF THE DAY for World Turtle Day: an unusual tortoise portrait from 18th Century England, and its connection to Ottoman Turkey
May 23rd is World Turtle Day! This tortoise painting was an interesting find in the British portraiture rooms at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Even the signage acknowledges how unusual it is!
ANIMAL ART OF THE DAY for Penguin Awareness Day: Japanese penguins?
Haori with Penguins and Icebreaker ShipsJapan, mid-Shōwa period, 1957-58silk plain weave, stencil-printed warp and weft[photos by author] Penguins (Spheniscidae) are found almost exclusively in the Southern Hemisphere, with only the Galápagos penguin (Spheniscus mendiculus) skirting the other side of the equator. They definitely aren’t native to anywhere near Japan! I saw…
ANIMAL ART OF THE DAY for International Land Snail Day: Snail gathering ritual on an ancient Moche vessel
“The figures on this Moche vessel hold gathering sticks that collect snails depicted in sculpture relief. The snail gathering ritual is taking place on a mountain suggested by the serpentine lines that arc across the top and front of the vessel. The snails absorbed mescaline-based chemicals while feeding on San…
ANIMAL ART OF THE DAY: Turtle Umblical Amulets
Here are two 19th-century turtle-shaped umbilical cord amulets from the Penn Museum‘s rotating display. The first one I saw on display this past weekend; the second one is from a visit back in 2019. I thought it looked different than what I remembered! 😉 1. Turtle-shaped umbilical cord amulet, Assiniboine…
ANIMAL ART OF THE DAY for World Honeybee Day from the Majolica Mania exhibition
For #WorldHoneybeeDay here is another piece from the Majolica Mania exhibition at the Walters Art Museum:
ANIMAL ART OF THE DAY: Owl Supernatural Decapitator!
Here’s another piece from the Ancient Americas gallery at the Reading Public Museum…“Owl Supernatural Decapitor” needs to be someone’s new goth metal band name In Moche art, birds of prey are sometimes depicted as Supernatural Decapitators who sever the heads of sacrificial victims. This Decapitator Owl has a face with…
ANIMAL ART OF THE DAY from Majolica Mania: Pretty Fly
Here’s another neat piece from the recent Majolica Mania exhibition at the Walters Art Museum:
ANIMAL ART OF THE DAY: Cat and Turtle
I’ve been going through my photos from all my museum visits from the past few years, and came across these photos I took of a fun find from the Met. The Met’s catalog of the Robert Lehman Collection suggests that the painting was inspired in part by Matisse’s Bathers with…
