Birthday at the Museum

For my birthday this year, Dan took me to see the Impressionists' exhibit at the Kimball Art Museaum in Fort Worth. This collection of paintings is on loan from the Chicago Institute of Art until November 2nd. If you have the chance to go and see it, I highly recommend going! What an opportunity to see these historical works of art in person! There is even a free audio tour included in the price of admission. And Tuesdays are half-price!

Here is just a taste of what we enjoyed viewing:

Edgar Degas, The Millinery Shop

Degas is famous for his paintings of ballerinas. There was one on display in a dark hallway to protect it from deterioration. The dim lighting made the uplight from the stage was even more brilliant. In The Millinery Shop, you are left to wonder whether this woman is an aristocrat trying on hats or if she is a hat maker herself. The hat she is holding is unfinished in comparison to the others, leading you to believe she is probably the hat maker.

Edouard Manet, The Races at Longchamp

Note the different point of view of this race--head on, rather than from the side, and the energy that that creates. Manet was one of the first "Impressionist" painters. He inspired artists like Monet. Rejected from the traditional exibition hall, the Salon, many of these inspired artists held their own exhibitions. Their critics gave them the name, the Impressionists. Though meant as an insult, these artists liked the name and adopted it proudly.

Claude Monet, Water Lilies

To see Monet's works in person were breathtaking! You could actually see how he thickly layered the paint. Also on display were several of his Stacks of Wheat studies.


Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Two Sisters (On the Terrace)

Renoir is my favorite. I love his use of color and the softness of his images. I learned that he was an apprentice to a porcelain painter! Maybe that's why I have such an appreciation for his work....my Mema and Uncle Lynn are both divine porcelain painters!



Georges Seurat, a sketch for La Grande Jatte

This oil paiting was one of 30 small sketches he made in preparation of the final work that never leaves the Art Institute of Chicago. That work (probably about 12 ft high by 18 ft long) incorporates his distict style, pointellism, in which his paintings are comprised completely of tiny little dots of color. You may remember this one from Ferris Beuller's Day Off : )


Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, At the Moulin Rouge


I always remembered this funny little guy from studying about him in my high school French class. Toulouse-Lautrec was a very short man (he had stunted growth in his legs after a riding accident when he was young) who loved to hang out at the Paris caberet, the Moulin Rouge. In this painting, his friends are featured sitting around the table while he and his cousin pass by behind them (he is the short guy), and the blue lady was a singer there who had some sort of drug addiction that turned her skin bluish.


Vincint Van Gogh, The Bedroom

There were only a couple of Van Gogh's paintings on display in this exhibit. He was remembered as saying that this was one of his favorite places....this plain, sad little room. Van Gogh was one of those brilliant mad men. I would have liked to have seen his Starry Night, which he painted while in an asylum.

Berthe Morisot, Woman at her Toilette

I was unfamiliar with this artist until this exhibition. She was one of two women featured in this exhibition of the Impressionist movement. She was the sister-in-law of Edouard Manet. This painting was my favorite in the whole exhibition. Her light and airy brush strokes just glimmered!

What about you? Which are your favorites?


Thank you, Dan, for a wonderful birthday gift!

I love you!