偽，muteness of a Chinese jar。

哥窯自縊後結晶了胭脂蜜：

Being broken by an inferior essence, a failed poem of pretense is made even more poetic than the knees of an antiquarian butterfly.

—“a violent slap of the exquisite” (a melody from the New Aristocrats manifesto)

Very drawn to artist Lukas Wegwerth's series of ceramic works “Crystallisation” displayed at Maison & Objet, Paris—
“The sure, sweet cement, lime and glue of love”* oozing out of celadon crazing of yore... (*Robert Herrick, The Kiss)

All I may, if small,
Do it not display
Larger for the Totalness —
’Tis Economy

To bestow a World
And withhold a Star —
Utmost, is Munificence —
Less, tho’ larger, poor.

～Emily Dickinson, from The Single Hound: Poems of a Lifetime (CXIII.)

“Heaven knows we need never be ashamed of our tears, for they are rain upon the blinding dust of earth, overlying our hard hearts. I was better after I had cried, than before—more sorry, more aware of my own ingratitude, more gentle.”

—Charles Dickens, Great Expectations

“From my rotting body,
flowers shall grow
and I am in them
and that is eternity.”

—Edvard Munch

The Moments of Dominion

That happen on the Soul

And leave it with a Discontent

Too exquisite—to tell—

～Emily Dickinson

Troisième Symphonie de Gustav Mahler
Ballet de l'Opéra de Paris (Nolwenn Daniel & Christophe Duquenne, Mélanie Hurel & Alessio Carbone)
Deuxième Mouvement: Printemps
Choréographie de John Neumeier

soundless music (to the new year) & Emily

W. S. Merwin's poetry never ceases to move me... his words and images create a realm of soundless music where I long to be, where poetic yearning is such poignant and yet quiet beauty.


With what stillness at last
you appear in the valley
your first sunlight reaching down
to touch the tips of a few
high leaves that do not stir
as though they had not noticed
and did not know you at all
then the voice of a dove calls
from far away in itself
to the hush of the morning

so this is the sound of you
here and now whether or not
anyone hears it this is
where we have come with our age
our knowledge such as it is
and our hopes such as they are
invisible before us
untouched and still possible

～"To the New Year," by W. S. Merwin

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And my beloved Emily... on this new day.

It's all I have to bring today— 

This, and my heart beside— 

This, and my heart, and all the fields— 

And all the meadows wide— 

Be sure you count—should I forget 

Some one the sum could tell— 

This, and my heart, and all the Bees 

Which in the Clover dwell.

～"It's all I have to bring today," by Emily Dickinson

A fine and rare celadon-glazed shell-shaped brush washer, seal mark and period of Qianlong.
Photo credit: Sotheby's.

徽宗之天青潤澤: Huizong's Celadon Tone Poems singing in Whistler's Visions

雨過天青雲破處，者般颜色做將來。 

Clouds part after the morning rain, colour of the sky,

Such is the colour of the days beyond.

白如玉、薄如纸、明如镜、聲如磐。

Fair as jade, fine as paper, brilliant as mirror, and sounds of grandeur.

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“You could say that when I slowly descended those rarely used steps to the small, always deserted beach, I was making use of a magical process in order to bring myself closer to the possible monad that is my self.”

～Fernando Pessoa, The Book of Disquiet

“...having shed its bright load, the relieved leaf unbent. Tip, leaf, dip, relief - the instant it all took to happen seemed to me not so much a fraction of time as a fissure in it, a missed heartbeat, which was refunded at once by a patter of rhymes: I say 'patter' intentionally, for when a gust of wind did come, the trees would briskly start to drip all together in as crude an imitation of the recent downpour as the stanza I was already muttering resembled the shock of wonder I had experienced when for a moment heart and leaf had been one.”

～Vladimir Nabokov, Speak, Memory

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*Two paintings by Whistler: “Nocturne Blue and Silver － Cremorne Lights” (1872) & “Nocturne, Blue and Silver: Battersea Reach”

Whistler’s emphasis on sensation and atmosphere over detailed description has been compared by some to the philosophy underpinning Gardner’s whole museum. “I see the entire museum as a correlative to these shadowy tone poems,’’ wrote the poet and critic Wayne Koestenbaum of Whistler’s nocturnes. (The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum)

Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775-1851), On Lake Lucerne, looking towards Fluelen, around 1841. Watercolour, with scraping out and marks made with the thumb, over graphite on wove paper, 223 x 283mm. The Courtauld Gallery, London.

‘The aim of the great inventive landscape painter must be to give the far higher and deeper truth of mental vision, rather than that of the physical facts.’ ～John Ruskin

瑰寶：淨白月牙

Tear stains of the feather-light ivory glaze
And two faintest lotuses etched by the sharpest
From the farthest melodies of the Silk Road
Echoed the most lingering fragrance, that left me
With ancient music, and 
Everlasting time in asphyxia

【北宋 定窯 白瓷劃花蓮紋長頸瓶】 

功能為盛裝器、花器，全器施牙白色釉，釉薄而明亮。器面留有流淌的「淚痕」，腹的下緣和足圈壁及器底均有露胎處，胎骨輕薄，胎土呈白色。器腹斜刀淺劃兩組蓮花。 (台灣國立故宮博物院 ， 陳列室：207) 

Ding Ware, Northern Song Dynasty, 

National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan.

Princesses of Ming 明

All exquisite jewellery below by Ming Design, London.

Qing Dynasty royal emerald snuff bottle, 19th Century. 
十九世紀 御用翡翠饕餮紋鼻煙壺 (image via 寒舍藝術中心)

Chinese Princess: Lantern Earrings

Pavé-set diamonds, black & green enamel, 18ct white and yellow gold

The Great Wave off Kanagawa (神奈川沖浪裏, Kanagawa Oki Nami Ura, lit. "Under a Wave off Kanagawa"), by Katsushika Hokusai (葛飾北斎).

Japanese Princess: Hokusai Water Earrings
Brilliant-cut diamonds, marquise-cut sapphires, blue enamel, 18ct white gold

Chinese Princess: Pagoda Ring

Onyx, square-cut emeralds, 18ct yellow gold

Tibetan Monastery (image via)

Tibetan Princess: Monastery Ring

Natural imperial jade, 18ct yellow gold

明 隆慶 甜白雙龍戲珠紋碗 (image via)

Chinese Princess: Dragon Chasing Flaming Pearl Earrings

200 pavé-set diamonds, rubies, Tahitian pearls, 18ct white gold

 傳統藝術 蝙蝠剪紙女紅 (image via)

Chinese Princess: Happiness Bat Earrings

108 pavé-set diamonds, white gold

Tibetan prayer wheels (image via)

Tibetan Princess: Open Ring

Pigeon's blood rubies, 18ct yellow gold

Kusho 1, by Shinichi Maruyama

Film still from Gion Bayashi 祇園囃子 (1953), directed by Kenji Mizoguchi

Japanese Princess: Tourmaline Ribbon Ring

7.64ct oval-cut Brazilian tourmaline, brilliant-cut diamonds, 18ct yellow gold

 Details of an Indian miniature painting (image via)

Indian Princess: Paisley Earrings

27cts emerald drops, 3.66cts brilliant-cut diamonds, 18ct white gold

an albinistic peacock

Japanese Princess: Swan Hoops

590 pavé-set diamonds, 18ct white gold

 Phoenix Hall (Amida Hall, or 鳳凰堂 hōō-dō), Byōdō-in (平等院), Uji City, Kyoto Prefecture, Japan {image via}

Tokyo Imperial Palace

Japanese Princess: Aquamarine Drops

30cts pear-shaped aqamarines, pavé-set diamonds, 18ct white gold

The Lake Palace, Udaipur, Rajasthan, India (image via)

Indian Princess: Lake Palace Cuff

Natural yellow brilliant-cut diamonds, 18ct yellow gold

藍

Between all the different shades of blue, there is form. And then there is the absence of form ― a freedom from resolution. There is music.

清 刺繡 峰頭十丈 Embroidery painting from Qing Dynasty, China.

Girl with a Pearl Earring, 1665, by Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675).

Vase of Flowers with Blue Ground, 1956, by Sanyu 常玉。

“... if you then consider none but those whose discriminating vision has been refined through contact with literature and art, he was convinced that the eye of that individual who dreams of ideal beauty, who craves illusions, who seeks some mystery in his women, is as a rule attracted to blue and its derivatives...” 

― Joris-Karl Huysmans, À rebours, 1884

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Pierre Fournier plays Zoltán Kodály Sonata for Solo Cello, Opus 8. Recorded in November, 1960.

北宋 官窯青瓷 Guan ware, Northern Song Dynasty, China.

元 鈞窯 天藍紫斑如意枕 Jun ware, Yuan Dynasty, China.

The Painter to the Moon, 1917, by Marc Chagall (1887-1985).

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Arnold Schoenberg: String Quartet No. 3, Op. 30, Movement I (1927). Recorded in 1937 by the Kolisch Quartet under Schoenberg's supervision.




Arnold Schoenberg: String Quartet No. 4, Op. 37 (1936). Recorded in 1969 by LaSalle Quartet.

Turquoise Wine Jar, Ming Dynasty, China.

Althea, 1895, by John White Alexander (1856-1915).

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Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov: Scheherazade, Symphonic Suite, Opus 35. The Sea and Sinbad's Ship/ Conductor: André Previn; Orchestra: Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra.

北宋汝窯青瓷橢圓洗/ Ru ware, Northern Song Dynasty, China.

Blue Waterlilies, 1919, by Claude Monet

“The word itself has another color. It’s not a word with any resonance, although the e was once pronounced. There is only the bump now between b and l, the relief at the end, the whew. It hasn’t the sly turn which crimson takes halfway through, yellow’s deceptive jelly, or the rolled-down sound in brown. It hasn’t violet’s rapid sexual shudder or like a rough road the irregularity of ultramarine, the low puddle in mauve like a pancake covered in cream, the disapproving purse to pink, the assertive brevity of red, the whine of green.”

― William H. Gass, On Being Blue: A Philosophical Inquiry, 2007.

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Hilary Hahn plays Schoenberg Violin Concerto, Op. 36 (1936). Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen.




Leonard Pennario plays Sergei Prokofiev Vision Fugitives, Opus 22.
Complete score: 1. Lentamente 1:10, 2. Andante 1:20, 3. Allegretto 0:49, 4. Animato 0:40, 5. Molto giocoso 0:27, 6. Con eleganza 0:37, 7. (Arpa) Pittoresco 1:30, 8. Comodo 1:10, 9. Allegretto tranquillo 0:56, 10. Ridicolosamente 0:40, 11. Con vivacita 0:59.

Edvard Munch, Kiss by the Window, 1892, oil on canvas, 73 x 92cm, The National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design, Oslo.

Pablo Picasso, La soupe (The soup), 1902-1903, oil on canvas, 38.5 x 46cm, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada.

Claude Monet, Water Lilies, 1915, oil on canvas, 151.4 x 201cm, Neue Pinakothek, Munich, Germany.