Infinite Art Tournament: February 2019

Wednesday, February 27, 2019

Left Bracket Sixth Round Elimination: Caillebotte v. Dürer

And here we arrive at the Sixth Round Elimination. We are down, you know, to 24 -- now, only 22 -- artists. You can see 'em over in the sidebar on the right, if you are at the actual website on an actual computer: the undefeated titans of Sargent v. Vermeer, Leonardo v. Monet, van Gogh v. Varo, and Bruegel v. Degas, and then the one-loss giants of Wyeth v. Sheeler, Rembrandt v. Michelangelo, Homer v. Eakins, Klee v. Patenier, Picasso v. Ely, and Gentileschi v. Benton. Those last twelve will soon be winnowed down to six, to join Caillebotte (who just upset Bosch, 8 votes to 6) and Dürer (who just ended Altdorfer's Cinderella story, a million votes to one).

Basically, you may still find easy choices... but you shouldn't be expecting them.

Gustave Caillebotte
1848 - 1894
French

Impressionists such as... Gustave Caillebotte enthusiastically painted the renovated city, employing their new style to depict its wide boulevards, public gardens, and grand buildings.... Caillebotte’s 1877 Paris Street, Rainy Day exemplifies how these artists abandoned sentimental depictions and explicit narratives, adopting instead a detached, objective view that merely suggests what is going on. - The Met's Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History

Defeated mobile pioneer Alexander Calder in Round 1.
Held out against Edward Burra in Round 2.
Fought to a draw with Caravaggio in Round 3.
Crushed Corot in the Round 3 tiebreaker.
Blasted Mary Cassatt in a Round 4 15-0 blowout.
Beat Frederick Church easily in Round 5.
Lost to Edgar Degas in Round 6.
Upset Hieronymus Bosch in the Left Bracket Sixth Round.

Albrecht Dürer
1471 - 1528
German

No artist better fits Thomas Carlyle's definition of genius, as the "transcendent capacity of taking trouble," than Albrecht Dürer. The industry of the man was breathtaking, his mastery of detail astonishing, yet everything he did seemed fresh and newly minted. The most intellectual of northern Renaissance artists, but the one who responded most immediately to nature, to the world and the people around him, he was profoundly religious yet supremely open-minded.

- New York Times

Defeated Anthony Van Dyck without too much trouble in Round 1.
Art-Brutalized Jean Dubuffet in Round 2.
Went ninja on Donatello in a massive Round 3 victory.
Beat Richard Diebenkorn on his home court in Round 4.
Lost a close one to Edgar Degas in Round 5.
Whupped on Paul Cézanne in the Left Bracket Fifth Round.
Beat Caravaggio in Left Bracket Fifth Round Elimination.
Crushed fellow Albrecht Albrecht Altdorfer in the Left Bracket Sixth Round.

Monday, February 25, 2019

The Songs of the Fifty States: Minnesota

(What is "The Songs of the Fifty States"?)

Mill Pond at Minneapolis by Alexis Jean Fournier (1888).

Minnesota!

Size: 225,163 km² (12^th)

2018 Population: 5,628,162 (22^nd)

Statehood: 1858 (32^nd)

American Human Development Index: 5.90 (6^th)

Art Mecca:

Mrs.5000 and I were in Minneapolis in October, and our hotel was a half mile or so from the Minneapolis Institute of Art. They call it "Mia," which is cute. They've got all sorts of good stuff, 90,000 pieces of it, in fact. Insider, whoever they are, "used data provided by Foursquare" to rank the Institute as the sixth best museum in the United States! That seems a bit aggressive to me, but then I wouldn't have put the Baseball Hall of Fame in fifth position, either. But still, awfully good. After a few hours of wandering about what seemed like a very strong collection, we kind of stumbled on a back half that we hadn't noticed before. So, we came back the next day. We got lost and had a hard time finding our way out, which is a good sign in a large museum. In a lot of states, I talk about their museum being a solid regional collection; in Minnesota, perhaps we have a minor national-class show.

One of the most interesting exhibits was the office of a former curator that had accidentally been walled over and then uncovered decades later, in 2013. It was a fascinating little time capsule, and really had us on!

The second game in town -- there are actually quite a few games in town -- is probably the University of Minnesota's Weisman Art Museum. It's is a very substantial and respectable university art collection, housed in one of those goofy, exuberant Frank Gehry buildings. Which is all fine and good, but it did feel a little bit like when you opened the biggest, most beautifully and elaborately wrapped present under the tree, and it ended up being, like, a nice sweater or something.

Both museums are free, which is really super cool.

Michael 5000's Minnesota

First Visited: May 1, 2005 (7^th)
Most Recently Visited: October 22, 2018 (7^th)

First Run In: 10/16/18 (24^th)
Best Run: 7.09 miles. Minnehaha Trail, Minneapolis, 10/20/18.
Raced In: Yes. Jack's Run 6K, Minneapolis, 10/19/18.

Have Admired the Visual Arts In: Yes.

Have Slept Overnight In: Yes.

Counties Visited: 43/87 (8^th)
% Complete: 49.4% (24^th)

Mrs. 5000's Counties Visited: 32/87 (tied with Idaho for 11^th)
% Complete: 36.8% (24^th)
Mrs.5000 First Visited: November, 1963 (probably 3^rd)
Mrs.5000 Most Recently Visited: October 22, 2018 (7^th)

Atlas of All Roads Travelled

Purple indicates travel by rail; orange by car; green by bus!.

Plans and Aspirations

No particular plans to return anytime soon.

Saturday, February 23, 2019

The Ladder of Art -- Week #13

Cast your votes for up to four of these seven artists by Friday March 2. For clarifications, consult the Ladder of Art FAQ.

At the end of a bye-week in the main tournament, you are no doubt champing at the bit to see some fresh artists here in the Ladder. Unfortunately for you, there's only one new contestant in the mix, as a three-way tie for fourth place in last week's set means that there was only a single vacancy in this week's group. (The only artist who didn't survive last week was my favorite of the set, Patrick Heron, who plunged a record-setting eleven spots in the overall ranking. But I'm not bitter.) We rotate the images, of course, so you'll still see some first-time content! We've got a choir loft by Luca della Robbia in here, for instance, and a sweet portrait by Andrea del Sarto. See for yourself!

Last Week's Results

This Week's Contest

Sebastiano del Piombo
1485ish - 1547
Italian

Tournament Record: Tied for 474th. Lost to Jan van Scorel and Martin Schongauer. 5 votes for, 16 votes against (.238).

Lucian Freud
1922 - 2011
German; worked in Britain

Tournament Record: Tied for 479th. Lost to Helen Frankenthaler and Sam Francis. 6 votes for, 20 votes against (.231).

Tied for Fourth in Week #12.

Andrea del Sarto
1486-1530
Italian

Tournament Record: Tied for 479th. Lost to Fra Angelico and Antonello da Messina. 6 votes for, 20 votes against (.231).

Tied for Fourth in Week #12.

Luca Della Robbia
1400 - 1482
Florentine

Tournament Record: Tied for 481st. Lost to Diego Rivera and Gerhard Richter. 5 votes for, 17 votes against (.227).

Tied for Second in Week #11.
Tied for Fourth in Week #12.

Edward Wadsworth
1889 - 1949
British

Tournament Record: Placed 490th. Lost to Édouard Vuillard and Alfred Wallis. 4 votes for, 16 votes against (.200).

Tied for Third in Ladder Week #6.
Tied for First in Ladder Week #7.
Tied for First in Week #9.
First Place, Week #11.

Baron Antoine-Jean Gros
1771 - 1835
French

Tournament Record: Placed 492th (tie). Lost to Juan Gris and Greuze. 4 votes for, 20 votes against (.167).

Placed Third in Ladder Week #5.
Tied for Third in Ladder Week #6.
Tied for Fourth in Ladder Week #7.
Third Place, Week #8.
Tied for Fourth in Week #9.
In a four-way tie for Second in Week #10.
In a three-way tie for Second in Week #11.
Tied for Second in Week #12.

Lucas van Leyden
1494 - 1533
Dutch

Tournament Record: Placed 494th (tie). Lost to L.S. Lowry and Tony Cragg. 4 votes for, 21 votes against (.160).

Tied for First, Week #5.
Tied for First, Week #7.
Tied for First, again, in Week #9.
Tied for Second in Week #11.
Tied for Second in Week #12.

Cast up to four votes in the comments by Friday morning!

Monday, February 18, 2019

Element of the Month!: Dubnium

February's Element of the Month:

Dubnium!
Db
105

Atomic Mass: 268ish amu
Melting Point: well, you know, it's really hard to...
Boiling Point: yeah, see, there again, you can't really...

Dubnium! Dubnium. Rub-a-dub-Dubnium. It is a totally fakey Element. I mean, Element #94, Plutonium, is by convention the highest-numbered Element that occurs in nature, although we've let a surprising amount of Element #95, Americium, go feral. Then there's Curium, Berkelium, Californium, Einsteinium, and then #100 Fermium, thought to be the highest-numbered Element that could occur in nature in certain extremely, extremely, extremely unusual circumstances. Then there's Mendelevium, Nobelium, Lawrencium, Rutherfordium, and then, finally, the Element of the Month, #115 Dubnium.

It doesn't exist in any meaningful way. The brainiest physics guys in all the lands can only, even at the very highest levels of funding, produce a dozen atoms at a time, and the half-life of Dubnium isotopes peaks at about one day. That means that most of the time, there's no such thing as Dubnium.

At this point, it is tempting to marvel at modern physics, but I'll caution you that Dubnium was first concocted at the Dubna research facility in a land called "the Soviet Union," and that it happened before I was born, and that I am not a spring chicken by any reasonable measure.

The most interesting thing about Dubnium is the controversy around how it was named, and even that is not very interesting.

The Centerfold!


Since Elemental Dubnium is not a thing that can be photographed, we turn -- as we once did for Hassium -- to the My Little Pony fan art community. Dubnium the Pony is "Solitary, Serious, and Grungy" and likes his music loud. He's the creation of Skoryx; image used with permission.

Fake Element chemists have been able to run a couple of experiments with Dubnium compounds, and I would imagine that they've been able to learn or at least confirm some significant ideas about atomic structure and behavior that way. Unfortunately, the summaries of these experiments always sound rather less than earth-shaking, along the lines of "gosh, they made three molecules of dubnium bromide!" In the current Wiki article on Dubnium, an earnest discussion of the chemical literature culminates in this spectacularly banal final sentence: "From the available information, it was concluded that dubnium often behaved like niobium, sometimes like protactinium, but rarely like tantalum."

And there you have it, folks. The few dozen atoms of Dubnium that have ever existed? They have rarely been like Tantalum.

"Dubnium," by Joyce Nielsen. I just found a whole periodic table worth of mixed media pieces by
this Denver artist, and they are all pretty great. Did I mention that my birthday is coming
right up? Because it will be, eventually.

Saturday, February 16, 2019

The Ladder of Art -- Week #12

Cast your votes for up to four of these seven artists by Friday Feb 22. For clarifications, consult the Ladder of Art FAQ.

Last Week's Results