New NPR 新廣播搶讀 荷蘭畫家梅茲介紹

Gabriel Metsu

荷蘭十七世紀知名畫家梅茲

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三幅畫作的介紹

最上方為 A Man Writing a Letter.
左圖為 A Woman reading a letter

另外一張照片只是為了讓大家知道這些畫作的實體大小。幾乎所有的荷蘭藝術大師都擅長畫很小幅的作品。我曾經於十八年前去華盛頓國家藝廊看過Vermeer的回顧展，當時一票難求，去看展的時候，因為畫作太小，加上現場人塞爆展覽室，其實根本看不太清楚。最後只好狼狽的擠出來，買了一本很貴的畫作書交差，最後殺去China Town 大吃一頓好平息心中的遺憾。其實那次媒體大肆批評展覽的場地動線設計不佳，不過作品真的太小，拿放大鏡看還差不多，真難為了遠道而來的藝術信徒。所以有時候還覺得不如看網路上的照片就好了。不過也有人覺得書籍跟網路照片完全不能跟原作相比，因為複製之後reproduce顏色確實會失真。

托福聽力項目經常愛考Art History, 同學不妨聽聽這一則報導，順便觀賞名畫，在賞心悅目的狀況下學習，效果加倍。

Gabriel Metsu: The Dutch Master You Don't Know

From NPR 

The Dutch loved him in his day and the French did, too. But it's taken 400 years for paintings by Gabriel Metsu to get much attention in this country. As NPR's special correspondent Susan Stamberg tells us, the first Metsu retrospective 回顧展in the U.S. has now opened at the National Gallery of Art in Washington.位於美國華盛頓特區的國家藝廊

SUSAN STAMBERG: Rembrandt - sure, we all know him. Vermeer too. But Gabriel Metsu - that's M-E-T-S-U - was right up there with them in the 17th century -the Golden Age of Dutch painting - and for long afterward.

Mr. DAVID JAFFE (National Gallery, London): Metsu was still the top boy數一數二的，頂尖的 in the 19th century. Vermeer is a very early 20th-century discovery.

STAMBERG: Vermeer and Metsu were contemporaries同一個年代的, but Metsu was the star, says David Jaffe of the National Gallery in London, a lender to the D.C. show. (這些展出的作品是倫敦的國家藝廊借給美國的，許多國家都會出借自已的館藏，在世界各地巡迴交流)

In 1664, Metsu painted his crowd pleaser非常受到眾人喜愛的作品,"A Man Writing a Letter."The scribe書記 is young, handsome, in black velvet黑色絲絨, with long blonde curls.

Mr. JAFFE: He's in his sumptuous study擺設非常奢華的書房, a very expensive Persian carpet on a table.

STAMBERG: Hung right next to him, bathed in Vermeerish light from a side window, Metsu's - "A Woman Reading a Letter" the one the blond cutie was writing, no doubt. She has kicked off one shoe a sexy little gold-encrusted mule鑲著金邊的拖鞋. And her yellow top is trimmed with ermine. 黃色的上衣有著白鼬皮滾邊(那個時代只有貴族法官等有錢有勢的人才能穿這種毛皮鑲邊的華麗衣著)

Mr. JAFFE: The most expensive cloth you can wear, which used to be a royal cloth. You can see the black flecks on her fur斑點. She's accessorized to the hilt.裝飾華麗繁複到一個極致

STAMBERG: Expensive clothes, gorgeously painted, fabulous technique - rustic or Biblical scenes鄉村或是聖經的場景 in early works made in his small hometown of Leiden荷蘭西南部的城市來登. Bustling market scenes and fancier folks and fripperies虛榮的裝飾 - the gold, the ermine - once he moved to Amsterdam in the 1650s, with its booming, sophisticated art market.

Whatever the subject, on all his canvases Metsu is telling a story, although the narrative is not always clear.

Mr. ARTHUR WHEELOCK (Curator): What is going on?

STAMBERG: Arthur Wheelock is curator of this Metsu exhibition.

Mr. WHEELOCK: Why are these people coming in the door? What are they seeing? What's going to happen?

STAMBERG: Metsu was a storyteller, Arthur Wheelock says. But it's not always clear what the story is. He worked to paint real emotions, real interactions between people. A weeping woman borrows money. Others eat, cuddle緊緊抱著 a pale, sick child.

Mr. WHEELOCK: But giving us a beginning, middle and end to the story was not what he was after.

STAMBERG: So you think about it later and you talk about it later.

Mr. WHEELOCK: Absolutely. And I think these paintings were huge points of discussion in drawing rooms all through the Netherlands in the 17th century.

Mr. JAFFE: Left wondering - he's a narrative painter畫中有故事或是劇情的, but he's not going to tell you the end of the movie.

STAMBERG: Neither did Metsu's contemporary, Vermeer. But Vermeer was even more mysterious. His exquisite"Girl with a Pearl Earring"and his other women - all caught in moments between moments在不經意的瞬間. In Vermeer, their lives are on pause. Metsu's people are coming from somewhere, going to somewhere, but darned if you can tell how it will turn out.

(Soundbite of crowd)

STAMBERG: Metsu's painterly star faded in the 20th century, and Vermeer became top Dutch boy. Vermeer, with his flattened backgrounds, muted colors不鮮艷的色調 and his distant gazers, looked more abstract to modern eyes. But theNational Gallery show, here until late July, suggests that Gabriel Metsu's time may have come once again.

I'm Susan Stamberg, NPR News, Washington.