My auntie turns ninety-five in a couple weeks. Her favorite word is ABBONDANZA, Italian for abundance.
She has asked me (more than once) not to spend money on presents for her. I will make her something instead.
Meanwhile, she told me she has ordered a big box of fancy, mixed chocolates from a candy maker in her neighborhood, for me and my coworkers.
Maybe I will calligraph this as a birthday card--the generous sower is very her:
"Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly,
and whoever sows generously will also reap generously."
--2 Corinthians 9.6
❧ ❧ ❧
Along the lines of giving freely...
Talking about watery things with Sarah of Circles of Rain, I came across this Bosch painting I'd never noticed before: "St Christopher Carrying the Christ Child".
www.boijmans.nl/en/collection/artworks/101481/saint-christopher-carrying-the-christ-child
Talking about watery things with Sarah of Circles of Rain, I came across this Bosch painting I'd never noticed before: "St Christopher Carrying the Christ Child".
www.boijmans.nl/en/collection/artworks/101481/saint-christopher-carrying-the-christ-child
Curious background details, like a little dog drinking water, lower right.
According to the 13th-century Golden Legend (Legenda Aurea) of Jacobus de Voragine, which tells the lives of the saints, Christopher was a giant named Reprobus (Latin for ‘rejected’) who helped people across a dangerous river.
One day, a small child asked to be carried across. As Reprobus carried the child on his back across the river, his burden became heavier and heavier.
On the other side, the child said, "Indeed you have been carrying the whole world on your shoulders, for I am Jesus Christ".Reprobus took the name Christopher, ‘bearer of Christ’.
His attributes are a tree (usually used as a staff, sprouting fresh leaves), a branch, a spear, a shield, and he may be shown as a man with a dog’s head.
--via
A dog's head! "Understanding The Dog-Headed Icon of St-Christopher", Orthodox Arts Journal
Bosch was such a peculiar painter. I've never seen this painting before, at least not that I remember. What's going on in the tree over Christopher's shoulder (on the left side of the canvas)? Looks like a bear hanging from a noose? The little drinking dog must be an allusion to the "dog's head" phenomenon.
ReplyDeleteSTEVE: I'm just starting to read about the iconography of this paining, and sad to say, yes, that's a bear-hunter catching a bear in the background--gruesome.
ReplyDeleteNot that that's unusual for Bosch.
Other dead things are around--the fish, a fox hanging from a tree...
Fascinating and a very strange painting indeed. Do you know where it is kept? I could look that up really!
ReplyDeleteSARAH: I should have put a link! You could go see it (one day)---
ReplyDeletethe Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam, the Netherlands.
www.boijmans.nl/en/collection/artworks/101481/saint-christopher-carrying-the-christ-child
Thank you! And I meant to say, happy birthday to your auntie!
ReplyDelete