Friday, December 7, 2012

The Cloisters!




Violent and sad, but most religious art is. Also, this is a tapestry! A crazy-huge-wall-sized tapestry! 

Here come some forgotten photos! Nik and I went up to the Cloisters way back in October (?!!), and had a nice walk around Fort Tryon park and in the Cloisters museum.  It's right up my alley with medieval art from the 9th-16th century Europe. I have a large fascination with religious and medieval art and basically anything with gold leaf on it makes my heart flutter. The Met is my favorite museum in NYC by far, but I hadn't made it up to their Cloisters branch yet. Plus, I timed it right, so we would be there when the leaves were changing. Leaf-peeping! It's so pretty there! Set in the scenic Fort Tryon park, along the Hudson River, it's a great day trip away from the city. I sounded like a guide-book just now. 

Terrible photo, but they keep the lights low to conserve all the tapestries.
Another wall-sized tapestry, and probably what the museum is most known for. Absolutely love them. Poor 'lil unicorn dude...

Cool braids.

Teeny little handwritten/illustrated books! These were only like 3-4 inches wide.




This looks totally typical until you note the weird thing he is stabbing...

Pretty courtyard

The outside!

View of the George Washington Bridge 
Fort Tryon Park


The arch!


Scenic overlook


Magnificent arch!



2 comments:

  1. Can't believe you got to see the Unicorn Tapestries in person! And those books look amazing. I haven't visited a museum in forever. I miss the experience. Thanks for sharing!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Fun post!

    The braided heads are interesting - are they carved wood? Amazing work. And I think the museum should play "Don't Fence Me In" out of speakers around the famous unicorn tapestry. :-)

    I'm almost speechless over those phenomenally eensy-weensy hand-written and illustrated books! How steady a hand, how sharp an eye, and what an abundance of patience the artisans had to possess! I can't begin to imagine.

    As for the artist who created the image of the knight stabbing the strange creature, I think he was reincarnated as Maurice Sendak!

    The scenery shots are really beautiful. And since it's blizzarding outside my windows right now, it was nice to see a pretty day with the fall foliage, so thanks for the trip back in time (in more ways than one!) :-)

    ReplyDelete