Bogtrotter
Senior Member
Definitely underestimated Gehry on this- under the circumstances he definitely delivered.
|
|
|
simuls
Senior Member
This was on wiki. Also on wiki, how did someone make this?
I've noticed a camera perched atop one of the Victorians across from the AGO and it hasn't moved. There seems to be a video cam plus a still cam. The roof also has a wind turbine and solar panels from what I can tell. Good view of this house from the Italian Sculpture gallery!
BobBob
Senior Member
^ I think that's Steve Mann's house.
Wait - so this is the guy with the "modern" eyesore across from the AGO littered with photovoltaic panels and various others gadgets? I'm not against the equipment per se, but geez, what a hovel that place has become! Call in an architect Steve and get it cleaned up!
42
adma
Superstar
I was about to answer likewise. (I guess his place is to here what Ernst Zundel's old joint is to Carlton. Motivations totally different, of course.)
smuncky
Senior Member
for those who don't have a membership...
Stay connected with us. Join AGO Mobile and sign up for our mobile alerts.
Gotta Go AGO – By opting into this FREE * bi-weekly service, you'll receive information alerts, contests, coupons and other special offers. Plus, you'll be the first to know about upcoming exhibitions and special events. For a limited time when you subscribe to this service, you'll receive a complimentary admission ticket to the Art Gallery of Ontario.
To subscribe, text WHOA to AGOAGO (246246) on your mobile device.
* Standard carrier charges apply. Tickets are limited, subject to availability and valid until January 18, 2009. Must be redeemed by showing your special mobile code at the AGO box office. Non transferable. One Free admission per person per mobile. Ontario residents only.
Please note this offer does not apply to pre-formed adult, tour or school groups. It is an offer to be redeemed on a individual basis only.
http://www.ago.net/mobile-alerts-fall-2008
-------------------------
this is great since there is definitely not enough time to view the whole gallery during the free 2.5 hours on wednesday. you also avoid a huge lineup which happens on wednesday nights.
Stay connected with us. Join AGO Mobile and sign up for our mobile alerts.
Gotta Go AGO – By opting into this FREE * bi-weekly service, you'll receive information alerts, contests, coupons and other special offers. Plus, you'll be the first to know about upcoming exhibitions and special events. For a limited time when you subscribe to this service, you'll receive a complimentary admission ticket to the Art Gallery of Ontario.
To subscribe, text WHOA to AGOAGO (246246) on your mobile device.
* Standard carrier charges apply. Tickets are limited, subject to availability and valid until January 18, 2009. Must be redeemed by showing your special mobile code at the AGO box office. Non transferable. One Free admission per person per mobile. Ontario residents only.
Please note this offer does not apply to pre-formed adult, tour or school groups. It is an offer to be redeemed on a individual basis only.
http://www.ago.net/mobile-alerts-fall-2008
-------------------------
this is great since there is definitely not enough time to view the whole gallery during the free 2.5 hours on wednesday. you also avoid a huge lineup which happens on wednesday nights.
Filip
Senior Member
I'm copy pasting this from SSC - my views on the new AGO.
I spent 3h in the AGO today.. Here's my critique (and direct comparison to the National Gallery in Ottawa).
From first glance, you'd expect them to arrange the European galleries in a chronological order, or at least by style. The AGO having relied so heavily on private donations has split the European galleries by donators which has left a piece meal impression on me (I couldn't completely consolidate everything). The NGC has galleries by styles which makes it much easier to appreciate when its contemporaries hang alongside them.
The collection: well impressive. The NGC, I felt, had a far larger amount of sculptures and especially medieval European religious art, but the ones displayed in the AGO were far more impressive. The first gallery you're most likely to walk into is the Italian renaissance gallery. First Bernini's 'Corpus' stands in the middle of the room, far smaller than I expected, but still humbling. Alongside the walls there are two Tintorettos I believe, a Carvagghio, and for some reason a French renaissance painter whose name escapes me atm. Going along the left side to the next galleries you are greeted by more Italian art, a room of Dutch portrait painters from the 17th century with some great examples of the incredible realism of Hals' paintings. Eventually you reach the Thomson galleries.
Thomson donated an incredible amount of art and such an amusing amount of little trinkets! There were these interesting beer mugs made of carved ivory depicting mythological scenes of rape, murder, love.. Whatever you could possibly muster! Eventually dragging your feet through all these trinket galleries you reach one room dedicated solely to Rubens. In the back stands the Massacre of the Innocents, absolutely breathtaking from the scene it depicts to the execution. The detail is just so astounding that you can't help but stand and stare. To my surprise on the left stood an even bigger Rubens: Samson and Delilah. Reading about it I see this seems to be a loan from the National Gallery in London, probably reciprocity over having Massacres hanging there for a few years. There are a few anatomical sketches by Rubens on the far wall.
One room particularly amazed me; The Parisian salon. An entire wall is plastered with dozens of fairly large paintings from French impressionists to the English (Turner, Reynolds, etc) and with a few Canadian artists in there as well. Rodin's the thinker and Adam stand in the middle. One particular painting particularly caught my fancy. I believe it is an English artist of an Italian noblewoman with red hair and a naughty expression about her. She seems as if she's taunting you with a little secret she knows.
There are a few random galleries throughout the European section with strewn works by Poussin, Renoir, Magritte, Picasso - without any sort of order which bothered me greatly.
The Canadian collection is far, far greater than the collection at the National Gallery. It is well known that the AGO is the place to go to if you have a fetish for copious amounts of group of seven works.
The modernism tower was... Interesting. I'll admit, modernism is not my cup of tea, but I did enjoy the Warhol and reading those funny interactive pieces of art with random sentences strewn together.
Overall, while the National Gallery has a richer collection of European art, the AGO delivers more 'blockbusters'. Now whether this is a good thing, or a bad thing is up to you. I enjoyed it, but left slightly unimpressed.
I saw one of the UT members there... Saw his pic somewhere on the forum, but recognized him instantly at the gallery.
I spent 3h in the AGO today.. Here's my critique (and direct comparison to the National Gallery in Ottawa).
From first glance, you'd expect them to arrange the European galleries in a chronological order, or at least by style. The AGO having relied so heavily on private donations has split the European galleries by donators which has left a piece meal impression on me (I couldn't completely consolidate everything). The NGC has galleries by styles which makes it much easier to appreciate when its contemporaries hang alongside them.
The collection: well impressive. The NGC, I felt, had a far larger amount of sculptures and especially medieval European religious art, but the ones displayed in the AGO were far more impressive. The first gallery you're most likely to walk into is the Italian renaissance gallery. First Bernini's 'Corpus' stands in the middle of the room, far smaller than I expected, but still humbling. Alongside the walls there are two Tintorettos I believe, a Carvagghio, and for some reason a French renaissance painter whose name escapes me atm. Going along the left side to the next galleries you are greeted by more Italian art, a room of Dutch portrait painters from the 17th century with some great examples of the incredible realism of Hals' paintings. Eventually you reach the Thomson galleries.
Thomson donated an incredible amount of art and such an amusing amount of little trinkets! There were these interesting beer mugs made of carved ivory depicting mythological scenes of rape, murder, love.. Whatever you could possibly muster! Eventually dragging your feet through all these trinket galleries you reach one room dedicated solely to Rubens. In the back stands the Massacre of the Innocents, absolutely breathtaking from the scene it depicts to the execution. The detail is just so astounding that you can't help but stand and stare. To my surprise on the left stood an even bigger Rubens: Samson and Delilah. Reading about it I see this seems to be a loan from the National Gallery in London, probably reciprocity over having Massacres hanging there for a few years. There are a few anatomical sketches by Rubens on the far wall.
One room particularly amazed me; The Parisian salon. An entire wall is plastered with dozens of fairly large paintings from French impressionists to the English (Turner, Reynolds, etc) and with a few Canadian artists in there as well. Rodin's the thinker and Adam stand in the middle. One particular painting particularly caught my fancy. I believe it is an English artist of an Italian noblewoman with red hair and a naughty expression about her. She seems as if she's taunting you with a little secret she knows.
There are a few random galleries throughout the European section with strewn works by Poussin, Renoir, Magritte, Picasso - without any sort of order which bothered me greatly.
The Canadian collection is far, far greater than the collection at the National Gallery. It is well known that the AGO is the place to go to if you have a fetish for copious amounts of group of seven works.
The modernism tower was... Interesting. I'll admit, modernism is not my cup of tea, but I did enjoy the Warhol and reading those funny interactive pieces of art with random sentences strewn together.
Overall, while the National Gallery has a richer collection of European art, the AGO delivers more 'blockbusters'. Now whether this is a good thing, or a bad thing is up to you. I enjoyed it, but left slightly unimpressed.
I saw one of the UT members there... Saw his pic somewhere on the forum, but recognized him instantly at the gallery.
Urban Shocker
Doyenne
Do people still expect major galleries to only display their works in strict chronological order, though? The AGO began to abandon that severe approach decades ago. There are interventions of contemporary art throughout the European historical galleries - a couple of films by Kara Walker in gallery 119 near the Brueghels, for instance; a campy Kent Monkman Laocoon in gallery 238 next to colonial era canvases; an upside-down Rodney Graham photograph of a tree next to an Emily Car tree painting in gallery 228, etc. The ROM does much the same thing, using contemporary art as an entry point to their historical collections. They mix and match cultural objects with chunks of rock in their new Minerals gallery, too, to show how pigments derived fom the natural world were used to decorate dinnerware.
The European galleries haven't been arranged by donors, apart from the huge Thomson bequest and the Henry Moore gallery that was set up in the 1970s. As you indicate, there are separate themed European galleries for Italian baroque, 17th century Flemish and Dutch, French impressionism ( contrasted with salon paintings ), women in art, still life, the nuclear age etc. The European galleries surrounding the Walker Court have been named after donors, though - Frank Wood, for instance, who gave them some real beauties.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_P._Wood
The Italian broad with the red hair was the famous Marchesa Casati, painted by Augustus John, referred to earlier on this thread. There's another paining by John - in gallery 123 which features women in art and women artists.
The European galleries haven't been arranged by donors, apart from the huge Thomson bequest and the Henry Moore gallery that was set up in the 1970s. As you indicate, there are separate themed European galleries for Italian baroque, 17th century Flemish and Dutch, French impressionism ( contrasted with salon paintings ), women in art, still life, the nuclear age etc. The European galleries surrounding the Walker Court have been named after donors, though - Frank Wood, for instance, who gave them some real beauties.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_P._Wood
The Italian broad with the red hair was the famous Marchesa Casati, painted by Augustus John, referred to earlier on this thread. There's another paining by John - in gallery 123 which features women in art and women artists.
BobBob
Senior Member
In slightly wider context:
jks
Continuous Lurker
LMFAO, like i said in the Murano thread, that building is everywhere
EDIT: Should this go to the Buildings and Architecture section, as it is completed, with all the galleries installed?
EDIT: Should this go to the Buildings and Architecture section, as it is completed, with all the galleries installed?
simply Dan
Active Member
LOVE the blue Japanese titanium - absolutely stunning.
Observer Walt
Senior Member
Nice picture BobBob, thank you. It's hard to imagine how there could have been a greater contrast between front and back.
BobBob
Senior Member
The blue looks... strange. I was convinced that it was some sort of protective coating which would be removed eventually. That and the boxy junk on top of the main box just looks a bit clunky to me.
CharmAlarm
Active Member
Couldn't agree more! When the cladding was going up...I couldn't figure out which was the supportive cladding(ie.that could be peeled away as suggested - I think it was silverish) and which was the actual cladding (blue). Becuase of the texture it does look like the blue backing to support some future cladding. Should have gone with a different shade of blue. Oh well.
simply Dan
Active Member
The blue colour continually changes depending on lighting and weather conditions.