The Lovers’ Chronicle 10 November – dream noir – art by William Hogarth, Théophile Steinlen & Louis le Brocquy – birth of Vachel Lindsay

Dear Zazie, Here is today’s Lovers’ Chronicle from Mac Tag dedicated to his muse. Do you dream in noir? Rhett

The Lovers’ Chronicle

Dear Muse,

have to go with one of the darkest songs;
“And now my bitter hands
Chafe beneath the clouds
Of what was everything
Oh, the pictures have
All been washed in black
Tattooed everything”
”Such a beautiful sad song”
any Pearl Jam and Eddie Vedder
”Works for me”
you know i created a playlist
just of songs with black in the title
”Wait, let me lie down before
I fall over in shock”
ha, no falls my sweet
and trust me,
there are a lot of black songs
”I would never challenge
your expertise on that subject,
but you have left your noir era”
i have and now our dreams shine

© copyright 2023.24 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

oh yes, anything black or dark, Leonard asked; you want it darker, oh hell yeah, books, movies, art, poetry, music, humor, everything as dark as possible, drinks too; coffee, beer, wine, rum, pull the shades, be the darkness. perhaps that is why you were so welcome, light at last, shinin’ in my dream noir

could be the topic every day
plenty of tales left to tell

in the early years went there
for sanctuary
escapin’ all kinds of problems

plus cannot resist any opportunity
to weave Inception references
into poetry

and darkness, please, promptin’
not necessary

so, grab your totem, baby
where would you like to go

Pale Love, Pale Rider

join me ‘cross this vision
lone and wild and we will sing
a song unsung, past doubts,
past what was long denied

we will live rare,
to our own tune

this is somethin’ to believe in

a force, even, say it
la forza del destino

we are there
swear to you
this is us

but you revisit not my eyes

to find no dawn
nightmares unveiled
not the more cease
i to wonder where
the Muses haunt

clear, smit with fervent verse
beneath tremblin’ flesh, feelin’s
pour and wash over, consumin’

nightly i visit this place we created

follow from afar
where are, only dreamers

lead me ‘cross this dreamland
lone and wild and i will sing
this song unsung
past doubts,
past what was long denied

we will live rare at dawnin’ there
singin’ this song, to our own tune

this is somethin’ to believe in

a force, even, say it
la forza del destino

we are there
swear to me
this is us

or how ’bout this dream…
over shared bottles
of superb pinot noir,
also called the most
romantic of wines,
or sex in a glass,
we laugh and talk
and…

and on this night,
time does not exist

Quantum of solace
I suppose
In the verse
In you

“Do you think
you’ll be able to sleep now”
I do not think the dead care
“I wish I could set you free”
Me too

“Think on your sins”
Every dang day

La forza del destino
I know, I know
you think I do not know that
never said I would not willin’
to pay the price

“room service”
I did not order anything
not even you

“how much
do you know about fear”
all there is

But I git words
from the pain and
I am afraid
if the pain goes
away, the words
will go away

“They call you, The Man,
the Myth, the Legend”
I just smiled and said,
You will just have to
find out for yourself

Chasin’ the light
And her image
In the pictures
I take, in the
Sketches I make,
And the words I
Write. Pursuin’
The dream of her

The dances in
My dreams, the stars
In the sky, the
Radiance in
The sunrise and
The words that I
Write. That is where
You will find her

So is this a measure of who you are/what you are: On a long roadtrip, what you think about the most is who you are/what you are.

This weekend, I drove 1000 miles (about 16 hours) in less than 36 hours. I wrote poems in my head for most of that 16 hours.

Today is the birthday of William Hogarth FRSA (London; 10 November 1697 – 26 October 1764 London); painter, printmaker, pictorial satirist, social critic, and editorial cartoonist who has been credited with pioneering western sequential art. His work ranged from realistic portraiture to comic strip-like series of pictures called “modern moral subjects”. Knowledge of his work is so pervasive that satirical political illustrations in this style are often referred to as “Hogarthian”.

In 1731, Hogarth completed the earliest of his series of moral works, a body of work that led to wide recognition. The collection of six scenes was entitled A Harlot’s Progress and appeared first as paintings (now lost) before being published as engravings. A Harlot’s Progress depicts the fate of a country girl who begins prostituting – the six scenes are chronological, starting with a meeting with a bawd and ending with a funeral ceremony that follows the character’s death from venereal disease.

The inaugural series was an immediate success and was followed in 1733–1735 by the sequel A Rake’s Progress. The second instalment consisted of eight pictures that depicted the reckless life of Tom Rakewell, the son of a rich merchant, who spends all of his money on luxurious living, services from prostitutes, and gambling – the character’s life ultimately ends in Bethlem Royal Hospital. The original paintings of A Harlot’s Progress were destroyed in the fire at Fonthill House in 1755; the oil paintings of A Rake’s Progress (1733–34) are displayed in the gallery room at Sir John Soane’s Museum, London, UK.

When the success of A Harlot’s Progress and A Rake’s Progress resulted in numerous pirated reproductions by unscrupulous printsellers, Hogarth lobbied in parliament for greater legal control over the reproduction of his and other artists’ work. The result was the Engravers’ Copyright Act (known as ‘Hogarth’s Act’), which became law on 25 June 1735 and was the first copyright law to deal with visual works as well as the first to recognise the authorial rights of an individual artist.

On 23 March 1729 Hogarth married Jane Thornhill, daughter of artist Sir James Thornhill.

Hogarth was buried at St. Nicholas Church, Chiswick, London. His friend, actor David Garrick, composed the following inscription for his tombstone:

Farewell great Painter of Mankind
Who reach’d the noblest point of Art
Whose pictur’d Morals charm the Mind
And through the Eye correct the Heart.

If Genius fire thee, Reader, stay,
If Nature touch thee, drop a Tear:
If neither move thee, turn away,
For Hogarth’s honour’d dust lies here.

Gallery

Satan, Sin and Death (A Scene from Milton’s `Paradise Lost’)

A Harlot’s Progress plate 1, Moll Hackabout arrives in London at the Bell Inn, Cheapside

Plate 2 Moll is now a kept woman, the mistress of a wealthy merchant

Plate 3 Moll has gone from kept woman to common prostitute

Plate 4 Moll beats hemp in Bridewell Prison

Plate 5 Moll dying of syphilis

Plate 6 Moll’s wake

portrait of his wife, Jane Thornhill

Before 1731

after 1731

Miss Mary Edwards 1742

“The Orgy” — A Rake’s Progress

Eva Marie Veigel and husband David Garrick, c. 1757–1764, Royal Collection at Windsor Castle

The Shrimp Girl c1740 National Gallery #

Marriage A-la-Mode: 1, The Marriage Settlement, The marriage contract

Marriage A-la-Mode 2, The Tête à Tête, Shortly after the marriage

Marriage A-la-Mode: 3, The Inspection, The visit to the quack doctor

Marriage à-la-mode: 4, After the old Earl’s funeral, The countess’s morning levee

Marriage A-la-Mode: 5, The Bagnio, The killing of the earl

Marriage A-la-Mode: 6, The Lady’s Death, The suicide of the countess

Today is the birthday of Théophile Steinlen (Théophile Alexandre Steinlen; Lausanne, Switzerland 10 November 1859 – 13 December 1923 Paris); Art Nouveau painter and printmaker. He was politically engaged and collaborated with anarchist and socialist press.

sculpting a cat in 1913

In his early twenties he was still developing his skills as a painter when he and his wife Emilie were encouraged by the painter François Bocion to move to the artistic community in the Montmartre Quarter of Paris. Once there, Steinlen was befriended by the painter Adolphe Willette who introduced him to the artistic crowd at Le Chat Noir that led to his commissions to do poster art for the cabaret owner/entertainer, Aristide Bruant and other commercial enterprises. Steinlen included cats in many of his illustrations, and even published a book of his designs, Dessins Sans Paroles Des Chats.
Steinlen was buried in the Cimetière Saint-Vincent in Montmartre.

Gallery

love

Nu devant un miroir

Modèle lisant (1898)

Motocycles Comiot

Trottin sous la pluie

Les midinettes, 1907

In “Compagnie Française des Chocolats et des Thès,” Steinlen includes his wife and daughter in the illustration

Cat in the Moonlight ca.1900

Today is the birthday of Vachel Lindsay (Nicholas Vachel Lindsay; Springfield, Illinois; November 10, 1879 – December 5, 1931 Springfield); poet. He is considered a founder of modern singing poetry, as he referred to it, in which verses are meant to be sung or chanted.

Lindsay’s private life was rife with disappointments, such as his unsuccessful courtship in 1914 of fellow poet Sara Teasdale before she married rich businessman Ernst Filsinger.

In 1924 he moved to Spokane, Washington, where he lived in room 1129 of the Davenport Hotel until 1929. On May 19, 1925, at age 45, he married 23-year-old Elizabeth Connor.

Lindsay had a serious love affair with Lucy Bates, a professional modern dancer who lived in New York City. His poem “How a Little Girl Danced” was dedicated to her.

Crushed by financial worry and in failing health, Lindsay sank into depression. He died by drinking a bottle of Lysol. His last words were: “They tried to get me; I got them first!”

Verse

I will not be a slave to my yesterday. I am creator, not a parrot.

I think that my first poetic impulse is for music; second a definite conception with the ring of the universe…

Poetry is for the inner ear

And today is the birthday of Louis le Brocquy (Dublin 10 November 1916 – 25 April 2012 Dublin); painter. His work received accolades in a career that spanned some seventy years of creative practice. In 1956, he represented Ireland at the Venice Biennale, winning the Premio Acquisito Internationale (a once-off award when the event was acquired by the Nestle Corporation) with A Family (National Gallery of Ireland), subsequently included in the historic exhibition Fifty Years of Modern Art Brussels, World Fair 1958. The same year he married the Irish painter Anne Madden and left London to work in the French Midi.

Le Brocquy is acclaimed for his evocative “Portrait Heads” of literary figures and fellow artists. Towards the end of his life, le Brocquy’s early “Tinker” subjects and Grey period “Family” paintings attracted attention on the international marketplace, placing le Brocquy within a select group of British and Irish artists.

The artist’s work is represented in numerous public collections from the Guggenheim, New York to the Tate Modern, London. In Ireland, he is honoured as the first and only painter to be included during his lifetime in the Permanent Irish Collection of the National Gallery of Ireland. Le Brocquy was survived by his daughter Seyre from his first marriage (1938–1948) to Jean Stoney, and his two grandsons John-Paul and David; his second wife Anne Madden whom he married in 1958, and their two sons, Pierre and Alexis.

Gallery