Skip Navigation
Falvey Library
Advanced
You are exploring: Home > Blogs

Share the Love: Seeking Romantic Art for Valentine’s Day?

SHARETHELOVE2

When asked to write a blog about romantic art, I could think of no images to accompany it; this is not a typical subject for this art historian. A search of Falvey’s catalog for “art, romantic” retrieved 297 titles, but these deal with romanticism in art and in literature. A Google search first gave me “Romanticism – The Metropolitan Museum of Art,” followed by “Romanticism – Wikipedia, the free encylopedia” and “images for romantic art.” None of these references yielded the type of images associated with love or Valentine’s Day. What they did have in common were references to a specific period in art history, the style known as Romanticism: a period which lasted from about 1750 to about 1850.

What is Romanticism in art? Broadly defined it is the beginning of modernism. Artists, according to Hugh Honour, had no programs nor common goals but were concerned with “integrity of feeling” (p. 25). Their subject matter is considered romantic because it stresses ideal beauty or strong emotions or combinations of ideal beauty, strong emotions and other materials. Gardner (Art Through the Ages, ninth edition, p. 872) says, “The Romantic artist, above all else, wanted to excite the emotions of the audience.” And these emotions can be either positive or negative.

"John Constable - Salisbury Cathedral from the Bishop's Garden - Google Art Project" by John Constable - SQHNHPBhfP7FBg at Google Cultural Institute,  Licensed under Public Domain via Wikimedia

“John Constable – Salisbury Cathedral from the Bishop’s Garden – Google Art Project” by John Constable  at Google Cultural Institute, Licensed under Public Domain via Wikimedia Is it just us, or is this the view looking east from Tolentine Hall?

This is one of the great ages of landscape painting – J. M. W. Turner, John Constable, Caspar David Friedrich and the American, Thomas Cole are major artists. Other artists with very different subjects are Antoine-Jean Gros, Théodore Géricault, Eugène Delacroix and Henry Fuseli.

The Barque of Dante, Delacroix 1822 (150 Kb); Oil on canvas, 189 x 242 cm (74 1/2 x 95 1/4"); Musee du Louvre, Paris

The Barque of Dante, Delacroix
1822 (150 Kb); Oil on canvas, 189 x 242 cm (74 1/2 x 95 1/4″); Musee du Louvre, Paris

The Metropolitan Museum of Art compiled a list of works of art dealing with love, but again, these will not meet your expectations of romantic, Valentine-type art.

For a more light-hearted approach to the subject, visit, “Love Is in the Air, and in the Art,” by Ken Johnson, “The New York Times, Art & Design,” published Feb. 7, 2013.

Dig Deeper

Metropolitan Museum of Art, “Romanticism.”
Romanticism by Hugh Honour. A classic work.
The Romantic Rebellion: Romantic Versus Classic Art by Kenneth Clark. Another classic.
The Romantic Rebellion by Eric Newton.
Romantic Art in Britain: Paintings and Drawings, 1760 – 1860 by Frederick J. Cummings.
German Romantic Painting by Hubert Schrade
Romantic Painting in America, Museum of Modern Art exhibition catalog.
Historical Dictionary of Romantic Art and Architecture by Allison Lee Palmer.


imagesArticle by Alice Bampton, digital image specialist and senior writer on the Communication and Service Promotion team. 


Like

Now through March 27, Peruse the Bloomsbury Collection

evUntil March 27 the library has a trial subscription to Bloomsbury Collections. This is a collection of e-books from Bloomsbury Publishing, which incorporates the previous Continuum, Methuen, and Berg imprints, among others. The collection is strong across a wide range of humanities and social science disciplines, including classical studies, history, literary studies, philosophy, political science and religious studies.

Click here to access the collections.

BLOOMSBURY

Some highlights: The Philosophy collection contains titles of particular interest in critical theory, postmodernism, political philosophy and aesthetics, as well as a number of excellent series, including Bloomsbury Studies in Continental Philosophy, Key Thinkers, and Ancient Commentators on Aristotle. The Literature collection contains the Arden Shakespeare, and the History collection has a large number of titles on ancient, medieval and early modern topics.

The collection is easily searchable and can be browsed by subject, so it’s simple to find book chapters on your topic of research. It also features a particularly clear interface. Most titles include a book summary/abstract, and individual chapters can be read as HTML, or downloaded and printed as PDF files.

Please contact Nikolaus Fogle (nikolaus.fogle@villanova.edu) with any questions or comments.


Like

Advent Poetry Calendar – Day 25

ADVENT DAY 25

1 Day Till Christmas

“Trust” by Gerald Dierkes
Read by Gerald Dierkes
Submitted by Gerald Dierkes

Gerald Dierkes is an information services specialist, and one of three Falvey staff members to submit one of their own poems for the Advent calendar.

With this final post I would like to thank everyone who has followed along with our Advent calendar as we made our way towards Christmas, my colleagues for contributing their favorite poems, especially my colleagues who bravely shared their own beautiful work with us, and our graduate assistant Michelle for working with me to get each one of these posts up on our blog.

I hope you enjoy our final poem, written and read by Gerald Dierkes, a reflection on trust.

Trust

Joseph, Mary’s husband, did you feel shocked
to learn of Mary’s unplanned pregnancy?
_____________________________Betrayed
by her apparent infidelity
so soon after your commitment to each other?
_____________________________Confused
by Mary’s joy in anticipating her child’s birth?
_____________________________Overwhelmed
by her implausible explanation?
_____________________________Love
as you protected her from legal consequences
of her alleged adultery?
_____________________________Duty
as you accepted responsibility for her child?
_____________________-_______Judged
by your neighbors in your small community?
_____________________________Puzzled
by God’s plan?
_____Why didn’t God arrange things differently?

When Caesar Augustus’ decree forced you to
leave your home in Galilee,
journey to Bethlehem, and
cause Mary to travel in the ninth month of her pregnancy and
give birth away from her home, away from her family, did you ask,
_____Why didn’t God time things differently?

When you sought shelter at an inn for your obviously pregnant wife
—and were refused—
did you think, What gives, God? I’m trying to follow your will, aren’t I?
You persevered, though, finding a shelter for animals in which Mary could give birth,
without her mother, without a midwife, with only you at her side.
Mary did give birth, and God’s Son was born into our world.
_____Why didn’t God plan things differently?

Mere days later, the angel again directed you to change your plans,
this time fleeing to Egypt for an unspecified length of time,
causing your father, Jacob, and Mary’s mother, Ann, to wait years before seeing their grandson.
_____Why didn’t God do things differently?

Did you expect God’s will to be predictable, logical (by human standards), and non-challenging?
Did you ever pause, in your struggle to trust God, to consider how much He trusts you?


Like

Advent Poetry Calendar – Day 24

ADVENT DAY 24

2 Days Till Christmas

“Fra Moses And The Flowers” by Eleanor C. Donnelly
Read by Sarah Wingo
Submitted by Laura Bang

Laura Bang is Falvey’s Digital and Special Collections Curatorial Assistant, and she is found this wonderful historical poem to share. This poem comes from page 2 of the first issue of The Villanova Monthly, from January 1893. The Villanova Monthly was the first student newspaper, running from 1893-1897. Returning after a hiatus in 1916, the paper was renamed The Villanovan.

The poem itself is by Eleanor C. Donnelly (1838-1917), a local Philadelphia Catholic poet. Falvey has digitized the Eleanor C. Donnelly Papers from the American Catholic Historical Society, which can be viewed in our Digital Library.

Dec 23rd FraMosesAndTheFlowers

 

 


Like

Advent Poetry Calendar – Day 23

ADVENT DAY23

3 Days Till Christmas

little tree, by: E.E. Cummings
Read by Alan Davis Drake
Submitted by Melanie Wood

Melanie Wood is Falvey’s Academic Integration Technical Specialist. This poem is, to me, a simple and sweet reminder to take notice of and appreciate the beauty of the little things in life.


 

little tree, by: E.E. Cummings

 

little tree

little silent Christmas tree

you are so little

you are more like a flower

 

who found you in the green forest

and were you very sorry to come away?

see i will comfort you

because you smell so sweetly

 

i will kiss your cool bark

and hug you safe and tight

just as your mother would,

only don’t be afraid

 

look the spangles

that sleep all the year in a dark box

dreaming of being taken out and allowed to shine,

the balls the chains red and gold the fluffy threads,

 

put up your little arms

and i’ll give them all to you to hold

every finger shall have its ring

and there won’t be a single place dark or unhappy

 

then when you’re quite dressed

you’ll stand in the window for everyone to see

and how they’ll stare!

oh but you’ll be very proud

 

and my little sister and i will take hands

and looking up at our beautiful tree

we’ll dance and sing

“Noel Noel”


Like

What We Were Reading in 2014

Though we’re not a public library, sometimes we get asked about what types of items were charged out the most. Of course, those may not always be the most popular items. So, taking a look back at the rapidly fading year 2014, finds the New York Times bestseller, Me Before You by JoJo Moyes, charged out as many times as any of our works. This is followed by perennial favorites, such as the The Holy Bible: New International Version-Containing the Old Testament and the New Testament, Oxford Spanish Dictionary, Mckay’s Modern Italian-English and English-Italian Dictionary, The Grammar Book: an ESL/EFL Teacher’s Course, Advanced Engineering Mathematics, The Documentary History of the Ratification of the Constitution (now also online), Phaedo, Catch-22, Ulysses, Lolita, Beloved: a novel and Catcher in the Rye.

Screenshot 2014-12-12 10.51.18

Popular this year too was the New York Times bestseller Flash Boys, followed by titles such as Gone Girl: a novel, the Gabriel García Márquez novel, El Coronel No Tiene Quien le Escriba, All Names Have Been Changed, Organic Chemistry as a Second Language: First Semester Topics (second semester topics not as popular), Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Methods Approaches (2014), The Fault in Our Stars, and The Laramie Project.

Screenshot 2014-12-12 10.51.45

Popular leisure reading material this year can be summed up in one sentence (more or less): Good News, for the Best of Me, in America’s Great Game, don’t Blink but Would It Kill You to Stop Doing That since 1345, or do you want a Casual Vacancy because you’ll have No Easy Day if you’re an Alchemist, English German Girl or a Racketeer.

Some of the most selected movies this year include perennial favorites like Citizen Kane; Groundhog Day; 2001, A Space Odyssey; and The Tree of Life. Other movies, The Corporation, Taxi to the Dark Side, Adaptation, Nun’s Story and La Jetée Sans Soleil were also charged out several times.

0KN3sONID7C2DBlMfWR_n3lRKxILMg-edK0UQEZalws

Very requested subjects and books borrowed through our interlibrary loan and E-ZBorrow services were The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, The Goldfinch: a Novel, and books about counseling, statistics, public speaking and science fiction.

Screenshot 2014-12-12 10.51.56

Happy holidays from all of us to all of you – and we hope Santa puts some of your favorite reading material in your stocking. But if not, you know the first place to visit once you get back on campus! Click here for Christmas and New Year break hours.


Like

Advent Poetry Calendar – Day 17

ADVENT DAY 179 Days Till Christmas

“‘Hope’ is the thing with feathers” by Emily Dickinson
Read by Jean Aked
Submitted by Laura Matthews

Laura Matthews is Falvey’s Library Events and Outreach specialist, and she submitted “’Hope’ is the thing with feathers,” saying,

“Although somewhat cliché, I like Emily Dickinson. It seems like she was a real legit lady that didn’t care what other people thought. I like that. My mom introduced me to this poem several years ago. I like it because hope is such a magical thing and when I read this poem it makes my heart smile.”

I too like Emily Dickinson very much, and I’m pleased to share this poem on our advent calendar.

Read by Jean Aked:


“Hope” is the thing with feathers
By Emily Dickinson

“Hope” is the thing with feathers –
That perches in the soul –
And sings the tune without the words –
And never stops – at all –

And sweetest – in the Gale – is heard –
And sore must be the storm –
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm –

I’ve heard it in the chillest land –
And on the strangest Sea –
Yet – never – in Extremity,
It asked a crumb – of me.


Like
1 People Like This Post

Advent Poetry Calendar – Day 15

ADVENT DAY 1511 Days Till Christmas

“Animal Rhymes” by William L. Greene, Jr.
Read by William L. Greene, Jr.

Little did I realize when I proposed this project that we had so many talented poets in our midsts right here at Villanova. William L. Greene, or Bill as we know him, is an Access Services Specialist at Falvey Memorial Library and he submitted several of his own poems for our advent calendar.

The first installment from Bill is set 6 of fun and cheeky rhymes that Bill was kind enough to read for us: Animals

Dec 14 Bill Animals

Image provided by William L. Greene


Like
1 People Like This Post

Advent Poetry Calendar – Day 14

ADVENT DAY 1412 Days Till Christmas

“Lines for Winter” by Mark Strand
Introduced by Garrison Keillor
Read by Mary Louise Parker
Submitted by Joanne Quinn

Joanne Quinn is the Team Leader for Communication & Service Promotion at Falvey Memorial Library. Joanne was kind enough to submit this poem and the story of how she came to find it: “A sleepless night led to a serendipitous discovery of an NYPL produced podcast of a conversation between Jessica Strand and her father, poet laureate Mark Strand. Their familial banter and his humor drew me in, and I chuckled when he oomphed over the hefty pages of his collected works, Collected Poems, published last month. Strand died Thanksgiving weekend at the age of 80.

When I pulled myself out of bed, I Googled Strand and found this poem. I don’t know about you, but in the year-ending swirl of tests and reviews and finals and navel-gazing, it was just what I needed to hear. I wonder, and hope, that at my life’s end, I’ll too be oomphing over the heft of my own collected works.”

You can access the podcast Joanne references here.

Read by Mary Louise Parker:


“Lines for Winter”
By Mark Strand

Tell yourself
as it gets cold and gray falls from the air
that you will go on
walking, hearing
the same tune no matter where
you find yourself—
inside the dome of dark
or under the cracking white
of the moon’s gaze in a valley of snow.
Tonight as it gets cold
tell yourself
what you know which is nothing
but the tune your bones play
as you keep going. And you will be able
for once to lie down under the small fire
of winter stars.
And if it happens that you cannot
go on or turn back
and you find yourself
where you will be at the end,
tell yourself
in that final flowing of cold through your limbs
that you love what you are.


Like

Advent Poetry Calendar – Day 13

ADVENT DAY 13

13 Days Till Christmas

“‘Twas the Night Before Finals” by Andrew Hund
Read by Sarah Wingo
Submitted by Bob DeVos

Bob DeVos is the Falvey Memorial Library Interim director, and he submitted “’Twas the Night Before Finals,” saying that it was a poem that he regularly sent to students the night before the Big Test. If you were a student of his during the holiday season, it will probably be familiar to you.

‘Twas the Night Before Finals read by Sarah Wingo


Ode to Finals Week!

Twas the night before finals, and all through the college,
The students were praying for last minute knowledge.
Most were quite sleepy, but none touched their beds,
While visions of essays danced in their heads.

Out in the taverns, a few were still drinking,
And hoping that liquor would loosen up their thinking.
In my own apartment, I had been pacing,
And dreading exams I soon would be facing.

My roommate was speechless, his nose in his books,
And my comments to him drew unfriendly looks.
I drained all the coffee, and brewed a new pot,
No longer caring that my nerves were shot.

I stared at my notes, but my thoughts were muddy,
My eyes went a blur, I just couldn’t study.
“Some pizza might help,” I said with a shiver,
But each place I called refused to deliver.

I’d nearly concluded that life was too cruel,
With futures depending on grades had in school.
When all of a sudden, our door opened wide,
And Patron Saint Put-It-Off ambled inside.

His spirit was careless, his manner was mellow,
When all of a sudden, he started to bellow:
“On Cliff Notes! On Crib Notes! On last year’s exams!
On Wingit and Slingit, and last minute crams!”

His message delivered, he vanished from sight,
But we heard him laughing outside in the night.
“Your teachers have pegged you, so just do your best.
Happy Finals to all, and to all, a Good Test!”


Like

« Previous PageNext Page »

 


Last Modified: December 12, 2014

Ask Us: Live Chat
Back to Top