Old Masters

(Sleeping Venus by Giorgione (1510) - Dresden Old Masters Gallery)

In the early 80´s, when I lived in Washington D.C., I visited a contempory art exhibition consisting of a great number of huge modern paintings. The rather clumsy and downright ugly paintings did not make a great impression on me. I asked the painter - a fairly wellknown compatriot of mine - how long it had taken him to paint all these big canvases. The painter told me that he had finished the works during a couple of weeks before the exhibition.

I have to admit that my already then rather modest interest in the works of contemporary artists almost disappeared after this encounter.

Thank god there is such a wealth of Old Masters to explore! I see no reason to waste time and energy on most contemporary "art". There are many excellent sites with pictures and texts about painters and sculptors who were masters of their art . Here is one of the best.


The Old Masters Picture Gallery of the Dresden art museum is well worth a visit, also a virtual one:

The Old Masters Picture Gallery is the first museum of its kind to open its doors 1:1 in the virtual world, known as Second Life, rather than just creating a fictional exhibition. In this way, the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden are taking on the challenge of the new 3-D potential of Internet presentation and invite you to participate in a special kind of experiment