A Photo a Week Challenge – Blue

Posted on November 25, 2018 by Mama Cormier

…thanks to Nancy Merrill for hosting the Photo a Week Challenge

My second most favourite colour is blue. Here are my entries for the theme blue.

Cee’s Black and White Photo Challenge – Sculptures, Statues and Carvings

Posted on August 24, 2018 by Mama Cormier

….thanks to Cee for hosting the Black and White Photo Challenge

This summer I’ve spent as much time as possible visiting art galleries, museums and gardens. The first group of photos are from the grounds surrounding the McMichael Gallery in Kleinberg. These amazing sculptures were created by Ivan Eyre.

The next set were taken at the AGO from the Rebecca Belmore show. Rebecca is an Anishinaabekwe artist who is known for her performance and installation work.

WPC – Unusual

Posted on July 20, 2017 by Mama Cormier

….this week’s theme for WordPress’ photo challenge is unusual

A few ‘unusual’ finds on my walk today.

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Thursday Doors – February 2, 2017

Posted on February 2, 2017 by Mama Cormier

…thanks to Norm from Norm 2.0 for hosting Thursday Doors

Last weekend my husband and I took a drive to Niagara Falls to meet up with our daughter and granddaughter. It was a cold and grey day, not the nicest for taking pictures of the Falls. When we arrived at our daughter’s hotel room we decided to get in the car and drive along the Niagara Parkway towards Niagara on the Lake.

We stopped at the Old Winery Restaurant and enjoyed a very nice lunch. Winnie enjoyed her bread and some of her mommy’s soup and her own macaroni and cheese.

After lunch we decided to drive around and take in some of the sights from the car. We were hoping that Winnie would nap and luckily she did. My husband grew up in the area and he decided to take a stroll with the car down memory lane. We headed towards St. Catharines, where he was born and he pointed out to our daughter the first place he lived in as a young child before moving to Niagara Falls. Not too far away was Rodman Hall which is now an art gallery.

The Thomas Rodman Merritt House was built over 150 years ago on a beautiful hillside property and is the perfect venue for special events, parties and weddings. The mansion features stained glass windows, 11 Italian marble fireplaces, patterned inlaid hardwood floors and ornate plaster mouldings. Today it is part of the University of Brock and hosts the visual arts students from the Honours Studio course.

The Rodman Hall Art Centre features the work of artists from Niagara, Ontario, Canada and the world. It houses a permanent collection of over 1000 objects, including paintings, sculptures, photographs, prints and drawings. While I was there they were featuring a special show called A Sublime Vernacular: The Landscape Paintings of Levine Flexhaug. I could also hear the sounds of workshops going on down the hall from the entrance. Throughout the year the hall hosts a variety of studio programs for children and adults, art camps and thematic family programs.

I would love to go back in the summer when I could enjoy the gardens and the interesting sculptures that are scattered throughout the property.

Cee’s Black and White Photo Challenge – Statues, Sculptures and Carvings

Posted on January 12, 2017 by Mama Cormier

……thanks Cee for this week’s theme

Florence, Italy -An Art Lovers Paradise

Posted on September 14, 2016 by Mama Cormier

…..Florence is well known for famous sculptures, paintings and architecture

Everyone told me I’d love the art in Florence. There certainly was a lot of it. The city is noted for its culture, Renaissance art, architecture and monuments. The city also contains numerous museums and art galleries, such as the Uffizi Gallery and the Palazzo Pitti.

Florence was home to one of European history’s most important noble families, the Medici. In 1469, Lorenzo de Medici, grandson to Cosimo, took over control of the city from behind the scenes. He was a great patron of the arts, commissioning works by Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Botticelli. To his peers he was known as Lorenzo il Magnifico which ironically was also the name of the street our apartment was on.

If you are going to Florence in the near future I would recommend that you prebook your tickets to the Uffizi Gallery. We booked on line the night before and went right to the front of the line when we arrived at our designated time. In fact we were ushered to an even faster line because we had the baby with us. Even though the baby was free of charge they wanted to see her passport before they gave us our tickets. We didn’t have the passport so we pleaded ignorance. Who knew? Did they think we were going to smuggle in an adult on an infant’s ticket? Other than that, getting into the popular Uffizi was quick and relatively easy and well worth the few extra euros to book ahead of time.

We never did get to see the real Michelangelo’s David. The two in the gallery above were replicas. I thought I would be disappointed if I didn’t get to the real one but there was so much to see and do and it was so hot in Florence that it wasn’t worth the ultimate exhaustion we would have suffered trying to get to the Galleria dell’Accademia di Firenze, which is now the home of Michelangelo’s sculpture of David. Maybe I’ll go there the next time I’m in Florence.

Ciao!

Bench Series #49

Posted on December 6, 2015 by Mama Cormier

….. for the month of December Jude from Travel Words challenges us to post a bench of our choice

When I saw that I could post a photo of any bench that I liked I remembered coming across two very unusual benches in the park that I frequently walk through. These two benches are part a memorial garden for the former patients of the Lakeshore Psychiatric Hospital that closed its doors in the late 1970s. They look more like sculptures but you can sit on them.