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art, artists, beauty, Gerard Manley Hopkins, inspiration, music, Nature, Paintings, Pied Beauty, poetry
Wassily Kandinsky, Waterfall II
Pied Beauty
by Gerard Manley Hopkins
Glory be to God for dappled things –
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced – fold, fallow, and plough;
And áll trádes, their gear and tackle and trim.
All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise him.
What is it about “dappled” things that so dazzles us?
I ran across this poem, a favorite of mine, not long ago, and was reminded once again of how much nature inspires and excites us. Painters as well as poets have been praising that pied beauty through their artwork down the ages.
Vincent Van Gogh
John Singer Sargeant
John Singer Sargeant
John Singer Sargeant
John Singer Sargeant
Gertrude Fiske
Anne Redpath
Rick Stevens, Immersed
Gustav Klimt
One of my two favorite poems in the whole world! Role-moles all in stipple on that painting!!! I can’t get enough of this poem. And your complementary art is wonderful.
I’m glad you enjoyed this, Luanne. One of my favorite too. What’s your other favorite poem?
Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking. Whitman. Two completely different types of poems.
I’ll have to re-read that one again. Whitman is also one of my favorite poets–I have so many!
Read it out loud. It is meant that way. Me too!
Thank you, Deborah, for this inspiring post that immerses us in beauty.
You are so welcome, Catherine. I enjoyed looking for the paintings to include here.
Lovely poem and collection of dappled paintings!
Thank you so much!
My pleasure. 🙂
What a lovely collection of words and images, Deborah.
As I was scrolling down earlier on my little phone-screen, I got to that Rick Stevens image and immediately thought “Klimt!” and no, but…..Low and behold! There he was, looking to my untrained eyes somewhat un-Klimt-like. Rather more impressionistic work from him than I am familiar with. And yet, how Klimt-like that Stevens piece is….
Thanks for the eye-opener!
I hadn’t thought of Stevens as Klimt-esque. But now that you mention it, I do see the similarity. I agree the painting by Klimt here is more abstract than most of his. I’d wondered about that too. I’ll have to do some research on his work.
I admit to being previously unaware of Stevens’ work, and only passingly familiar with Klimt–it’s just what struck my eye. I shall have to look into Stevens as well–Thanks!
What a feast for eye and heart you have offered here, Deborah! I love the poetry you’ve shared. So evocative in the way it trips off the tongue like a living, dappled thing itself. It’s good to read words I haven’t revisited for a while. The art work is superb as well. I think Rick Stephens’ and Gustav Klimt’s pieces are reminiscent of your own experiments with light and colour, tone and texture, and speaking poetically through art. Lovely! 🙂 x
I’m glad you enjoyed this. You are right, Steven’s and Klimt had been an inspiration for my own artwork. Newly inspired by Hopkins’ poetry as well.