Spring Into Art!

Spring is in the air! It's almost daylight savings time, the ground is gloriously brown, my kids shoes are filthy with mud... yes, we just had a blizzard last Wednesday, but never mind that- it's most definitely Springtime! Don't you find everyone in a better mood? At least until allergies start hitting? I just love it. Friends from school start showing their faces again after a long winter of doing the carpool line, everyone is discussing Spring Break plans, Easter is right around the corner... life is good in the Spring, if you ask me.

Judging by the number of paintings featuring Springtime scenes, artists must be as moved by Spring as I. Claude Monet did some of his best work during this season, as did Van Gogh. Persephone, the goddess of spring, has inspired plenty of beautiful art, and birds and blossoms are popular subjects for numerous artists. One of my personal favorite warmish weather artists is John William Waterhouse.

A Song of Spring. It's still too chilly in Michigan to go topless, but good for her!

I love Waterhouse's paintings and not just because his subjects are often redheads. I think they're beautiful and flowy, which fits my Spring mood exactly. His details are gorgeous, his subjects are interesting, and his technique is top notch (says the girl who has no technique). He often painted scenes from Greek mythology, but my favorites are A Song of Spring (above) and Windflowers:

He painted this in 1902, but couldn't this be a breezy hippie wedding in 1968?

There is a theory floating around that the subject in Windflowers may represent Persephone. We know Waterhouse was a fan, having painted her before, plus the flowers are apparently the same sort of poppy as those that Persephone was collecting before Hades kidnapped her. I think it's a pretty solid theory. In other news, if I ever open a flower shop it will be called "Persephone's Poppies." 

Until next week (when we may very well have an ice storm!), put a little Spring in your step!