The Answers to Christmas Details 2013
Tuesday 24 December 2013
Christmas Details 2013
The Answers to Christmas Details 2013
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The Answers to Christmas Details 2013
The Answers to Christmas Details 2013
18 comments:
Thank you for posting this! I missed buying The Independent this year, and my mother (Jenny of the back issues of the Christmas Quiz!) pointed me this way. I agree that it's now become so much easier - back in the day, it would take my mother and me a good week or more to do, and we never, I think, completed it. We had a good home library of art books and would also go to the National Gallery bookshop with a folded quiz tucked up a sleeve! Well, I have nowhere near as good a home resource as my mother does, so nowadays I'm forced to do it mostly online. And it is laughably easy to do so. :-( Simply putting a basic search term into Google has turned up the ones I didn't immediately know. I think this year's is pretty basic in any case. I'm now just looking for the chalk/charcoal drawing, and the lady in red.
Thank you for your comment. I agree with your comments and indeed the nostalgia for the days when the details were much harder to identify. There was so much more satisfaction in finding them! I have similar fond memories of scouring reference books to try to beat the deadline. I, too, am stuck on the sketch/study/drawing and I expect many others will be. too. Make sure when you find it to keep it to yourself and don't publish it on here! I can be contacted on vonthoma@yahoo.com if you need guidance on the red portrait. Good luck
Thank you for posting the images. I did buy the newspaper but no. 14 is impossible to make out - much clearer on the computer but I still haven't figured it out. Or no. 4.
I love it as a game but hate the idea that there's now an app. that can do it for you.
It's nice to know there are other obsessives out there. Let's hope the champers goes to a true seeker!
I too am stuck on nos. 9 & 11. I know I've seen no.11 but can't for the life of me pin it down.I try not to use the internet but may have to resort to it this time!
I can send a better copy of 14 to you, Edinburgher, if you want one. Send any response to vonthoma@yahoo.com
Apps won't find the difficult ones!
I still do not have 9 and I have a bad feeling about it.
Jo, from other correspondence that I have received, 4 and 11 are causing people most problems as well as 9.
P.S. Anyone can write to me on vonthoma@yahoo.com
Yes, 9 is very strange. I can't even decide which period it's from.
I got 4 quite early, by sheer coincidence, when looking for one of the others. 11 is driving me mad!
I wrote last year about my uneasiness with Apps that can find answers just by scanning and uploading images. What satisfaction is there in that?
However, I managed to find all the answers to the 2006/2007 Christmas Details in the days before such Apps existed. But I did use Google Search to find an answer, a detail from a painting by Joan Miro. But this was by guessing that the detail, which bore a stylistic resemblance to Miro's work, might be by Miro. I managed to find a gallery of Miro's works and eventually found the painting. But it took me a long time to find the answer. I do not really see that as any different from using a reference book or a library. So I am not opposed to Google Search, per se.
In response to Jo's last comment, I agree that it is well nigh impossible to decide what period number 9 is from. At least with 11, Jo, you can see what period it comes from and even guess a Movement, which gives you a start at least!
4,9,11 and 14 are driving me crazy!!! 14 I am not even sure I am visualising the detail correctly and no 11 I was convinced I knew it. I may email you Details Detective!!
Details Detective I agree with your comments about the use of Google etc as an online reference book if necessary, and also with your sentiment about apps. Part of the enjoyment for me is looking through books of beautiful pictures, and learning at the same time, even if I don't find the one I'm searching for. My local reference library used to have a very good collection of art books and I've spent many a happy hour browsing through them, but they have now almost all been moved into 'storage' and replaced by audio-books and DVDs. The staff are very helpful and willingly search the bookstore, but it's often impossible to tell them exactly what to look for!
PS I'm STILL not getting anywhere with 9 and 11, but thanks for the encouragement.
At last I have identified 11 and also 14. The colours for the reproduction of 14 are very poor especially in the print copy I had. Any clues for no 4?!
Hello Clecky Well done! You will need to write to me at vonthoma@yahoo.com about 4 as I won't put answers or clues on the Blogger. Sure you understand this.
Well, I am almost resigned to sending in an entry without the answer to number 9! I think I will be in good company. As usual my mind plays tricks and I have imagined a false and invented painting/sketch for 9 just because I have become so familiar with the pesky detail, and I must try to clear this from my mind and be open to something completely different. I might just invent a likely title and painter just to avoid a gap. It would not be the first time.
Number 14 has such sludgy colour reproduction that it completely obscured the telling detail of a very well known painting, and I needed multiple clues from my annoyingly sharp-eyed daughter (1st comment above, and she is only using keywords and a basic Google images search) before I could see it! 4 eluded me, but not her, for ages, and I needed clues. 11 is downright obscure, in my opinion, as I knew only one work from this painter and it was not stylistically helpful.
So, to sum up, what seemed a fairly easy Detail competition, with an early rush of easy familiar images, has come to a juddering full stop. I am having a final push this weekend after a break, but only luck will help. Come in number 9, your time's up!
I'm giving up the will to pursue no 9!!
Well, I've sent off my entry with a guess for no.9, which has eluded me completely. Worth a try?
Jo
And so the 2013 "Child's Play" Christmas Competition passes its deadline with many seekers of truth apparently submitting incomplete entries. Noted that the IoS asked entrants to send their entries to Christmas Details 2102. This year's competition was strange as most of the details were easy to identify. I think that the four causing problems were 4,9,11 and 14. The last of these, 14, was reproduced too darkly and made it hard to see the outlines. 4, I think was a little uncharacteristic of the recognised style of the painter, while 11 was apparently familiar, but hard to identify. But by a distance, number 9 remained elusive, as the postings above testify. I don't think it is a work which is easy to identify, but I have difficulties with drawings as I find establishing their period very tough. For the record, there is a database that I have checked with substantial numbers of pieces of work by the artist in question. This has over 7000 images. Incidentally, it is very very hard to find the image through a Google search. Its identity has to be known in order to find it. The exact title, which is not in English, would need to be entered. The translated English title will not locate it. Even then, it is well down the Search page. All I have to say, from another context, is "Chapeau!" to whoever managed to find the answer. A detail of real difficulty is something to treasure. For those of us who struggled long and hard, it will "never pass into nothingness".
I am out of the country when the answers are published - please would you publish them on this page as I am intrigued to find out where the ones I've been unable to find come from. Thanks
You can obtain the Independent on Sunday online from PressDisplay.com The New Review comes with the paper and it costs 69p (approx)once you have registered, but it is pretty straightforward to register. This does not buy the Sport Section, though. I am not sure what I shall put on the Blogger as there could be copyright issues.
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