Draped to the Ankles

Heart of Darkness

I just had to post this picture of my son. He's a good looking kid, but he's also really good with photoshop.

All you young girls can stop drooling, he's taken!

Not So Unisex Fashions

I have discovered something that is probably common knowledge to most other people already. Unisex fashions in the high schools are NOT unisex. On the surface, everyone is wearing blue jeans, T-shirts and hooded sweatshirts. But leave it to our young to figure out a not-so-subtle way of creating "girl" clothes vs "boy" clothes. Girls' jeans are practically painted on. When I first realized this, I wondered how they found pants to fit like that. And no, it's not like I'm watching girls' asses all day long. I just want to know how I can get that. So I went searching and figured it out - lycra in the jeans. Ok, this was probably obvious to every other woman in America, but I was never quick on the uptake when it came to fashion. So I have to figure things out the hard way. Anyway, I went searching and found a few pairs that actually fit that way. They do show off a shapely butt very nicely.

And the boys? Baggy, baggy, baggy. Not one pair of pants that manages to hug any part of the body. That puzzled me until I figured out the whole boys vs girls thing. Now I get it. Only gay men wear tight jeans. I have one student whose jeans are so loose that he sits on his belt. I keep thinking that can't be all that comfortable. There are a few girls who wear baggy jeans but they are either unconcerned with boys, or are sadly too skinny to fill a pair of jeans.

Now all my baggy jeans are "mom jeans." And the tight ones are date jeans. Woohoo!

Changing Tastes

I was reading an article on American artists in Paris in the Smithsonian Magazine the other day. Anyone familiar with 19th century art will recognize the names of Whistler and Cassatt and possibly Childe Hassam. But what struck me was the discussion of a certain painting that has become relatively well-known today.

Now, before you look at the painting, let me tell you what was said. The painting is a full-length portrait of a woman in high-society. It was not commissioned - the artist just wanted to paint her and display the work in the yearly Salon. When he finally did, it was considered scandalous and the lady's mother was convinced her daughter's reputation was completely ruined.

both painter and sitter were vilified as "detestable" and "monstrous." One critic wrote that the portrait was "offensive in its insolent ugliness and defiance of every rule of art."

The artist hung onto the painting for years until he finally sold it to the Met in 1916. By then, it was not considered quite so scandalous due too a minor change the artist made. Here is the work.

Madame X (Virginie Avegno Gautreau) by John Singer Sargent, 1883

If you are anything like me, you will look at this and marvel at the beauty of this portrait and wonder how anyone in their right mind could consider it ugly or offensive. But 120 years makes a big difference in our perceptions. In all fairness, I have to say that the portrait originally showed one of the jeweled straps of her evening gown carelessly askew, and that was a big part of the painting's scandalousness. Still, you wouldn't think it would warrant the reaction it got. I imagine these same critics would have had coronaries when Picasso and his bunch started showing their cubist works. But that's what artists have been doing for 150 years, shocking their audiences and challenging the status quo. Nowadays, it takes a lot to shock us, but it can be done. The question is, why? Why is it so important for artists to continue to shock and challenge? When was the last major art movement, and what did it do for us?

But I digress. I just wanted and excuse to show this beautiful portrait of Madame X. Stunning, isn't she?

Bidding on Picasso

Want to know where to find the richest people in th world? Try attending an auction of modern masters. A Russian buyer practically stole Picasso's Dora Maar au Chat for a mere $95.2 million. I have seen stories on news shows about how incredibly rich some russians have gotten in the past decade, but this really points it up. When they start showing up to buy art, you know they've hit the big time. The Art Newspaper article says they aren't sure which russian billionaire actually bought the painting - it was one of two possible men. Whoever it was, he outbid Steve Wynn, the Las Vegas casino owner who has been amassing a pretty decent collection to show in his properties out there. The "mysterious" russian bidder also outbid a couple of other American billionaires.

"Don't Even Think of Bringing Gum"

Somehow, I missed this excitement when it happened. A 12-year-old boy stuck chewing gum on a Frankenthaler at the Detroit Institute of Arts. Wow, talk about kids with no sense of right and wrong. What gets me is that it happened at all. We go to our little art museum here and the guards are constantly telling kids not to even touch the walls, let alone get close to the artwork. I think the DIA needs to re-think their guard policies, because I'm sure there are more than a few underage philistines out there who would find this kind of thing hilarious.

Still Lifes

The NY Times has an article on the still life images of Peter Claesz. This artist is representative of the 17th Century Dutch still-life artists. Very realistic, lots of gleaming objects, images of excess and the requisite momento mori images of skulls.

Pieter Claesz
Still-life with Turkey-Pie
Oil on wood
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

While trolling Blogshares (surprise!), I came across a modern artist doing the same type of thing. She's not alone. Lots of artists really like the old Dutch still-life tradition, like this one.

The image I chose above doesn't really show you what the modern artists are doing, so I've added this:

Pieter Claesz
Still-life with Wine Glass and Silver Bowl
Oil on wood, 42 x 59 cm
Staatliche Museen, Berlin

Cluck, Cluck

Oh, this is just great. It seems the Tate Gallery in London, one of the most prestigious art galleries in the world, has sprouted feathers and a yellow streak. They have decided not to exhibit John Latham's "God is Great," for fear of offending the Muslims. This art work "consists of a large sheet of thick glass with copies of Islam, Christianity and Judaism's most sacred texts - the Koran, Bible and Talmud - apparently embedded within its surface." Ooooh, how very anti-Islamic! I bet the Christians and the Jews are going to be up in arms, too... oh, wait, we weren't worried about them. Just the Muslims. The Tate is afraid of violence.

Understandably, John Latham is ticked off and is demanding his work back. If the Tate curators are going to be such a wusses, they should give it back so a gallery with a backbone can exhibit it in a place of prominance.

Idiots

This is rich: Thieves steal fake Munch artworks. I can only say serves them right.

The New Modern Masters

Ok, so an original painting of Dogs Playing Poker has sold for $590,400 at auction. I know kitsch is considered very popular, and the Dogs are nothing if not kitsch. For that reason alone, I can see why this painting would bring in so much. But consider this: the Dogs are an American icon now, a symbol of bad art just as much as velvet paintings. I suppose the ultimate would be Dogs Playing Poker painted on velvet. The image is ubiquitous, and now it has been given importance by the all-powerful dollar. It has made it to the big time. Does anyone realize where this is heading? In years to come - centuries from now, perhaps - Dogs Playing Poker may well be the image that represents 20th century zeitgeist. A nation of dog-loving, poker-playing, beer-drinking art lovers. That's us, by golly.

Charles Sheeler (1883-1965)

I mentioned Charles Sheeler to Rufus the other day because her content - thought certainly not her style - is very remeniscent of his work. So I thought I would spotlight this not-quite-so-famous artist today.

Sheeler was a photographer first and a painter second. He preferred photographs to painting, but he was very good at both. He was considered a precisionist painter, creating works with sharp, hard lines and flat planes. He based his paintings on his photographs, which featured hard contrasts of light and dark and geometric shapes. For more on the artist himself, look here and here. A good site to view his photography can be found here.

My favorite Sheeler piece was done for a series of six works commissioned by Fortune magazine in 1938 entitled "Power." Being the great capitalist mag that it was, it looked to spotlight America's ability to produce power, goods, and armaments as WWII came closer to our doorstep. The piece is Steam Turbine. He manages to make this huge machine look both cold and sensual at the same time. The sinuous, rounded shapes and smooth surfaces make you want to touch it. Yet, it is still crisp and sharp; touching it wouldn't be a good idea.

This another in the series, called Suspended Power. The color palette in this one is disturbingly organic. That, and the large, smooth planes make this another of those touchable pictures. But, when you look closely, you see a very small human figure standing in the well below the turbine. Suddenly the fanned turbined becomes more menacing, a mechanical "Sword of Damocles" ready to crush anything in its path.

This third painting is different in execution, with its emphasis on a monotonal palette. I think that the photograph it's based on is actually more interesting.

The photograph Wheels seems to have more power, as if concentrating our view on a slightly smaller section intensifies the experience.

Of the three other works in this series, Yankee Clipper and Conversation Between Sky and Earth can be seen here (just scroll down). Again, they are different in execution, and don't have the power or intensity of the other three works. I could not find an online image of "Primitive Power", perhaps because it was the "odd man out," being a picture of an old fashioned water wheel.

For all his wonderful images of American Industry, when you Google Charles Sheeler these are what come up most: insipid early works from his days of experimenting with cubism. Not terribly inspiring, and not the kind of works that would make you want to do anymore research on this artist. But he's worth the digging.

The MOMA Revisited

In an article titled A Modest Proposal in the Village Voice, Jerry Saltz says he's been to the MoMA 14 times since it re-opened. 14 times?!?! I guess he's not paying for his own tickets. Anyway, he proposes that the museum should exhibit the works in strictly chronological order. That way, we could see who influenced whom and who did what first.

As it is, the museum is divided by floors - and they assume you will start on the 5th floor and work your way down: Special Exhibitions; Painting and Sculpture I; Painting and Sculpture II; Architecture and Design; Contemporary Galleries; Sculpture Garden. The rooms are devoted to major works by a few artists like Pollock and Picasso. The set-up works, especially when it's crowded, but I like Saltz's "75 Years" better.

He also presents "Nine Ideas for a Better MoMA" which are reasonable. Not enough women represented, and too many contemporary white guys and Germans.

However, I would like to take a moment to think about the function of the MoMA. Is it a museum of Modern Art? Or is it a museum of Contemporary Art? The two are not the same, not for a long time now. How long will we call something "Modern" once it has passed it's 100th birthday? I have a feeling we will be calling Picasso's work Modern Art for centuries to come. This means we need to re-think the meaning of the term Modern Art. And perhaps the MoMA should consider concentrating on Modern Art and leaving Contemporary Art for galleries and museums of Contemporary Art. Although I suppose the MoMA could be seen as a bridge between the two.

I was going to go on to say something like this before I started doing a little web surfing:
The art historian in me says, "Oh, but to understand a contemporary artist, we must look at what came before." But, that isn't necessarily true. Contemporary Art is light years away from its moden predecessors. To say that to understand Mark Dion you must look at Picasso is like saying to understand Picasso you must look at Michelangelo. It doesn't work.

But I was wrong, and my art historian voice has triumphed. Mark Dion can only be understood once we realize that Duchamp came first. And Sigmund Polke is better undestood after looking at Picasso and Warhol. Contemporary Art is often too difficult a concept to grasp without looking at how classic art was deconstructed by the Modern Masters of the 20th century. Those not emersed in art history need some kind of wading pool before jumping into the deep end. Otherwise, it's all nonsense.

Now, whether an artist was actually influenced by older masters is another matter. Some will claim they were not at all influenced, and some will make direct references. Whatever the case, they will never be completely fee of that "cultural baggage." Not every artist looks at it as "baggage," I'm sure. I know of at least one artist who studied art history with diligence before launching himself into the world of Contemporary Art. Bob Melzmuf felt he needed to understand his predecessors before he could truly break away from them.

But, back to the MoMA. I still believe there is a fundamental schizofrenia at work there. One way to get around it may be to say, "Look at what all this art and innovation has led up to today!" But then you have relegated the Modern Masters to mere predecessors useful only in their ability to help us understand what's being produced today. I don't hold with that idea at all. So, the Museum for Modern Art = Museum of Modern Masters. Notice the word "contemporary" gets left out completely.

UPDATE: A certain blogger pointed out that I neglected to do two things. 1) I neglected to mention that he was the one who pointed the Village Voice article out to me. Yeah, he did, but I didn't have anything to link to over there. He's too busy being a rocket scientist. 2) I neglected to link to my earlier article on the MoMA in which I discussed an article from the American Conservative - also kindly pointed out by said blogger. The aforementioned article would be here if they had deigned to publish it online. Anyway, go to my earlier article to read what it said.

The MoMA

I spent the holidays in Connecticut with my sister and her family this year. Loved the snow. My son - who has never really seen a good snowfall - got to experience the unique pleasure of walking on snow so cold it crunches beneath your feet like cornstarch. He also got to walk on ice, though only on the very edge next to the bank - I would not let him go beyond a point where I could not reach him with an outstretched hand. The next day, the weather warmed up and everything melted. Then we got to experience the not-so-unique sensation of bleary, gray days. We don't get many of them in El Paso.

My son initially didn't want to go - he's not so keen on that set of cousins - but I bribed him with a trip to New York to see the new Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). Surprisingly, he was very excited about this. So was I, since it has just opened after a long bout of rebuilding. At $20, I think the tickets are way overpriced. And of course, it was crowded.

The building is amazingly cold and sterile. Big, empty white and gray spaces accented with abstract art. Somehow, it felt like everything should have been behind plexiglass. While I was happy to see things like Van Gogh's Starry Night, and a work by Clyfford Still, my son was inspired by the Picassos and Brancusi's Bird in Flight. That boy does surprise me sometimes, but I am delighted that he takes pleasure in these things. We were particularly taken with the modern design section: chairs, tables, computers, musical instruments, cars, etc. The 60's produced some wonderfully unique designs, perhaps more so than the 30's and the whole Art Deco style.

I read an article (I don't remember where, my husband showed it to me) which basically called the MoMA a mausoleum for modern art. The author has a point. We have reached a stage where "modern art" is now only art history. It was a jumping off point, and we left those shores long ago. Now we're drowning in contemporary conceptual art, and stuff that just isn't original anymore. I mean, how do you top all that shock art when we can't be shocked anymore? Where do we go from here?

So, don't go to the MoMA looking for avant garde art. That's not what it's for. Go to see the masters of the 20th century. They are reasonably well represented.