art

Constellation (Diane Arbus)

~ michaeljhealy ~ Leave a comment

The critical reputation of an artist can be shaped for a generation by a major retrospective of their work. When large numbers of works are exhibited, a reputation can be enhanced or diminished. In the case of Diane Arbus: Constellation (at the Park Avenue Armory), I fear the overall impact might be a damaging one.

Part of the problem, and this is obviously nothing to do with the artist, is that Constellation is one of the worst staged shows I have ever seen. More than 400 pictures are displayed entirely randomly and largely without captions. Some are hung so high on the wall that only exceptionally tall visitors could see them properly, while others are near the floor. It is, let’s be clear, a complete mess. Arbus deserves better than this amateurish staging.

The photographs themselves are surprisingly uneven. The best ones are brilliant. Unsettling portraits of what Arbus called “freaks” or ordinary people captured on a street or in a park. These are often arresting and disturbing, and reflect Arbus’s genius for capturing with humanity, generosity, and good humor the enormous diversity of life as it’s lived. Children playing in the park, society hostesses in their salons, and performers in the “freak shows” that were still a feature of New York in the 1960s – all are caught in a single moment with tenderness and without judgement. By way of contrast, her few portraits of well-known people (Herbert von Karajan or James Brown, for example), are less successful, though I loved her picture of Marianne Moore with W.H. Auden.

Some of Arbus’s interests are explored here too extensively. There are, for example, dozens of pictures of people wearing masks of various kinds. The effect overall is somehow to emphasize the narrowness of her artistic vision, not its breadth. A wiser curator would have selected fewer pictures. So, in summary, a great talent not well served by the show’s curator, but Constellation is worth seeing.

All the Beauty in the World

~ michaeljhealy ~ Leave a comment

I rarely notice museum guards. When I do, I find myself pitying them. The job looks exhausting and boring in equal measure. Being surrounded by priceless treasures cannot be much compensation in the circumstances. Patrick Bringley’s delightful account of working for ten years at The Metropolitan Museum did little to change my outlook, at least as far as that particular job is concerned.

All the Beauty in the World tells his story. Leaving behind an enviable position at The New Yorker magazine, Bringley, devastated by the illness and death of his much loved older brother, sought (and found) refuge and consolation amid the beauties and wonders of The Met’s collections. In his decade as a guard, Bringley learned a lot about art and history, but much more about himself and the life he wanted to live. It’s no exaggeration to say art saved his life. It taught him how to look and to live. Whether one believes there is a “purpose” to art or not, surely no one who loves looking at pictures and sculptures denies their power to heal, console, educate and transform. The book is a deeply felt account of his journey, and along the way it gives us a fond and funny insider’s account of that extraordinary institution and some of the people who protect its treasures and educate its visitors. I recommend it highly.

Siena: the Rise of Painting 1300-1350

~ michaeljhealy ~ Leave a comment

Critics lucky enough to get a sneak preview last year of Siena: the rise of painting 1300-1350 hailed it as the must-see exhibition of the season. They weren’t wrong, but they were guilty of understatement. The show is a once-in-a-lifetime masterpiece. It transfers from The Metropolitan Museum in New York to The National Gallery in London at the end of January. Anyone who loves painting and who missed it in Manhattan might, if circumstances permit, want to consider booking a flight and an entrance ticket now. It is sure to sell out, and rightly so.

The exhibition featured a range of objects, including sculpture, textiles, manuscripts and liturgical artifacts, but it is the paintings that steal the show. Paintings of sublime and timeless beauty, paintings of extraordinary sophistication that anticipate what was to come in the Renaissance. The focus is on Martini, the Lorenzetti brothers, and especially on the brilliant Duccio di Buoninsegna, whose Maesta altarpiece is the star exhibit. Many of the individual paintings that originally made up the Maesta were dispersed over the centuries, and what makes this a unique exhibition is seeing many of them brought together again. It is no exaggeration to say this may never happen again once the show ends in London.

The show is also a triumph of exhibition design and the Met’s staff deserve congratulations for finding such creative ways to see these precious and fragile masterpieces up close and in some cases from 360 degrees. The designers in London have a high bar to reach!

Francis Bacon: Human Presence

~ michaeljhealy ~ Leave a comment

Is it appropriate to measure the greatness of a painter by the range of human feeling they elicit in the viewer or display on the canvas? Perhaps narrow and deep should be sufficient, picking at one feature of human existence over and over again, worrying relentlessly at a scab to burrow deeper to discover and uncover the real wound beneath the surface. The thought occurred to me walking around The National Portrait Gallery’s outstanding exhibition of Francis Bacon’s portraits, Francis Bacon: Human Presence.

Bacon understood despair and the awareness of futility. He knew something about the longing to accept and impose cruelty. Suffering, isolation, and pain are never far from the canvas. He detected such things in the artists and paintings he admired, in Velazquez, Picasso, and Van Gogh. He discovered over time his own language in paint to express such things. His greatness lies in that language. His reputation is growing all the time, eight decades after he made his first impact on the world, and his work reverberates even more powerfully now when so many experience the world as a threatening, ominous, and lonely place.

Where is the affection, tenderness, and love in Bacon’s world and work? An exhibition devoted to his portraits might reasonably be expected to be a useful starting point, perhaps in paintings of his friends (including Lucian Freud and Frank Auerbach) or lovers (Peter Lacy, George Dyer, and John Edwards). But Bacon’s grim inspection of the skull beneath the skin is abundant even here and the portraits are full of snarling, grimacing, and screaming faces, many of them distorted by injury and pain. Only in some of the later paintings, especially one of John Edwards, is some tenderness detectable. Did Bacon soften slightly in old age?

This was one of the most impressive and compelling exhibitions I have seen in recent years. An opportunity to see some really important pictures rarely on display (notably the double portrait of Freud and Auerbach which I had only see before in reproductions), and confirmation, if confirmation is needed, of what a great (and grim) artist Bacon was.

Cork City Musings

~ michaeljhealy ~ Leave a comment

Even Cork’s greatest admirer would struggle to say the city is a pretty one. The dominant theme is one of grayness. Gray buildings under skies that are often that particular gray that signals rain. It can all seem a little grim at times in the city center, somewhat neglected and shabby. But whatever it might lack in prettiness, Cork has character, charm, and energy in abundance.

For decades the city has been little more than the beginning of my frequent trips further west, but recently I had the opportunity to spend a couple of days there, and I enjoyed it very much. The food scene is vibrant (highlights included Goldie and Nano Nagle Cafe), and there is, of course, no shortage of historic pubs. Sin E for traditional music, The Oval, Mutton Lane, and Arthur Maynes for unique atmosphere and craic in general. The Crawford Art Gallery is an unmissable spot and I was delighted to visit before it closes for major restoration work. Tempting as it might be to skip the city en route to the glories and splendors of West Cork, that would be a mistake. Linger a little and let it work its magic.