What show did I see of Philip Guston’s work? It’s the prerogative of the amateur to neither care nor remember, however, I do remember not being particularly excited about his work. I saw it in Chicago and for some reason I thought he was a professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (where some of my friends still teach). Even if I got all my facts wrong (and who knows, he could have been a visiting artist there) he was solidly IN MY MIND in the school of Chicago Imagism which I still revere. This school includes Roger Brown, Jim Nutt and H. C. Westermann. Given that kind of company, artists unabashedly “pro-image”, Guston’s work seemed uninteresting. Sure I could see there were social critical themes underneath (why else all the Klansmen?) but they weren’t painted in a way that shouted at you (like Diego Rivera shouts “Marxism Good!”) nor were they interesting to me as images. I didn’t even like his signature “flesh rose” or whatever it was. So, I dismissed him. Wrong!
What do these people (and paintings) have in common?
Ziggy Stardust (David Bowie) was one of the innovators of the modern notion that as an entertainer you are allowed (and can profit by) a series of persona changes. Madonna, too, cashed in on this. Ali G (and Borat and Bruno), all creations of Sacha Baron Cohen, pushed the “hidden identity” issue further. Many people, including the officials in Khazakstan, thought Borat was real. At first they were outraged, then they saw it as a way of making money and were less so. Read More »
I’m surprised Googling “apocalyptic ennui” didn’t deliver much, just a few quirky blogs and song lyrics. Maybe that means it’s a really meaningful connection of the two words. I realized when writing my review of “Boys Adrift” that apocalyptic ennui is a significant part of my psychology and inevitably my politics at the moment. Growing up in the 60’s (fear or nuclear war) then switching to “hippie” fears (global cooling, nuclear war, the draft, American culture generally, unhealthy food and religion) was exhausting enough. I wasn’t ready to get on the next bandwagon: global warming, global capitalism, American culture–especially overseas, antibiotics in food leading to new killer bacteria, killer viruses like Ebola, terrorism at home and abroad, destruction of species, inequality of wealth–leading to revolutions, crash of the dollar, depletion of oil, ethanol destroying the food supplies, and the inevitable Islamic takeover of Europe–perhaps leading to an imminent crash of the West. Read More »
It’s not that the writing is so bad, it’s not. It’s OK. But if a white male (without proper credentials via biography) wrote this, it would never have been published. Though ostensibly fiction, what seems inherent in the attraction of the book is the authenticity of the story. This is a person who’s “been there” not unlike the book A LONG WAY GONE by Ishmael Beah (which my son is reading now). Here’s the thing: one can’t suppress the sense that it is the STORY these people (or people close to them) have lived that makes us read on. These are tragic and dramatic stories. That does not mean, however, that this is necessarily “good writing” (in the same way Graham Greene is good writing, or Patricia Highsmith, both favorites of the moment). Read More »
The biggest issue I had with the book was the author’s relationship to the “literal” Catholicism of his main character, Scobie. Was Scobie a true believer or was he already so deeply wounded (by the loss of his child, I suspect) that his religion is a legalistic “shell” he lives inside of. In this sense he “believes” the Church’s teachings but not so much with his HEART (title reference) but with this HEAD. Read More »
I’ve seen Kitaj paintings before. I think before I was seriously painting I found them interesting. I even remember marking him down once on a sheet of paper along with Anselm Keifer–people to look up. What a great name, too.
As my own paintings have evolved, the only “modern” artist (besides Magritte, of course) I have allowed “into the family” has been Neo Rauch.
Yesterday I read in THE ECONOMIST that R. B. Kitaj died. At first, I was only mildly interested but nevertheless read the obit. Then it hit me. The story of the “1994 Tate Gallery disaster”–this was something! Without knowing much about it (so far), this is what I know:
(1) Kitaj is considered “illustrative” which means “bad” or “decorative” to many critics;
(2) Kitaj moved around stylistically, realism, surrealism, other forms, this also irritates critics who like people to be stylistically unique, evolving, in a word comprehensible. The idea that artists, perhaps whimsically, move around and try things goes against the image of “serious/obsessed” that critics like. Stylistic whimsy is considered “freshman in art school” sort of work, lost, sans personality, even immature;
(3) The critics finally got an opportunity rather late in Kitaj’s successful career to savage him and they did so with a vengeance at the Tate Gallery show in London in 1994. The shock was so great to Kitaj that he claimed his second wife died (heart attack?) from the impact of all the negativity;
(4) I think it was about this time that Kitaj got more serious about identifying himself as a Jew and even casting the criticism as anti-Semitic and also moved to the United States (ostensibly to punish London). Read More »
So finally I find this incredible writer. How did I find her, I’m not even sure now. Oh, I remember, I was looking into “literary thriller” lists on the net and her name came up. Since Hitchcock did her “Strangers on a Train” I thought it would be fun to read it, then see the movie. Read More »
Letter to the Editor, published in THE WALL STREET JOURNAL 07-18-07
As a recovering hippie who reads The Wall Street Journal (apparently there are a few of us out here), I felt one perspective was missing from the Ted Nugent discussion (Letters, July 14). Read More »
People who don’t know me well wonder why my art is dark. If they meet me socially they wonder why a “nice” fellow would paint such material. Once an African American woman, fresh from working with what they used to call “witch doctors” in Africa, walked through my studio and said, “I get this, this like African art, life and death shown all together.” Read More »
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