My daughter Jane and son Keith accompanied me to the Metropolitan Museum of Art the other day. Next to the Louvre, the Met is my favorite museum. I am going again in three weeks. The painting that struck me with the most force is Goya’s Group on a Balcony. It’s paintings like this that elevate…
I didn’t know Philip Pearlstein long enough for him to be a true mentor, but even so he made a powerful and long-lasting impression on me. During the 80’s Philip was on the staff of Brooklyn College. His presence was the main reason Brooklyn College’s graduate fine arts department was ranked #2 in the country behind only…
I plan on visiting the Cleveland Museum of Art’s exhibition van Gogh Repetitions later today. It will be my third visit to see it. The show has a number of first rate van Gogh’s and the theme–the artist copying himself–is interesting. I will write more about it later.
After a long and (for me) painful absence for conservation, Andrea del Sarto’s The Sacrifice of Isaac is once again on display at the Cleveland Museum of Art. del Sarto’s unfinished masterpiece from 1527 is on a massive wooden panel. The painting’s unfinished state opens a window into the artist’s studio, and shows us his working method. The…
Do you remember your first encounters with great art? I vividly recall my introduction to certain artists–life-changing discoveries that revolutionized my views about art. The composer Berlioz recalled his introduction to Shakespeare this way: “Shakespeare, coming upon me unawares, struck me like a thunderbolt. The lightning flash of that sublime discovery opened before me at…
During my weekly visit to the Cleveland Museum of Art I was pleasantly surprised to see a newly-hung lithograph titled Blackburn. In the lithograph by Ron Adams (an artist heretofore unknown to me) I instantly recognized my former mentor Robert Blackburn. Adams portrays Robert doing what he was always doing: working a printing press. I…
At first sight, I was underwhelmed by Brinsley Tyrrell’s show, Ohio Lands Forever, at Busta. The large-format pieces with their electric colors and ropey splatters struck me as gimmicky and shrill. Tyrrell’s enamel on steel technique threatened to skid out of control–obsession with process has shipwrecked many artists. But after a couple of processions around…
The Cuban-born, Cleveland-based artist Augusto Bordelois is showing some striking works at Cleveland State U. The exhibition, titled “Based on a True Story,” is filled with large-format paintings full of bold colors and simple shapes that burst their frames and overflow the shallow space, as in the accompanying photo. The designs are strong although simple;…