Painting a cold, dark land
Henry Raeburn’s The Reverend Robert Walker Skating on Duddingston Loch (better known as The Skating Minister) manages to romanticize both the landscape and the Scottish character. The rise of Romanticism meant that the Scots were no longer defined (by themselves or others) as a marginal, occupied people; they were now dramatic, rugged primitives. What then to …
The Yes Man
The artist at work… November is NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month, when a quarter million Americans sign up to write a novel in a month. This is my daughter’s maddest, gladdest time of the year. She is remarkably disciplined, setting herself a goal of around 1700 words a day and consistently meeting it. (She’s …
Banksy, behind the curve
Banksy—as everyone in the world knows—was recently in New York. While there, he submitted the above screed to the New York Times (which, recognizing a publicity stunt, didn’t print it). Apparently Banksy never saw the late, lamented Twin Towers, or he’d know better than to call the new buildings an “eyesore.” Since that ghastly day …
A tonic after two days of Dead Baby Art
The Lord Is My Shepherd, Eastman Johnson, 1863 Yesterday Jane Bartlett sent thisto serve as a tonic for the two days I spent thinking about what she called Dead Baby Art. Another artist, Kristine Greenizen, calls it Damien HirstSteak Spectacular: spectacle that has little about the craft and thought of art in it. To our modern eyes, …
Personal performance art, revisited
Portrait of Dr. Samuel D. Gross (The Gross Clinic), 1875, Thomas Eakins. Who knew Eakins was such a visionary? Yesterday, I had a minor medical procedure done, which—as is the nature of these things—will be followed by a slightly-less-minor medical procedure. While discussing scheduling, the surgeon mentioned that he could do it either at an …