Thoughts on Paintings

When I look at a painting, the artist speaks to me. I can picture the painter at work at his easel, making the brushstrokes, mixing the paint and pigments. I see the blank parts of the canvas and the colors and I can almost imagine what they are thinking, and I listen carefully. Whatever the picture is, its elements are telling a story, conveying a feeling, offering a sensation of the mind, or giving a message, sometimes seeming to reveal a secret, a chance to look into the artist's mind. Much like a writer is vulnerable, and bleeds onto the pages, the painter bleeds himself onto his canvas.

I look at the paintings from two perspectives. First the spectator- I stand back and view, taking it in and noticing how and which way the work catches my eye, its aesthetics. I catch a mood, a layman's feeling from the piece. Next I play the role of amateur artist, studying it, observing the technique- up close, the brushstrokes, the detail, I always pay attention to which colors were used- which colors straight from the tube mixed to form the palettes. Then I step back again, note the arrangement of objects, the composition, the balance, number of figures, etc. Of course this is done almost sub-consciously. You can't measure a painting's worth concretely like that, you have to feel the painting, catch the vibe from it. You can't see into the artist's soul by computing a pictorial space as you would solve a math equation.

Not only is enjoying a painting a leap into a mind, but it is a bound into another time. The paint on a board of wood, applied in 1150 AD, has collected the dust of centuries and is as real now in front of your face as it was to its creator, who himself has been dust for centuries. Not just the artists who executed these works but the subjects, too, give us a glimpse of another age. You look at the Duke of Urbino, posing stately in royal garb, and you may wonder what was he thinking, or the peasants portrayed by Jean-Francois Millet in their daily plight, who really were these people?

Let us not be confined to human subjects and portraits to our examination of another era's questions. When you look at an open landscape, you know that the tiny farmhand in the distance of some American landscapes has long since died and you will too long before the actual land in the picture will change. Or on the other hand look how different the land changed since the painting was done, but feel how insignificant people are in the beauty and immensity of nature.

You can sometimes react to a painting much the same way you would of a real life situation. You can look at either Cazin's or Millet's "Solitude" and feel yourself walking in a moonless wintry forestscape, hearing the eerie silence, the crunch of the snow under your feet, feel the cold on your face. In reality you bundle up your shirt as you get a chill standing in the gallery room. A painting can put a smile on your face, bring a tear to your eye, or light a fire in your belly.

Paintings can raise questions, provoke concern or bring an air of mystery. I don't speak entirely of the Surrealists, or the Abstractionists, indeed a Realist can do the same perhaps even more powerfully. Consider Andrew Wyeth's maypole painting. Who were these strange and peculiar people? We know some of them, but who were the others, namely the German soldier? Why do the footprints not make a perfect circle in the snow, or why are the shadows not consistent throughout?

Sometimes paintings don't have to be this mysterious to raise a question. When I look at an excellent painting in the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Feast of Saint John, by Jules Breton, I feel a sense of mystery. You can see that these peasants celebrate the longest days of summer and dance around bonfires on the Feast Day, and as you look you can almost smell the fire. You may wonder who they were, and what they believed in and what they were going to do.

Sometimes a painting really draws you in. Having some knowledge and interest in the U.S. Civil War, I have a particular affection for this next one. Growing up, being fascinated by the war and looking at illustrated histories of it, there was always a specialness to the naval battle scenes. I could spend hours looking at the pictures and playing the scene in my head, famous scenes such as the Monitor and the Merrimack, and see the smoke, hear the distant resounding shots of the guns, the splashes of the missed shells, the crackle of the grapeshot, and the orders of the officers on both sides, sometimes within earshot as a maniacal maneuver such as a pointblank broadside goes under way. Such excitement!

The painting is by Edouard Manet, the impressionist who did a lot of marine scenes, leading to such exhibits as "Manet and the Sea" at the PMA. The painting depicts a sea battle off the coast of Cherbourg, France, in 1864 in which a Confederate Sloop of War, the CSS Alabama was sunk by the USS Kearsarge, a Federal Sloop of War dispatched to rendezvous with the enemy ship to stop the havoc she had been causing to commercial trade to and from Europe. Manet did the work quickly, responding to the current event after hearing or reading about it just as it happened.

As you look at the painting, which depicts the scene from a bit of a distance, it keeps the viewer at neutrality to the sides (with a slight slant sympathizing towards the sinking Confederates). It shows the Deerhound, a private yacht, in the foreground rescuing survivors from the water. In the distance the Alabama sinks steadily by her stern with plumes of smoke emitting as a result of the direct hit to her engines scored by the Kearsarge. The story has it that five of the 100 Union shots fired were after the Southern vessel struck its colors. The painting further shows the Union ship, almost covered from view firing a volley at the doomed floor-bound Alabama. The primary color in the masterpiece is of course that of the ocean, which is vivid viridian green and blue, and you can make out the civilians on the yacht, in their hats and sailor clothes attempting to rescue what looks to be two sailors clinging to a piece of wreckage.

There's nothing like a good painting that you can just watch for an hour. In this category I might plug Thomas Eakin's masterpiece and Philadelphia's prize "The Gross Clinic" which will be in Philadelphia for a little while. Besides simply admiring the painting and being glad its here to stay, there really is a lot going on in the painting. It's a huge canvas which takes a whole wall to itself, and shows an almost photographic scene unfolding.

Professor Samuel Gross stands in the middle of the beam of sun coming from the skylight teaching his famous bone marrow operation to a group of Jefferson students. (And might I add that there's never been a better forehead painted in the history of art. It shines in the light! I think my hair will recede that far by the time I'm 30, though I don't think I'll grow Gross's sideburns). Scalpel in hand, he instructs while he and assistants perform the leg operation, with the boy's mother cringing behind. The detail is superb, from the looks on their faces to the little drops of blood on the one assistant's cuff.

Another favorite artist of mine has you watching the canvas for long periods of time almost expecting surprises. Henri Rousseau is one to leave you in awe, not just from the greatness of his work, but from the mystery he brings to the table. He's what you may call a surrealist, maybe a symbolist, but one thing is for sure, you can't call him ordinary. As a self-taught artist, he has a style all to his own.

Probably my favorite painting in the whole Philadelphia Art Museum would have to be Rousseau's "Carnival Evening." Another chilly winter scene but this time its very mystifying. While his paintings may not be perplexing as a Dali landscape, Rousseau would give you just enough elements to leave you a little bewildered. "Carnival Evening" shows a forest, middle of winter, completely bare trees at night with a bright full moon above. Only thing is, the forest is strangely in darkness. A couple stand in the center on their way to the carnival, dressed in costumes, the man smoking a cigarette, both seeming to be illuminated from within, not from the moon. Off to the left is a cottage (?) with a mask or face on it, and an unexplained street lamp looms nearby.

The painting after this is in an opposite setting, in a thick jungle. It's entitled "The Merry Jesters" and it shows an almost "cartoony" setup of baboons with strange beady eyes with what little musical instruments. Click on the thumbnail for a larger image. How many baboons do you count?

 
The Merry Jesters, Henri Rousseau