GLENN LONEY'S MUSEUM NOTES

Nor is that true of sphinxes, though there is only one Great Sphinx. There are a lot of small ones surviving. And the idea and image of this strange mythical mixture of human and lion—sometimes with wings—was repeatedly borrowed in Western Art.

The monumental new show at the Met emphasizes the importance of such images as examples of early Egyptian Art. You can draw your own conclusions about the potency of these sculptures, symbols, styles, conventions, and artifacts on the arts of later centuries.

For the moment, however, Met visitors are being encouraged to take a new look at the ancient monuments of the Old Kingdom. Not as architecture. Not as history. Not even as symbols of religious mysteries.

Instead, all the objects on view are presented as works of art. It is not necessary to know how to read hieroglyphics to appreciate the artistry with which some of the inscriptions in this show were carved and painted on stone.

One early panel has two odd images which I could not find in any later hieroglyphs. These involve legs on a symbolic feather and a basin. Millennia before Dada or Surrealism, some scribe/stone-carver conceived a most ingenious visual short-hand: "Let that basin be brought over here!"

There are over 250 sculptures and works of decorative art in the new show. And they were all created for use in the temples and tombs around the Great Pyramids.

Even though some spectators may think they've seen some of these carvings or statues before—some are from the Museum's own considerable collections—most have never been seen before in New York. Or even in America.

This will be the only showing of this exhibition in the United States. Paris and Toronto are the other venue-cities.

These priceless artworks—testimonies to lifestyles and cultures some thousands of years old—have been gathered from 30 major museums in 10 countries. The Cairo Museum's collections are well represented.

Tools used in constructing the Pyramids are on display. As are scale-models showing how tombs and temples were built—with placement of artworks.

Those who cannot visit this blockbuster show in Manhattan will find that the beautiful volume which explicates it and reproduces much of the art is an invaluable reference. And a handsome centerpiece on any coffee-table.

It could also be an excellent—and greatly appreciated—holiday gift! Who is not fascinated by the mystery of the Pyramids and the Egyptian beliefs in Life After Death?

There are 540 illustrations among its 560 pages. And 420 are in full color. These are stunning images, but often subtle colors—for the suns, rains, and winds of centuries have softened some works which were not buried deep in the sands of the Nile.

"Egyptian Art in the Age of the Pyramids" contains commentaries and explanatory texts by a range of experts. Distributed by Harry N. Abrams, Inc., the hardcover edition costs $90. But it's also available paperbound. And possibly less expensive in the Met shops than outside.

Rather removed from the Big Show, but near the permanent Egyptian installations at the Met is a charming small-scale show of the work of two contemporary Egyptian artists.

Painter Farouk Hosny is represented by some colorful abstractions—which suggest strong influences from Vasily Kandinsky. Adam Henein's interesting sculptures, on the other hand, range from sleek modernizing of ancient Egyptian subjects and forms to his own quirky modern vision.

Wang also collected ancient works when and as he could. Over time, he was fortunate to gain access to important private collections and add to his collection.

Last season, a small show of his own work and collected treasures—including some interesting forgeries of scrolls—was shown at the China Institute.

This is a much larger, finer, more comprehensive exhibition. It is drawn from the Museum's own holdings, from the Wang Family Collection, from promised Wang gifts from the Oscar Tang Family, the British Museum, and from museums in San Francisco, Princeton, and Cleveland.

Few museums have the space to show many ancient horizontal scroll-paintings, but the Met has managed some long cases for expanses of brilliant brush-work and calligraphy.

Long hanging scrolls are much easier to accommodate, and a number of these—from a long span of Chinese history—are shown to great effect.

If you are unfamiliar with variations from dynasty to dynasty—for painters in this highly traditional society followed the examples of ancient masters—this show will help you see the changes, however slow.

Long before there were Impressionists in the West, centuries before that development in Western Art, Chinese masters were able to suggest misty mountains, delicate pavilions, surly fishermen, and elegant eagles with a few deft strokes of a fine brush dipped in ground black ink.

Do see these treasures. And pause in the Chinese Scholar's Garden, as recreated by Broadway designer Ming Cho Lee!

But not the Countess. This lovely lady—who looks directly at the viewer with a faint but thoughtful Mona Lisa smile—will greet them at the Met Museum instead. She is a centerpiece of its current blockbuster show of Ingres Portraits.

Those who believe they know Ingres as the painter of luxurious oriental fantasies, noble historical subjects, or mythical scenes may be surprised to discover what an impressive portraitist he was. From the beginnings of his long career to its end!

Almost as beautiful as his handsome women, however, are his detailed renderings of their gowns, upholsteries, and carpets. A lovely gown will one day wear out, but it can live forever in a great portrait by a famous artist. Ingres was certainly the man to commission.

Among the handsome ladies on view at the Met are—in addition to the Countess: Princesse Albert de Broglie, Madam Paul-Sigisbert Moitessier, Madame de Sennones, Comtesse de Tournon, and Queen Caroline Murat.

Jean Ingres also painted portraits of powerful and important men. He chronicled the rise of Napoleon Bonaparte, from First Consul—a youthful dandy in a red suit—to Emperor, as a majestic figure enthroned with a wreath of golden laurel.

When Napoleon conquered the Italian States, Ingres had the opportunity to paint some significant portraits. As well as sketch some major antiquities he could use in later historical subjects. One handsome drawing combines both.

Ingres' sketch of Lucien Bonaparte—a smartly dressed, top-hatted, literary gentleman living in Rome—exactly captures the distinctive Bonaparte features. Seated on an ancient Roman monument, Bonaparte seems far removed from the ambitions which drove Napoleon onward.

Had he known that Jerome Bonaparte—created a king by his brother—would find himself on a New Jersey chicken-farm when the empire fell, Lucien might have felt even more content in his withdrawal from family aspirations.

The current Ingres exhibition includes 40 paintings—some of them very grand and seldom loaned—and over 90 drawings. These represent the artist's career of six decades.

Very impressive are the images of the Russian ambassador, Count Nikolai Dmitrievich Gouriev, and of Louis-François Bertin. Manet once called Bertin "the Buddha of the bourgeoisie." Ingres seems to have captured something of that quality.

Ingres painted his friend François-Marius Granet, a landscape painter, as a tousle-haired and handsome romantic. He sketched composers Luigi Cherubini, Nicolo Paganini, Franz Liszt, and Charles Gounod.

It's interesting to see how deft and quick Ingres' sketches seem, in contrast to the exacting detail of many of his portraits. If you aren't able to come to the Met and see this contrast for yourself, you can study it at leisure at home in the handsome exhibition catalogue.

No less than Six Decades of Fashion are on display in the basement galleries of the Costume Institute. So the changes in clothing styles, fabrics, decorations, and silhouettes are demonstrated quite dramatically.

For those who wonder why there's not even a shawl from an Ingres portrait, it should be noted that all the clothes in the cases are from the Museum's own immense collections.

And there was no thought of copying the paintings with actual originals or look-alikes. As Curator Richard Martin says: "Our purpose was not to seek out fatuous look-alikes, but to try to capture the same flourish of fashion that is present in Ingres' acutely observed, vividly depicted portraits."

Indeed, Ingres seems to have spent even more time on the delicate details of dress and carpet patterns than he did on his sitters' faces.

Knowing his tremendous skill in recreating the shimmering folds of a highly-patterned silk gown, some of his lady-sitters must have searched the closets for the most intricate designs they could find.

They certainly got their husbands' money's-worth!

PRAGUE'S FRED AND GINGER HOUSE -- This building in Prague, whose dancing towers are evocative of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rodgers, is called "Tancic dum" (Dancing House) by the Czechs. Designed by Vlado Milunic and Frank Gehry, it was built in the mid-1990s for the Nationale Nederlanden (a Dutch Bank).

Even in the immediate wake of the destruction of World War II, Prague remained The Golden City. It was one of the few in Europe whose ancient architectural monuments had not been destroyed or severely damaged.

And even the 45 years Prague spent after that under Communism didn't do too much damage to the historic buildings. It did a lot of damage to the people of Prague and their economy, but it couldn't kill their culture or their spirit.

Prague's great monuments and buildings—St. Vitus' Cathedral, the Great Hrad, the Karlsbrücke, the Tyl Theatre—where Mozart's Don Giovanni had its premiere—all became considerably darker and dirtier with grime and soot, however.

This enchanting exhibition shows Prague and its architecture over the centuries—free of both soot and Socialism. There are paintings, water-colors, engravings, wood-cuts. And there are also a few artifacts, such as an example of Czech Cubism.

In the West, it's not well known that Prague had its own distinctive Modernist Movements, including Czech variations on Art Nouveau, Jugendstil, and Art Deco.

From Prague's legendary founding by Libuse and her royal husband, nothing remains save a hallowed tradition. But from its medieval beginnings, however, Prague has been blessed with the most impressive buildings, fortifications, and monuments that the genius of native, French, Italian, and German artists, artisans, and architects could create.

Prague—as the capital of Bohemia and once the seat of the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II—has had a succession of builder-rulers or overlords. Austria's Empress Maria Theresia sparked a Baroque transformation of the city. Much of which remains today.

One great monument you will not see—and which is certainly not in this show—is the great marble statue of Josef Stalin which once stood on a stone promontory on the River Moldau in the 1950s. The proud Czechs tore it down as soon as they could.

Rather, it is an extension of, even a pendant to, that previous and fascinating revelation of Washington as man, husband, planter, surveyor, soldier, commander, President, and Father of His Country.

Washington died 200 years ago, at Mount Vernon in 1779. From both these shows, it becomes increasingly clear what a remarkable man he was in all aspects of his life.

Indeed, from the manuscripts and documents on display at the Morgan Library, it is clear that he was, even as a very young man, deliberately forming his character, preparing himself for the role of leadership which he filled with such exemplary consequences for our nation. And, in effect, for the development of Democracy in other nations as well.

Some 160 manuscripts, artworks, maps, books, broadsides, and personal artifacts are on display—with concise explanatory texts. These have been selected from the collections of the Huntington Library in San Marino, CA; the Morgan itself, and the priceless autograph letters and documents in the Gilder-Lehrman Collection, on deposit at the Morgan.

Among the show's treasures are General Cornwallis' letter of surrender at Yorktown and a first printing of the Declaration of Independence.

Richard Gilder and Lewis Lehrman—wealthy Wall-Street gentlemen—have dedicated themselves to collecting as many original manuscripts and printed documents as they can find, devoted to the founding and development of the American Nation.

They even fund a series of lectures at the Morgan, in which outstanding American historians discuss specific events, trends, or personalities in the ongoing "Calvacade of America."

It's no coincidence that the lecturers have usually just published important books on their lecture-topics. Richard Brookhiser discussed "Alexander Hamilton, American" on October 4.

Subsequent lectures—November 8, February 7, March 20, April l7, and May 15—will deal with Slavery, American Whigs, the Depression, J. P. Morgan, and Burr, Hamilton, and Jefferson.

The Morgan's upstairs auditorium is fairly small, so these lectures are generally limited to teachers and professors of American History.

These programs have spawned summer seminars for teachers. And special New York high-schools, with this subject as their core-curriculum, have proved so successful, they are being copied elsewhere.

There are also programs for non-specialist schools as well. For more information on the varied American History programs of the Gilder Lehrman Institute, call: 212-972-2510.

If he likes what he sees there, he could help the Dahesh obtain that Edward Durrell Stone oddity on Columbus Circle which was once cultural playboy Huntington Hartford's very own gallery. It now belongs to the City.

The Dahesh has a huge stash of 19th century Academic Art, but very little space in which to display it. The current "Highlights" show offers a survey of some of the distinctive works in the collection.

There are 35 paintings, sculptures, and prints, organized to illustrate major themes in this kind of art. Their social, economic, and cultural contexts are also noted.

A number of the works on view are recent acquisitions, such as Gérome's "Michelangelo in His Studio" and Bauernfeind's "Jaffa, Recruiting of Turkish Troops in Palestine."

Among the best-known of 19th century Academic images, also on view, is Bouguereau's "The Water-Girl."

Obviously, there wasn't time to comment and post a review on-line. So I'm recycling my comments on substantially the same collection of photos at San Francisco MoMA:

The title of this show puts emphasis on his photographic innovations. These made his pictures more powerful for viewers, especially those who favored stereoptical views.

To historians and scientists, however, his most important contributions were his painstaking attention to the details of such natural wonders as Yosemite and the commercial and social changes emigrants made in the western states.

In order to record the splendors of Yosemite and other aspects of California's grandeur—previously unknown in the East and in Europe—Watkins constructed a huge camera which could make plates 18" by 20."

But even these were not enough to demonstrate the vastness of the landscapes or the sprawl of new cities such as San Francisco. So Watkins developed the panorama effect, often with three sections of wide horizontal images.

Participating in the greatest emigration then known to man—the California Gold Rush—Watkins first worked in Sacramento City. His friend there, Collis P. Huntington, would become one of the Central Pacific Railroad's "Big Four." And the great Huntington Library he would found in San Marino has lent Watkins images to this show!

Instead of grubbing in the Mother Lode goldfields, Watkins moved to San Francisco—which remained his operational center. Miners and merchants wanted photos to send to family back east. Young families wanted to record their own beginnings and growth.

But Watkins was even more interested in capturing the rapid development of San Francisco. Many of these vintage images show a city with both shanties and important buildings which have long since vanished. Largely in the 1906 Quake and Fire, which also destroyed all his archive of negatives.

Some of the most impressive images of the great California Redwoods were taken by Watkins. The same is true of his 1861 views of Yosemite-which astonished such worthies as American philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson, France's Emperor Napoleon III, and President Abraham Lincoln, who signed the Yosemite Bill in 1864.

The breathtaking Yosemite Valley—with such majestic mountains as El Capitan and Half Dome—was first seen by white men early in the 1850s. [I have somewhere a full-page account by those astonished explorers, printed on the first page of the Fourth of July edition of a goldrush paper published near the hidden valley.]

Modern collectors know many of Watkins' western nature subjects from the powerful black & white photos of Ansel Adams and Edward Weston. But Watkins was there first, and his photos are less self-conscious artworks than they are records of his place and time.

They are also of a sepia or even darker brown tone—which may have deepened over the years in surviving prints. In some images, the color is so dark that details are not easy to read.

Under the reduced light-levels required for exhibition, they seem even darker than they do in the excellent catalogue. Considering the crowds at SFMoMA, anyone really interested in California, the Development of the West, and/or photography will want to have this beautiful volume and study Watkins' work at close range.

Watkins was employed to photograph lands and mining operations for the record or for evidence in legal disputes. Among these images are detailed photos of Hydraulic Mining in the Sierras—which destroyed entire mountains and choked the rivers below in the Sacramento Valley with mounds of mud and sludge.

I was especially interested in his shots of the Malakoff Hydraulic Mine. Engineer Adolph Sutro devised its famous drainage tunnel—and he later gave San Francisco Sutro Baths.

Watkins' photos of the great log & earth dams constructed to build up large amounts of water are most impressive. As are the immense and seemingly endless flumes built to channel the water. Pent-up water would flow down under tremendous pressure to the Hydraulic Monitors and wash away the red-dirt of Nevada County's mountains.

[I spent my formative years on a ranch not far from what were once the "Malakoff Diggins." In fact, we had our own Petrified Forest, laid bare by hydraulic operations half a century before. We'd drive down—and up—the Yuba River canyon to picnic at the Malakoff, then a miniature Grand Canyon with blue and green lakes.

[At the nearby ghost-town of North Bloomfield—photographed by Watkins in its Malakoff heyday—my father was going to buy its old hotel for $400. Its old saloon-bar was still intact, and the tiny bedrooms with single beds were still untouched, even with candles still in Wee Willie Winkie candlesticks by each bed. But the hotel burned down.]

At least Carleton Watkins saved for our own time and the future images of much that is gone forever. The scope and daring of some western mining projects, as recorded by Watkins, is astonishing. A series of wide photos shows the Feather River diverted from its natural bed and into great flumes so gold could be found in the riverbed sands.

In some of the projects, the ethnic division of labor—also practiced in building at least the western sector of the great Transcontinental Railroad—is clearly shown in Watkins' photographs. On a rickety raised wooden plankway, Chinese "Coolies," in their distinctive wide-brimmed wicker hats, are pushing wheelbarrows of earth.

The emigrant Irish are more hazardously employed. But at least they aren't "muckers."

Carleton Watkins' innovative device of positioning some interesting natural or man-made object in the foreground of a deep-perspective picture was especially effective for stereopticon viewing. Astonishing is Watkins' mastery of Depth of Field—everything is in focus.

There are some stereopticon slides and cards in the exhibition. The two side-by-side images may seem duplicates, but they are not. They are slightly displaced, as are the images seen by each eye. Viewed through separate lenses, they merge and appear three-dimensional.

In San Francisco, the effect of Victorian stereopticon viewing was recreated—thanks to the 21st century technology of SteroGraphics CrystalEyes© and Silicon Graphics 320 Visual Workstations.

In a special room, there were twelve computers with the liquid crystal glasses that help make the 3D illusion work even better than with a Victorian hand-held viewer.

This technology could bring back 3D in a big way. But it has other even more important applications. For more information, check out their website: www.SteroGraphics.com

The Watkins exhibition is regarded as so important—both in the history of photography and the history of Western America—that it will also be shown at the National Gallery in Washington, DC.

Through good times and bad, American artists responded to the challenges of surviving—even of succeeding—in an era of epic social, political, and cultural unrest and change. Most of them were "connected" to some degree with the American reality around them, whether urban or rural.

Poets, novelists, painters, film-makers, sculptors, architects, photographers, designers, playwrights, composers, and performing-artists: they interpreted their times for their fellow-citizens.

Or, driven by intense personal visions or demons, they expressed their own states of being. Sometimes with no regard for, or interest in, an audience.

Expressing, with artistic materials and methods, powerful but confused emotions, fuzzy feelings, and hermetic, undefined ideas—with no special interest in communicating them to readers, viewers, or listeners—became the hallmark of much art in the second fifty years.

This conferred new power and authority on curators and critics. If artists had no urge—or ability—to explain themselves or their visions in their work, there were certainly those more able to do it for them.

In the second half of this American Century, some notable artist reputations and fortunes have been created more by the ingenious efforts of critics, curators, and gallery-owners. Than by the talents and artworks of the artists in question.

Not only have the various media conspired in this puffing of artwork and artist—always in search of a "story"—but some artists and their agents have astutely used this media-machine.

Andy Warhol was a master-exploiter. But he was also something of a visionary. And an indisputable talent with a technical mastery that some of his contemporaries could not demonstrate.

It could be said at many a show of contemporary artworks that the real artistic creativity is on view in the wall-texts. The rallying of adjectives and adverbs, the massing of metaphors: all the varied powers of words are enlisted to analyze and interpret a broken saucer embedded in dirty plaster on a stretched canvas.

The current fifty-year survey at the Whitney Museum of American Art is no exception. This explanatory Art of the Wall-Text is even more in evidence at the currently embattled Brooklyn Museum of Art.

Actually, strolling through the various exhibition-mazes at the Whitney, it seemed like Old Times. Seeing old friends again—but they were paintings and assemblages. Not real people, like fellow-critics or actual artists.

This historic show looks more like a Whitney Retrospective than a summation of half-a-century of American culture. One could even interpret it—and the way it is hung and explicated—as a de facto validation of the taste and judgment of the Whitney's recent director, David Ross, and his predecessors.

Many of these works have—over the years and with many exhibitions and catalogues—achieved the hallowed status of American Cultural Icons. The fact that the Whitney showed some of them first certainly had something to do with that. Not to diminish the role of MoMA.

But—had such works not been showcased and spot-lighted—would they ever have commanded the exposure which helped enshrine them?

Just asking.

What about the artists who—and the works which—failed to get into a definitive Whitney show? Or win a retrospective at the Met or MoMA?

Just asking.

The careers of some current "Name" artists were certainly not damaged by spending time in the Hamptons. And getting to know the Right People. Are there perhaps artists just as talented out there in Idaho or Iowa whose careers might take off if they could be invited out to one of the Hamptons?

Just asking.

Looking at some of the perversities and oddities on display at the Whitney, it's difficult to believe there aren't some wonderful and totally unknown artists and works "Out There." Unknown artists without the clout, know-how, or connections to get major shows, great reviews, and big commissions.

To suggest that Art in America has been steadily regressing since we bombed Hiroshima is to go too far. It actually began in some areas before World War II.

If you did not already know that certain canvases—or assembled/jumbled sculptures—are Cultural Icons, created by famous artists, you might think some of the Whitney's current artworks were school-projects of handicapped children.

Primitive art may have inspired Picasso, but it has proved a malign influence on some untalented and lazy artists.

The Big Thing—for a long time now—has been to discover or manufacture a Trademark Artistic Gimmick, either in style or subject-matter. Or both.

Keith Haring certainly found a very special gimmick. But he had to work at it very hard for a long time before he struck pay-dirt.

I used to see him dashing down subway stairs and chalk his radiant men, pyramids, and babies on black poster-spaces. Even then, I thought I ought to strip some of them off the wall as strange encoded expressions reacting to our times.

They'd be worth a lot now. At least you can see one of these subway-chalkings at the Whitney. If you ever see Keith on a darkened subway platform, it has to be his ghost.

The fact that some large contemporary artworks are now deteriorating—demanding costly preservation or restoration—suggests that some famous names are deficient in knowledge of materials and techniques as well as artistic vision.

An unfortunate trend—which began in the 1950s, and has only become more of a menace with the passing years—is the urge to create ever-larger canvases and "Installations."

Larger is not necessarily better, especially if the results deliberately resemble ghetto graffiti. As modern museums built larger galleries—with bigger wall-space—to accommodate their growing collections, clever artists like Robert Rauschenberg and Roy Lichtenstein began painting canvases which could fill an entire wall. Crowding out those Minimalists who still create small works.

A negative dividend of this gigantism impairs the current Whitney exhibition layout. Very large works take up too much space, so that very small objects—like major books, or small photos—are shunted aside into dark corridors or into tiny rooms, difficult to enter with large crowds of thrill-seekers.

At home—on display in the UC Art Gallery in Berkeley—Jay DeFeo's "The Rose" has a large wall to itself. Its mystery and majesty glow.

At the Whitney, it's true it also has a wall to itself. But it's a small white one in a white box of a space. The visual—and emotional—effect of this strange but remarkable work is greatly diminished. But fortunately not destroyed.

[Jay DeFeo poured her life into this virtual sculpture, built up of endless blobs and squiggles of paint over a long period. Maybe, somewhere deep in the center of this symbolic rose, Jay's spirit is lingering?

[I have a special fondness for this work—and not only because of its sad history in the way that Jay made it. But because Jay's first public exhibition of her artistic talents was in California Hall at UC.

[She—with her chum, David Wool—offered to design the sets & costumes for my first staging of a play. Jay turned old furniture and flats into a riot of Steinbergian scrollwork for a special translation of Anton Chekhov's "The Bear."

[Her work was the best thing on view. And working with her was the best part of that experience. How was I to know she'd become famous, even tragically so?]

In the first half of the Whitney's American Century show, most works were on a much smaller scale—or, like WPA murals, could be represented in smaller forms such as sketches and photos. This made possible a much more complex and attractive mixture of cultural icons of the 1900-1950 period.

Even various display alcoves and cul-de-sacs were colorful, attractive, welcoming. That's not now the case.

Or maybe our first five decades of art & culture in the American Century really were better, more significant in the lives of our people? More colorful, passionate, sincere, meaningful, interesting, and challenging to Americans and the distinctively new emerging American Spirit?

By all means, go to the Whitney—and see where it has brought us now!

Here is an Honor Roll of some of the Usual Suspects whose work you will see: Julian Schnabel, William Wegman, Cindy Sherman, Jackson Pollock, Louise Bourgeois, Nam June Paik, Willem de Kooning, Bruce Nauman, Diane Arbus, Chuck Close, Eric Fischl, Richard Serra, Jenny Holzer, Claes Oldenburg, Nan Goldin, John Cage, Edward Kienholz, Ross Bleckner.

Ross Bleckner?

Archived from its 1969 exposure in Chicago, "Art by Telephone" can be listened-to by the public-telephones. Richard Serra and William Wegman—the photographer with all those dogs in funny costumes—can be heard phoning in instructions to curators.

Wow!

In the Whitney women's bathroom—No Men Allowed—Julia Sher's 1997 artwork, "Washroom Male, Washroom Female," can be heard—not seen—by those who will listen.

Double-Wow! But isn't it sexist and undemocratic to prevent men and boys from experiencing this transformative work-of-art?

Just asking.

But, while you're at the Whitney, don't miss the work of Chris Burden, Matthew Barney, Laurie Anderson, Jonas Mekas, and Yoko Ono! Jamie Wyeth, where have they hidden you?

Aptly Named "Sensation" Show Opens
At the Endangered Brooklyn Museum of Art

I thought someone had made the mistake of permitting the Mayor to preview this selection of works by young British artists in the Saatchi Collection. After which he immediately denounced the show—and several works in particular—as "filth."

But I was apparently mis-informed. A source said he'd never actually seen the offensive artworks. Of course, this is a good ploy for a censor. Seeing, reading, or hearing something unfit for public consumption is hardly something a Defender of Public Morality should be doing.

The Mayor initially announced that he was slashing the Museum's city-subsidy, a move certain to guarantee 150% attendance at the exhibition. Even art-lovers who have no idea where Brooklyn is will now have to find out—and discover which subways to take to get to the Museum.

Even those who hate most Post-post-Modern Art will want to see the paintings and sculptures the Mayor of "The Greatest City in the World" found "disgusting."

This is an Election Year. His Honor is running for NY Senator against Hilary Clinton. This makes his highly publicized outrage a bit suspect. There's nothing like Taking a Stand Against Immorality and Degeneracy to win votes.

Perhaps Mayor Giuliani is trying to model himself on that earlier Italian-American Reform Mayor? But Fiorello H. LaGuardia found an easier target in closing down Minsky's 42nd Street Burlesque.

Currently, the Mayor and most Manhattan Movers & Shakers are determined to make 42nd Street even gaudier and livelier than it ever was in the Depression Era. So it's probably easier now to pick on the Borough of Brooklyn and controversial modern artworks.

Actually, the Brooklyn Museum is one of the great museums of the world, not only of New York City or the United States. Its collections—notably from Egypt's Middle Kingdom period—are outstanding.

Not many New Yorkers—or even Brooklynites—are aware of this. And the Museum regularly mounts impressive shows of cutting-edge modern artists. But this is the first time one has caused such fiscal and cultural tremors at City Hall.

Chalk it up to Election Fever!

Museum officials and their powerful supporters invoked the First Amendment. The Mayor retaliated with—among other dire measures—a city lawsuit to evict the Museum, its officers, and its remarkable collections from this city-owned building.

As of this writing, nothing was resolved. And matters seemed to be going from bad to the proverbial worse.

Knowing I'd just been to Brooklyn for the press-preview, my building-superintendent informed me: "I'm a Catholic, and I think it's a fucking outrage to show this ----." He then asked me: "Do you want our taxpayers' money spent on ---- like this?"

Well, of course, no one in Albany or Washington asks me how I want my taxes spent. When I learned how many billions of dollars it cost us to bomb Belgrade—and how many more billions it will cost us to rebuild the city—I did think the money could have been better spent.

By sending in ground-troops initially. Or by putting a stop to the whole Balkan Mess ten years ago, before it got out of hand. But no one was watching then.

Then one of our building staff weighed in with his opinion: "Dr. Loney, Upper New York State is 41% Catholic. The voters are not going to stand for this!"

Sounds like Election Year again! Do Catholics vote as a block? Is that what the Mayor is hoping?

Subsidized Health Care for every New Yorker is too expensive an issue.

Didn't the Mayor—or someone on his staff—already know what this show was going to offer? If not, why not?

It had already been shown at the Hamburger Bahnhof in Berlin. To both acclaim and outrage.

It's just possible, however, that a number of viewers will agree with the Mayor's art-review. But it's to be hoped they won't rally for imposition of Arts Censorship in New York City.

That wouldn't be cool. Nor was the Mayor's over-reaction, whether impulsive or calculated.

But it must be said that some of the works on view are truly egregious—or deliberately provocative—so it's not surprising that he was disgusted.

The poster-logo for the show is itself suggestively provocative, so the Museum is certainly inviting—or hoping for—viewer-alarm and outrage.

The poster is a yellow sign with black lettering, headed HEALTH WARNING.

Its tongue-in-cheek text: "The contents of this exhibition may cause shock, vomiting, confusion, panic, euphoria, and anxiety. If you suffer from high blood pressure, a nervous disorder, or palpitations, you should consult your doctor before viewing this exhibition."

By all means, do consult your doctor—if he has time to see you. But do not miss this shocking show. Next door, you can cool down in the lovely Brooklyn Botanical Garden!

Or walk on a bit farther to the handsome Art Deco Brooklyn Public Library. You can read about Brooklyn's highly censorable—and homosexual—poet, Walt Whitman. Or see Abraham Lincoln on horseback at Grand Army Plaza.

BAM and Juniors' cheesecake are waiting for you down Flatbush Avenue!

Even if you've just seen Charles Saatchi's trophy-treasures, you will probably still have an appetite. Seeing Damien Hirst's cow sliced vertically into many sections may make you want a hamburger. If not a Hamburger Bahnhof.

Don't worry about where Saatchi stores all this stuff back home in England. When he gets too much of it—or possibly bored with it—he sends it for auction-sale. How very interesting then that Christie's is a sponsor of the current show.

As is "TimeOut/New York." The Saatchis made their name in Public Relations. They are credited with helping Baroness Thatcher achieve political prominence. I do not know, but I suspect that the original "TimeOut/London" is one of their projects.

This is hardly the first time rich art collectors have had their collections validated by major shows at major museums. Saatchi is an old-hand at it. It gives questionable artworks the Seal of Approval, And adds to their provenance.

The Met Museum, at least, hopes for a gift or gifts from the collection being shown.

Perhaps Saatchi will want to leave the Brooklyn Museum of Art all those heavy glass cases filled with formaldehyde solution and cow cross-sections?

It must have cost big bucks just to ship—or fly—those cases across the Atlantic. Not to mention other weighty artwork.

Had Hirst only left this poor bossy-cow intact, she could have had a nice big case all to herself, like his huge killer-shark. Or that poor little lost sheep, standing tall in formaldehyde.

I don't have the catalogue—yet—so I don't know if Hirst does his own chain-sawing of cows.

[By the way, where were Animal Rights Protesters when the Mayor was on the warpath?]

It has become an accepted practice for artists to find real craftsmen to do the actual execution of their artworks.

Jeff Koons moved from Hoover vacuum-cleaners in clear plastic cases to chrome bunny-rabbits. And life-sized ceramics of Michael Jackson and his monkey.

His best artworks were actually made by Italian artisans. You can't beat Old World Craftsmanship!

Some works in the current BMA show look like spin-offs of Pop Art and other tired trends. They should be inoffensive to the most ardent Upstate New York Catholic.

They were hardly worth sending across the wide blue waters.

And there are revisionist versions of much earlier art-trends. Hadrian Piggot, for instance, has couched a porcelain sink—with plumbing parts—in a red plush carrying-case.

Marcel Duchamp showed a urinal on its side as an artwork years ago at MoMA. So where's the innovation, ingenuity, or interest in Piggot's work? Is it intended as an hommage?

Certainly provocative—but not exactly titillating—is Marcus Harvey's "Myra." The woman in question is Myra Hindley, the infamous Moors Murderess.

She and her friend tortured and killed small children, savoring their shrieking agonies.

Harvey's dubious inspiration was to render her portrait in blacks, whites, and grays—are these colors symbolic of ways of looking at her crime?

But his colors are laid on with a kind of infantile pointillism. Hundreds of tiny kiddie hand-prints compose the very large portrait of Myra.

The big shocker in the show, of course, is Chris Ofili's "The Holy Virgin Mary."

If his colorful painting did not have such a title, most viewers would have no idea who this smiling lady—in her jeweled gown—might be. Some African Priestess or Chieftan's Wife, perhaps?

What apparently offended the Mayor—and by extension, 41% of Upstate New York Voters—is the Blessed Virgin's exposed right breast. The exposure is not shocking enough; Ofili had to render it in 3-D, with a great hunk of elephant-dung.

He has said he was trying to create a Hip-Hop vision of the Virgin. He certainly succeeded in making the Mayor hopping-mad!

Several other of his colorfully paint-jeweled paintings stand on big balls of elephant manure. Apparently, they have lots of this stuff in Africa.

Ofili, it is said, comes from a Nigerian tradition. I have seen colorful paintings in Nigeria which use actual beads on the canvas, much in the manner of his tiny dots of paint.

But I never saw one with elephant turds.

For that matter, although I traveled from Lagos to Ibadan, from Ife to Kano, I never saw anyone cooking food over elephant dung—said to be one of its major uses. I never even saw an elephant.

Fortunately, Rachel Whiteread's Roman-Legion of resin sculptures is not going to make anyone upset or ill. But she is apparently an apostle of the Minimalist Idea of the Presence of Absence. Or the significance of empty spaces.

She has filled an entire chamber with translucent resin-casts of the spaces under chairs. Many, many chairs. Constructed in different ways, with different numbers of spindles, &, &.

I suppose none of those chairs is alive today. She'd have to dismantle them to get at her faintly colored casts.

One of my favorite sculptures in the show is of a tiny naked angel—middle-aged-male division—scrunched disconsolately on a pedestal. His white-feathered wings are perky enough, but he's holding his head in his hands in despair.

"What do you think that is supposed to mean?" a colleague asked me.

That's easy! British Air lost his luggage. They do it every time you cross the Atlantic.

Coming & Going—Next-To-Last Roundup:

Going & Coming: "The Un-Private House"

All summer long, in major European and British newspapers and cultural magazines, this unique MoMA exhibition was the subject of extended reviews and speculation. It showed homes of the future—some already built, others still dream-plans on architectural drawing-boards.

What fascinated continental critics is the unusually open nature of many of these homes. Instead of being "A Man's Home Is His Castle" fortresses, these structures open themselves to nature, to neighbors, to the Public Eye.

Some of them are even space-sculptures in their own right. But many of these buildings also suggest—more than "A House Is Not a Home"—that a workplace combined with a living-space is the Wave of the Future. For those who can afford it.

This show is the first of a projected five-part MoMA architecture series. It has excited so much interest and comment that it may well be shown elsewhere. Nothing official yet. Watch this space!

If you missed this show, do buy the book, either at the MoMA Shop or at your local Barnes & Noble. THE UN-PRIVATE HOUSE, by Terence Riley. 250 illus, 106 in color. 152 pp. Harry N. Abrams, 1999. Paper: $29.95.