Posted on 05/04/2005 3:37:15 AM PDT by Republicanprofessor
PHILADELPHIA, Dec. 14 -- One of the nation's richest troves of impressionist and post-impressionist art is moving to downtown Philadelphia now that its trustees have won court permission to leave their hard-to-visit suburban gallery, a legacy of the collection's eccentric founder.
Trustees of the Barnes Foundation had argued for two years that they should be allowed to move the collection of Renoirs, Cezannes, Matisses and Picassos because decades of limited attendance and high costs in Lower Merion Township have nearly bankrupted the foundation
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
I think it is too bad that they have to move. Barnes envisioned the whole environment: house, grounds and even the exact placement of the artworks in the house. It is an INCREDIBLE collection and very uniquely situated (which was a great deal of its charm).
Why couldn't they use the $100-150 million raised for the new building to save the "bankrupt" foundation? Or why couldn't they allow more than 400 tourists in per day? Those seem like more conservative ways to save the foundation. Perhaps the curators just wanted to be more "in the swing" of the art world in Philadelphia. Merion PA is a bit out of the way. (That's the charm, duh...Not to mention the battle Barnes had all his life with Philadelphia society and the entrenched art world of his time.)
I hope the NEA didn't fund that last piece of junk on post 2.
Ping.
I got some help to do images. Hurray!
When are they moving?
I guess I'm going to have to start an Art Appreciation class on FR. Modern art takes some education, but the abstraction can echo the movement and power of the twentieth century more than simple realism.
For those who only like photographic realism in art, (because it seems to take more talent), the camera was invented in 1839 and after that artists were free to explore other options. Abstraction can express inner ideas better than realism.
We just have to open our eyes to look and our minds to try to understand modern art.
This is not to say that all modern and contemporary art is great. I'm just saying that we have to develop the facility to look more critically.
When they build their new facility, in downtown Philadelphia. Just what Barnes envisioned, I'm sure.
Nice pictures! I really like those odd out-of-the-way museums. I've never been to this one, but it does sound like mismanagement may have been responsible for some of its woes.
I'm not trying to make you conform. I appreciate beauty, but there's so much porno around these days, it's like hearing Barry Manalow or "Achy-Breaky Heart" one too many times. Just me. Just offering my opinion. And like I said, I hope the NEA didn't pay for that piece of porno. It wouldn't even attract the guys in trench coats.
BTW, here's another interesting post about parts of a collection being sold. Thomas Malloy, a Bishop of Brooklyn who died in the 1950's, had a private collection that included a truly stunning Murillo and other odds and ends. He left it to the Diocese of Brooklyn, although I don't know where they kept it, if it was accessible to view, etc. It is being sold by the Diocese at the Christie's Old Masters sale in May to raise money for education.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1395779/posts
The judge should have ruled that these directors were incompetent, and appointed me to run things so it could have been kept in place, in accordance with Barnes' wishes.
But moving the museum is way out of line. I like your idea of the Cuture of Disrepect. Did you trademark that?
But Matisse's Joy of Life, which is the pink piece in post 2, was created in 1906. It was far more shocking then. It is not pornography. Yes, it does show nudes, but so has art for centuries. The fact that the nudes were flat was what was shocking 100 years ago.
I see pornography as something that is designed to "excite" the viewer (or user). Just a nude doesn't do that for me. These women are reclining and enjoying the landscape; they are not making love nor seducing anyone. There is music and dance in the background.
It is indeed a celebration of life at its most basic: bright colors of landscape, music, dance, relaxation, and one kiss. Nothing "porno" about it.
The NEA was established sometime in the 1980s or so. So it had nothing to do with this. (Now if we want to debate Piss Christ, we can do that, and I don't think that it's great art by any means nor should public money have support it.)
So, I am really a Republican, and a professor, so my tagline is not an oxymoron.
Art ping.
Let me know whether you want on or off the art ping list.
I totally agree with you.
Feel free to pass on anything that would help me appreciate modern art. At best, it leaves me cold and at worst, it's offensive.
I see college students who are art students here and their works seem overdone in trying to convey a lot of negativity or be deliberately provocative for the sake of being provocative. Frankly, I think they're grasping at straws - most of them wouldn't know tragedy if it came up and slapped them in the face.
With all due respect (since I see from your later posts that you teach this stuff for a living), art appreciation is easy. If it looks good, it's art. If it doesn't look good, it's just a waste of paint.
That is the only real criteria for the appreciation of art. As an example. A local muffler shop mechanic had a few hours to kill so he welded some old parts into a very good looking dragon. That's art. In Milwaukee a few years back some 'artist' recieved thousands of tax dollars to place 6 bright orange I-beams welded together on the lake front. That was just very expensive scrap metal.
The picture you provided in post 2 (the bottom painting) falls into the waste of paint category for me. It could never be hung anywhere as it's just plain ugly.
Kind of reminds me of the sunflower pictures. (can't remember who painted them but I think there were several by the same guy). I've seen better looking florals at starving artists' fairs or yard sales, yet these particular sunflowers sold for millions. I just figured someone got ripped off big time as the paintings aren't all that much to look at
Of course others mileage may vary.
When is the collection slated to move? I plan on getting over to Lower Merion to check it out while it is still there.
Wills dont seem to mean much these days....when the presumed greater good of the public is involved.
You said... "If it looks good, it's art. If it doesn't look good, it's just a waste of paint."
Dont fall into the 'art is everything...everything is art' logical trap.
If you do...you might as well call Finnaren and Haley and Sherwin Williams popular American artists.
Even Warhol wouldnt swing for that.
I recall another case in Pennsylvania, where a man left his money for something and the court overturned it. I don't recall any longer what the issues were. I do remember that there was no question that he might have been pressured or that he was not of sound mind.
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