Category Archives: Anthology

My collected writings and those of family members.

Parting Looks

This gallery contains 1 photo.

The humans are cartoonish, with unsettling ocular highlights. The man’s buckle and spurs gleam unexpectedly. The beakish woman (clad in denim?) grasps a shepherd’s crook. A bucket dangling from block and tackle drips water drawn from an artesian well. It … Continue reading

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“Corrupted Formalism”

I ponder what exactly the relationship between professional critic and working artist is. I, of course, am neither — a nosy bystander at best. I’m aware glancingly of debates in the professional art community about who says and does what. … Continue reading

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Haunted by the Undefined

Thank you, Maeve Higgins. I’m always glad for the rare journalist who doesn’t assume her reader is privy to novel slang. A term I knew only from sailing has headlined several unread articles recently. I assumed it had to do … Continue reading

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Not Ready for Answers

Merce Cunningham comes across in these recollections of his dancers as a man who spoke volumes in few words. “Don’t make everything so pretty” and the terse statement that answers demand questions cover about ninety percent of art and life, … Continue reading

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A Black Hole Sings in B Flat

There is great buzz today around black holes in celebration of the latest observations. The sense of awe these phenomena induce has intersected just now with my private boning up on fundamentals of music theory, leaving me astounded on many … Continue reading

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“I don’t paint what I see but what I saw”

There’s much that’s discoverable for me about Munch. These excerpts stood out. Artists I admire are similarly self-critical and leery of pretty pictures. Munch’s house and studio were on a remote hillside above Oslo, where he fled after his 1908 … Continue reading

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“All right — take the picture!”

Annie Leibovitz’s latest exhibition of her photography is Annie Leibovitz: The Early Years, 1970-1983. It includes a shot of Henri Cartier-Bresson, one of her idols, during her time roaming Paris as a budding photographer. The notoriously camera-shy Frenchman glares into … Continue reading

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Cartoon Transfer Technique

The article is about Raphael’s preparatory cartoon for his fresco “The School of Athens” in the Vatican. What caught my eye in particular was mention of the method used to transfer the image to the walls. Its value must have been … Continue reading

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Van Gogh in London

A new exhibition at Tate Britain, “Van Gogh and Britain,” opens March 27, 2019. This article causes me to think somewhat differently about van Gogh. Of several good illustrations it contains, I chose the painting reproduced here because I’ve never … Continue reading

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“You Invent Your Own Game”

Older artists profiled in this article are achieving belated critical and financial success after laboring in obscurity for much of their careers. In her title the author makes the artists’ ethnicity explicit, providing good context for the categorization, and it’s … Continue reading

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