I was in NYC this last weekend and while there visited the Museum of Modern Art. And guess what? It has Starry Night. So I spent a considerable amount of time looking at it just to see what makes it so much better than the Dominic original.
I thought that I was close to seeing what it was; but then I happened to wander over to a collection of paintings by Picasso. And when I did, I couldn’t help but think that Dominic’s drawing really might belong in the collection of great artworks.
One thing, however, is certain: Van Gogh’s Starry Night is worth a whole lot more than Dominic’s drawing.
And that got me to thinking about what Van Gogh’s finances were like just after he painted it. And that led me to the following sentences from two of his letters to Theo just after he painted Starry Night. The sentences paint an interesting picture. I shall call it:
The Pauper
These four days I have lived mainly on 23 cups of coffee, with bread which I still have to pay for.
I am almost sure that Bague will like my big studies, the “Starry Sky,” “Furrows,” etc., he will like some in the last batch much less.
I have a lot of expenses, and it worries me a good deal sometimes when I realize more and more that painting is a profession carried on most likely by exceedingly poor men, and it costs so much money.
So Van Gogh, having painted what would become considered one of the greatest paintings of all time, was forced to live on coffee and bread, was worried whether some collector would like his paintings, and was dismayed by the fact that painting cost so much. And what did he have in his possession at that time? A future treasure, as is shown by another sentence from the same letters.
That's 5 canvases I have in progress this week, that brings the number of these size 30 canvases for the decoration to 15, I think.
2 canvases of sunflowers
3 “ the poet's garden
2 “ the other garden
1 “ the night café
1 “ the Trinquetaille bridge
1 “ the railway bridge
1 “ the house
1 “ Tarascon diligence
1 “ the starry night
1 “ the furrows
1 “ the vineyard
Van Gogh was 35 when he wrote these letters and hence had less than two years to live.
The universe is a funny thing. Perhaps Van Gogh didn’t ask enough of it. Or perhaps he asked too much.
Friday, July 16, 2010
Friday, July 9, 2010
Van Gogh at 30
Van Gogh painted himself. His self-portraits are some of his best-known works.
Interestingly enough, Van Gogh also painted himself in written form. His letters to Theo, his brother, paint a fascinating picture of Van Gogh throughout his life.
Those letters can be accessed in unabridged form here:
http://www.webexhibits.org/vangogh/
Of course, all pictures misrepresent. And today, we are presented with pictures within pictures within pictures. It is enough to drive one mad.
But at the risk of driving someone to madness, here is a picture of Van Gogh composed from four sentences taken from a letter he wrote to Theo February 8, 1883 at the age of thirty.
I will call the picture:
Van Gogh at Thirty.
Sometimes I cannot believe that I am only thirty years old, I feel so much older.
I feel older only when I think that most people who know me consider me a failure, and how it really might be so, if some things do not change for the better; and when I think it might be so, I feel it so vividly that it quite depresses me and makes me as downhearted as if it were really so.
I sometimes think I will make an experiment, and try to work in quite a different way, that is, to dare more and to risk more,
What a mystery life is, and love is a mystery within a mystery. It certainly never remains the same in a literal sense, but the changes are like the ebb and flow of the tide and leave the sea unchanged.
At 30, Van Gogh considered himself a failure, as did most everyone else; he resolved to take more risks; and he was, it would seem, a romantic.
At 36, Van Gogh was unable to find love, unable to consider himself a success.
At 37, Van Gogh was dead.
Interestingly enough, Van Gogh also painted himself in written form. His letters to Theo, his brother, paint a fascinating picture of Van Gogh throughout his life.
Those letters can be accessed in unabridged form here:
http://www.webexhibits.org/vangogh/
Of course, all pictures misrepresent. And today, we are presented with pictures within pictures within pictures. It is enough to drive one mad.
But at the risk of driving someone to madness, here is a picture of Van Gogh composed from four sentences taken from a letter he wrote to Theo February 8, 1883 at the age of thirty.
I will call the picture:
Van Gogh at Thirty.
Sometimes I cannot believe that I am only thirty years old, I feel so much older.
I feel older only when I think that most people who know me consider me a failure, and how it really might be so, if some things do not change for the better; and when I think it might be so, I feel it so vividly that it quite depresses me and makes me as downhearted as if it were really so.
I sometimes think I will make an experiment, and try to work in quite a different way, that is, to dare more and to risk more,
What a mystery life is, and love is a mystery within a mystery. It certainly never remains the same in a literal sense, but the changes are like the ebb and flow of the tide and leave the sea unchanged.
At 30, Van Gogh considered himself a failure, as did most everyone else; he resolved to take more risks; and he was, it would seem, a romantic.
At 36, Van Gogh was unable to find love, unable to consider himself a success.
At 37, Van Gogh was dead.
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
Melanie's Paintings
First things first – Melanie’s paintings should be displayed vertically, not in a triangle, like I had them before today. When hung vertically, they form an obvious progression from the heat of the day to the cool of a moonlit night.
So what do I like about Melanie’s paintings?
This may sound like criticism, but it is far from it – I like Melanie’s paintings because they are childlike. Not childish. Childlike. If you were to try to paint the dream of a child, these are what you would paint. The buildings are distended, as if alive. The windows, especially in the middle painting, look like eyes. The sun in the top and bottom paintings looks almost as if it has been spit up from the street. And the street itself looks as if it is standing straight up and down.
Melanie, it seems to me, has captured brilliantly a recurrent dream image of a child. And that is no insignificant feat.
It seems to me that capturing is perhaps one of the fundamental artistic metaphors.
Great artists somehow capture something.
Maybe the fact that capturing is so important to art is part of the reason that photography changed art so much. Photographs capture rather well the world just as it is. So with the advent of photography artists had to figure out not just how to capture something but also what to capture. And that doubles the difficulty.
This is pure speculation, but perhaps what makes contemporary art so difficult, both to produce and to appreciate, is the fact that artists must now figure out both what to capture and how to capture it. Picasso’s cubist attempts to capture the three dimensionality of a person on a two dimensional plane is a case in point. It took a genius to think that such a phenomenon could and should be captured and then to figure out how to do it. And it takes a certain aesthetic leap to appreciate Picasso’s cubist paintings. Neither capturing what is not part of the world nor appreciating what is captured are easy feats.
And this in part is what I like so much about Melanie’s paintings. She has captured a child’s dream. Indeed, when I look at Melanie’s paintings I feel a bit like a child who has been winked at by someone who knows about his dreams.
So what do I like about Melanie’s paintings?
This may sound like criticism, but it is far from it – I like Melanie’s paintings because they are childlike. Not childish. Childlike. If you were to try to paint the dream of a child, these are what you would paint. The buildings are distended, as if alive. The windows, especially in the middle painting, look like eyes. The sun in the top and bottom paintings looks almost as if it has been spit up from the street. And the street itself looks as if it is standing straight up and down.
Melanie, it seems to me, has captured brilliantly a recurrent dream image of a child. And that is no insignificant feat.
It seems to me that capturing is perhaps one of the fundamental artistic metaphors.
Great artists somehow capture something.
Maybe the fact that capturing is so important to art is part of the reason that photography changed art so much. Photographs capture rather well the world just as it is. So with the advent of photography artists had to figure out not just how to capture something but also what to capture. And that doubles the difficulty.
This is pure speculation, but perhaps what makes contemporary art so difficult, both to produce and to appreciate, is the fact that artists must now figure out both what to capture and how to capture it. Picasso’s cubist attempts to capture the three dimensionality of a person on a two dimensional plane is a case in point. It took a genius to think that such a phenomenon could and should be captured and then to figure out how to do it. And it takes a certain aesthetic leap to appreciate Picasso’s cubist paintings. Neither capturing what is not part of the world nor appreciating what is captured are easy feats.
And this in part is what I like so much about Melanie’s paintings. She has captured a child’s dream. Indeed, when I look at Melanie’s paintings I feel a bit like a child who has been winked at by someone who knows about his dreams.
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Three For One
I made another trade. But I didn’t just get one painting. No, I got three.
Last night I drove to Melanie Bamberg's place to see her collection of art. But as I did, Kelly's first question kept bouncing around in my head: How will I know if I trade up?
In fact, I was almost driven to distraction by that question.
But then Melanie solved the dilemma for me. After she showed me her very interesting collection of art, she offered me three paintings for one. And in strictly numerical terms, getting three for one is a trade up.
Indeed, as I thought about trading with Melanie, I couldn’t help but consider an interesting possibility. If I got three paintings in this trade, maybe in my next trade I can get eight paintings; and in the next, seventeen. Who knows? In ten trades I may have eight thousand paintings; and I bet I could trade eight thousand paintings for a Van Gogh.
Of course, I still want to trade for good paintings, even if I am getting more of them.
But in the case of Melanie’s paintings I couldn’t be more pleased.
When I looked at Melanie’s facebook gallery of paintings a few days before visiting her, I immediately noticed the three that I eventually traded for. But when I saw them online, I thought: surely, Melanie won’t give even one of those paintings away. They are all so cool. I really dug those paintings. Still do.
But then Melanie offered to give me all three. I was flabbergasted. Still am.
In my next post, I will tell you what I think is so cool about Melanie’s paintings.
But before doing so, let me first thank Melanie for giving me three such awesome paintings.
And before leaving for the day, let me add: if anyone wants to trade for my three totally cool Melanie Bamberg paintings, let me know.
Last night I drove to Melanie Bamberg's place to see her collection of art. But as I did, Kelly's first question kept bouncing around in my head: How will I know if I trade up?
In fact, I was almost driven to distraction by that question.
But then Melanie solved the dilemma for me. After she showed me her very interesting collection of art, she offered me three paintings for one. And in strictly numerical terms, getting three for one is a trade up.
Indeed, as I thought about trading with Melanie, I couldn’t help but consider an interesting possibility. If I got three paintings in this trade, maybe in my next trade I can get eight paintings; and in the next, seventeen. Who knows? In ten trades I may have eight thousand paintings; and I bet I could trade eight thousand paintings for a Van Gogh.
Of course, I still want to trade for good paintings, even if I am getting more of them.
But in the case of Melanie’s paintings I couldn’t be more pleased.
When I looked at Melanie’s facebook gallery of paintings a few days before visiting her, I immediately noticed the three that I eventually traded for. But when I saw them online, I thought: surely, Melanie won’t give even one of those paintings away. They are all so cool. I really dug those paintings. Still do.
But then Melanie offered to give me all three. I was flabbergasted. Still am.
In my next post, I will tell you what I think is so cool about Melanie’s paintings.
But before doing so, let me first thank Melanie for giving me three such awesome paintings.
And before leaving for the day, let me add: if anyone wants to trade for my three totally cool Melanie Bamberg paintings, let me know.
Monday, June 28, 2010
Picasso!
3500 ceramic pieces in a little over ten years. -- that’s how many Picasso made near the end of his life.
I learned that fact over the weekend at a museum in Charleston. I am still stunned by it. That’s about one piece a day. Except for performing basic biological functions, I haven’t done anything every day for even a week much less ten years.
So I’m feeling pretty ordinary compared to good old Picasso.
As I drove away from Charleston I thought that perhaps I would feel a bit less ordinary were I to trade up to Charleston. That way I would own the museum that holds the Picasso vase that made me feel so ordinary.
Could I trade up to Charleston?
Probably not.
Besides, even though Picasso is great, I still prefer Van Gogh. I think it has something to do with his ear. And I don’t think there are any Van Gogh's in Charleston.
So I will stick to my original plan. Trading up to a Van Gogh.
And as I mentioned last week, I am supposed to go see another artist’s paintings on Wednesday.
I have seen pictures of the artist’s work online, and I think they are great. So I can’t wait.
I will let you know what happens in my next post.
Just to help things along, though, I can’t help but tell the universe:
I want to trade my Kelly Koeppel this week for a cool painting.
I want to trade my Kelly Koeppel this week for a cool painting.
I want to trade my Kelly Koeppel this week for a cool painting.
I learned that fact over the weekend at a museum in Charleston. I am still stunned by it. That’s about one piece a day. Except for performing basic biological functions, I haven’t done anything every day for even a week much less ten years.
So I’m feeling pretty ordinary compared to good old Picasso.
As I drove away from Charleston I thought that perhaps I would feel a bit less ordinary were I to trade up to Charleston. That way I would own the museum that holds the Picasso vase that made me feel so ordinary.
Could I trade up to Charleston?
Probably not.
Besides, even though Picasso is great, I still prefer Van Gogh. I think it has something to do with his ear. And I don’t think there are any Van Gogh's in Charleston.
So I will stick to my original plan. Trading up to a Van Gogh.
And as I mentioned last week, I am supposed to go see another artist’s paintings on Wednesday.
I have seen pictures of the artist’s work online, and I think they are great. So I can’t wait.
I will let you know what happens in my next post.
Just to help things along, though, I can’t help but tell the universe:
I want to trade my Kelly Koeppel this week for a cool painting.
I want to trade my Kelly Koeppel this week for a cool painting.
I want to trade my Kelly Koeppel this week for a cool painting.
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
Pagan Rituals
Two nights ago was the summer solstice. What a beautiful night.
I think Van Gogh liked the summer solstice. That is pure speculation on my part. But it is hard not to like the summer solstice. The moon takes on a special glow.
I wonder whether Van Gogh ever engaged in a pagan ritual. He was an artist after all. Aren’t they supposed to do that kind of thing?
Does anyone really know what Van Gogh was like? I would like to know what he was like. Did he know about pagan rituals? Did he engage in any?
I think it would be a shame if there were no truth to pagan rituals. Indeed, I propose a bold thesis:
If there isn’t at least some truth to pagan rituals, the world is less beautiful than it could have been.
Pagan rituals, after all, are beautiful.
I will call that thesis: The Pagan Ritual Thesis (PRT)
And because I feel so strongly about PRT, I am going to declare to the universe:
Let there be at least some truth to pagan rituals.
Let there be at least some truth to pagan rituals.
Let there be at least some truth to pagan rituals.
And now that I have the universe’s attention, I want to thank it for the lovely time I had two nights ago – it was a beautiful summer solstice.
And on an unrelated note, someone else may be interested in trading. A week from today I am supposed to go see her collection of art. I can’t wait.
I think Van Gogh liked the summer solstice. That is pure speculation on my part. But it is hard not to like the summer solstice. The moon takes on a special glow.
I wonder whether Van Gogh ever engaged in a pagan ritual. He was an artist after all. Aren’t they supposed to do that kind of thing?
Does anyone really know what Van Gogh was like? I would like to know what he was like. Did he know about pagan rituals? Did he engage in any?
I think it would be a shame if there were no truth to pagan rituals. Indeed, I propose a bold thesis:
If there isn’t at least some truth to pagan rituals, the world is less beautiful than it could have been.
Pagan rituals, after all, are beautiful.
I will call that thesis: The Pagan Ritual Thesis (PRT)
And because I feel so strongly about PRT, I am going to declare to the universe:
Let there be at least some truth to pagan rituals.
Let there be at least some truth to pagan rituals.
Let there be at least some truth to pagan rituals.
And now that I have the universe’s attention, I want to thank it for the lovely time I had two nights ago – it was a beautiful summer solstice.
And on an unrelated note, someone else may be interested in trading. A week from today I am supposed to go see her collection of art. I can’t wait.
Monday, June 21, 2010
Kelly's Second Question
I want a Van Gogh. So I decided I’d try to trade up to one just like the red paper clip guy traded up from a paper clip to a house. But in order to make my plan a bit different and so potentially more interesting, I thought I would hold a lottery for the Van Gogh once I got it. If I gave all and only those people who traded with me the right to buy a lottery ticket for half the ticket’s real price, anyone who traded with me would get some benefit in addition to helping me achieve my goal. That, I thought, might be lots of fun.
But then, as I was in the middle of trading with Kelly, she asked very bluntly:
With the addition of the lottery, hasn’t your plan now become too much of a scheme? Won’t money taint it?
If I could express in words the sinking feeling I had when she asked me those questions, I would. Maybe Kelly was right. Maybe I had tainted my plan. Money does do that. And people don’t like getting caught up in a scheme. So maybe I should stick to trading up to a Van Gogh and leave out the lottery part.
Kelly then had a very good suggestion: why don’t you ask some of the other people who might trade with you what they think?
So that is what I will do. I will ask the next few people interested in trading which plan they prefer: trading up without a lottery or trading up with a lottery.
But just to set the stage, here are what I take to be the pros and cons of the two plans.
Trading Up Without Lottery
Pros
Isn’t tainted with money.
Cons
Isn’t all that different from the red paper clip guy’s plan.
People who trade with me won’t get any benefit other than having
participated in my pursuit of a Van Gogh
Trading Up With Lottery
Pros
People who trade with me could benefit monetarily and could, if they so choose, donate such money to some worthy cause.
Cons
Taints the process with money and so seems like a scheme.
Those are the options at the moment. If anyone has any thoughts, let me know.
And of course if anyone wants to trade for my awesome Kelly Koeppel original, let me know that as well.
But then, as I was in the middle of trading with Kelly, she asked very bluntly:
With the addition of the lottery, hasn’t your plan now become too much of a scheme? Won’t money taint it?
If I could express in words the sinking feeling I had when she asked me those questions, I would. Maybe Kelly was right. Maybe I had tainted my plan. Money does do that. And people don’t like getting caught up in a scheme. So maybe I should stick to trading up to a Van Gogh and leave out the lottery part.
Kelly then had a very good suggestion: why don’t you ask some of the other people who might trade with you what they think?
So that is what I will do. I will ask the next few people interested in trading which plan they prefer: trading up without a lottery or trading up with a lottery.
But just to set the stage, here are what I take to be the pros and cons of the two plans.
Trading Up Without Lottery
Pros
Isn’t tainted with money.
Cons
Isn’t all that different from the red paper clip guy’s plan.
People who trade with me won’t get any benefit other than having
participated in my pursuit of a Van Gogh
Trading Up With Lottery
Pros
People who trade with me could benefit monetarily and could, if they so choose, donate such money to some worthy cause.
Cons
Taints the process with money and so seems like a scheme.
Those are the options at the moment. If anyone has any thoughts, let me know.
And of course if anyone wants to trade for my awesome Kelly Koeppel original, let me know that as well.
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