Bostontowners–under the ruthless self-promotion category, two events are coming up, 3/24, The Mystery, Rob Noyes, Ross Hammond at Blue Bag, and 4/8, Sunday Afternoon Rager of Poetry and Song with Tanya Larkin, Wendy Eisenberg, Christina Davis, Sandra Lim, and yours very truly at Armory Cafe.

A MODEST PROPOSAL

wish my fake photoshop attempts were better but you get the idea ya

Let’s have an old master show in a 7-11. I know, I know, potential for damage, donors in hysterics, balking insurance firms, acid-throwing painting murderers making their terrible plans, but, oh, still, just think of it. The Thinker in front of the taquitos in their eternal twirl, The Arnolfini Portrait dangling at a safe distance over the heat lamps with the quietly sweating pizzas underneath, Holofernes getting his head chopped off by Judith (yes, that is Goliath to the left there–what was it with Caravaggio and choppin’ off the heads) in front of the Nacho Pretzel Combos.

Modest Proposal

No, this is not meant as a pointed observation on the commerce of art (wait: is it? No. But, fair point). Nor is it an urge towards invidious desecration of great masters’ work or a big pffffffffft to ye olde Establishment. Just a seeking of further/other art truths through means of context. Am I 100% right or am I 101% right? However, I’d shy away from a faked 7-11. Unless the museum is actually selling the Mountain Dew, et al. How about The Dinner Party in a Walmart. Boy, now, that makes a gal feel funny.

Klimt, Standing Woman (Study for Portrait of Eugenia Primavesi), 1912–13, Graphite on Asian paper

KLIMT AND SCHIELE: DRAWN MFA Boston until May 28^th

I’ve been to the MFA twice in the last month now that I’ve discovered it’s FREEFREEFREE thanks to my employer. As a total culture vulture, this was just corking news. But should you be on a budget remember there are free nights and in any case I’d say this is a particularly good bang for your buck time, considering the Murakami, Escher, and Phantasmagoria exhibits, not to mention the Rothkos. Although it’s a great deal to digest at once. Like a 7-11, I might add.

Klimt Homage, The Master Blackmailer

Part of my motivating desire to see this Klimt and Schiele: Drawn was the realization I’m most familiar with both artist’s work through college dorm posters. That’s a bit sad, isn’t it. My eye has been arrested by both, particularly Klimt, susceptible as I am to gilded, gold-y, and gleaming anything. But I’d found Schiele’s starkness and higher than average use of monocles completely thrilling too. And there’s a spectacular Klimt reference in BBC’s adaptation of The Master Blackmailer  * which, mystery nerd that I am, I’ve seen many times. But Klimt/Schiele by proxy is not the same thing.

Since the surliness of my extreme youth, I’d had some sort of ill-defined and yes, questionable, wariness around Weimar cabaret singin’ and dancin’. Although I’ve admired other contemporaneous painters unfettered by this prejudice, I’d somehow glomped both Klimt and Schiele into that cabaret bucket, independent of historical accuracy, their work, and even my own opinions about their work. I don’t know how that happened. But I knew this should be transcended. Because it’s silly to miss out on the neat-O. Or eternal.

Schiele, Portrait of the Artist’s Sister-in-Law, Adele Harms, 1917, Watercolor and black chalk on Asian paper

Let me get to the important part and here I will in all fairness glomp them together: they are both fantastic f*cking draw-ers. As a viewer, to be able to derive so much from sketches and watercolors—some of them quite cursory—strikes one as a bit of a magic trick on the part of ze artistes. And to my eye the thing Klimt and Schiele had most in common was an ability to communicate one of the granddaddy and mommy truths of ‘em all: that we are alive for a time in this world.

Klimt, Standing Female Nude (Study for the Beethoven Frieze: The Three Gorgons) 1901, Black chalk on wrapping paper

Maybe it’s the immediacy of sketching that conveys this. Or it could be the rumpled dishabille. Or all the marvelous hair waving about (turns out many Austrian ladies had great hair). Or Klimt’s many “study of…” portraits, that, even in embryo state of pre-paintings, capture the individuality of his subjects. Or the pain in Schiele’s self-portraits in prison. The sense that if you found these drawings on their yellowing paper in your greatgrandpapa’s attic it would be the coolest thing ever. Would it be some corny (but quite apropos) Freudian shite to suggest maybe their willingness and consistency to draw women’s nether areas (lightly display here but elsewhere, yes, boy howdy) as something to do it with it. Hey, that’s life, baby. In any case 100 years on there’s vitality and presence to spare. In chronicling their subjects passing through this earth, by extension the artists are doing the same for themselves, and furthermore doing this for a real specific time of ideas/people in Western history.  That’s always true. But here, it is extra-true.

Klimt, Standing Girl in Coat; Klimt, Portrait of a Woman in Three-Quarter Profile; Schiele, Albert Paris Gütersloh

It seems lazy to praise Klimt and Schiele simultaneously. I’m also relying on the accompanying photos to remind everyone of how different they are. If the praise shoe fits two separate feet, even those with their own singular voices and visions, what is one reviewer to do but be efficient. Their relationship doesn’t seem to have been particularly competitive (?) which could go either way in a mentor(K)/mentee(S) thing, nor is the exhibit presented as a rivalry. But I couldn’t help but press myself which one I liked best: Klimt or Schiele. Klimt or Schiele. Klimt or Schiele. I was probably trying to distract myself from all the horrible people milling about obstructing my view for moments at a time and saying things in courteously subdued voices.

Klimt vs. Schiele: definitive scientific research

I may just be more of a Klimt gal. This surprised me. I tend to like my reality a little more… well…gargled by the artist. To my eye Schiele is gargle-ier. More subjective. Harsher. Brutal (too strong?). Klimt’s work here is smoother. More Romantic? Calmer. Mein gotten himmel, the harmoniousness, the composition—it’s hard to not get carried away. Am I saying Klimt is less brave? I don’t know if that’s fair, but I may be. I do think as someone who draws a lot, Klimt’s ability to get proportions so unfailingly right on feet, heads, ears, hands, enviable and admirable in the extreme. I sighed in that pleased way you do.

Egon Schiele, Old Houses in Český Krumlov, 1914, Pencil and watercolor on Asian paper

But that being said, far and away my favorite piece was Schiele’s “Old Houses in Český Krumlov,” 1914. That’s one of the most fully realized pieces of art I ‘ere did see. And if I could award a posthumous prize for best title ever it would be Schiele’s “Hindering the Artist Is a Crime, It Is Murdering Life in the Bud!” You said it, Egon.

I don’t mean to ruin anything by overselling, which is easy to do in urging people to experience something not overtly, like, dazzling. Pencil (etc.) sketches, even when filled in with wash, watercolors, etc., can seem wan in the museum-y context, especially when you are, like moi, more of a painting vs. drawing junkie. And there’s heightened expectation where so much expense and stage-managing has gone into presentation. Lor’, imagine the potential number of meetings involved in choosing the color of the walls alone. One of those discrete shades that make one feel the walls have their eyes politely averted.

Klimt, Lady with Plumed Hat, 1908, Ink, graphite, colored pencil, and watercolor on Asian paper

I had to stop myself from reading all the material because at some point I was noticing I was reading more than looking. This can be a hazard in a museum, I think. But I did glean what had to be the most important and inevitable fact: Klimt’s dad was a gold engraver. OF COURSE HE WAS.

The exhibit was a joy, and more than sum of its parts (a credit to the exhibitors), and even if you would only experience it as a partial to middling joy, I’m going to guess in these times and places, you’ll take what you can get. Go on. I urge you to leave the house and get there. Plus who doesn’t love that MFA cafeteria.

*re: The Master Blackmailer–shoutout to the glorious art direction generally, and please note in our era of blackmail porn, remains plenty pertinent.