From my distracted grazing through the internet this morning comes the
news that the artist Cy Twombly died today at age 83. As
quoted in the Washington Post -
One of his leading proponents, Kirk Varnedoe, a former curator at New York’s Museum of Modern Art, wrote in a 1994 essay that “Twombly is the original ‘My kid could do this’ sculptor and painter.”
When I started out studying painting at the Art Institute of Chicago, I suppose I found myself agreeing with that statement, though I was a bit too intimidated by the world of High Modern Art to say so. However, over time, I found myself warming up to his work - not necessarily because I had now acquired properly academic Good Taste (though that may have been a part of it), but mostly because Cy seemed to be having so much fun doing what he was doing, and it became contagious.
And because he did it so well! If you've ever worked with oil paint on big canvasses, you'll know that it's not so easy to move around the surface like he did. Doing large gestures like that, you run the risk of having your line looking boring and meaningless on one end of the spectrum, or like a self-indulgent puddle of vomit on the other. Twombly never let his paintings run to either extreme. He slung paint around like Zorro, and his gestures and scribbles turned from heroic to comic and back again.
The thing about abstraction like Twombly's is that once you start to appreciate it, things start to reverse in your mind. Instead of scoffing and saying, "Humph, my kid can do that!", you start to say, "Wow, my kid can do that, too!"
A wall becomes more than a wall. You start to see traces of time, history, and the hands and energy that made it.
(Of course, in this case, it helps that this particular wall was hand plastered and exposed to the elements for quite a while, but you can see my point, right...?)
You start to see art everywhere, even if it doesn't have a recognizable form as such. We all like to look at fireworks and fountains, right? They're simply moving versions of the same principle at work.
I'm not saying that makes me particularly cultured or insightful, but it does mean that I'm often easily amused...
(Look! Some kid built a shelf in the middle of this one!)
And am I the only dad that has a secret urge to join in with his kids in the competition for the window seat on the plane? I hope not...
You mean all along, we've been flying over abstract artworks? Shucks, they told me it was mountains...
Happy noticing, everyone!
