A Few of My Least Favorite Things

Audience members frequently hear me swoon over a number (usually all) of the works I feature in my gallery talks and lectures. I tell them anecdotes, histories and gush over a Rococo curve or particularly charming blush in an 18th century cheek. I read them dramatic excerpts of contemporary poems, Abbot Suger, and sometimes a scathing Salon review.

So I thought it might be interesting to be upfront about a few of my least favorite things. It should be noted that this is entirely subjective (you'll see just how so!). I readily admit that. It's also not to say that these works don't have critical, aesthetic and historical value. It's everything from the Old Masters, Impressionists to very important works in the trajectory of the Avant-Garde. So here goes with none of the charm of Julie Andrews:



1. Pierre-August Renoir, Lucie Berard (Child in White), 1883, oil on canvas

In gallery 201 of the AIC are the masters of high French Impressionism. From Caillebotte to Pissaro to Monet. And in the middle is Lucie Berard, staring vapidly out at the gallery, slightly bored. At age 3 she must have seen so unimpressed by the visitors and masterworks alike. Lucie was one of Renoir's favorite of the Berard children to paint. The youngest daughter of a Parisian banker, she was betrothed to a civil engineer at the age of 25 and one of her sons became an influential Surrealist poet. And she lived a long life, dying just before her 97th birthday in 1977. Yet her image in mottled ultramarine blue, splotched with peachy pinks belies any charm intended by the bubblegum color palette. Looking more like an alien wearing the mask of a child and puppetting a chemise, the Child in White will always make me uneasy.



2. Joos van Cleve and Workshop, The Infants Christ and Saint John the Baptist Embracing, 1520/25, oil on panel

The scene of the Holy Infants Embracing is a typical subject for Netherlandish panel painting in the 15th and 16th century. The subject derives from the biblical narrative when St. John the Baptist and the infant Christ meet outside of Egypt after escaping the Massacre of the Innocents. There are so many things I enjoy about this work: the delicately brushed landscape in the background, the lamps of carved sardonyx, the delicate gems that hang from the red silk canopy, even the feathered griffin feet supporting the architectural frame. But I don't know what Joos van Cleve or one of his assistants were thinking when they mucked up the shadows of what should be fleshy baby fat with an overzealous amount of burnt umber. The used so much there must have been none left to shade in the holy infants' coifs. Where one is used to seeing wispy curls of blond one is met with awkwardly gelled pincurls of out-of-the-box red hair. Those who have left ammonia hair color in their hair too long (or not long enough) recognize that shade of orange. I speak from experience and it's not the kind of experience I want associated with what should be a charming devotional panel painting.



3. Ferdinand Hodler, Day (Truth), 1896/98

Part of me feels that I should not be legally allowed to post this on the internet. The reason for this uneasy feeling is the very reason why I despise this work. Displayed below and around this work are some exquisite examples of fin-de-siecle and turn of the century decorative arts which I cannot enjoy because of their mere proximity to this piece. I cannot admire the lines and craftsmanship of the art nouveau Austrian side chairs for fear that I will accidentally look up at this piece, and even worse, someone might catch me looking at this piece. The model, Berthe Jacques, would be the fourth in a line of model-mistress-wife's in the artist's career. A deeply Symbolist painting, it surely captures that maxim of the "ugly truth."



4. Antonio Mancini, Resting, c. 1887, oil on canvas

Resting. Yes, we're all sure of that. Though, I can't tell if it's from a recent bout of scarlet fever or consumption (tuberculosis) or something more lewd. The smutty, thick paint echos the stale heat of the sick room she lies in. I can only imagine that the various glass bottles must contain horrid 19th century potions. Whatever she has just experienced, it seems to be ignored by the swooning and adoring sighs people let out when they see it.