The Dialogue of Art - a reflection on the Museum of Computer Art's Donnie 2014

[The following is excerpted and modified ever so slightly from my Introduction to the Catalog of artwork submitted for the Museum of Computer Art's annual 2014 Donnie contest.]

While looking at Dreilich’s photo of an athletic field with a set of empty bleachers in the background my eye drifted off to the right and caught a glimpse of someone in a robe carrying a cross out of frame.

How odd, I thought. Beyond the obvious narrative, what else am I seeing here?

With that question we find ourselves standing right at the point where reality and art part company, between the apparent and the assumed, between the perceptible and the imperceptible.

Several years ago I discovered Impressionism, French Impressionism, and the works of Edouard Manet, Edgar Degas and Berthe Morisot in particular. After looking at dozens of their paintings it suddenly struck me that each artist sought to express their own peculiar vision of the world around them in a unique way: not through attempting representation of reality, rather by trying to capture how that reality “impressed” their sensibilities. And each one did it quite differently from the others. Quite.

So it is with computer art.

Of course, to say that each artist sees a thing with a peculiarly distinct, personal vision is to state the obvious. Each artist then attempts to express that very special vision in a way uniquely his own, like the Impressionists, with a vision at once personal and public, impregnable yet vulnerable.

For it is right here that the viewer comes into the picture (pun intended). For it is the viewer, the observer, the reader of minds who must discern what the artist’s vision may be and fit that comprehension into the context of whether the viewer cares for the vision or the presentation.

We reflect on the canvas (or monitor screen) and wonder "what is it I’m seeing?" While some visions cannot be comprehended at all, others are patently obvious. Or so it may seem, but things are rarely ever as they seem.

I like much of the work found at the Museum of Computer Art: some pieces speak directly to my sensitivities; others leave me perplexed as to what the point is (or may be). But that is art. Art is at once personal and public; personal in its individual appeal and yet public in the general exposure, at once unassailable because it comes from within the artist and yet vulnerable in the extreme since the artist seeks to share it with total strangers.

Which artists draw you into their vision, and which leave you cold, unmoved, unengaged? Most importantly, why you feel such passion or ambivalence, indifference or animosity? Why do you prefer a certain vision, a distinct expression and not another?

Art is give and take, see and understand, accept or reject. Art is a dialogue. Join it.

[so, check out the MOCA site, browse for a bit, sink your mind's eye into some of the most luscious art to come out of another human's being. . . ]

Aspects of human nature by Giovanni Boldini

a friend of the marquis 1875

a lady admiring a fan 1878

Confidences

Fireworks

morning letter 1884

Spanish dancer at the Moulin Rouge 

beauty before the mirror

the conversation 1870

the hammock

the lady pianist

the model and the mannequin 1873 

self-portrait 1911

Women you may know by Giovanni Boldini

a portrait of Emiliana Concha de Ossa

Emiliana Concha de Ossa 1901 

Cleo de Merode

Consuelo duchess of Marlborough with her son Ivor Spencer Churchill 1906

Countess de Rasty seated in an armchair

Diaz Albertini 1909

 girl in a black hat 1890

lady in rose

madame Georges Hugo and her son Jean 1898 

madame Michelham 1913 

madame Pages in evening dress 1912 

mademoiselle de Nemidoff 

mademoiselle l’Anthelme 1907

miss Bell 1903

mademoiselle Laure 1910

mrs Leeds the later princess Anastasia of Greece and Denmark 1914 

portrait of a lady, Lina Bilitis with two Pekinese 1913

Alice Regnault 1880

Elizabeth Wharton Drexel 1905

Gladys Deacon 1908

Lina Cavalieri 1901

Lina Cavalieri 1901

madame Doyen 1910

madame Josephina Alvear de Errazuriz 1892

madame Julliard in red 1912

mademoiselle de Gillespie, la dame de Biarritz 1912 

mrs. Howard Johnston 1906

princess Marthe Lucile Bibesco 1911 

Rita de Acosta Lydig 1911

Sarah Bernhardt

countess Zichy 1905

countess Ritzer

The Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts

In 2011 we visited this incredible little gem of a museum located in the wilds of the far northwestern corner of Massachusetts, a space that seems almost dedicated to those who seek out the French Impressionists. At that time the the museum was in the process of expanding into a new space and most of the French Impressionist work was loaned out. Well, the good news is Renoir, Degas, Manet, Morisot and their comrades are back from their tour -- and the new building and environment is not to be missed.

It gets better: here you can also find an incredible collection of Winslow Homer juxtaposed neatly with several moving pieces by Frederick Remington. Plus there are a few other treasures to be found and savored; Giovanni Boldini being one of our discoveries this trip. His work is small in scale but huge in effect. And of course there's the Alfred Stevens room and the numerous works by Corot, Daubigny, and Sargent, three more "favorites" of ours.

Undertow 1886 by Winslow Homer

child with bird (Mademoiselle Fleury in Algerian costume) 1882 by Renoir

Venice, the Doge's Palace 1881 by Renoir

Portrait of a young woman 1874 by Renoir

Woman crocheting 1875 by Renoir

a box at the theatre (concert) 1880 by Renoir

Marie Therese Durand-Ruel sewing 1882 by Renoir

the bath 1885-86 by Berthe Morisot

the cliffs of Etretat 1885 by Claude Monet

Comte Henri Amedee Mercure Turenne d'Aynac 1816 by Jacques Louis David

Trumpeter of the Hussars 1815-20 by Théodore Géricault

featured exhibition: Magna Carta

Dance of the masked dancers 1879 by Degas

Mery Laurent wearing a small toque 1882 by Edouard Manet

Jane Avril 1891-92 by Henri Toulouse-Lautrec

dancers in the classroom c. 1880 by Degas

the dancer by Degas

young woman crocheting 1875 by Giovanni Boldini

young woman reading 1875 by Lucio Rossi

By the time we arrived at it was getting later in the lunch hour and so our first order of business was to grab something to eat. We were pleasantly surprised to find the food at the Clark Cafe quite tasty.

the back side of the cafe

turkey wrap

flatbread with roast beef

Without a doubt this is one of the finest art museums on the East Coast. It's not easy to get to but then nothing worthwhile is ever easy, right?

looking out toward the reflecting pool

the reflecting pool