Saturday, October 7, 2017

M.F. Husain at the Art Institute of Chicago







India, the largest experiment in democratic institutions the world has ever known, has many grave challenges. Pollution, communal strife, massive income disparity, and especially lawlessness continue to flourish. No wonder both M.F. Husain (1915-2011), the artist, and Lakshmi Mittal, his multi-billionaire patron, decided to live somewhere else. The awkward quality of these eight wall-size triptychs, twelve feet wide by six feet high, reflects this difficult moment in history. Executed 2008-2011, the design and drawing is crude, while the iconography wantonly conflates the personal with the national. Much of it is incomprehensible without the accompanying texts in the gallery signage which are often incomplete. Is this really how “India’s most important 20th-century artist” presents South Asia’s cultural legacy?

Mostly, what Husain has to offer is sincere affection and sentimentality. He loved the streets where he grew up, even if he could no longer walk them. Offended by how he depicted their deities, militant Hindus threatened his life. One of the triptychs in this show depicts the great trimurti, Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva, as Marc Chagall might have imagined them. They are more like charming characters in a folk tale than cosmic divinities who demand worship and interpretation. They feel no more sacred than the heroes of Bollywood cinema—just goofier—as if all of creation was a situation comedy.

A few pieces offer a pleasing, cheerful design – especially his depiction of “Traditional Indian Festivals” . The bold colorful pattern would look good printed on a tropical shirt, as well as hanging from the wall of a restaurant. One might note, however, that all three festivals depicted are Hindu, despite the artist’s Muslim background. Indeed, the only Muslims depicted in these eight paintings are the Mughal emperor, Akbar, and members of the artist’s own family.

For Americans, the most revealing piece might be “Indian Households.”. Grandfather and teenage granddaughter are sitting on the same bed— – he is smoking a hookah, while she is leaning back with her knees spread and a fresh green mango in her lap. That arrangement may suggest sexual transgression, – but probably not for those who grew up in small, one-room apartments. Americans might also be surprised by the prominence given in “Three Cities” to Chandra Bose. His status as a liberation leader has been undercut, for us, by his collaboration with Hitler.

For me, the most annoying piece is “Language of Stone”, a celebration of India’s tradition of stone carving. It hangs in the Alsdorf Galleries, surrounded by many examples of devotional sculpture whose qualities Husain’s stiff, awkward scrawl cannot even begin to suggest. Has India’s greatest artistic legacy really become so invisible in the modern world?

Husain’s approach to “The Indian Civilization” appears to be nostalgic both for the land of his childhood as well as the painting of early Twentieth Century European Modernists. He offers more of a suggestion than a strong connection to either one of them. His work has the content as well as the aesthetic quality of a cheap travel brochure. One of the great achievements of Hindustani classical music is that it expresses South Asian identity in a spiritual yet non-sectarian way. Husain’s attempt to do that with visual art was a noble, but not especially successful one.


“India Modern: The Paintings of M. F. Husain” shows through March 4 at the Art Institute of Chicago, 111 South Michigan.





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Unlike most of the reviews posted to this blog,  this one was rejected by New City and an explicit reason given:

"It doesn't approach the work with the generosity of spirit that such works require, especially from the standpoint of someone who knows little about the culture from which it comes."


This review , written by Rachel Q. Levy,  a graduate student in Art History, was published in its place, and it exemplifies the kind of  "social justice" art commentary that now dominates academia.

First, one might note that an ideological assertion has been made without reference to specific evidence: "The triptych challenges recent claims by Hindu nationalists that India is synonymous with Hinduism"

Yet as I pointed out in the review left unpublished, the series portrays no Muslims other than Emperor Akbar and the artist's own family. The "Language of Stone" panel does include the Qutb Minar as well as ancient and medieval Hindu artifacts. But elsewhere, all the political leaders portrayed are Hindu, all the festivals portrayed are Hindu, all the deities portrayed are Hindu, and there are no Islamic saints or other spiritual leaders.

M.F. Husain's attitude towards Hindu hegemony is not as clear and simple as the reviewer would suggest. Husain seems to be reasserting it, though it's been secularized enough to displease some Hindu fundamentalists.  As they seek to align themselves with a well established political correctness, both the reviewer and the art editor have paid little attention to what was actually up on the wall.

Then, one might also note that aesthetic judgment has been made in the passive voice: "Husain is often referred to as “India’s Picasso.” Who, actually, has ever made that assertion?  There is no other mention of aesthetic qualities other than "rich color palette and grand scale" -- and the same could be said for most billboards along any highway.

The only indication that the reviewer has actually seen these pieces is her comment that the installation serves to interrupt the flow of traffic through the Alsdorf Galleries. If that is all one can say about the visual qualities of these paintings, why do they belong in an art museum ?



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Friday, October 6, 2017

Real - Impressions at the Palette and Chisel Academy



Donna J. West


“Gracious”, my favorite painting by Donna J. West , seems to record an ecstatic moment – like the breathless aftermath of a paint-gun fight or the Hindu festival of Holi.  There are bursts and slaps and smears of color.   Her figurative work, however, reflects the life of young women finding their way in the big city.  In accord with her career in activewear fashion, West depicts the stroll of stylish young models.   They are slim and vigorous  - but there is also a  sense of anxiety, tension, and emptiness.  They are trying, perhaps too hard, to appear carefree.  Most of them are faceless mannequins, and if they have a face,  it feels disjointed or the eyes are concealed by dark glasses.  The paint is too thick and chalky. The colors are annoying and discordant. The drawing is angular and jagged.   The same is true of her floral still-lifes.  They are more about the conventional idea that flowers are supposed to be pleasing than the luxuriant growth of actual foliage.  Beneath the surface of all her work, there are the ripples of edges  painted over – echoing  much struggle and effort .  It takes hard work to appear casual and attractive– and West documents that corner of modern, urban life.


Stephanie Weidner



There is a different kind of tension in the paintings of Stephanie Weidner.  In her best work, she offers the perfect depiction of a world that is just a little strange.  Not as strange as a surrealist like Magritte might make it – but strange in an ordinary kind of way.  As when she depicts a twisty, sinuous  vine erupting from a  squat, solid vase. Or a maze of tree roots hovering over a neatly folded tablecloth. Or a flight formation of large-winged insects pinned against a checkered cloth.  Or a red vase painted beside a gray oil can that might suggest a conventional married couple: the woman tall elegant and poetic ; the man  squat, strong, and  practical.  And then there’s the totally weird “Dragon with Craspedia” – a larger work where the stability established by a solid  black vase seems threatened by a whimsical dragon emerging from a printed pattern behind it.   Weidner is not familiar with Chicago legend, Gertrude Abercrombie, but their odd, careful, claustrophobic work has much in common



“Real /Impression” is the name that  Weidner and West have chosen to denote how their styles differ. At the Palette and Chisel Academy, where they met and are now showing, one might indeed find two ongoing traditions being taught.  One group is inspired by the object-centered realism perfected by the Seventeenth Century Dutch masters.  Another group is inspired by that emphasis on light and expressive  brushstroke pioneered in nineteenth Century Paris.  But Weidner is more concerned with the mysteries of an inner world than with the perfection of an outer one.  And West is more about the drama of life in Chicago than with how light falls on a garden.  The two still make for a good contrast, though, and good examples of what contemporary painters are doing outside the contemporary artworld.


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Responding to my suggestion that her painting resembled that of Gertrude Abercombrie,  Stephanie sent me the above images.

She painted the cat on the left -- Abercrombie did the one on the right.