Naked

Naked before the Camera is a small temporary exhibition given in Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. It evolves around the topic of naked human body in photography, bringing the light to this highly disputed motive in art and depicting it from various angles. Therefore, we see the first female naked bodies and acts, done by French impressionist for the purpose of painting them later on, we see the photographs of dead bodies or bodies in motion, used for medicine and scientific scrutiny, as well photographs of rare skin illnesses or muscular build of athletes, again finding its use in medicine and analyzing human anatomy. One may see also varieties in the technique and media how human body is being portrayed; the proximity of camera, the angle, play of light and shadow, so that the body often has an abstract organic form. It becomes apparent that the photographer wants to tell us something with it. The motives are sometimes banal and show the everyday life, but soon they become more personalized. There we see first attempts in feminist photography as well as gay population. It is interesting – just to see this rather obvious image having its evolution in art in so many unexpected directions and applications and being subject here to artistic investigation.

Eadweard Muybridge, “Boys Playing Leap Frog”, 1883-1886

Brassai, “Nude”, 1931-1934

Man Ray, “Arm”, 1935

Franz Roh, “Nude in Tub”, 1922-1925

Miro

In my last post I forgot to tell about another imperfect sightseeing tour. Wanting to see some modern classics*, I went to Fundacio Joan Miro. However, when I reached the place, the parks with Miro’s sculptures around was so beautiful that I sat there and spent an hour or so just enjoying the nature&weather&colours, only to discover that I can be in museum for half an hour or so before they close it.

So I say, whatthehexx, went inside and picked my favourite for the day: Femmes, oiseaux, etoiles

Joan Miro, “Women, birds, stars”, 1942

*Picasso was out of question, as you see Picasso’s everywhere. Right now there is exhibition “Frauen“, with works of Pablo Picasso, Max Beckmann and Willem de Kooning, in Pinakotheke der Moderne in Munich. I thought for a moment that they simply didn’t know what to do with collections and put them up together – ok, probably it is good from curatorial point of view…

Picasso on Neretva

While I am still on topic: as I was last week home in Bosnia, I spent several evenings just chatting with my parents and keeping it low. One evening we came to the topic (now don’t ask me how) of then famous movie “The Battle of Neretva” from 1969.  Although a subtle part of communist propaganda, especially portraying partizans in heroic endeavors and leader’s mastermind behind the strategy, the movie itself was internationally  very well accepted and even nominated for best foreign movie at Oscars. Some international stars at that time played in the movie, such as  Orson Welles, Franco Nero and Yul Brynner, and budget was obviously available. Back home, whole nation loved it, watched it numerous times and is still part of national heritage.

While my parents remembered their own perceptions of the movie, my dad mentioned that –listen this – then very well-known, established and already internationally proclaimed artist Pablo Picasso was asked to make a poster for the movie. He apparently accepted, but then when he was asked how much it would cost, he answered that a cast of best local wines would do. … and this is how he made a special poster, which was printed in only 80 editions.

Hearing this story for the first time, my suspicious face had expression ‘are you for real’  but apparently my dad was – and after checking it out online, here is this beauty. I love it – hope you too!

On being sad

Last week I was in Sarajevo and my time there was spent in remembrance on aggression on my country. April 6th was 20-year anniversary of the longest siege and many world media have reported on this.

I am not about to write about historical facts on this; they can be found elsewhere. I can just say that it made me feel extremely sad, deceived, disappointed and played out. This is how I felt then, being 10 years old and this is how I feel even more now, as a grown up. Nevertheless, it also gives you a strange feeling of being proud, more about those who have been killed for Bosnia and Herzegovina, but also of us. We are still here.

Nude

Last week opened exhibition on Marcel Duchamp in Lenbachhaus Kunstbau in Munich is certainly not a highlight of art events for me. Well, I am no expert to judge it, but the focus of the concept was not clear to me: was it Duchamp? Was it Munich in expressionist era? I thought that it would be about the time he spent in Munich and how it affected his work – but, again, I was not so clear on this message (as opposed to previous exhibition here, which I loved).

Nevertheless, you become rather speechless before some of his pieces. Its Nude Descending a Staircase, No.2 (1912)  represents a breakthrough in art history not only because it combines cubist and futurist elements, depicting a female body by composing abstract conical and cylindrical elements and giving dynamics in its motion, but also because it is mimicking stop-motion photography by superimposing several images. It caused quite a stir, first at the Salon des Indépendants in Paris, where it was not shown in the end, and then at the 1913 Armory Show in New York.

Marcel Duchamp (1887 - 1968), Nude Descending a Staircase (2012)

As said by Kunstbau, this painting “captured the ideas and influences of a whole epoch in one iconic image. His readymades fundamentally altered our ideas of what art is, of how artists produce it, and of the institution of the museum – unlike no other idea in the art of the twentieth century”.  

Exhibition can be seen until 15 July 2012.

“The most noble sentiment is religion and art” -Egon Schiele

My first day of this year’s holidays started very unspectacularly: with a conference call at 9.00, which lasted till 13.00. Egon Schiele exhibition “Das unrettbare ich” (“Unsalvagable ego”) in Kunstbau was something that I definitely wanted to see. The majority of pieces were lent from Albertina and, although you might get easily irritated in Wien with Klimt and Schiele popping out from every souvenir shop, the exhibition alone took me (still) with surprise. My allocated hour for the exhibition was nearly not enough to see and comprehend everything, as the exhibition evolved not only around his visual works but also poems and writings. Being exposed on daily basis only with technical specifications and world/politics/social/economic news, getting into something rather different and way deeper was also so refreshing but also shaking experience.

The exhibition was organized not chronologically but more focusing on different topics. The central theme in Schiele’s works was “crisis of the subject”, which was also strongly reflecting the crisis of Austro-Hungarian empire around 1900. This “crisis of the subject” was very present with other artists in that time, which could be easily noticed in Schiele as well, and he emphasizes it further by poem “I, eternal child” (“Ich ewiges Kind”). Hermann Bahr, literary critic, puts it as “The ego is not an immutable, defined, sharply delineated entity. ”

This particular topic is the one that fascinated me the most in the exhibition as well as his portraits. For example, just look at this painting of two little girls: it is amazing how he plays with color to accentuate the form. The black is darker where the fabric is supposed to be creased and thicker, while cold blue and warm red play against each other to highlight another one. This one is perhaps the most important and  most beautiful portraits of Egon Schiele.

Source: home.arcor.de

 

Source: wikimedia.org

 

I also found this portrait very interesting. Just look at the facial expressions of three girls: the upper one has a rather frightened look, the one below is sad and both of them are concerned and caring for the girl laying on the left side. Egon Schiele often portrays the children in his paintings as he sees the childhood as an important transition -and childhood itself is standing upon great transition within the society.

Source: wikimedia.org

 

Flowers and plants were also important motive of Egon Schiele. As they are shown in center against a still and quiet background, they appear as if they are human beings themselves. As in the work below, sunflowers are often depicted as a symbol of life, but here they are more symbolizing death with its fragility. Or as in the painting below – the tree is so weak that it cannot stand alone and it needs a support, while the outermost branches are almost transparently shown. With his associations in nature, as when compares the forest with church, Egon Schiele is looking for God in nature, or, as he says in one of his manifestos:

THE MOST NOBLE SENTIMENT IS RELIGION AND ART. NATURE IS PURPOSE, – BUT GOD IS THERE, AND I SENSE HIM, POWERFULLY, VERY POWERFULLY, THE MOST POWERFULLY.

Source: images.easyart.com

 

Source: germanposters.com

 

Egon Schiele says that the death of man cannot be devided from his birth and sees the death as an unfinished state, transition, something that is floating. Many of his paintings evolve around this idea, as the painting below, which shows a woman that is maybe sleeping, or being ill, or maybe even dying, or maybe even on the way to the graveyard.

Source: wikimedia.org

 

These were the themes that touched me personally the most. Egon Schiele touched me also with many of his ideas and poems, such as:

I, Eternal Child

I, eternal child —
I sacrificed myself for others …
who looked and did not see me …

Everything was dear to me —
I wanted to look at the angry people
with loving eyes,
to make their eyes do likewise;
And to the jealous,
give them gifts,
telling them I am worthless.

 

Anarchist Sun

Taste, red one! Smell swaying white winds, 
look hard at the universe: Sun, gold glittering
stars, look until you recover and are forced to
close your eyes. Mind worlds sparkle about you 
in your sockets. Let your passionate fingers tremble, 
grope for the element you must thirstily seek out, 
staggering, that sits leaping, lies lurking, dreams while
resting, grows while dreaming. Fever consuming 
thirst and hunger, and reluctance, blood seeps through.
Look upon me, father, upon me, you are there, 
envelop me, give me: Nearness, distance, run 
here and there in fury, world. – Now stretch your 
noble bones. Offer me a tender ear, lovely 
pale blue watery eyes. – That, father, was there. 
Here I stand before you.

One may say that my view of Schiele’s best works is rather one-sided. I might agree with that – as it truly portrays what I am ‘into’ right now. You should not forget that Egon Schiele is also famous for specific perspective in his works, for erotic and breaking tabus with theme of homosexuality while also reflecting on Japanese art, as well as for his landscapes and depictions of room and objects.

All of these made me think this evening and also made me plan another trip to Kunstbau soon.