Questioning Art

It's been a tough day and admittedly, I'm virtually brainless at this point. But I'll spew out a few words about the "Birth of Impressionism" exhibit, now open at the de Young Museum.

The boy and I went there last Thursday. I bought a family membership the day before for ninety-five dollars, knowing that I would be seeing his one exhibit at least three times; I have no doubt the yearlong membership will be worth it.

And it was a wonderful experience zipping through the exhibit with my son in a baby carrier (something that will be a thing of the past before too long--he weighs almost thirty pounds). We only spent twenty-five minutes looking at the art, and he was just as fascinated by the lights overhead and the circular couches in the middle of the rooms, covered in plush red velour like something one would expect to find in a 19th century artist's salon--but he did point at a Renoir, perhaps the most famous painting in the exhibition (and of course, I forget what it's called), and gurgle something.

I like the de Young--the interior that is, I'm not as enamoured of the dour brown exterior as some San Franciscans seem to be. The exhibit is not huge--but that gives one even more of a sense of dancing through rooms filled with light and life, exploding with color. These paintings are astounding--even if one is bored by the love affair Americans are having with French Impressionism, this has to be granted, after seeing this exhibition. I walked away from the exhibition believing the world is a better place than it really is (something T.E. Lawrence said about listening to Beethoven, I think).

It's true that the Impressionists were considered rebels in their own time--and whether or not they've become as mainstream as, for instance, the next "American Idol" winner--and I think they probably have--seeing an exhibit like this forces one to think about the progression of the visual arts, and all arts, really. Up until the mid-twentieth century, the movement was mostly towards greater abstraction and indeterminacy (a wave which began with the Impressionists). By sometime in the seventies, the field had been broken wide open. All art was accepted and all art was questioned.

Today the pendulum could swing in either direction--realism or abstraction--and it often does, in a single artist's work.

More on all this tomorrow, perhaps.