Monday, April 29, 2013
Pictures at an Exhibition
We went to see the Picasso exhibit at the Art Institute this weekend. We had waited a couple of months to go in hopes that it wouldn't be as crowded, but boy was that plan a bust. It was pretty much wall-to-wall people inside the gallery, which meant that mainly I saw the back of people's heads as they milled around and stood in front of the artwork. I'm actually thinking about doing my own series of paintings of people standing in front of paintings. Or in front of episodes of TV's Army Wives, I can't decide. They're all masterpieces in their own way.
Anyway, due to the crowding, I didn't have an especially fantastic time at the exhibit, but I did pick up some interesting tidbits, although typing the phrase "interesting tidbits" just made me throw up in my mouth a little bit. Did you know, for instance, that Picasso painted the Blue Guitarist over the top of a few other paintings he had done? I mean, not like a painting of the Muppets fornicating or anything, but still, that's kind of weird. And then apparently there was originally a third person in the composition of his Mother & Child, but he literally cut the guy out and painted over his arm. I'm guessing they got into a fight on Facebook or something and Pablo got pissed. But all this information was obtained by x-raying the paintings, so I'm definitely going to take my Edward Hopper poster in to the ER to see if maybe there's a Monet water lilies under the surface or something. This could be my chance to get rich quick.
We went to see the Picasso exhibit at the Art Institute this weekend. We had waited a couple of months to go in hopes that it wouldn't be as crowded, but boy was that plan a bust. It was pretty much wall-to-wall people inside the gallery, which meant that mainly I saw the back of people's heads as they milled around and stood in front of the artwork. I'm actually thinking about doing my own series of paintings of people standing in front of paintings. Or in front of episodes of TV's Army Wives, I can't decide. They're all masterpieces in their own way.
Anyway, due to the crowding, I didn't have an especially fantastic time at the exhibit, but I did pick up some interesting tidbits, although typing the phrase "interesting tidbits" just made me throw up in my mouth a little bit. Did you know, for instance, that Picasso painted the Blue Guitarist over the top of a few other paintings he had done? I mean, not like a painting of the Muppets fornicating or anything, but still, that's kind of weird. And then apparently there was originally a third person in the composition of his Mother & Child, but he literally cut the guy out and painted over his arm. I'm guessing they got into a fight on Facebook or something and Pablo got pissed. But all this information was obtained by x-raying the paintings, so I'm definitely going to take my Edward Hopper poster in to the ER to see if maybe there's a Monet water lilies under the surface or something. This could be my chance to get rich quick.
