Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Leslie: Mumbles from the National Gallery

This is an excerpt, beyond the Stav poem, from my travels earlier this semester. I hadn't gone back through and read it until just now. Since no one had really written about art, I thought I'd include it, a wider glimpse into the strange mind that makes its home in my body. 

At the National Gallery of Art again in my own universe. A heaven. I am my own best friend. Wearing clothes I wore all day yesterday and through the night, yet I feel fresh. Fresh in the middle of a traveler's high. Headphones on again in an art museum, one of my favorite things to do. Like being in Prof. Mary Brantl's class at good ol' StEdwards. Yes. One word, StEdwards. With other people I find museums boring. Maybe it's because I can't get lost. I have to be WITH them, out of my little space. Here I am, alone in D.C feelin' warm again.
In front of me are two paintings, one familiar the other new to me, but familiar. Thank you Mary Brantl, Modigliani and his Nude on Blue Cushion from 1917 with her coy and confindent gaze. The rather ugly maroon tone over the background would bore me if it weren't for that gaze of hers. Big tits with sizeable aereolas, just like mine. She seems to be telling me with that face, "go on, be proud of your curvy, healthy frame". Ok I say.
Aaaand here she is. Aereolas and all. 

I'm not going to say he's my favorite artist but I love what Toulouse Lautrec does. In 1897, or something like that, he uses oil on cardboard! That badass Toulousse LauTrec.

 Who says you need to be painting on canvas to be high art? Reduce, Reuse, Recycle indeed. These cardboard works of his always leave some memory of happening with me. The man in a white sport coat stands with his back to me, painted in what seems like a split second, but gracefully done. His lady friend, almost grotesque, leers at someone, maybe me or this flash camera little girl beside me. The leering lady, a little ugly and full of life. I love it. 
Little girl with windup disposable camera taking pictures of paintings. Just for the joy of doing so. These paintings inspire me to do more cardboard art. Such texture, such "fuck it-ness". 
Hm. This is the Chester Dale portion of the gallert...Whoever this Chester Dale guy is, he was loaded. What did he do? How is there someone with so much money? 

ha ha ha ha ha. Stream of Consciousness indeed, eh? If you don't engage in this type of writing I highly encourage you to do so. It really pulls out the creativity and rawness that we all possess. Thanks for reading and I love you all! 

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