National Portrait Gallery

Did I ever post this? This is dated October 20th, but I found it, again in my drafts...so I'm not sure. I'm posting it just in case.


National Portrait Gallery

After a wonderful in-class exercise with label-writing a field trip to the National Portrait Gallery was in perfect order.  The fact that NPG prioritizes the sitter before the artist on their labels is something that I had never given any thought to previously. It would seem to make sense however. The art they exhibit is more about the sitter than it is about the artist. Although the artist is extremely important, unless the sitter is deemed extraordinarily important or it is a major masterpiece that is a revered part of the canon, it seems that very rarely is the sitter shown very much attention at all. Almost as though they were a prop, a throwaway, an add-on or a bonus. 

140 is the magic number

Enough words to make the point plain, to flesh out the concepts and move on.  Much like a more fleshed out but carefully contrived more scholarly Twitter. I believe that with guidelines such as these in mind, I would be able to hone in on becoming more succinct with my writing. It is something I know I should definitely focus on.

Bill & Melinda Gates: The Billionaires Next Door

The amount of time spent deconstructing the newest addition to NPG’s collection was also very insightful. Bill and Melinda Gates’ appeal to be more like everybody else despite their billions and billions of dollars. It’s refreshing albeit a bit unrealistic, aside from the fact that their portrait is impressive in technique but approachable in its outcome. Upon first glance I certainly thought that the portrait was a painted over digital print on canvas. I can only compare the detail and intensity to the portraits of Simmie Knox, a portraitist who is based, here in the metropolitan Washington, D.C. area has painted several Presidents, Dignitaries, university presidents and historians among others. http://www.simmieknox.com/official.htm

Mary Cassatt and Immortalization

The portrait on display of Mary Cassatt by Edgar Degas is troubling. Troubling because if I were Cassatt I would have sat a little more erect, made myself a bit more presentable and would have insisted on my  friend painting me not as I really was, but as I wanted to be portrayed for years to come. I guess that brings to the fore, the concept of immortalization. Self-promoting or sustaining vanity and perhaps foresight. Perhaps it is naïve of me to think that everything should be beautiful, but when it comes to how I want to be remembered, I certainly don’t want to be remembered as slump shouldered or run-down. I may feel that way, but I certainly don’t want to be remembered that way. Perhaps Cassatt really did think better of it after the fact, she forbade Degas to sell the painting to an American collector.

All in all, it was a wonderfully enlightening afternoon, I enjoyed myself immensely.

Leading a Strong Arts Organization

Last night's discussion at the Museum of Women in the Arts was amazing. I was inspired by Mr. Kaiser's vision, optimism and enthusiasm. If I were a board member, employee, and even as an audience member I was ready to 'take it to the streets.' Coming from a fledgling historically black college I know that this same model of spending the right amount in areas of marginal importance seems simple but isn't it generally the easiest things that end up being the most critical?

What I found most interesting about Mr. Kaiser's remarks was that he repeatedly stressed the importance of 'branding' without having ever uttered the 'b word.' Perhaps this is where the problem for most arts organizations and other non-artistic organizations miss the mark. It could be that they are so focused on branding this and branding that they forget about the minutia that makes a good organization great, and a great organization better.

The following are some of Mr. Kaiser's most salient points in my opinion;

"Leaders must respect and acknowledge their staff and artists. Don't be the 'angry parent' and make the artists the 'naughty child.'

"Arts organizations' missions are about art, not money."

"Orchestras shouldn't always play "Beethoven's Ninth." Surprise people! If not, they'll go elsewhere. Engage them! They'll contribute monetarily and in terms of volunteer hours."

"Plan, plan, plan. Years in advance. It gives everyone something to look forward to and be a part of. Gets everyone excited about the future."

"It's not about size, use resources. Use strengths. It's not about size or recession."

"Saving your way to health DOES NOT WORK!"

"Curiosity over skepticism!"

"Never create a program to make donors happy. Ask donors which project they're interested in and get them involved."

"If and when cuts are necessary, don't cut programming! When you support great art, when the marketing is great the family you've cultivated the family gets excited and grows."

"Less marketing = less programming = less revenue = smaller family"

"Keep the arts vibrant, keep overhead down."

"Get people talking about the future. Don't worry about the past. It passed."

"There's no shortage of money. Arts organizations have to create the desire to engage. Make support FUN for donors."

"Our country was founded by Puritans who thought art and dance were evil. There is a separation between art and state."

"We can't get an orchestra to play any faster. We can't improve the speed of the orchestra it's set. Once we build a theater we have a set number of seats. No more. We have to approach things differently. We have to use what we have to get what we need."

All in all, it was a MAGICAL evening. I wasn't particularly sure what to expect but I was thrilled and inspired beyond measure. Thank you.

Propaganda

My other unpublished post:

I thoroughly enjoyed our visit to the Holocaust museum today. I had been once before, around this time last year and what struck me then, and what resonates today is man's inhumanity to man. The extent to which persons who are found in some way to be different and thereby, deficient is baffling. Throughout this visit and the last, I couldn't help drawing comparisons to the plight of African Americans and Indigenous peoples at the hands of their oppressors. In a way, man's inhumanity to man in general. How atrocities such as these COULD be stopped and SHOULD be stopped, but we how we must first realize that what has gone on, should NOT be simply chalked up to human nature. Things like the Holocaust and oppression of any peoples, forcible removal from their homes and familiar settings don't have to happen. And yet, they have, thus the importance of institutions such as the Holocaust museum and the National Museum of African American History and Culture but also the challenge these institutions have in presenting their story, the cultural sensitivity they must have and how they should proceed.

In relation to museums that memorialize tragic events, such as the Holocaust and the September 11th attacks I found the issue of how much too soon to be a very intriguing one. How does one pay homage to the lives that were lost especially when those who knew and loved them are often still dealing with that profound loss each and every day? Or, in the case of United States slavery, when there is ample evidence that persons of native African American origins, those who were born and raised in the U.S., whose foreparents have tangible ties to specific small towns, farms, sharecropping plots or plantations, we know some of our history but can claim no direct descendents and can only claim a history that is only bound together in bits and pieces. Should their pain, and its aftermath, its aftershock be considered any less tragic?  I wish there were some specific narrative that we could pull from to tell a unified clear cut story, but then again, who actually has a clear-cut story to tell? Although  6 million Jewish men, women and children perished, there was no singular narrative. But instead, because these horrible hate crimes against those of Jewish descent, homosexuals and those with physical and mental challenges lived witin the last century it is a much "easier" story to tell. How do we reconcile this, qualify it in a meaningful way and present the story in a respectful manner?

Gordon Parks

I thought that I had posted this posting and the next one, a LONG time before now. My mistake. Here it is.

I can recall seeing Gordon Parks' reinterpretation of Grant Wood's American Gothic with a world-weary, older government employee with her mop and broom in front of an American flag as a young child. What I had not seen, however were the subsequent shots of the same older woman who toiled to keep courthouses and public displays of patriotism and equality immaculate for visitors to the fair Nation's Capital when she had to retire to a ramshackle hovel. A woman whose life was dedicated to cleanliness while all the time living in squalor. No one should have to live like that. Then or now. And sadly, I have seen the favelas of Brazil. I have seen children like those Parks' photographed for Life magazine. But before Life published Parks' photographs many had not. What is amazing about the small but representative exhibition of Parks' photography at the Corcoran is the breadth and power of his work.  Knowing his life story he contributed many history firsts: the first African American to photograph for Vogue magazine, first photographer to receive a Julius  Rosenwald fellowship. Perhaps it was his own destitute beginnings that lent themselves to compassion that is palpable through his lens and sensitivity in capturing his subjects.

I broke down halfway through an article accompanying a photo essay about a mother providing for her 10 children while all the time being beaten down by her alcoholic husband who could hardly hold down a job. From the family in Chicago to the children from the streets of Rio de Janeiro, to the federal employees whose "existences" he documented, theirs are the stories that break my heart and make me ashamed to have all that I have and only give them a second though when I enter spaces like this gallery. Or to see their faces splashed across television and newsprint like the ones on display. It is thanks to documentarians like the late Gordon Parks who remind us all of our own humanity.