In 1909, Founder of the Futurism art movement summed up the objectives as "We will glorify war - the world's only hygiene - militarism, patriotism, the destructive gesture of freedom-bringers, beautiful ideas worth dying for and scorn for women."
Not a good way to win this girl over.
I do so enjoy the art that this movement but it was, obviously, a movement full of men. (not totally; Natalia Goncharova was a prominent painter on the scene at the time.) It sounds good in the beginning. An art movement that embraces technology that was gaining speed at the turn of the century. Not just technology but change, media, and how it shapes our little lives.
But as it became engrossed in politics, and some of the artists embracing fascism and war (not too surprising since the movement started in Italy 1909), my feelings start to turn a little sour. I love the sense that I get from some the works, invoking the sensations of the world’s first big cosmopolitan cities. Beautiful light, color and always interesting movement. And because of Futurism movement, Art Deco was born, for which I will forever be grateful.
So the real question is, can you still love the art when the original intention of the art (or the artist) is something you are fundamentally against?
Can you like a painting by a serial killer? Or a member of the KKK? Hitler was a painter…
Well, I would definitely kick someone in the shins or cut in line. I would probably run though Times Square naked. I would definitely pay, if I had the money. (Will work for red feather strapless dress with white tulle underskirt.) He was new, shocking and so inspiring in a sometimes uninspired landscape. (Tommy Hilfiger, I'm looking at you.) His clothes were like stories, portals into a stories, into the bodies of characters. Never was there a boring piece. It was art.
Even if you don't follow fashion, you have probably seen his work. A blatant ripoff of a wonderful McQueen dress was featured in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (part 1), not to mention on the red carpet, covering Lady Gaga, Cate Blanchett, Michelle Obama, and if you've been keeping up with all the silly royal wedding madness, Katherine Middleton's wedding dress was based on a McQueen design.
For his 2004 ready-to-wear collection, instead of the standard runway, McQueen staged an extravaganza, reenacting "They Shoot Horses, Don't They?". Models and dancers started the show with exuberant dancing moves, and ending with a sole dancer, barely keeping her head up, then collapsing on stage. McQueen and the choreographer carried her off stage. Not only was the staging ingenious but the clothes themselves were beautiful and innovative.
I personally loved that he dress the common girl to the first lady. He had a line at Target a couple of years ago but also creates dresses that retail in the tens of thousands. And he knows and loves women. Now, you might want to argue that after seeing some of the contraptions he puts his models in but I would argue right back. You can't look at some of his beautiful dresses and say he doesn't worship our bodies. The chest-plated outfits and high collars, I argue, are statements, art speaking about changing our shapes via harshness. But that's just one girl's opinion.
In this month addition of Bazaar, close friend Annabelle Neilson wrote about "Lee" (his true given name) on the one year anniversary of his death. In the article, she seems still in shock about the whole thing, her retelling scattered and grief-stricken. She spoke briefly that he had promised her that he would never go the way of Isabella Blow.
Isabella Blow was a editor, style icon and muse for the fashion forward. She suffered from depression after the people she helped get started in the business left her behind, infertility and money issues, not to mention her ovarian cancer and bipolar diagnoses. She drank weed killer that finally ended her life but, according to Daily Collegian, before that she had attempted to do so by jumping off the Hammersmith flyover in London (breaking both her ankles), car accident, getting horse tranquilizers, drowning and overdosing on various pills. The woman was determined. And in the end, so was Alex.
Alexander McQueen meant something to me. It was as if he knew how I wanted to dress; the secret wish that I could be like the girls on his catwalk. They were romantic, tough, sexy, and highly strange. I would often see a dress and fall deeply in love with it only to find out that it was a McQueen. ("Of course it's a McQueen!" I would shout in the middle of the grocery store magazine aisle.) Dripping in style and never compromised, he never pussy footed around the concept. He was brave. And that's what I wanted.
I'll miss you, amazing designer, visionary and fabulous person.
The blisters were the size of your head and worth every bit of pain they inflicted.
The Louvre is massive, but you know that. It's one of the most famous museums in the world housing some of the most recognizable pieces of art known to mankind. Open since 1793, the Louvre's over 500,000 square feet of museum holds over 35,000 pieces of priceless art. From Antonio Canova's Psyche Revived by Cupid's Kiss to Da Vinci's Mona Lisa to the Venus de Milo, this place holds them all in a building that is art in and of itself. But I think it's the art in between that some people miss, and that which I treasure most.
The first thing I hope everyone takes a moment to admire is the building itself. Born as a fortress to protect Paris from the Anglo-Normans, I'm not sure anyone could have known what it would become. Kings and queens occupied the great structure when in 1793 the Museum Central des Arts opened up in the Grande Galerie and the Salon Carré to the public. From then on, the art expanded through until 1882 when the Louvre was fully dedicated to art and showcasing it to the public. Walking through the halls and from great room to room you realize you are walking in the footsteps of kings. Look up the the ceilings to see intricate and amazing murals. Marble and tiled floors. Beautiful wrapping staircases with metal work that boggles the mind. Even the lighting seems that it was considered when they installed the windows. To live in such a place must have been something to behold.
One of my favorites was the huge Near Eastern stonework; simply breath taking! The Assyrian human headed winged bulls were so much larger than I had imagined from books and pictures. I was really looking forward to seeing the Code of Hammurabi but it was currently on a tour of Europe and Africa. And I have been in love with ancient Egypt since I was a child; what kid isn't fascinated by mummies? The stone monkeys and The Grand Sphinx was just too cool. Just imagining someone working on it roughly 2600 years before the modern era is baffling.
The marble statues were amazing. To stare into the eyes of a statue that has been in existence before my family lived in America, before English was a modern language, before so many things really puts my life into perspective.
Now here's the highly distracting bit. Modern art. I dig modern art, I do. It can be fun and quirky or dark and dramatic. And many times, very confusing. I love that though! I love a good mystery. I can sit there and let the wheels in my head turn and try and figure out what this person was saying, if anything at all. But right in the middle of soaking in Dutch and Flemish masterpieces, there in the middle of a very large, long room was a large, long pile of headstones. Entangled under and over them was a huge, hairy earthworm with a human face. And to top it all off, somewhere, hidden among the toppled tombstones, was a speaker emitting soft moaning and whispering fast phrases in french. (Did I mention the worm was hairy. I actually almost gagged...)
At first I was fascinated and disgusted by the groudy human-earthworm. How interesting! What does it all mean? Jan Fabre is famous for shocking his audience. (In 2005 he held an exhibition in which woman reveal there bleeding nether regions and men peed into bottles. Yum...) Certain reviewers of his latest work say that he has lost his provocative touch. I'm just glad I didn't step in human waste or get peed on. Regardless though, this giant work was sitting in the middle of a room housing some of the best German, Flemish and Dutch paintings in the world! After moving on, trying to look at some of the other paintings, I felt that I could not concentrate. I couldn't enjoy and ponder these while some creepy earthworm dude was moaning and whispering french at me. Sadly, I was forced to move on.
There is so much history here and controversy to boot. After WW2, thousands pieces of art were returned to France, although many did not have a clear owner. Many years later, pieces began filtering back to Jewish families who had lost them via the Nazis. (Don't even get me started on the devastating loss of so much irreplaceable art destroyed by those evil fuckers. Just seeing photos of Nazi officials holding The Coronation of Napoleon by David makes me so angry and disgusted...Check out the fabulous documentary The Rape of Europa if you want to know more about how curators, soldiers and everyday people saved so much for future generations to see. Heart-breaking is that many pieces are still missing to this day and may never be found. But that's a whole other blog...) There are still debates today about who owns what in the Louvre. Not just from WW2 but acquisitions taken by Napoleon and art taken from digs in Egypt and many other countries.
There is so much that's contained in a single piece of art. Not only the image and technique but it's life it has lived. For example, the Mona Lisa was completed at some point in 1503 and later sold to the King of France. After the French Revolution it was transfered to the Louvre and stayed there until Napoleon took it to decorate his bedroom. After he was banished, it returned to the Louvre. Fast forward to 1911 when it was stolen my a man who worked at the Louvre who CUT it from it's frame and ran off with it because he believed it belonged in an Italian museum. Two years later it resurfaced and was returned. During WW2 it was moved six times, once being transported by ambulance to conceal the true nature of it's cargo. It made it through the war only to have acid thrown on it's lower half and have a rock thrown at the upper left part of the canvas in 1956. Since then, good ol' Mona has been chillin, going on the occasional tour, but mostly behind bulletproof glass in the Louvre.
I really wish my brother had been there. I could have told him all the greek mythology I knew and try to recall all I could remember from my Art History and Art Theory class in college. He loved the hidden things in art that spoke about the piece more than just the overall painting, because like life, there is so much more hidden in the crevasses. (haha, insert dirty joke here. Thanks Jill...)
My favorite piece? Who can pick? There are so many I love. One of my many favorites is this one. Her. She is so beautiful, no?
Of course I have completely forgotten her name. I think she is Veiled Woman by Agostino Corradini. If I'm wrong, shoot me an email and let me know. (Behind her and to the right you can see Canova's Psyche.)
In 5 hours I saw almost every wing and room that the Louvre had to offer. My feet paid the price. So worth it.
I felt like I had travel through time and back and my mind was scrambled and tired after all of it. When asked about my day, all I could do was smile and drool. My brain was done for the day. As the sun sat on that lovely day I had broiled beef and margaritas, dragged my ass back home and passed straight out, images of Rodin and Degas floating in my dreams.
For more info on the Louvre, check out http://www.discoverfrance.net/France/Paris/Museums-Paris/Louvre.shtml
For more info on the Mona Lisa, read and relish The Annotated Mona Lisa: A Crash Course in Art History from Prehistoric to Post-Modern by Carol Stickland
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