George Bellows A Day in June 1913 In the young adult novel The Giver the world is a fair and equal place, a peacefully drab community of such numbing sameness that random chance, even if sometimes cruel and unjust, gradually comes into focus as a valuable part of human existence. The first insidious hint for the reader that the gleaming utopia is in fact a horrifying dystopia is the dawning awareness that the world in The Giver has no color. No color, thus no racism - no color, thus no flashy show-off fashion - no color, thus few ways to tout superiority through superficial indicators. But just think... no Color. No rainbows, no bright spring flowers, no blue sky, no rich range of greens, blues, yellows, oranges found in food, fabrics, cars, cats, trees, houses, etc., etc. Need I mention that there is no art in this sad practical world? Culture as a category has been expunged as messy and troublesome.
Great Hall Detroit Institute of the Arts This post is dedicated to the Detroit Institute of Arts, one of the greatest of American museums, with an international collection of art that ranks among the best in the world. No surprise there; the font of American industrial wealth centered in Detroit was perfectly sited to nurture the DIA in the late 19th and early 20th century when the great American museum collections were being compiled. A long list of European masterpieces is a given, but the DIA is a vibrant, living place with a vigorous embrace of world art and contemporary art as well. The setting is also first rank, a landmark building designed by Paul Cret, the French-born, Philadelphia-based master architect.
Diego Rivera Detroit Industry Fresco Cycle (detail) 1932-33 And now, when Detroit has been left out to dry for a sad laundry list of reasons and inevitabilities, this great institution has become a pawn. None of the art has been sold off yet but the possibility seems to be very real. If that happens, what will be lost? Will it be the complete set of massive murals by Diego Rivera, commissioned in 1932 by Edsel Ford as homage to Detroit’s world-changing invention and hard work?
Pieter Bruegel The Wedding Dance 1566 Or one of the priceless (but a price will be established, never worry) Van Goghs, his Self Portrait with Straw Hat (the first of his self-portraits to enter an American museum collection) or his portrait of Postmaster Roulin, partner to the masterpiece at the Barnes Foundation? How about the fabulous Bruegel Wedding Dance from 1566, one of only a handful by this master in the U.S.? Would it matter, after all, if this great collection were to be nibbled away at the edges, like a prized cashmere blanket left to the mercy of moths?
Van Gogh Self Portrait with Straw Hat 1887 Yes. It matters very much. Art is the color in our banal and practical world; without it we lack grace, joy, and rich significance, we miss the palette of magnificence that offsets and complements the hum and strain of daily life. While a collection like Detroit’s might have been built by grim, hardworking men who made their fortunes by the grinding screech of machines, the benefit of the art they amassed is that it calls us all - then, now, and far into the future, to eternal grandeur.
Donald Sultan Oranges on a Branch March 14 1992 Great art is what reminds of us of our possibilities, no matter how often and by how much we fall short in the effort. The glory of art, the stuff of human striving towards the divine in some form, is there to pick us back up, dust us off, and inspire us to try again. The DIA and its irreplaceable collection is a trust for the long haul; at this moment, as much if not more than any other, we must remember that it is not ours to bargain with. Great museums hold our collective memory; they must be maintained and respected for those who come after us. Once we start chipping away pieces we cannot guarantee the integrity of the whole; the story of humankind starts losing pages.
Joan Mitchell Before After ii 1998 Human lives and accomplishments function on a strange sliding scale in our world; those with fancy cars and fat bank accounts get high marks and great esteem, never mind the possible human cost of all that luxury, while pitiful souls who scrape by in creative fields are often denigrated as losers and ne’er do wells. When Detroit was alive with industrial wealth it was a byword of the American Dream, but now that the party has moved on, the glory days are forgotten and the city and the people who worked to achieve that wealth get kicked to the curb.
Allie McGhee Night Ritual 1991 Apparently artists are now moving into Detroit, attracted by the dirt-cheap housing and the freedom from the high overhead of thriving cities like New York. How ironic that an artist like Van Gogh, who starved and suffered through his sad existence while sharing his explosive joy in life in paintings that no one wanted during his lifetime, might have been one of them. How weird that he is now considered a commodity with enough ka-ching to make a dent in the plight of a down-on-its-luck American city.
What do you think?
What do you think?
The Website of the Detroit Institute of Arts
http://www.dia.org/
Wikipedia gives a good account of the history and holdings of the DIA
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detroit_Institute_of_Arts
All art in this post is from the collection of the Detroit Institute of Arts
http://www.dia.org/
Wikipedia gives a good account of the history and holdings of the DIA
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detroit_Institute_of_Arts
All art in this post is from the collection of the Detroit Institute of Arts
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