CEZANNE & DE KOONING These two pieces start in very different places, but because of a similar attitude about surface, the results are strikingly similar. Both begin with white tones held together by intermittent black lines. Both employ the same palette: green, red, orange, and blue, although the predominance of greens and reds is reversed.…

ARTHUR DEVIS The portraits of Arthur Devis  (1712 – 1787)  can seem quaint when compared with grander portrait styles, but they are less convention-bound, and have their own curious vision. The spaces are large and dim, and get paler as you look into the farther rooms. The views visible through the windows are just like…

I’ve tended not to take Audubon’s bird illustrations seriously, but lately—at last—I’ve begun to appreciate both his sense of drama and the abstract power of his designs. So like Kline. Not just an illustrator, not at all.

GLORIOUS DECORATION This fuzzy file from Wikipedia is the only image I’ve seen for this painting by Peter Kobler von Ehrensorg  (1746), but the delight here is not the details, but the unbridled luxury of the design. The two figures float on a field of black and near-black. The emperor almost disappears into a flurry of…

NUDES AND NUDES The nude takes many forms, and serves many agendas. Here are four examples, proving that in art, as elsewhere, form follows function. Peter Paul Rubens devoted himself to fleshy, sensual women–richly detailed, like everything else in his paintings. The danger in being so single-minded is that the world is wide, and it…

THE STUDIOLO I never visit the Metropolitan Museum in New York without devoting a few minutes to Gallery 501: the Studiolo, or study room, from the ducal palace of Gubbio, dating from 1478-82. Its murals are executed in intarsia, or wood inlay. Everything between the text band of gold and blue at the top and the red tiles at…

AT THE WHITNEY–FINE and OH PLEASE! The current hanging at the new Whitney in New York includes several galleries of portraits. A mixed bag, as big shows tend to be. The standout on the quality side is this intricate portrait of Andy Warhol by Alice Neel (1900-1984), which I’d never seen in the flesh before. The…

A TRUMP PORTRAIT This blog largely concerns itself with good art, because that is where the most interesting ideas are found. But bad art, while not uplifting, can still be full of information. Here we have an example. The portrait (of Donald Trump, in case you didn’t recognize him) is feeble and kitchy, and the massive gold…

A FAVORITE FRA ANGELICO Fra Angelico (1395-1440) produced many fine paintings, but this one engages particularly by the boldness of its abstraction. We have two vignettes, subtly united: the bottom of the bed platform aligns with the base of the wall in the right half; the curtain rod aligns with the top of the doorway; the little window on the…

Pages 34-35  of the March 14 New Yorker present a piquant juxtaposition: Alicia Garza, labor organizer, today, and Mary, Lady Van Dyck, c.1640. How the world turns!