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| Headline in The Times |
Van Gogh features prominently in the coverage of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art—even making a recent headline in The Times (London). The popular Dutch artist's name is often dropped as an example of the type of art that Lucas visitors can expect to see when the museum opens Sep. 22. Apparently many of the journalists haven't seen the modest work they're writing about. The only original van Gogh on view at the Lucas is Sien Nursing Baby, an early drawing in gouache, watercolor, and black chalk. It dates from 1882 (three years before The Potato Eaters), when the artist was still learning his craft. Van Gogh made many spectacular drawings, but this isn't one of them.
Christie's auctioned the sheet for $365,900 back in 2003. Drawings from van Gogh's maturity have sold for over $10 million.
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| Vincent van Gogh, Sien Nursing Baby, 1882. The drawing measures 19 by 12 in. |
Comments
Do better, Lucas.
Queen Latifah told attendees to spread the word that “a new institution is being born, and it is here to change the way we look at art. Paris has the Louvre. New York has the Met. And now L.A. has its artistic equal.” [End quote]
Dana Owens' (aka Queen Latifah) comment makes me grimace. It's the reverse extreme of art connoisseurs insisting that overly abstract, non-representational works, where technical - and perhaps aesthetic too - skill isn't too apparent, are somehow more deserving of respect than illustrations or so-called narrative art is.
The director of the Broad Museum attended the Lucas's premier last night. So did artists Jeff Koons and Takashi Murakami. I wonder how each of them perceived what was on display?
Koons and Murakami, however, are the least abstract/non-representational of current-day ("contemporary?") artists. But they and the Broad's Joanne Heyler are accustomed to dealing with mainly hipster-style (or sometimes "even my kid can do that") artworks.
LACMA's director was there too, who has been too much into making his own museum "a de facto museum of contemporary art, but frankly...not a very good one."
I hope the Lucas Museum makes him at least question what he has been doing to LACMA, such as alienating the Ahmanson Foundation.