Blackpaint 620 – Signorelli, Picasso and the Ape in the Museum

National Gallery

A new Signorelli, someone up a ladder, probably related to a Crucifixion.  This one’s good, but I have to say, I wasn’t keen on his other big ones – a visit of the Magi and a Circumcision.  The first has one of the worst baby Jesuses I’ve ever seen (and I’ve listed several in previous blogs).  I think Signorelli is much better doing his murals of writhing, fighting demons in his cartoon-like style, like those in Orvieto, for instance.

 

Yes, it’s definitely a baby…

That’s more like it, Luca…

In addition to Signorelli, we were looking at the painting by “Follower of Georgione” and the one by G himself and it struck me that the texture and detail involved reminded me a little of Richard Dadd’s “Fairy Feller’s Masterstroke”.  Fanciful, I know, but then I got another blast of Dadd from the Altdorfer – I think it was the legs of the man on the right…

Follower of Giorgione

Altdorfer

Finally,the big Perugino and the Mond Crucifixion by Raphael, the one with the sun and moon with faces: surely both P and R were using the same model for Mary?

The Square, dir. Ruben Ostlund (2017)

From the director of Force Majeure, this repeats the motif of a smug, liberal, bourgeois male who commits a disgraceful act.  In FM, it was running away from an avalanche, leaving his family; in this film, the guilty man posts accusing letters through all the doors in a block of flats, knowing that his stolen phone and the thieves are in one – but which one?  It has unfortunate consequences for a young boy in one apartment.

The erring male is an art museum director and the scene above is a performance staged at the museum by an actor who imitates an ape.  Of course, he goes too far and begins an assault on a female guest that looks as if it will turn into rape if uninterrupted.  Eventually, one of the suited guests tries to pull him off and the others  join in, punching and kicking.  Funny, and reminiscent of Bunuel, Festen, and maybe Airplane, a little.  Not sure what point, if any, was being made here, however.  Those Swedes, though – they do love to “epater les bourgeois”, don’t they?

More Picasso

As promised last time, some more pictures from the Picasso Year 1932 exhibition at Tate Modern.  Some of them are in hideous frames, so I’ve cropped them out.

Inflatable ladies playing at beachball.

 

One of an impressive Crucifixion series, recalling both Grunewald and Goya’s Disasters of War.

 

This looks like a beautiful flower from across the gallery; pretty good close up too, except that the breasts resemble the eyes of a frightened ghost…

 

Bit of a horror image – her face looks like a stylised Otto Dix trench corpse…

 

Unusual for Picasso (that sounds odd in itself), in that there are no hard lines around the various components of the image.  Great little painting.

 

Continental Drift

Blackpaint

26.5.18

 

 

 

 

Blackpaint 619 – Milne, Picasso and Truffaut

A long gap since I posted last, due to events as Harold MacMillan put it.  More regular from now on, I hope.

Dulwich Picture Gallery – David Milne

Another Canadian artist at Dulwich.  I’m afraid this exhibition finished last week, but I thought it was worth mentioning.  Milne used a limited palette of four or five colours in most of his paintings, but the effectiveness is not diminished, as you can see.  For my money, the best ones were those where figures are set within the surroundings in such a way as they sink into them.  Look closely at the painting below; it’s a seated woman reading, with a cat on her lap.

Picasso 1932 – Tate Modern

I’ve been twice so far.  It’s staggering, if only for the volume and range of work completed in the year.  If you look at the dates of the works, it appears that he was completing a painting or sculpture a day – this is because he dated the work on the day he decide it was finished.  Sometimes, he probably took a few days to finish!

As far as the pictures go, it’s clear that he was generally uninterested in surface or texture; he gets the image down on canvas and moves on to the realisation of his next idea.  There will be a series of variations on a theme (for example The Rescue, in the final room, in which we see several images of a woman saved from drowning).  Most of the images are stunning; in a few, you feel that he is pushing it – perhaps even taking the piss (can’t think of a more delicate way of phrasing it).

Strangely for a big prestige exhibition like this. you can take photos freely – I’ve got more than I can be bothered to post in this blog, so I’ll put a few more up next time.

 

 

Unusually, a bit of texture in this one, around the face…

 

Taking the piss here just a little?

 

I know this picture well, but unbelievably, hadn’t noticed the resemblance to an octopus.  The exhibition helpfully has a film of the – cephalopod, is it? – next to the painting, so you can hardly miss it.

 

Now, a series of tiny octopuses apparently contained in tins, like sardines.

More on Picasso next blog, which will be soon.

Francois Truffaut (DVDs, boxed set of eight)

I’d always thought of Truffaut as a little bit – soft really; bit slushy.  I think it is the hangover of “quirkiness” from the unwatchable “Jules et Jim”, Jeanne Moreau in a “quirky” cap set at a jaunty angle, dressed as a man (she’s got a pencilled-in moustache  for some reason, I think), running across a bridge, pursued adoringly by the two men in her life.  It’s in the box, but I can’t bring myself to watch it.

The other films. however, were a really pleasant surprise, particularly the three mentioned below.  In “Anne and Muriel”, the triangle is reversed; two sisters to one man – but not at the same time.  Or even within the same time frame.

Anne and Muriel

The Last Metro (1980)

Again, two men, one woman – eventually.  And yes, within the same time frame.  Stars the ice queen Catherine Deneuve, displaying emotion with the merest movement of an eyebrow, the pursing of the lips..

The Woman Next Door

Depardieu again, this time with Fanny Ardant.  The best film in the set, I think, as well as the darkest (even though The Last Metro is set in WW2 occupied France).

 

Crouching Pink

Blackpaint 

14.5.18