But Is Is Art?

(Andy Warhol Liz #3 1963)

Author’s Note: I’m taking off for the Christmas holidays, Dear Readers.  This will be my last post of the year.  I hope you thought this year’s Letter From Elba has been naughty and/or nice.

I’ll be back in your email box on Sunday, January 3.

Until then, I wish you all a very happy, healthy 2016.

Now on with the art show…

Last Saturday afternoon, I was invited to a members-only premiere of the new Stefan Edlis/Gael Neeson Collection galleries at the Art Institute.

That’s because I’ve had the great good fortune to be friends with Joan Arenberg.  Since 1988, knowledgeable Joan has given fascinating tours to the Art Institute- as well as escorting people all around the United States wherever there are great works of art to be seen- and appreciated.

Here’s Joan with her favorite work of art- her grandson, Julian.

During the course of her distinguished career, Joan has given countless learned and entertaining lectures on her passion- contemporary art.  Thus, she was the perfect guide to the museum’s fabulous new acquisition.

OMG!

There are forty-four works- valued at some $400 million.  They are by the superstars of the contemporary world- Jackson Pollock, Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, Cy Twombly, Takashi Murakami, Gerhard Richter, Damian Hirst, Richard Price, Cindy Sherman, Jeff Koons, Roy Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol.

There are other major art works now being shown that belong to the Art Institute’s own collection, as well. Some of these pieces have been in storage and are out again for the first time in years.

Curator’s Sidebar: If you want to tell the players without a scorecard, remember this.  The Edlis/Neeson Collection has been mounted on light gray walls.  The museum’s original holdings are on the white walls.

An hour in and I was swooning with Stendhal’s Syndrome.  My senses were overcome with the likes of these.

(Jasper Johns Target 1961)

(Robert Rauchenberg Untitled 1955)

(Cy Twombly Untitled 1969)

And the Warhols have their own room.

They deserve it.

I couldn’t get over Andy Warhol.

I mean he is today.  Forget about his fifteen minutes.  He couldn’t be more NOW.

His work spoke to me about the nature of notoriety and tragedy.  How he would have loved the shameless cravenness of the Kardashians, the self-aggrandizement of Face Book, the immediacy of Twitter, the dangerous buffoonery of Donald Trump.

The Roman Circus spectacle of it all.

And sadly, I think he would have understood Newtown and the recent terrorism in Paris.

After all, he too, was a victim of horrific gun violence.

(Andy Warhol Twelve Jackies 1964)

As I said, Joan was a wonderful Cicerone.  She explained some works to me.  And she solicited my opinion on others.

As I toured the rooms, I tried to put my finger on the emotion that the art had wrought in me.  I thought and thought… and then I had it.

This exhibit was sexy.

Yep, sensuous and fun and visceral- and it turned me on.

But all that passion had made me…hungry.

Joan made an executive decision and we adjourned to the cafeteria and shared a chicken wrap- and a table.

The wrap was delicious.  The table was fun.  Two other ladies who had come to the opening added their p.o.v.’s to the proceedings and a most lively conversation ensued.

Caught up in the Pop Art frenzy, I even captured a photorealistic moment of my own.

And now it was time for a lecture by the head of the department of Contemporary Art- James Rondeau.

Another OMG!

Handsome, urbane, witty, his lecture brilliantly limned the arc of modern movement- from Pollock to Johns to Lichtenstein and beyond.  He explained the correlation between gesture and feeling.  He made me understand the terms “action painting” and “all over’ painting

And he slyly explained that the Twombly painting shown above was sneakily Rated X.

Calling Dr. Freud Sidebar:  Gosh.  I have been out of the dating game too long.  I thought it was just one giant doodle.

It was a scintillating lecture and I never wanted it to end.

But when he finished, I knew why this was art.

(Jackson Pollock Greyed Rainbow 1953)

And this was not.

(Ellen Ross Farmhouse in France 2014)

So thanks, dear Joan, for a memorable afternoon.

Btw, I read that the exhibit is going to run for three years.

Wanna go again?

(Next time the chicken wrap’s on me.)