Pinakothek der Moderne
The final gallery of the three takes you right up to date. By the end of the exhibition you'll have encountered not only such newfangled artistic inventions as photography, but also the sort of conceptual art that gets Daily Mail readers riled and others puzzling over the level of humour required in the viewer's interpretation of such pieces, and indeed the level of craft and artistic (rather than conceptual) talent needed for the artist to execute his or her project. One exhibit had a considerable series of clothes on hangers suspended high up over the viewer's head. Regrettably I can't remember the artist's name but was a tiny bit dubious about the fulsome explanation offered on a side panel about how the piece evokes the abandonment of identity in the workplace, as though people had had to hang up their garments in order to don company uniform or builders'/ miners' overalls etc. Well perhaps. But if a piece of art, like a poem, requires too much explanation and can't rely on the responses and 'dialogue' with the audience, hasn't it somehow failed in its project?
Two powerful paintings.
Franz Marc's Tyrol from 1914. I am drawn to the rainbow-like refracted light which fills Marc's canvasses with such force - neither gentle nor necessarily beautiful in a comfortable sense, but full of storm, challenge and energy, and perhaps with some kind of answer in its rich texture too? This one according to my guide was painted in 1913 but revised a year later 'in the light of a more spiritual expression, which changed the work into an allegory not only of Christian salvation but also of the historical catastrophe that was unfolding... central to the composition's clear colour structure is the head of a veiled Madonna'. Can you see her? Riding the waves, making some of her own.
I was also struck by an absolutely non figurative painting (?) by Lucio Fontana, a 'Concetto Spaziale...one of many such pieces of pretty solid block colour (this one a deep blue) with (four in this case) deep vertical cuts.
The guidebook suggests that the cuts in the canvas 'enable the spectator to experience a spatiality that exists only in his own imagination: he will recall a space behind the canvas or will see the space of the paintng opening up as his own.' Is this a gender specific perception? There is something compelling about these incisions though. Scars - of beautification, reminding me that some African tribes consider scarification a process of making a woman's face more pleasing. The cuts could also imply violation, penetration, or even something slashing through a wall to find escape.
So much art all in one week. Perhaps one is in danger, at this rate, of experiencing Stendhal's syndrome, which is wiki-described as 'a psychosomatic illness that causes rapid heartbeat, dizziness, confusion and even hallucinations when an individual is exposed to art, usually when the art is particularly beautiful or a large amount of art is in a single place. The term can also be used to describe a similar reaction to a surfeit of choice in other circumstances, e.g. when confronted with immense beauty in the natural world.' A kind of craziness in response to the cultural sublime. I seem to recall other interpretations of the syndrom might suggest a desire to damage the art works which have brought on the sensations - perhaps Fontana experienced this as an intrinsic part of his creative project?
At any rate. We were exhausted by this building with its ambience of challenge greater than the previous two pinakotheks combined. We sat in the gallery cafe for an almost indecently long time, while a woman with a formidable looking camera took shots of a slick looking male model, with oiled hair and salmon-pink trousers, who lolled professionally against the wall on which the name of the gallery was inscribed. Seemed fitting somehow.
Two powerful paintings.
Franz Marc's Tyrol from 1914. I am drawn to the rainbow-like refracted light which fills Marc's canvasses with such force - neither gentle nor necessarily beautiful in a comfortable sense, but full of storm, challenge and energy, and perhaps with some kind of answer in its rich texture too? This one according to my guide was painted in 1913 but revised a year later 'in the light of a more spiritual expression, which changed the work into an allegory not only of Christian salvation but also of the historical catastrophe that was unfolding... central to the composition's clear colour structure is the head of a veiled Madonna'. Can you see her? Riding the waves, making some of her own.
I was also struck by an absolutely non figurative painting (?) by Lucio Fontana, a 'Concetto Spaziale...one of many such pieces of pretty solid block colour (this one a deep blue) with (four in this case) deep vertical cuts.
The guidebook suggests that the cuts in the canvas 'enable the spectator to experience a spatiality that exists only in his own imagination: he will recall a space behind the canvas or will see the space of the paintng opening up as his own.' Is this a gender specific perception? There is something compelling about these incisions though. Scars - of beautification, reminding me that some African tribes consider scarification a process of making a woman's face more pleasing. The cuts could also imply violation, penetration, or even something slashing through a wall to find escape.
So much art all in one week. Perhaps one is in danger, at this rate, of experiencing Stendhal's syndrome, which is wiki-described as 'a psychosomatic illness that causes rapid heartbeat, dizziness, confusion and even hallucinations when an individual is exposed to art, usually when the art is particularly beautiful or a large amount of art is in a single place. The term can also be used to describe a similar reaction to a surfeit of choice in other circumstances, e.g. when confronted with immense beauty in the natural world.' A kind of craziness in response to the cultural sublime. I seem to recall other interpretations of the syndrom might suggest a desire to damage the art works which have brought on the sensations - perhaps Fontana experienced this as an intrinsic part of his creative project?
At any rate. We were exhausted by this building with its ambience of challenge greater than the previous two pinakotheks combined. We sat in the gallery cafe for an almost indecently long time, while a woman with a formidable looking camera took shots of a slick looking male model, with oiled hair and salmon-pink trousers, who lolled professionally against the wall on which the name of the gallery was inscribed. Seemed fitting somehow.
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