By Patrick F. Cannon

I went to the Art Institute of Chicago the other day to see “My New Yorks,” which focused on painter Georgia O’Keefe’s cityscapes from her time living in a Manhattan high-rise building in the 1920s. While the exhibit includes work from other periods – including her more famous and typical work from her years in Taos, New Mexico – it focuses on views of the city seen from her apartment window.

            While “realistic” in the sense that you can recognize what you see, it’s obvious that the artist was more interested in the city’s shapes as abstractions than in precise realism. In some, the Sun (or Moon) provides dramatic lighting effects. In general, the colors are muted, and no people intrude. No people, in a city that would have a population of seven million by 1930. In fact, you can look at O’Keefe’s work as a whole and find only a few female nude sketches; even animals are represented only by desert-bleached bones and skulls.

              There are exceptions, but painters and sculptors went in the 20^th Century from an exclusively human-centered art to one where people are mostly absent. Indeed, figurative artists like Andrew Wyeth have often been criticized for being too concerned with realism. In fact, the word “figurative” is often used dismissively by critics. The only acceptable figurative art seems to be graffiti-influenced, or the kind of manipulation of photographs and everyday objects that made Andy Warhol famous.

            Yet, there are eight billion people in the world, each one unique. When Diego Valazquez (1599-1660) painted “Aesop” in 1640 – that’s a portion of it above – he didn’t imagine what the ancient Greek, reputed to be the author of the famous fables, looked like. Instead, as his model, he chose a local beggar, whose face showed the kind of world-weary humanity that Aesop must have had. Valazquez – who many consider the greatest of all painters – was the court painter in Spain, but in addition to doing portraits of the royals, was among the first to paint scenes of everyday life.  

            When we see the great paintings and sculptures of the Renaissance, we are meant to imagine they are famous saints, gods, and mythical creatures. But in most cases, the artists used their friends, relatives, and strangers as models – in other words, living human beings standing in for creatures from the heavens. And then, if you were notable and had the cash, a portrait became the ultimate status symbol. And the frugal Dutch favored a group portrait by the likes of Rembrandt and Hals, each of the subjects paying his share! Rembrandt’s “Night Watch” is a perfect example.

            The reaction against “academic” art in 19^th Century France was perfectly understandable. Anyone who has seen the massive canvases in the Louvre that show the ancient Romans in orgiastic complexity can understand where Corbet, Manet and the Impressionists came from. Their people inhabit a recognizable world. Their break with the past gave license to artists like Picasso, Matisse, Braque, Miro, and others to see people in new ways. Then, inevitably, came Mondrian and pure abstraction.

            I have no argument with abstract art, except it has now, I think, reached a dead end. Most if it is simply design. It is human only in its creation and our reaction to it. I’m reminded of a psychiatrist interviewed on Charlie Rose’s show who reported breaking into tears while looking at a Mark Rothko painting. While he did not admit it, his reaction was certainly related to his knowledge that Rothko had committed suicide. Absent this knowledge, when I first saw one of his color-field paintings, my only thought was that it must have been difficult to create those subtle shadings of the same color.

            I think there’s a reason people respond positively to the murals that are appearing on blank walls around the world. Although many are poorly pointed, they are full of people – some of the eight billion who should demand the artist’s attention.

(P.S. Happy 4^th!)

Copyright 2024, Patrick F. Cannon