Getting to Yes: Pope Consecrates Gaudi’s Sagrada Familia

On November 7^th, Pope Benedict XVI consecrated Antoni Gaudí’s weirdly wonderful masterpiece of religious architecture, the Sagrada Família (shown above). The Catholic Church tends to distrust anything modern these days, so seeing it accept one of the earliest works of modern 20^th century architecture seems a little out of character. Some hope that this marks a change in the persistent “no” of the current Pope to a more hopeful, accepting “yes.” Everything about the Sagrada Família screams “yes” to the exuberance of life and overflowing imagination. Getting to that “yes,” and getting to the Papal “yes,” remains an interesting story and a work in progress. Please come over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "Getting to Yes."

I'll Be Your Mirror: Michael Fried’s “The Moment of Caravaggio”

“I'll be your mirror,” The Velvet Underground sang in the song of the same name, “Reflect what you are, in case you don't know.” In The Moment of Caravaggio, Michael Fried argues that the art of Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio captivates us by reflecting back at us the interior life we the viewer project into it. Fried adds to that dynamic another “moment,” in which the artist himself finds himself captured by his own painting, which he must cast off if it is to live as an independent art work. One of the most intriguing and subtle art critics writing today, Fried casts new light into the work of the master of chiaroscuro and presents a fresh approach to understanding just why Caravaggio’s art lingers in the mind and holds our attention even today, four centuries after his death. Please come over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "I'll Be Your Mirror."

[Many thanks to Princeton University Press for providing me with a review copy of Michael Fried’s The Moment of Caravaggio.]

Out of the Ashes: Art Stolen by Nazis Rediscovered

It’s a sad fact of human history that the leadership regime most obsessed with art belonged to that of the Nazis. From Adolf Hitler the frustrated painter to obsessive collectors such as Herman Goering and Joseph Goebbels (who knew enough to step aside when Hitler lusted after an object), the Nazi power circles thought about art and its effect on their country’s culture continually, more often to art’s detriment than to its benefit. Exhibit A of the detrimental effects of that cultural concern is that dark episode in modern art history—the infamous Entartete Kunst (“Degenerate Art”) exhibition of 1937 that defined for Germans what was and what wasn’t acceptable art. Some of those “degenerate” works and the artists that made them escaped Nazi clutches, while much of that condemned art seemed lost to posterity in the same conflagration that consumed the Nazis themselves. A recent discovery, however, adds a small, but happy coda to the tragic symphony of the Nazis destructive love of art. Please come over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "Out of the Ashes."

Who’s Your Dada?: Surrealists Games in “The Exquisite Book”

For most art history students, the days of Dadaism and Surrealism seem like ancient history—two “-isms” buried beneath the quick succession of newer and newer “-isms” reigning ever since. Illustrator Julia Rothman, graphic designer Jenny Volvovski, and animator Matt Lamothe bring the cold corpse of Dada back to life in The Exquisite Book, a large-scale playing of the Surrealist game “Exquisite Corpse” by 100 contemporary artists. The Exquisite Book turns back the clock to the early days of modern art and reminds us of the origins of the twentieth century mind. By the time you finish playing along with the game, you’ll know exactly “who’s your Dada.” Please come over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "Who’s Your Dada?"

[Many thanks to Chronicle Books for providing me with a review copy of The Exquisite Book by Julia Rothman, Jenny Volvovski, and Matt Lamothe.]