Billy's Lines Of Gibberish

The twin-towered Louis Bank of Commerce

The annual conference of the ASN, the American Society of Nephrology, was held in San Diego two weeks ago.

There was a lot of interesting stuff for a nephrologist there. No topic for this blog though. Rather than blogging about work, I will rather show photos taken while I strolled around in the city's streets and museums, either on the day before the Convention began this year, either during a previous stay in 2006, when another ASN Renal Week was held there.

Architecture. There are beautiful buildings in San Diego. In Gaslamp quarter especially, many houses are remarkable. The twin-towered building above is located at 837 Fifth Avenue. Its top floor used to be a house of prostitution and the first floor an Oyster Bar where Wyatt Earp operated for a time.

From inside the Convention Centre

The Convention Centre itself is beautiful work, and many skyscrapers are beautiful as well. In Balboa Park on the contrary, buildings are essentially 20th century pitiful attempts to reproduce Spanish mostly, Tuscan sometimes, buildings of the baroque style... with stucco. The California Tower of the Museum of Man is nice though.

Marriott Hotel

California Tower

Sculpture. French sculptor Niki de Saint-Phalle lived in San Diego from 1994 to 2002. She had solvent-related emphysema, and enjoyed the paradise weather of the area. Yet it did not prevent her from dying of pulmonary failure.

Two sculptures by her are exhibited in Balboa Park, in front of the Mingei International Museum: Poet/Muse and Nikigator. Children love the latter especially, some kind of dragon they are often brave enough to sit astride.

Poet and Muse

Nikigator

Bergen (2006)

San Diego (2009)

Another French Sculptor, Bernar Venet, was much in evidence in several places in the city, although temporarily only. You know what? I believe this guy is following me: everywhere I go, I see his iron arcs.

When I had vacation in Norway in 2006, they were exhibited in Bergen. When I attended the annual conference of the French Society of Nephrology in Bordeaux two years ago, they were exhibited there. And at present they are exhibited in San Diego too!

Sorry Bernar, but you'll have to resign yourself: I will never buy any, my kitchen is too small.

Painting. Close to the Mingei Museum in Balboa Park, the San Diego Museum of Art displayed artworks by Picasso and Miró especially, in a temporary exhibition. I liked a couple, essentially a drawing by Picasso of a Minotaur stroking a sleeping woman. There was an exhibition of Calder Jewelry too. I don't like Calder's mobiles that much. I didn't like his massive earrings, tiaras and necklace either.

Anyway, the main reason why I went to Balboa park was the Museum of Art permanent exhibition, with several Renaissance paintings I had been longing for three years to see again. There are paintings by Rogier Van Der Weyden, Giotto, Titian, and others, Flemish and Italian. Here come a few words about my three favourite.

Giorgione — Portrait of a Man Oil on panel, 1506

Portrait of a Man, by Giorgione.
This painting is one of the greatest Renaissance portraits in my opinion. The composition is closely cropped around the head of the sitter. The setting or props often used at the time to animate portraits are absent, yet the man's turning gaze and ambiguous expression make the portrait wholly engaging and alive.

Giorgione was friend of Titian (who finished his Sleeping Venus after his early death, a painting that foreshadowed my beloved Venus of Urbino — see a previous blog). He was unprecedented in his ability to describe warm flesh and soft hair. Quoting Georgio Vasari, Giorgione's 'modern manner' sought to paint 'living and natural things', several years before Titian, Tintoretto and Veronese arrived on the Italian scene.

Hieronymus Bosch — Arrest of Christ Oil on panel, ca. 1516

The Arrest of Christ, by H. Bosch.
The painting depicts Jesus's arrest outside of Gethsemane. To the right, Peter raises a sword in defence of Jesus. He has just cut the ear from the High Priest's servant, who bites his arm and thrusts a lantern in his face. The grotesque figures of his tormenters contrast with the serene image of Jesus himself.

I love the way Bosch, in this painting, distorts the characters into something like caricature. Can you believe this was painted 500 years ago?

B. Luini — The Conversion of the Magdalene Oil on panel, ca. 1520

The Conversion of the Magdalene,
by Bernardino Luini. This is the moment when Mary Magdalene, the attractive and fashionable woman on the right, decides to put aside her finery (like the necklace on the table) and old life, and follow Jesus, like her sister Martha (on the left) previously. She holds an unguent jar, a symbol of her act of anointing Jesus's feet.

Bernardino Luini was among Leonardo da Vinci's closest followers in Milan. One can find a lot of Leonardo typical features in this painting: the characteristic figure types especially, with the mysterious, seductive smile of Magdalene, and the distinctive gesturing hands that animate the narrative.

So... after one day in the streets and museums of the city, I had my eyes and camera full of pictures. It was just time to go to the Convention Centre and attend the Conference.

Il Cenacolo (The Last Supper) by Leonardo Da Vinci (1495-1498) Refectory of Santa Maria delle Grazie (Milan).

Last may, I went to Italy twice. I spent five days of vacation in Florence, then attended a Conference in Milan. Due to lack of time, I wrote one blog in Florence only, and one in Milan.

I do love Italy, and Italians. There is a lightness, a Joie de Vivre in the air of most Italian towns, you will hardly find anywhere else. Also, Art is everywhere.

In Florence first, then in Milan, I was stunned by frescoes. There's always a difference between looking at a reproduction and seeing an artwork for real. Walter Benjamin named aura this specificity of artwork, which is unique, linked to a special place, and part of history.

Il Cenacolo by Ghirlandaio (1448)

Frescoes certainly have an aura, because they are part of the place on which they were painted. Also, frescoes are impressive because they are very large. Characters painted are taller than you sometimes. You may feel as if you were a witness of the scene.

It was the case in particular in Florence — the city with 70 museums — with frescoes by Filipino Lippi and Domenico Ghirlandaio, in Santa Maria Novella Church and the Church of Ognissanti, famous for the great Last Supper fresco, Ghirlandaio painted in 1488.

Santa Maria Delle Grazie (Milan)

It was the case also in Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan, a red brick church and monastery built in the 15th century where Leonardo da Vinci painted his Last Supper, Il Cenacolo, in the refectory of the monastery from 1495 to 1498.

Because it was a long-term work, Leonardo did not paint on wet plaster but on a dry wall. Strictly speaking, the painting is not a fresco then. It is a mural painting. Unfortunately, because of the method used, the work deteriorated quickly and its restoration has been a never-ending task.

If you want to see the painting, you must book in advance, and arrive on time. You will then be admitted among a small group of visitors (around 25 people), one group at a time, every 15 minutes. You must go through a double entrance door first, for sake of constant temperature and humidity. You wait there a few minutes, then you enter the refectory at last.

The Last Supper by Leonardo da Vinci (click on the picture for a larger scale)

Here it is, painted on the wall on the right side of the refectory. Awesome, huge — about nine meters wide — painted with a perspective that continues the walls of the refectory

The characters are approximately life-sized, a little taller. Although the work is damaged,you feel as if you were there, standing at about eight meters from the table. All 13 character are in front of you, on the same side of the table. Unlike Ghirlandaio and others, Leonardo did not paint Judas apart from his colleagues.

Jesus has just announced that one of those sitting at the table will betray him. The twelve apostles react with various degrees of shock, denial, and anger.

Jesus is in the middle of the painting. Precisely in the middle. In fact, a small hole in his right temple was used by Leonardo to help define the vanishing point of the whole perspective of the painting. Around him, on his right and left sides, the apostles are grouped in four groups of three, and each of the three figures in each group reacts its own way.

On the left side,  Bartholomew, James the Younger and Andrew appear stunned by Jesus’ declaration. They look at him with stupefaction. Andrew raises his hands before him in a gesture of horror and incredulity — yet an apostle can hardly be incredulous, can he ?

 

In the second group, a knife in hand, Peter is ready to punish the traitor. He leans towards John, the boyish, almost feminine apostle seated beside Jesus: "Ask the Master, John! Who is it?" He pushes Judas forward, who holds a purse with thirty pieces of silver inside.

On Jesus left-hand side, Thomas, James the Elder and Philip are assuring Jesus of their obedience. James the Elder expresses his indignation, and we can almost hear Philip protesting his loyalty: "You know me, Master, you know I did not do that".

The last group on the right is made up of Matthew, Jude Thaddeus and Simon. They are involved in an animated discussion, and don't look at Jesus. "One of us? How is it possible?" Matthews asks Simon, while Jude Thaddeus seems to be about to clap his hands in a "didn't I tell you?"

-:-:-:-:-:-

[BbN #13]

Note: You cannot fully appreciate such a masterpiece in less than 15 minutes. There's so little time, you must hurry, you can hardly have a look at every character. It is frustrating. If you ever go to Santa Maria delle Grazie and see The Last Supper by Leonardo, here is my advice then: book for it twice, half an hour apart. I will do that, the next time I go to Milan.

I thought I had something so simple to say. Something useful to everybody. A film that could help bury forever all those dead things we carry within ourselves. Instead, I'm the one without the courage to bury anything at all. When did I go wrong? I really have nothing to say, but I want to say it all the same. Guido, in 8½ by F. Fellini)

The movie depicts the crisis of a creative mind, the despondency of an artist who doesn't succeed in creating any more.

[BbN #8.5]

Guido, played by Marcello Mastroianni — and a transparent alter ego of Fellini himself — has lost inspiration. He is overwhelmed by an uncontrolled flood of dreams, fantasies, and hallucinations.
From this movie on, Federico Fellini took up a style of Realistic Fantasy, where extravagance is more real than reality, filled up with humanity, fantasizing and imagination.

Venus of Urbino by Titian (1538) Oil on canvas, 119 x 165 cm — Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence

I had known her for years, we had never meet though. About two years ago, I had hoped we would, at an exhibition dedicated to Tiziano Vecellio, aka Titian, held in the Palais du Luxembourg, the Museum of French Senate in Paris.

Portrait of a young woman (1536) Oil on canvas, 96 x 75 cm State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg

Yet, she stood me up. Well, as a matter of fact, she came, but she came on disguise, dressed as the young lady with an elegant feathered hat on the right side. I once wrote a blog about our quasi-meeting.

Because she was not allowed to travel to Paris, I had to go to Florence, the city where she has lived for about four centuries. I am just back from a five-day vacation trip there. As you can imagine, my eyes are still full of a lot of wonderful images: paintings, frescoes, statues, by Botticelli, Giotto, Lippi, Fra Angelico, Leonardo, Michelangelo, Donatello, and so forth, displayed in many places in the city. I am going to blog about them soon, yet on my first day in Florence the main thing was: I went to the Uffizi Gallery and I have met her at last!

Even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking in one element: its presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be." (Walter Benjamin)

In 'Little History of Photography' first, then in his famous essay The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction, Marxist philosopher Walter Benjamin used the word aura to describe the specificity of the work of art, which is unique, linked to a special place, and is part of history. According to him, and without going into details, mechanical reproduction of artworks by means of modern techniques such as photo and cinema frees them from place and ritual, and results in a loss of their aura. Although I don't agree with many developments of Benjamin's theories in terms of mass culture, I did feel Venus' aura in the Uffizi Gallery in a much deeper way than when I looked at her reproductions.

Thousands of pages have been written about this great painting. There have been endless commentaries and discussions about the meaning of Venus' open eyes that look directly at us, her left hand location, the bouquet in her right hand, the dog asleep at her feet, the two handmaidens in the background rummaging in what seems to be a wedding chest, the plant pot near a column on the window ledge, and many other details in the painting.

Sleeping Venus by Giorgione & Titian (1510) Oil on canvas, 108 x 175 cm — Gemäldegalerie, Dresden

I won't add to so many erudite works. To me, the Venus of Urbino is simply one among the most beautiful pieces of arts ever, as well as a big step towards modernity in painting. There is little doubt that Titian took the topic of the Venus of Urbino from a painting by Giorgione, the Sleeping Venus (also known as the Venus of Dresden), he himself finished after his friend and master died.

Venus  by Palma Vecchio (ca 1520) Oil on canvas, 113 x 186 cm — Gemäldegalerie, Dresden

Perhaps he knew also of the Venus by Palma Vecchio, where the nude woman, who lies in the country like in the canvas by Giorgione, gets the Venus of Urbino's wide open eyes.

Titian's Venus of Urbino in turn inspired countless painters over the centuries in one of major topics of Western Art: the reclining female nude. It includes such huge painters as Francisco de Goya and, especially, Édouard Manet when he painted Olympia, more than three hundred years later.

Venus by Lambert Sustris (1558) Oil on canvas, 116 x 186 cm — Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

Venus and Cupid by Johann Rottenhammer (ca 1610) Oil on canvas — Gemäldegalerie, Dresden

La maja desnuda by Francisco Goya (1805) Oil on canvas, 87 x 190 cm — Museo del Prado, Madrid

Olympia by Edgard Manet (1863) Oil on canvas, 130 x 190 cm — Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Gagnants/Perdants by Noir Désir

Noir Désir became famous in 2001 with their song 'Le vent nous portera'. Yet the band was disrupted after singer Bertrand Cantat was jailed for the manslaughter of his girlfriend, actress Marie Trintignant after a violent row in a Lithuanian hotel in July 2003. He was sentenced to eight years imprisonment, but left jail last year after he had served half the sentence.

"Noir Désir died the same day as Marie", Cantat once said. Yet the band does not appear to be that dead, since they released two new songs on the Internet last Thursday, that everyone can download for free.

Le vent nous portera (Noir Désir)

For several months, I did not listen to 'Le vent nous portera' because I could not help thinking this voice belonged to a man who once beat his wife to death. I still have mixed feelings about it: the song exists anyway, and it is a great song.

Giorgio de Chirico The Red Tower (1913) The Barnes Foundation

When I was in Philadelphia lately, I visited The Barnes Foundation, a fascinating place where hundreds (!) of chef-d'oeuvres are displayed. It owns a lot of Impressionist paintings especially. Also, many canvases by various painters who were not impressionists are exhibited, among which several pieces by Giorgio de Chirico.

I like many paintings by Chirico, in particular those he painted during his 'metaphysical' period. Yet the artist later joined the futurist movement 'Valori Plastici', then its 'Novecento' following, who both supported Mussolini's fascism. I sure dislike what were the ideas and behaviour of the individual. I still love many of his paintings anyway.

Another example: French writer Louis-Ferdinand Céline, also a doctor in medicine. His first novel, 'Journey to the End of the Night' (Voyage au bout de la nuit) is among my favourite books ever. 'Death on the Instalment Plan' (Mort à crédit) is another great novel by him. His medical thesis about Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis, who discovered the cause of puerperal fever and introduced hand washing in medicine, is at the same time a marvel of smartness and independence of mind, and splendid literature.

Yet Céline was a racist and anti-Semite, who shared many opinions with the Nazis. He wrote shameful pamphlets about the Jews before and during WWII. After the war, he was convicted a collaborator and imprisoned. I despise the man, I deeply admire several novels he wrote.

So... I still look at paintings by Chirico. I still read Céline. I still listen to music by Wagner. I may still listen to the songs by Bertrand Cantat also then. It does not mean I would shake the hand of the man, if it ever happened that I met him.

The tomb of Galileo Galilei by Giovanni Battista Foggini Basilica Santa Croce, Florence.

Henri-Marie Beyle, better known by his pen name, Stendhal, is the author of several famous novels, among which Le Rouge et le Noir (The Red and the Black) and La Chartreuse de Parme (The Charterhouse of Parma). He was also a lover of arts. In 1817,  aged 33, he had a long trip in Italy. He related afterwards, in his book "Rome, Naples et Florence", that he was quickly overwhelmed by the rich legacy of art and history of the country.

The day he visited the Basilica of Santa Croce in Florence, a monument that houses the tombs of Machiavelli, Michelangelo, and Galileo, and with famous frescoes by Giotto on the ceilings, he was overcome with emotion:

I was in a sort of ecstasy, from the idea of being in Florence, close to the great men whose tombs I had seen. Absorbed in the contemplation of sublime beauty, [...] I reached the point where one encounters celestial sensations. [...] I had palpitations of the heart [...] Life was drained from me. I walked with the fear of falling.

Stendhal wrote then the first description of what is now called Stendhal Syndrome, a psychosomatic phenomenon that may include dizziness, increased heart rate and palpitations, chest pain, sometimes loss of self-conscience, confusion or even hallucinations. Some people will get depressed, others will go from exaltation and feeling of omnipotence to panic attacks and fear of death.

About ten cases of the Stendhal syndrome are reported every year in Italy, among people who have gazed at works such as the David by Michelangelo or The Birth of Venus by Botticelli. It is not a specific 'Italian art disease' though: it can occur whenever people who have been eagerly expecting an emotion for a long time finally feel it, in the deepest way. It can happen in front of a special place, when you gaze at a painting or a landscape, or even when you look at the face of the beloved one, the day you have succeeded at last to have a date with her/him...  Look out then!

Portrait of a young woman (1536) Oil on canvas, 96 x 75 cm State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg

It is funny when you recognize somebody you 'know' in a painting.
I told previously how it happened to me in Oslo two years ago: I was amazed to recognize Edvard Munch's painting Madonna in the young woman portrayed in The day after.

I had the same experience at an exhibition called Titien, le pouvoir en face (Titian, power straight in the face) held last year in Paris at the Palais du Luxembourg, the museum of the French Senate. The portraits exhibited were essentially those of powerful men of the time, of which Titian was the official portraitist, such as several Doges of Venice, Dukes of Urbino, Kings of Spain Carlos V and Felipe II, King of France François I, and so forth.

A few portraits of women were also displayed though, among which I particularly loved the canvas displayed above. This young lady with an elegant feathered hat, who wears her coat on one shoulder in a very casual way, is showed before a dark background. Yet the whole picture is lightened by her brilliant skin and white shirt.

The Venus of Urbino (1538). Oil on canvas, 119 x 165 cm Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence

Watching at the portrait of this young woman, I progressively had a weird feeling, that I knew her in person. I realized it was almost the case indeed, a few minutes only after I left the exhibition: the woman portrayed here was also the sitter of the Venus of Urbino, one of the most famous paintings by Titian.

I'll probably write here some day about how Titian took the topic of the Venus of Urbino from a painting by Giorgione, the Sleeping Venus (also called the Venus of Dresde), that Titian finished after his master died in 1510, and how his painting in turn inspired Édouard Manet when he painted Olympia, more than three hundred years later.

In fact, I had just hoped to see this wonderful painting in the exhibition, but it was not there. Probably it does not leave the Galleria degli Uffizi in Florence more than the Mona Lisa ever leaves the Musée du Louvre in Paris...

Well, at least I saw the face of Venus on that day, if not her whole naked body.