Artwala Road

We sent out the announcement for Le Salon des Refusés II last week to both the artists and the public. It will be held at the Arsenal Center for the Arts in Watertown, MA this Sunday, the 20th, to show the work of artists rejected from the Members Show last November. We artists are always vulnerable to criticism and it seemed like all who entered a show like this ought to be honored in some way—hence this alternate show. The good news is that the Center made a decision that a members show ought to include one piece from every artist who enters. I’m truly happy with that decision. Now we can celebrate the journey of making art. It’s all good.

The first Salon des Refusés was in 1863 in Paris. When the great French painter Edouard Manet was rejected from the annual Paris Salon exhibition of ‘official’ painting he took his entry, ‘Le Déjeuner sur L’herbes,’ and created another venue. His painting sparked both an artistic and a cultural revolution. It was radical then to show a picnic in the woods with the women unclothed. It was also radical to make a painting that appeared unfinished, one of the nudes just sketched as if the painter were imagining a possibility rather than painting a reality—which is just as it was. French society at that time was rigid with conformity and propriety, denying all sensual and erotic expression. It would still be odd to happen upon such a picnic.

It’s curious that even now Manet is radical. His painting ‘Olympia’ is actually of a naked woman, a prostitute, in fact, in the setting of an affluent Parisian home of the time complete with servant. It was painted like an official portrait of a wealthy woman but without the clothes. Cheeky. But it’s more cheeky still that Olympia is entirely self-satisfied and looks out at us with an air of utter confidence in who she is. I don’t think Manet was painting the reality of the prostitute’s life or even trying to suggest that. But I think he was trying to honor who she truly was as a person, her sensuality and seductiveness even her cheek, and accept her without judgment. That remains a truly radical perspective.

I made a pilgrimage to the Musée D’Orsay in Paris some years ago with my son who was fourteen to see that painting. We wandered around and around and couldn’t find it. I was going to give up but Nick insisted we find it. So glad he did. It’s radiates good energy.

Which brings me back to our Salon. There will be no Olympias, I’m sure, but who knows what lurks! I’m approaching our Salon and my own work in it with the same radical acceptance Manet brought to Olympia. We’ll toast Manet—and each other.

Should be a fun party even though at this point we have no idea how many people will come!

On Saturday the Saturday morning drawing class begins again….

January 16th, 2008 | Category: Dear Reader | Subscribe to comments | Leave a comment | Trackback URL