Van Gogh's Drawings
J1 and I spent the afternoon in a variety of fun outings (Indian food for lunch, seeing the Wallace and Gromit movie, going to the Met, and having dinner). I'm not sure what was my favorite, and since you all probably don't want to hear me ramble about the food I ate, I'll avoid detailed restaurant reviews. I will say one thing: check out Celeste (Amsterdam above 84th) for good Italian food, good atmosphere, and reasonable prices.
The Wallace and Gromit movie is excellent as well, although possibly eclipsed by the short film featuring the penguins from Madagascar which runs directly before W&G. You know, I think penguins are pretty much a sure-fire way to make a good movie. It's like adding a cheerleader to a football game. You just cannot lose, from Billy Madison to March of the Penguins to Madagascar.
But the whole point of this post, as you might have guessed from the title, was to talk about the new Van Gogh exhibition at the Met, featuring his drawings. These drawings make up a majority of his early work, and a fair amount of his later work. He strongly believed that in order to paint effectively, he needed good drawing skills. A fairly logical assumption, I suppose.
It was interesting to see the evolution of his work. He started with very simple one point and two point perspective drawings. Kind of like what I did in eighth grade art class where I drew a line for the horizon and made a point in the center. All lines converged (or would have converged) at that point. Of course, the main difference between my work and his was that his, even at the earliest stages, was that his was beautiful, brilliant, incredibly artistic, and conveyed so much emotion, rather than looking like ugly **** drawn with a ruler. But other than that, it was identical. (Just for the non-sarcasm-detecting people in the audience, I'm joking here. I was just proud that I knew what one-point and two-point perspective were and could identify it in his drawings.)
My larger point is that from these basic beginnings, he went so far. His later drawings have such an incredible sense of perspective. He had an incredible talent for using simple pen-strokes to give such a sense of depth. Not to mention emotion. The degree to which he was able to convey his feelings with simple black and white was really great.
I bought a postcard of one of my favorite drawings, of fields in France.
They also had some of Van Gogh's paintings on display, which I prefer to the line drawings. While he was able to communicate so much through his drawings, when he took the same skills and added the color and depth of paint, the results were incredible.
If you get a chance to stop by the Met to see the exhibit, I would highly recommend it. Remember, if you're a Columbia student, you get in free. Even if you're not, the posted admission prices are technically just "suggestions" -- you can donate whatever you feel you can afford.
And one more picture -- this is Van Gogh's Starry Night (one of my favorites of his), from last week's visit to the MoMA:
The Wallace and Gromit movie is excellent as well, although possibly eclipsed by the short film featuring the penguins from Madagascar which runs directly before W&G. You know, I think penguins are pretty much a sure-fire way to make a good movie. It's like adding a cheerleader to a football game. You just cannot lose, from Billy Madison to March of the Penguins to Madagascar.
But the whole point of this post, as you might have guessed from the title, was to talk about the new Van Gogh exhibition at the Met, featuring his drawings. These drawings make up a majority of his early work, and a fair amount of his later work. He strongly believed that in order to paint effectively, he needed good drawing skills. A fairly logical assumption, I suppose.
It was interesting to see the evolution of his work. He started with very simple one point and two point perspective drawings. Kind of like what I did in eighth grade art class where I drew a line for the horizon and made a point in the center. All lines converged (or would have converged) at that point. Of course, the main difference between my work and his was that his, even at the earliest stages, was that his was beautiful, brilliant, incredibly artistic, and conveyed so much emotion, rather than looking like ugly **** drawn with a ruler. But other than that, it was identical. (Just for the non-sarcasm-detecting people in the audience, I'm joking here. I was just proud that I knew what one-point and two-point perspective were and could identify it in his drawings.)
My larger point is that from these basic beginnings, he went so far. His later drawings have such an incredible sense of perspective. He had an incredible talent for using simple pen-strokes to give such a sense of depth. Not to mention emotion. The degree to which he was able to convey his feelings with simple black and white was really great.
I bought a postcard of one of my favorite drawings, of fields in France.
They also had some of Van Gogh's paintings on display, which I prefer to the line drawings. While he was able to communicate so much through his drawings, when he took the same skills and added the color and depth of paint, the results were incredible.
If you get a chance to stop by the Met to see the exhibit, I would highly recommend it. Remember, if you're a Columbia student, you get in free. Even if you're not, the posted admission prices are technically just "suggestions" -- you can donate whatever you feel you can afford.
And one more picture -- this is Van Gogh's Starry Night (one of my favorites of his), from last week's visit to the MoMA:
posted by N at 11:36 PM
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