Balthus has never particularly moved me. But that's neither here nor there as we're all moved by different imagery. Still, I completely support your opinions throughout the piece. Watching the world take shockingly illiberal turns is a daily adventure. (Btw, you write, "The artist, born in 1908, would have been 29 today." Wouldn't that be 116?)
While in grad school, many of my classmates, and I, considered Balthus one of the great 20th century painters. My opinion has not changed. He was idolized simply for his formidable work; my, have things changed. To the post-liberalists of the world, like Hannah Black, I say, no one is making you look at anything and who are you to dictate the destruction of a work of art?
Contemporaneity is certainly a fouled sluiceway. Stupidity, of course, is part of the problem, as it has been since the beginning of history, but that alone is not enough to explain the current scenario--which is not just mindless but profoundly perverse. The merely stupid are relatively innocent, since they really don't know better and may be incapable of doing so, but the perverse know all too well.
Balthus has never particularly moved me. But that's neither here nor there as we're all moved by different imagery. Still, I completely support your opinions throughout the piece. Watching the world take shockingly illiberal turns is a daily adventure. (Btw, you write, "The artist, born in 1908, would have been 29 today." Wouldn't that be 116?)
While in grad school, many of my classmates, and I, considered Balthus one of the great 20th century painters. My opinion has not changed. He was idolized simply for his formidable work; my, have things changed. To the post-liberalists of the world, like Hannah Black, I say, no one is making you look at anything and who are you to dictate the destruction of a work of art?
And Gregory Crewdson while I am at it.
Balthus, Piero, Puvis, Julie Blackmon. My VIP invite list for today’s birthday party.
Contemporaneity is certainly a fouled sluiceway. Stupidity, of course, is part of the problem, as it has been since the beginning of history, but that alone is not enough to explain the current scenario--which is not just mindless but profoundly perverse. The merely stupid are relatively innocent, since they really don't know better and may be incapable of doing so, but the perverse know all too well.