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AS I MENTIONED in the last post, one painting in particular jumped out at me when I was last at the Institute. A little lie. Another one did too, but not as boldly. They're totally different from each other, though stylistically Chagall's White Crucifixion follows the trajectory of this one.
Picasso's Portrait of Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler (1910) was the first to grab my attention. Kahnweiler was an important person in Picasso's life, not least because as an art dealer (he's also an under-appreciated art historian) he championed Pablo's new, 'radical' style (Cubism) and thus worked tirelessly to promote his and other's (almost always those who had no audience or collectors) works in his gallery in Montparnasse.
AS I LEARN MY WAY around Chicagoland, one spot has become a semi-regular stop—the Art Institute of Chicago.
The last time I was there, one painting in particular jumped out at me—Chagall's White Crucifixion (1938). There's a couple of elements in this painting that have kept me thinking about it:
The first is the juxtaposition of the central figure—Jesus on the cross—with the surrounding images of Jewish oppression (from all over: Nazi Germany, Lithuania, and communists in Russia). Jesus the suffering Jew is thus shown to be in solidarity with the suffering Jews of history.
8:35 AM
