Monet in Chelsea

Darlings, run don't walk to the show up now at the Gagosian Gallery at 522 West 21st Street on the late work of Claude Monet. It's there until June 26th and it's a beautiful thing. A year ago Mr. Gagosian mounted a show on the late work of Pablo Picasso. Hats off to the gallerist for bringing these shows to the public, free of charge.

Off course you know that French Impressionist Claude Monet (1840-1926) created some of the most poetic and idyllic paintings in Western culture. This show focuses on the end of his career when he was enjoying some prosperity, and had bought the house and gardens in Giverny which would inspire and comfort him. He turned his attention to the gardens and the water gardens for subjects, and created his meditative, transporting water lily paintings. You may remember when Jane and I visited his famous Water Lily series at the Museum of Modern Art.

At the Gagosian, the paintings are hung in four rooms. The gallery has very high ceilings and openings of light that imitate sky lights. It's like being in a very modern church.
(Images from Gagosian web site)

My favorite paintings were light and sunny. Green, blue, pink and olive green swirl together suggesting reflection and water depth in this painting from 1907.

This take from 1908 was more greenish, suggesting a bright day.


One painting of water lilies from 1916-1919 featured pink lilies that looked like fat roses floating on light green leaves in a pond of light blue water. Dark green tendrils of weeping willows hung down the sides. What a vision. Claude Monet once said, "I perhaps owe becoming a painter to flowers."

I have long been drawn to the work of Claude Monet. When I first arrived at college at McGill University and even before I became an art history major I bought myself in the college bookstore a poster of this painting by Monet.

It's titled The Regatta at Argenteuill from 1872. I loved it's buoyant, cheerful colors. The brushstroke streaks of pink and orange reflection in the water just made me happy.
Monet famously lived a life of great style at his house in Giverny which I have wanted to visit. I have some books about his art of living including Monet's House which covers how the house was decorated

and Monet's Table which includes recipes, for he and his wife were renowned entertainers.

The house at Giverny included a big studio where Monet painted. Here is the old man now.

I like the wicker furniture, the polished wood floor and the paintings hung high up on the walls. Isn't it fun to think of Monet painting here some of the works now on display at the Gagosian Gallery.

Picasso in Chelsea

Gagosian Gallery
I went to see the Picasso show now up at the Gagosian Gallery. Wow. What a treat.

The show was curated by John Richardson, the Picasso biographer and Vanity Fair writer, and it features 50 paintings and 49 prints from the last decade of Picasso's life, from 1962 to 1972; Picasso died at 91 in 1973. So this is the work of an artist in his eighties. You might think that paintings by an artist towards the end of his life would be dark and gloomy and morose as he contemplated the great unknown but this work is the opposite of that. I personally am not a huge fan of all of Picasso's paintings; some of them are a little pointy and sharp and almost violent for me, but these paintings are colorful and round and full of great joy. I really was astonished.

The show is called Mosqueteros, or Musketeers, because it includes paintings of matadors and circus performers and entertaining characters like that.

Buste
The colors are light and bright -- pale green, yellow, beige, not tones that I associate with Picasso. Thick brush strokes celebrate the glorious qualities of paint.

Femme
There is a happy sense of playfulness. Here is a woman teasing a cat. The cat looks like it was rendered in about eight brush strokes -- quick, light, fun.

Femme Nue Couchee Jouant avec un Chat
There also is a short movie to watch of Picasso in his studio. He is wearing a yellow v-neck sweater, red pants and a brown and white scarf at the neck. (I had a yellow v-neck sweater like that once from Brooks Brothers -- it was a gift from my friend Abby. I wonder if they still make them.) You get the sense with the paintings and the movie that the artist is really enjoying himself and revelling in his mastery. Picasso was creating these pleasures up until he died; what a great way to go out. This show is at Gagosian until June 6th, and it's on 21st Street so don't go the 24th Street Gagosian Gallery like I did. And of course its free. Only a few of the works are for sale so this show is a labor of love for the gallerist. Thank you Larry Gagosian!