Hi from Fogland Road, which I believe you know well. (Yes the wind still howls, and the potatoes still grow.) I thoroughly enjoyed reading (and rereading) this essay.
This stuck out to me:
“a quietly insistent pulse of energy and chroma through which each of its riot of elements vibrates out to the viewer with light and life..”
Well, first, congratulations for putting it so succinctly. That pulls together the best explanation i could come up with for painting (smears of colored grease on rags.) Your words struck me all the more because I have been thinking a lot about the vibration in painting of marks -here there/in out- that remind me of locating a wave/particle.
I’m glad you wrote about experiencing Bonnard. I can’t wait to see one again. -Peter
Great to have a shoutout from the old Tiverton hood, Peter! I was there in RI for a spell last fall and did my annual pilgrimage to Four Corners to have a peek at the old place there on Neck Road and make a stop at Fogland. Vis seeing Bonnard: I went on the MoMA website when I was writing this piece last week and learned that The Breakfast Room is not currently on display. It may be that it was taken down to travel to Texas for that show, so it may still be on the road. Don’t know if Boston MFA has any, but I’d imagine that they do. They are always worth hunting up!
I wish I had gone all the way to Texas to see that show. I remember a big show at the Philips many years ago, but this looked far grander. Yes, Bonnard is very difficult. I had a book of his aphorisms once; taken from his notebooks. A quote: "It's all very well to paint yourself a dada (Fr. slang for hobbyhorse) but don't mistake it for a Pegasus". Another story about someone who complained about the way a patterned floor seemed to be pasted between the woman's legs: "Sometimes a mistake is the making of a picture". Another, "brush in one hand, rag in the other". Some of the so- called avant garde painters of the twenties dismissed Bonnard as a butterfly of impressionism. Well, nobody looks at those avant garde painters now. They look tired and predictable. Bonnard is always new. Always intensely inventive. Who else can paint the shadow of a fruit black and make it work? A personal story: I was visiting the graduate school at BU once and was speaking to James Weeks. He asked about my painting. I said I was very influenced by Bonnard. He paused thoughtfully and then said, "That can be either very good or very bad." Bonnard has swamped many, many painters.
CB, love what you’re writing. Bonnard spent a lot of time working on his paintings. Many layers of scattered opaque colors smudges, color notes all electric and buzzy— making light animate. A joy and wonder to experience. Thank you for the reminder of his genius.
Thanks John! Finally getting back in the studio after a long hiatus, and all these questions about what a painting is and how we build its components up through the process are right up in the forefront of my mind. You seem to me to have a great handle on this stuff and it’s always been one of the things I admire in your work – that always apparently questioning deliberation that goes into each mark as you put them together into a harmonious whole.
I so enjoyed this post, Christopher! John and I saw some terrific Bonnard's at the Musé d'orsay a couple of years ago, and then again at the NCMA when they brought the Philips Collection here. I love what you said about Bonnard "defying the gravity of prose" while also managing to anchor something essential about his works in our imagination. Thank you!
I have a very similar feeling about museums as sanctuaries. I once referred to, well still do, the Antonio Lopez Garcia Rizzoli monograph as the bible.
I also casually dismissed Bonnard early on. I didn't dislike his work, I just couldn't see it. I enjoyed looking at his paintings, but never thought they were all that great. Then in the early 2000's I finally "saw" Bonnard at the Philips Collection in DC. In its quaint rooms with no one around, The Open Window was glowing with light. Bonnard is magic.
Yeah, that thing where we suddenly “see” the work is fascinating, isn’t it? That’s really what I’m talking about when I use the awakening analogy to Satori or Moksha, because it isn’t anything you can construct intellectually. However much it happens internally, it comes at us from without and it happens on its own time!
In around 1985/6 I met a older woman who was painter that took me under wing to encourage me, I didn’t end up being a painter, but I did learn about Bonnard from her. I had a girlfriend who bought the catalog monograph from a big show of late Bonnard paintings and I took it over to the painters studio to show it off, she looked at it with me picture by picture and pointed out that Bonnard is structurally rigorous, but the compositions assemble themselves as you look.
A few years later I was working as a carpenter/ project manager on my uncle’s house being remodeled in DuPont Circle in DC about 10 minutes walk from the Phillips collection. I stayed in DC for two years and visted the PC and the museums on the mall several times a month to look at painting. I watched the bonnards assemble at front of me.
Such a phenomenon, Bonnards are situations made with some paint. And the situations unfold. How can you even explain it?
Hi from Fogland Road, which I believe you know well. (Yes the wind still howls, and the potatoes still grow.) I thoroughly enjoyed reading (and rereading) this essay.
This stuck out to me:
“a quietly insistent pulse of energy and chroma through which each of its riot of elements vibrates out to the viewer with light and life..”
Well, first, congratulations for putting it so succinctly. That pulls together the best explanation i could come up with for painting (smears of colored grease on rags.) Your words struck me all the more because I have been thinking a lot about the vibration in painting of marks -here there/in out- that remind me of locating a wave/particle.
I’m glad you wrote about experiencing Bonnard. I can’t wait to see one again. -Peter
Great to have a shoutout from the old Tiverton hood, Peter! I was there in RI for a spell last fall and did my annual pilgrimage to Four Corners to have a peek at the old place there on Neck Road and make a stop at Fogland. Vis seeing Bonnard: I went on the MoMA website when I was writing this piece last week and learned that The Breakfast Room is not currently on display. It may be that it was taken down to travel to Texas for that show, so it may still be on the road. Don’t know if Boston MFA has any, but I’d imagine that they do. They are always worth hunting up!
Will look into it, and I do have an nyc trip coming early March. I trust you collected some visual material in your brain of the RI motif!
I wish I had gone all the way to Texas to see that show. I remember a big show at the Philips many years ago, but this looked far grander. Yes, Bonnard is very difficult. I had a book of his aphorisms once; taken from his notebooks. A quote: "It's all very well to paint yourself a dada (Fr. slang for hobbyhorse) but don't mistake it for a Pegasus". Another story about someone who complained about the way a patterned floor seemed to be pasted between the woman's legs: "Sometimes a mistake is the making of a picture". Another, "brush in one hand, rag in the other". Some of the so- called avant garde painters of the twenties dismissed Bonnard as a butterfly of impressionism. Well, nobody looks at those avant garde painters now. They look tired and predictable. Bonnard is always new. Always intensely inventive. Who else can paint the shadow of a fruit black and make it work? A personal story: I was visiting the graduate school at BU once and was speaking to James Weeks. He asked about my painting. I said I was very influenced by Bonnard. He paused thoughtfully and then said, "That can be either very good or very bad." Bonnard has swamped many, many painters.
Love the brush and rag quote!
Stresses the importance of museums and experiencing work in the flesh.
CB, love what you’re writing. Bonnard spent a lot of time working on his paintings. Many layers of scattered opaque colors smudges, color notes all electric and buzzy— making light animate. A joy and wonder to experience. Thank you for the reminder of his genius.
Thanks John! Finally getting back in the studio after a long hiatus, and all these questions about what a painting is and how we build its components up through the process are right up in the forefront of my mind. You seem to me to have a great handle on this stuff and it’s always been one of the things I admire in your work – that always apparently questioning deliberation that goes into each mark as you put them together into a harmonious whole.
I so enjoyed this post, Christopher! John and I saw some terrific Bonnard's at the Musé d'orsay a couple of years ago, and then again at the NCMA when they brought the Philips Collection here. I love what you said about Bonnard "defying the gravity of prose" while also managing to anchor something essential about his works in our imagination. Thank you!
Thanks Tori!
I have a very similar feeling about museums as sanctuaries. I once referred to, well still do, the Antonio Lopez Garcia Rizzoli monograph as the bible.
I also casually dismissed Bonnard early on. I didn't dislike his work, I just couldn't see it. I enjoyed looking at his paintings, but never thought they were all that great. Then in the early 2000's I finally "saw" Bonnard at the Philips Collection in DC. In its quaint rooms with no one around, The Open Window was glowing with light. Bonnard is magic.
Yeah, that thing where we suddenly “see” the work is fascinating, isn’t it? That’s really what I’m talking about when I use the awakening analogy to Satori or Moksha, because it isn’t anything you can construct intellectually. However much it happens internally, it comes at us from without and it happens on its own time!
In around 1985/6 I met a older woman who was painter that took me under wing to encourage me, I didn’t end up being a painter, but I did learn about Bonnard from her. I had a girlfriend who bought the catalog monograph from a big show of late Bonnard paintings and I took it over to the painters studio to show it off, she looked at it with me picture by picture and pointed out that Bonnard is structurally rigorous, but the compositions assemble themselves as you look.
A few years later I was working as a carpenter/ project manager on my uncle’s house being remodeled in DuPont Circle in DC about 10 minutes walk from the Phillips collection. I stayed in DC for two years and visted the PC and the museums on the mall several times a month to look at painting. I watched the bonnards assemble at front of me.
Such a phenomenon, Bonnards are situations made with some paint. And the situations unfold. How can you even explain it?
exactly
I had a similar experience with that Bonnard breakfast room painting when I was in NY visiting for the first time!
It's a magical picture!