Courbet and After Courbet

Here's an opportunity for us to take a look at John de Andrea, the creator of this week's piece here at Fifty Two Pieces. We've entered his studio as he gazes at the mold of his model's face. The model looks down at de Andrea. Much like Dying Gaul, neither figures looks the viewer in the eye. We are there, but not. We're free to examine these two people and their relationship for long as we wish, unbeknownst to them. De Andrea is a master of creating the realism of the human body. Both he and fellow sculptor, Duane Hanson, are discussed in the video below.

Man Cannot Live on Bread Alone

"Just as a man's soul creates his body, in the same way if a man paints a portrait it will always look like himself, the painter, as well as the sitter." Leonardo da Vinci

It wasn't his diet, nope. He's in better shape than probably ninety percent of his viewers. No doubt, he's based on an idealized representation, but he makes us look out of proportion doesn't he? A recent Michael Pollen investigation of our diet, The Omnivore's Dilemma, claims one of the most important yet unnoticed (there is little unnoticed in the Dying Gaul) changes to the human diet in modern times is the ratio of Omega-6 to Omega-3, the essential fats. These two are found in seeds (omega-6) and leaves (omega-3). It's the ratio here that matters (oh that glorious ratio) because it's not how much of either one you get, but that you get them in proportion (1 to 1). Omega 6 clots blood,omega 3 makes it flow. We've eliminated omega-3 as we've gone from a diet of animals fed on grass to one of animals fed on grain (corn really, as in King Corn, the documentary based on the book.) Including fish, farm raised and fed on grain. By doing so we've switched our omegas and are way overloaded with Omega 6, the clotter. We didn't know how important that shift would be until the 1970's, with clearer understanding, but it was oh so late. It's a contributing factor to obesity, heart disease and all kinds of behavioral disorders in children. Do you want to have a body like the dying Gaul? I do, only I don't think plastic surgery is for me. Here's my short term solution, forty days without meat, fish too. Normally I wouldn't include fish as a meat but now I know that it's better to eat grass fed beef than farm raised fish and the whole concept throws me. So, I'm going without, and I'll to try not to live on cheese alone.

The Roman Dying Gaul

In answer to the question, what does the Roman sculpture of the Dying Gaul look like, I've decided to post this photo of the Dying Gaul at the Capitoline Museum in Rome. Much like the Portland Art Museum's Dying Gaul, he is resting, leaning on his one arm. But here, his sword lies behind him and his horn is broken in two. 

Here's a video from the internet showing the Dying Gaul in Rome...

And last but not least, the Slater Memorial Museum in Norwich CT loaned their plaster cast of the Roman Dying Gaul to the Getty for the show early last mentioned in the January 1 post below, our inaugural post. Spending so much time thinking and reading about the Dying Gaul, I discovered that the sculpture at the Capitoline Museum was not found until the 17th century during excavations for the construction of Ludovisi Palace. From that time forward it has been both celebrated and used for copies as well as in drawings engravings and paintings. 

The Greek View of the Body

I've just read Elizabeth Costello by J.M.Coetzee. The first and last thing I read of his was Disgrace. This novel feels like retribution. If he was to embody whom he might most have offended in his tormented Disgrace, she might look like Elizabeth Costello. Coetzee brings her to life through a set of eight lectures and conversations. It is Elizabeth's argument with her sister Blanche, the nun, which comes to mind as I examine my feelings about the Dying Gaul.

Elizabeth questions Blanche's life of bowing to writhing Christ on a cross, in agony, when it seems to her that at one time Christ was vibrantly alive, why not worship him in that state? Blanche's reaction is to see it as perverse to envision the one who died for our sins in any other way. It was his act of suffering that we relate to, as suffering beings, she says. This is what we need. Blanche claims Elizabeth, and all humanities scholars, are tainted by the Greek custom of worshipping pure form and marble statue.

In a letter Elizabeth sends to Blanche she says:

"In all our talk about humanism and the humanities there was a word we both skirted: humanity. When Mary, blessed among women smiles her remote angelic smile and tips her sweet pink nipple up before our gaze, when I, imitating her, uncover my breast for old Mr. Philips, we perform acts of humanity. Acts like that are not available to animals, who cannot uncover themselves because they do not cover themselves. Nothing compels us to do it, Mary or me. But out of the overflow, the outflow of our human hearts we do it never the less: drop our robes, reveal ourselves, reveal the life and beauty we are blessed with. Beauty. The humanities teach us humanity. After the centuries long Christian night, the humanities give us back our beauty, our human beauty. That was what you forgot to say. That is what the Greeks teach us, Blanche." This snippet of Coetzee sums it up. The Dying Gaul is the breathing beautiful body and still he suffers, it is a fine middle ground, deserving of reverence from both sisters.

 

 

 

 

                          

Seeking Serenity

To me you're not dying; you're very much alive. Sometimes I can feel you breathe. You never look up though, always so deep in thought. What is life all about? How do we know which way is right? Is there a right? Or is it important to just act? So many questions as I look at you. And then I hear Alison Luterman's poem, I Confess. I first read this poem on the wall of #15 bus. It remains in my memory a perfect moment.

I Confess

by Alison Luterman

I stalked her in the grocery store:

her crown of snowy braids held in place by a great silver clip,

her erect bearing, radiating tenderness,

the way she placed yogurt and avocados in her basket,

beaming peace like the North Star.

I wanted to ask, "What aisle did you find your serenity in, 

do you know how to be married for 50 years or how to live alone,

excuse me for interrupting, but you seem to possess

some knowledge that makes the earth burn and turn on its axis"

but we don't request such things from strangers nowadays.

So I said, "I love your hair."

More Than Now

Last night I dreamed my dad was shrinking. He warned me this was going to happen, but the next thing I knew he was shorter than me with white hair and thin old man scabs, round on his forehead, like moles, but red and crusty. He actually stands over six feet tall and moves like a bear. In my dream he comes up to my chest, his body feels like sticks in a bag. I cry to him “No this can’t be, you can’t be this tiny, this…remnant, you just can’t be…dying.”
When I woke up I called my brother. When he was seven he fell from a neighbor’s roof and broke both his arms. Today the home owner’s insurance policy will pay him over $12,000, it’s his 25th birthday. I tell him on the phone that though he two-cast stumbled as a tike, now it was all paying off. He laughed “I’ll probably still get arthritis in my arms.”
I said “we have to go visit dad.” It’s a seven hour drive over the barren hills of eastern Washington. I’d rather go during harvest, when the loaded semi trucks with ears of corn, bins of apples and bright orange pumpkins pass. But it can’t wait. We have to go now.
I also dreamed in shades of my sister. Her hair was hip length red ropes like she wore when we were kids. She was walking in autumn, golden leaves flew around her feet. She was wearing sunflower print. A yellow rope hung from the trees, she rode the rope down like a pirate.
What is interesting about dreaming my dad two decades from now and my middle aged sister as a ten year old is how, in my subconscious, time moves in both directions. The Dying Gaul is like that, a modern take on a 2000 year old Greek Sculpture. In it is the future of every boy and the past of every old man. But when you're there with him, it is present-time. Blue veins course, soft flesh of toes grow cold in the museum’s quiet evenings, as we would, if we were nude. It is so real it is now, as my father’s future and my sister’s past is now, as my brother’s broken arms are part of his past and will be part of his future, the Dying Gaul is, was, and always will be.

Dying Gaul

What a year! Sometimes I wonder how I cope from day to day. The giggles and titters from children are one thing. You grow to expect that. But some of the comments from the adults. I'll just say they should know better. At least, now people who come up to me have an explanation of who I am, not just Dying Gaul, John de Andrea 1984. People can read that I'm a polyvinyl sculpture based on a Roman copy in marble of a Greek warrior. That's a mouthful. What I like most about where I've been placed is that more people come by to see me than when I was over in the other building. Museums can be lonely places. Now, everyone who comes to see the special exhibitions has to walk right past me.

Quite a few visitors do come over. Some to ogle, some to admire my suntan (how does that happen when I'm inside all the time). I remember one woman who stood next to me for what seemed like hours, time does go by slowly here. She told me how much I reminded her of a man she used to know. One of the security officers came up to her and asked if there was anything else in the museum he could help her find. Her response was short and to the point. "No, I'm quite happy right here." At least she didn't touch me. Believe me, I'm grateful when the security officers remind people about the hands off policy in art museums.

My big event this year was a trip to Southern California. I know, I know, some of the other pieces here at the museum go to the East Coast and some have even gone to Europe, but being featured in an exhibition at the Getty, now that was something. I was one of 43 painted statues from five millennia. It was amazing to be with works created by El Greco and Paul Gauguin. So, I guess I can't complain. Life is good. I have a roof over my head and a warm room. Drop by and see me. Maybe I should say, come up and see me since you have to come up the stairs after you've been welcomed at the main entrance.