Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Politics distorting art...

...Postmodern Cézanne
Painting is rendered invisible in the glow of so much effulgence. Cézanne represents no seismic break with the past. Far from being isolated, he was intricately tied to the prevailing artistic currents of the 19th century. The hackneyed assertion that Cézanne made us see differently is a pious fiction. We see as our species has always seen; so did Cézanne. His optic nerves worked the same as those of prehistoric draftsmen in Lascaux. Just as yours and mine do. What distinguishes Cézanne is what he did with what he saw—in tandem with what he knew about chromatic dances of color, one touch against another. His discernment was the gleaning of a long, luminous pedigree that stretches past his beloved Delacroix, back to the persistently inventive Constable.

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