The hegemony of me

I just finished reading a wonderful novel by Antonio Tabucchi, who unfortunately recently passed away, called (I think in English) "Pereira Pretends."  It's a story about an overweight middle-aged journalist in Lisbon in August 1938. Within the span of a month, this man undergoes a change.  Tabucchi cites a theory called "the confederation of souls" in the novel. This is basically the idea that each of our personalities is composed of multiple souls and these souls are governed by a "hegemony of me." Anyhow, this domination changes over time or when faced with an attack by another "hegemony" and when that occurs, one can only accept it.  I thought that the theory was a very apt idea for my life as I have lived through at least two changes of hegemonies--from art student, to medical student, to doctor, now to full-time artist . . .

The construction at the studio is done and I was able to set-up my work in there again this past week.  It took several trips and several days to get everything ready and to move my supplies back there, but I finally started working there again.  I've been painting so much on the small table here in the kitchen that I have gotten quite used to it.  I think I am going to keep working here in the kitchen on my small pieces.  There is fantastic north light here and even though the space is small, for the rather small pieces I have been working on, it is a nice and cozy place to work.

The trees in the city are in full lime green fresh Spring bloom right now.  It all happened over the past few days.  Overnight it seems, we went from gray to a touch of green and now there is an abundance of it.  The canopy of trimmed chestnut trees that are at the Luxembourg Gardens is light and gentle right now and it is soothing to have the leaves overhead.  Winter can be so harsh.

Easter week brought a great crowd to the Louvre.  There were hoards of people.  Luckily, for the things I go there for, there were very few. Poussin is not a favorite of the tourist crowds as he is hidden up away in the French painters of the 17th century (the Richelieu and Sully wings), far away from the large galleries of Italian Renaissance painters (the Denon wing).  I am thankful for that.  Anyhow, on Friday, I looked up at a painting that I don't usually spend a lot of time with, as it is placed high and the lighting is rather poor.  But I was swept away in it on Friday:

It is Jesus healing the blind at Jericho.  It is not easy to get beyond the narrative of the story, but Poussin has played with light and shadow to convey the story of vision.  Jesus, the center, is bathed in light and faces the light.  The blind suppliants are kneeling and their faces, thus their vision, are in the shadows.  To the left of Jesus, his three disciples have robes in the primary colors of the visual spectrum (in paints)--blue, red and yellow (of course, in optics, the blue would be replaced by green).  The extended right arm of Jesus crosses over from the right-side of the canvas (the side of light) into the left side, which is bathed in shadow.  And of course, the two kneeling blind beggars also have their arms outstretched in supplication . . . moving our eyes to the right.  It is funny how the three disciples seem to be separate and turned-in within themselves.  

This piece is placed on top of another famous painting of Poussin, which is why I didn't until now give its upstairs neighbor much of my attention until now:

It is the story of Orpheus and Euridice.  There is a similar dialectic of light and shadow in this piece.  Orpheus is on the right, playing his lyre, and Euridice is to the left, in the center foreground, frightened and turning away from the viper, to which her heel is exposed.  Here light is a metaphor of life and death. Orpheus sings and his face is bathed in the light of life, where Euridice, with her face half-turned, is passing from light to shadow, foreshadowing her death.  The two sides of the foreground are dramatically lit as well--the left is a grove of trees and a small rock formation, all thrown into dark shadows.  This shadow dramatically throws its shade over the legs and feet of Orpheus and prefigures his journey down into Hades.  The beautiful (is it a chestnut tree?) on the right is bathed in light. It will be hard for you to see it but in the mid-ground, right on top of Orpheus' head, behind the water of the lake, there is a group of men and boys swimming, resting, undressing to swim.  To their left, there are men working, they are pulling a boat up the water with a rope.  The juxtaposition of work and play is interesting.  And in front of them, on the shore of the foreground, there is a young man fishing, the only person in the painting that is a witness of the fatal viper bite that will kill Euridice (is he working or is he playing?).  The background of the painting is an amazing juxtaposition of human endeavor vs. nature.  On the left, there is a large city, with towering plumes of smoke rising up to the sky.  And on the right, there is a large pyramidal Olympian mountain rising up to the dark smoke and clouds above.  This circular dance of light and shadow between the background and foreground is like the inevitable cycle of life and death.  The genius of this piece perhaps beyond all the wonderful erudition and play, is that one's vision travels in the painting, in a sort of contemplation of civilization, its place in nature, the ephemeral nature of all endeavors.

The construction of the light and shadow of Jesus healing of the blind in Jericho is similar.  And the travel from shadow to light is the reverse  of the journey that Orpheus will have to take.  I can see why the curators wanted to place one painting on top of the other.  They both use the contrast of light and shadow as metaphors and as narrative tools.  

Paris, April 8, 2012