Actually an Artist

I have so many favorite artists. That includes musicians, playwrights, authors, and actors. But also crafters, particularly sewists and knitters (my two favorite crafts), who are pushing the limits of practical object decoration and construction. Everything is art if we view the process as art. That’s my hill to dye on ;-). Don’t hate me.

Anyway, back to the question. I love, love LOVE Dali. And the other surrealists. And following them, the magical realists. I love the books of Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Isabella Allende. And Paolo Coehlo. And surrealist music? Fun times. Erik Satie is fun. His Vexations is just a 20th century version of La Folia, which I ironically enjoy to the fullest.

Which brings me to baroque art. Love beyond a love. And earlier stuff, especially organ music. I shared it recently and I’ll shamelessly share this song again because the organ is divine and I love my playing (a rarity, sadly), AND the song is so emblematic of what I love from the 1600-1800s.

When I studied abroad in Paris, Fall 2008, I took a 19th century art history class that was half in museums. Best decision I ever made, ever. Ugh, I jealous-hate my past self it was so amazing. Louvre, Musée d’Orsay, and many other smaller museums in and around Paris. I had such an adventure. Obviously, I studied a lot of Jacques-Louis David, whose work at the Cleveland Museum of Art made a big impression on my kid this past summer when we visited-it’s the one with Eros and Psyche there on the left.

From that time period, I enjoy the music, but there’s not a lot I really really love. I love the 20th century organ composer, Duruflé, who French organists argue is basically an impressionist, even though he lived a century later than Debussy and Ravel. I play (but have not yet recorded) the Prélude et Fugue sur le nom d’Alain and the Veni Creator Spiritus. Here’s a video of my organ teacher from Versailles playing the Prélude et Fugue. So beautiful and haunting.

Really, any art that drops the act, is genuine, authentic, and raw is gonna be important to me. You have to go out on a limb somehow and play or do what’s authentic to you, which the world really may not like. I think anything can be art because anything can be that true-Self-made thing. Or maybe true-self-revealing thing. That’s why the later 19th century makes me gag a bit; so much of it got super polished and perfected and ‘salon approved’ that it lost all grit and grime. Gross. And sometimes I feel that way about the music, at least the performance practice that I experienced in school.

I leave you with my current favorite esquisse, Driver on Bus by my amazing little 5 year old, who just this evening was telling me about the monster contraption art project he’s working on next in art class. Because the final bus work on yellow paper was completed. I just love it all so much.