wanderingfalcon: Nostalgia

Showing posts with label Nostalgia. Show all posts

Wednesday, 5 August 2015

One of my biggest dream: see Van Gogh and Monet at the Met and MoMA

I've always wanted to visit New York. Of course who doesn't? But for me, the vision of beholding the Manhattan skyline, the Statue of Liberty or being overwhelmed at the Grand Central Terminal or the Times Square or looking at Brooklyn Bridge is in no way more profound than seeing an original Van Gogh or Monet at the Met or the MoMA. A Picasso here and there would also be nice ;)

Here are the paintings I'm dying to see at the Metropolitan Museum of Art:

Blind Man's Meal
Picasso
Because I'm more into his Blue Period paintings than when he became a truly Modern artist.

The Third Class Carriage
Honoré Daumier
Because just looking at this painting, the word "squalor" and "pathos" are personified.

Vincent Van Gogh
Self Portrait with straw hat
Because...it is the master himself....

Jules Bastien-Lepage

Joan of Arc
Because, it intrigues me...the visions in her mind, the lost, almost "carried away" look in her face ....

Madame Georges Charpentier

Auguste Renoir
Because no one can make portraits of people come alive the way Renior does...you keep guessing what's on their minds

Shoes

Vincent Van Gogh
Because Van Gogh drew those shoes...period.

The Water Lily Pond

Claude Monet

Because he is the greatest of the Impressionists...one I have admired since I was a kid and was learning the effect of light bouncing off of objects .

Bain à la Grenouillère

Claude Monet
Beacase of the way the water ripples, and the overall composition of the painting that has been done in seemingly effortless strokes.

The Little fourteen year old dancer
Edgar Degas
Because I read somewhere that the young ballerina almost looks like she is ready to spring and start dancing....

Water Lilies
Claude Monet
I don't need a reason to look at Monet...especially when he paints Water Lilies

The Harvesters
Pieter Bruegel the Elder
Because I was so intrigued by this guy after I saw " Museum Hours", an exquisite, subtle movie on how art reflects life...

Wheat Field with Cypresses at the Haute Galline Near Eygalieres

Van Gogh

Because no other artist can paint a sky like that, and make tress sway like that....

And finally, my favorite, which is in the MoMA....

Needs no introduction....The Starry Night...by Van Gogh

And was just curious to look at the provenance of this world famous painting, and looking at it, I wonder how many countless people would have laid eyes on it, marvelling at the sheer brilliance, technique and inimitable style of this very disturbed artist, who shot himself at the age of 37, never to know how famous these very paintings would make him one day. What an absolute irony.

Provenance

Owner	City	Country	Date acquired	Comments
Theo van Gogh	Paris	France	1889-91
Johanna van Gogh-Bonger	Amsterdam	Netherlands	1891-1905
Oldenzeel Gallery	Rotterdam	Netherlands	1905-06
Miss G.P. van Stolk	Rotterdam	Netherlands	1906-38	On loan to Museum Boymans, Rotterdam, until May 1924.
Paul Rosenburg Art Gallery	New York	United States	1938-41
Museum of Modern Art	New York	United States	1941	Acquired through the L.P. Bliss bequest.

Just looking at this brief list, I'm breathless with part anticipation, part sheer gratitude to the Cold Spring Harbor Conference due to which I have this exceptionally wonderful opportunity to go to New York and visit these hallowed spaces called museums and above all be in the presence of some of the greatest art in the world.

On the joys of reading and rereading the classics, and why there are so many multiple screen adaptations

The past few weeks have been full of reading. I stumbled across Donna Tart's excellent 1992 book "A Secret History" when I was checking the literary references in the movie, " Dead Poet's Society". Hailed as a modern classic, the book is a first person narrative of the macabre experiences of a Californian fresher, who joins an elite university in Vermont, and befriends a clique of students who study Greek literature under a very enigmatic professor. Pretty soon, the academic idyll is shattered with the death of one of these friends, and the ensuing repercussions is what constitutes the bulk of the narrative.
In fact I was so besotted with the reviews and references of this book, that I actually went to Popular to buy the book when I could't get it online. Alas! After I combed through most of the shelves, trying to look beyond the " Fifty Shades of Grey" and other modern bestsellers piled up in eye-grabbing patterns, it was time to ask my brother to send me an e book. The moment he sent that, all I did, apart from lab work, was to read and savor the book.

Around that time, Thomas Vinterberg's adaptation of the Thomas Hardy classic " Far from the Madding Crowd" released. There is an interesting memory associated with this book. I had won it in a creative writing competition when I was an undergraduate, but had not read it until recently. There are two versions already adapted for the big screen, one in 1967 (starring Julie Christie) and another in 1998.

Which sort of made me think why the classics have the power to draw us back to them again and again, and how each time, they speak new things, altering our perception of them, and the associated memories while reading them. I have not seen the previous two movies, but the 2015 one starring Carey Mulligan as the intrepid Bathsheba Everdeen and the extremely handsome Matthias Schoenaerts as Gabriel Oak left me spellbound.

And that set the tone for Thomas Hardy, and I went ahead and watched " Jude" based on his other novel, " Jude, the Obscure" as well as " The Return of the Native", and was left transfixed by the modernity of the respective heroines Sue Bridehead and Eustacia Vye. D H Lawrence revered Hardy and was inspired by him, and probably that's why both these authors' predominant themes revolved around class issues, repression of freedom and sexuality, and men and women suffering due to these shackles of society.

I know Jane Austen is a universal favorite, but I'm more of a Bronte' sisters' fan, especially "Wuthering Heights" and " Jane Eyre". And the fact that there are so many screen and theatre adaptations spanning decades is a testament to the greatness, timelessness, universality and popularity of theses classics. Jane Eyre has close to 10 movie adaptations, my favorite being the 1996 version directed by Franco Zeffirelli and starring William Hurt and Charlotte Gainsbourg as Jane and Mr Rochester. The more recent 2011 version directed by Cary Fukunaga starring Mia Wasikowska and Michael Fassbender is good too. Its the same with " Wuthering Heights" too, with close to 10 adapations for the big screen as well as TV series over the course of five decades.
The surprising aspect is that each adaptation of these classic tales, as much as each reading or re-reading of the same brings out something new each time. Little details spring to notice, and certain issues become more noteworthy for their everlasting influence.

I think we reread and love to revisit the classics for the simple reason put forth by Italo Calvino, that " A classic is a book that has never finished saying what it has to say". Most people are initiated to read the classics at a young age (my assumption), sometimes by enthusiastic adults or as part of the school curriculum, or as abridged books, and hence it is but natural that those books become an inherent part of childhood memories, some still fresh in the mind, some tucked away in the hidden folds of memory. The same book, when read as an adult conjures up the memories of childhood, at the same time, in the light of maturity that comes with age, highlights some other aspects of the book. Moods too have so much to do with how a book is perceived.
While this is applicable to most books, classics have their own niche in this scheme of things. They are timeless, for one. Pick any Shakespearean tragedy or comedy, and extrapolate that in the contemporary travails of society or life, you will find instant resonance. Pick any heroine from a Thomas Hardy novel, and instantly, a likeness with your personal struggles as a woman in today's world will appear. And think about when these were written. The sixteenth century. Or 1860. We talk about sexuality and openness today. Read Lady Chatterley's Lover, written by the brilliant D H Lawrence in 1928, and feel the passion of his views on repression of sexuality and class discrimination, and in a snap, you will be able to relate to it, despite a difference of more than 8 decades. Little Women, published in 1880, which I read when I was 11, then at various stages of my life time and again, continues to bewitch me, soothe me, transport and transcend me. Maybe that's why we read them over and over again.

My 10 best classics are:

1) Little Women
2) Lady Chatterley's Lover
3) Great Expectations
4) To Kill a Mockingbird
5) Far from the Madding Crowd
6) Rebecca
7) Gone With The Wind
8) The Thorn Birds
9) Wuthering Heights
10) Jane Eyre

Of course, the list is endless.
Here is a list of 100 best classics from the Guardian.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2003/oct/12/features.fiction

Tuesday, 28 April 2015

Ulysses, by Alfred Lord Tennyson: nostalgia overlaid with respect

Today, for no reason except maybe nostalgia for my school days, I recalled my English Lit classes conducted by our school principal, Mr O A Joseph. Eng Lit classes were always special for me, as there are two things that make life special- a great idea, and someone great who understands, shares and resonates with you on the same plane to discuss and expand on that idea. That was Lit classes for me- great literature and O A Joseph Sir.

Even though there were several works that we were taught, ranging from Shakespeare ( we had The Merchant of Venice at that time in ICSE), stories by stalwarts like V.S.Naipaul, O'Henry, Guy de Maupassant, Roald Dahl, Katherine Mansfield, D H Lawrence....the list goes on, entire novels like Great Expectations, poems by all the great and well known poets, somehow, Ulysses by Alfred Lord Tennyson remains by ONE TRUE INSRIRATION and MEMORY of those long ago classes. I'm sadly not in touch with Joseph Sir any more, but I'd like to dedicate him this poem after all this while.

Sir, if it hadn't been for you and the way you taught me this poem, my life might have turned a tad bit different from the one that I'm currently pursuing and the plans that I have for my future. The memories of those long gone days still evoke the best that life has offered me yet.Wherever you are, please know that I will never forget you, nor what you taught me. Thank you so much for being you.

Ulysses

by Alfred Lord Tennyson

It little profits that an idle king,
By this still hearth, among these barren crags,
Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race,
That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.
I cannot rest from travel: I will drink
Life to the lees: All times I have enjoy'd
Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with those
That loved me, and alone, on shore, and when
Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades
Vext the dim sea: I am become a name;
For always roaming with a hungry heart
Much have I seen and known; cities of men
And manners, climates, councils, governments,
Myself not least, but honour'd of them all;
And drunk delight of battle with my peers,
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.
I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'
Gleams that untravell'd world whose margin fades
For ever and forever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use!
As tho' to breathe were life! Life piled on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains: but every hour is saved
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,
And this gray spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.

This is my son, mine own Telemachus,
To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle,—
Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil
This labour, by slow prudence to make mild
A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees
Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere
Of common duties, decent not to fail
In offices of tenderness, and pay
Meet adoration to my household gods,
When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.

There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail:
There gloom the dark, broad seas. My mariners,
Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me—
That ever with a frolic welcome took
The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed
Free hearts, free foreheads—you and I are old;
Old age hath yet his honour and his toil;
Death closes all: but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:
The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,
'T is not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

Monday, 27 April 2015

Why I love folk art II: Tara Books and the art of making handbound books in traditional folk art

Ok.....this one is a piece on something that really, I mean really swept me off my feet. A few days back, I was browsing through Flipboard, and reading an article on Indian tribal/folk/indigenous art. A link led me to discover an independent publishing house based in Chennai, called Tara Books, founded by a lady named Gita Wolf. Now, what she does has been something I myself have been wanting to do since a long time, given my absolute love and fascination for Indian Folk Art. Not only does Tara Books bring to light amazing art works in the form of illustrated books by marginalized, little known tribal artists representing the various tribal art forms in India, like Madhubani, Gond, Warli, Kalamkari etc, it also employs local workers to turn these illustrated stories into handbound books!! Now that, I say, is sheer brilliance. I am so so impressed!!

It is amazing, rather so inspiring and heartening to see people giving a boost to this cottage industry that deals in indigenous art. And wait till you see the stunning works of these artists. Hailing from little villages, harboring an insularity that is the very source of their genius, and wielding brushes that produce intricate, detailed portraits and vignettes from our Hindu epics, oral stories and their bordered lives, these artists and their works are a joy to behold, as well as a testimony to the beauty and simplicity of these marginalized art forms.

Have a look at this video to appreciate the art of making handbound books:

http://www.tarabooks.com/about/media-gallery/

Also, the sheer beauty and resonance of some of the art works in the illustrated books left me spellbound.

"Alone in the Forest" by Gond artist Bhajju Shyam.

The Night Life of Trees: Gond art by Bhajju Shyam

"Gobble you up": Mandana traditional art by Sunita

The London Jungle Book: Gond art by Bhajju Shyam

Drawing from the city: Gond art by Tejubehan

Waterlife: Madhubani art by Rambharos Jha

Hope is a Girl selling Fruit: Madhubani art by Amrita Das

A long, long time ago, my art teacher, late Mr Venkat, had introduced me to Madhubani art. His descriptions about these slowly disappearing art forms had created a special interest in my mind. Although quite interested to pursue this art form by actually going to the Madhuban region of India, also referred to as Mithilanchal or Mithila, and finds mention in the great Indian Epic Ramayana, I have yet to see this cherished dream come true. But as is with things, when you desire something, you do stumble across ways to achieve it. That opportunity came my way through a fellow- Phd mate, now my best friend, Ajit Prakash, who happens to be from Darbhanga, which falls in the Madhubani District in Bihar, India. He too expressed an interest in this art form, as distant relatives of his have been doing this since a long time. We have plans of creating a startup to employ these little known artists, who are mostly women, and give them a better platform to not just give them a steady and decent source of income, but also make this art form more popular and appreciated. At the moment, we have created an e-commerce website that is called " Chitrankan, The Indian Art Store" (www.chitrankan.in). But the idea is still in it's inception, and may take a while to be on the floor as we are too busy to take time off from our PhDs to pursue this full time. But I'm glad it's happening finally.

Sunday, 18 January 2015

In Taiwan with Murakami

I clearly remember that phase.......I had newly discovered Murakami, having read his Sputnik Sweetheart as a first novel. I was reading "After Dark", steeped in an eerie, surreal world. A really intense longing to be invisible seized me......to be swallowed up whole in another world where bizarre things happened, happiness played hide and seek, you were there, yet not quite there.....a world of alien beings, grey mountains, azure skies, neon lit alleys, purple sunsets, black hearts and white hope......

Yes I remember the joy......the untainted possibilities, the feeling of being on the move....on the high speed railway lines, crisscrossing through Taiwan.....tobacco leaf shaped Taiwan where the temperature was 17 degrees.....Taipei 101 enticed with its panoramic view..... Alishan loomed ahead, with a dead Mountain railway line leading to paradise....quaint cafes with non-English speaking staff....and a bamboo forest old and wise......and a gorge that was called Taroko.....and after all that crazy madness.....finally the endless Pacific.......

At that time, I did not know that happiness was just memories.....