Boris Kalendariov (Kalendarev)
“It often seems to me that the night is much more alive than the day.” This became the watchword of Vincent van Gogh, who would paint late into the night. It relates to me, in more ways than one. To me the night is when space comes alive. The vast and timeless universe, through billions of years of evolution, is still expanding. The chaotic explosions and collisions are constantly occurring. Yet every night the sky is painted as the day turns from light to darkness. This “painting” of the universe can be seen all around the world, illuminating even the darkest places. It is this “skyscape” that has influenced thousands of painters, scientists, mathematicians and second graders, as I once was, to prefer the life of the night to the day. It is this night that has influenced both van Gogh and me.
This semester I decided to explore Van Gogh and the Colors of the Night exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art and the Cosmic Collisions exhibition at the American Museum of Natural History’s Rose Center for Earth and Space. While both present art in vastly different ways, a commonality of subject and concept was evident. Moreover, my approach to understanding both of these shows was shaped by the passion behind the creators that had been included by the curators. This same passion for discovering these treasures lies in me.
I grew up fascinated by space starting in second grade, when I was always reading books about its history. At one point I remember wanting to become an astrophysicist. However, after many years of learning the ABC’s of outer space, my interests shifted into different fields. Nonetheless, my fascination with science remains and I indulge myself in this passion by going to different space exhibitions. Some exhibits portray events through texts and pictures and others that try to graphically, with the use of visual aids, depict and explain various periods of the eternal universe.
The exhibit at the Rose Center for Space and Earth was facilitated by the use of visual aids, taking me back to my elementary school days. Since then I learned that “time” as we know it began after the Big Bang. After billions of years of explosive collisions, galaxies and planets were formed. This evolution is depicted in Cosmic Collisions, a breathtaking half-hour film, narrated by the award-winning director and actor Robert Redford. The show provides hyper-realistic views of the night sky, from the beginning of time to now. This captivating theatrical show that depicts the beginning of time was not only meaningful to me but was also very entertaining.
Another treasure that I discovered this past year, which has had a tremendous impact upon me for its originality, was van Gogh’s art, specifically his masterpiece, Starry Night. Riding the subway one day during October, I saw an advertisement for the van Gogh exhibition at the MoMA. It hit me then that I learned about him in class so I decided to select it for my cultural passport. The exhibition was so popular that it required timed-entry tickets. Even after waiting two hours to get into the gallery, I had to fight my way through the crowds if I wanted to catch a close-up glimpse of some of van Gogh’s masterpieces.
I learned that van Gogh’s masterpieces did not come easily to him. Some would say that Van Gogh was a late bloomer, in the sense that Malcolm Gladwell uses the term in a recent essay on Cezanne, becoming better as he aged. Van Gogh decided to pursue a career in art only later in life, after unsuccessfully working as a clerk and art salesman. Through experimentation and diligent work he was able to become a master at painting landscapes, specifically night scenes. He had an intimate feeling for the night and like most artists he relied on the skills of observation for his work. But painting in the dark in the late 19th century had its difficulties. Nonetheless, he was able to fuse his passion for art and his fascination for the night and through seamlessly endless nights of combining his love for nature and the nocturnal landscapes, interweaving the images and color effects, he was able to successfully portray the paradoxical representation of night by light and color. His innovativeness allowed him to conquer the problem of depicting night.
Earlier I referred to how both of these discoveries had a commonality. It is interesting to note that van Gogh was influenced by the lights of the night. What are the lights of the night? The moon and stars. If we look at the Big Bang theory, we understand that the collisions from billions of years ago helped create the moon and the millions of stars that illuminate the night, which with out would have not influenced van Gogh or an elementary school kid.
Van Gogh realized there was more to the night than meets the eye and he was able to portray this hidden beauty on canvas. Scientists from the last few centuries realized there was more to night and were able to discover its beginning. From Galileo’s telescope to Einstein’s theory of relativity, through years of analyzing data and satellite images, scientists were able to develop the Big Bang theory. This was then condensed and simplified for the everyday person to watch and understand. The commonality that both van Gogh and the hundreds of scientists shared was their intellectual curiosity. They had a hunger that they needed to satisfy and were able to do so through their work. Through their sense that something more was there, the invisible gained its representation.
I grew up with a passion for science and was able to allow room for the passion of art to develop. Van Gogh’s exhibits portraying the Starry Night helped this development as I found my passion in science in his artwork and was able to relate to it. These exhibitions satisfied my hunger and have also have developed my intellectual curiosity, which like the universe, continues to expand.
Boris Kalendariov (Boris Kalendarev)
Quite frankly, I came into the semester reluctant to take on the challenges that came with being part of The Arts in New York City. Being busy with not only school but work as well I’d tell myself, “I don’t really enjoy all this stuff and I don’t have time for it either.” But I remember that somebody once told me take on your challenges now and worry about the problems later. With this in mind on the first day of class I strapped myself into my little cultural cart and since then it has been a heck of a roller-coaster ride. I knew that maybe I would not enjoy the entire ride, there would be some thrills and some parts would be a snore, but at least I should try to give it a chance. By the end of the first month, all I kept thinking about was how many papers I had to write for what I thought to be an insignificant class and how many nights, after being at work and running to school, I had to set aside to be part of this “journey.”
The roller-coaster ride did not yet begin and I was already trying to take off my seatbelt. Yet for some reason and at some point, as the cart was shifting upwards and gaining momentum, after five papers, after a few events, after listening to my professors, after going to meetings and hearing the minds of today looking for students with an interdisciplinary background, and after actually looking inside myself and realizing what it was I wanted to achieve, an insignificant class was not so insignificant anymore.
The bait was taken and I was being reeled in. I felt as if I was starting to understand the arts in a more conceptual way. That everything does not have to be concrete, like in science. Like a loop de loop in a ride, sometimes I was excited to be at an event or write a paper and at other times not so much and this continued up until the third month. I came out of my semi-closed minded cocoon and I remember exactly when that happened. A professor told me during a sitting, listening to Brahms string quartet, “listen to the conversation between the violins and violas, what do you hear?” Initially, I was upset that such a question should be asked. I mean for heavens sake, two instruments are being played there is no conversation.
This was a pivot point for me. Personally, I always enjoyed classical music, listening to the details of every instrument being played, yet I realized after a few minutes maybe this professor was right, maybe there is a conversation that I am missing. I closed my eyes and I began to look back through the semester. I realized that I have changed, I was less rigid and I had started to delve into different aspects of art and pay attention to even its subtleties, something that before would not have happened. I began to open my eyes and take in what was given. This change can be seen in my portfolio.
I decided to choose two diverse pieces of art, one that I grew up fascinated with and another that I only recently touched upon and was able to relate to. I am a big believer that knowledge is something that no one can take away from you, and throughout this semester, after writing reviews, landscapes, passports, listening to conversations between violins and violas, numerous doors in the art world were opened up to me and with it came a better sense of writing, something that, I hope, will stay with me forever. The ride is almost over but in the end it was well worth the ups and downs.
Writing this cultural passport portfolio was a truly gratifying experience. I got to document my personal growth from the beginning to the end of my first semester of college. In the beginning, I felt like I was being dragged kicking and screaming, and it was reflected in my writing. Towards the end of the semester, I began to realize the significance of the cultural passport and of art as a whole, and that too was reflected in my writing.
In the past four months, I have seen and experienced more art as well as varieties of art than I have seen in my past eighteen years. There is a little bit of wordplay in that statement. I have attended more art displays in my past eighteen years, but I have SEEN more in the past four months.
In the past, I would go somewhere and take in the art at face value if at all. It just didn’t interest me past the physical realm of what it was and how it looked. If I disagreed or disliked something, it had no chance, and now, that has all changed.
I can now go to any show, exhibit, or presentation with an open mind and an appreciation. If I enjoy something, that’s great. If I do not, I now have the capacity to appreciate it anyway, for the effort put into it and its message. I can now see the good in something I do not like. “Why do other people like this form of art?”
I have changed my writing style and my capacity as a writer. I can speak with a voice worth listening to because I look at something on several levels instead of just one. I can write more eloquently and passionately because I appreciate everything I see whether I enjoy it or not. Once again, I started out kicking and screaming, but it was all for the best and a great start to college and my love of life as a whole. In other words, I am “in touch,” now. Thank you, Professor Tenneriello.
“Why didn’t I think of that,” I had the urge to ask myself. It was the beginning of October 2008 and my cultural passport assignment was due. I was drawing a blank as to where I should go to complete it. My professor recommended that I take a look at the tree houses at Madison Square Park and that was that. The park was only a couple of blocks away, and I couple get a one thousand calorie Chipotle burrito along the way. I could kill two birds with one stone!
Speaking with full honesty and humility, in high school, I had rarely if ever put real thought into any school work that was assigned. They were just assignments, busy work that had to get done so I could get to what I really liked to do, train. I wasn’t a dumb jock by any means. It’s just that I coasted through high school, relatively unchallenged and unabsorbed in the work.
Revelation: When you are absorbed and enjoy your work, it’s not really work.
I showed up at Madison Square Park without any significant expectations. Art was art, which was assigned work, which was a pain. Oh, how my opinions changed. The park was smaller than a city block, so the exhibit should have been easy to find, but it wasn’t. It frustrated me at first and I eventually gave up looking around. Defeated, I sat down on a bench and closed my eyes. It was a park after all so why not relax and take a few deep breaths?
I opened my eyes again as I was looking at the sky and saw them, the tree houses that is. Even though my professor clearly called the exhibit here “The Tree Houses,” it had never crossed my mind to look up and find them. I guess I hadn’t been much of a person for scenery. It used to be all business, “Get this done.”
Pleasantly surprised, I began taking photos of the Tree Houses. Oh, how simple and unique they were. “Why didn’t I think of that?” I felt like quite the intellectual college student, standing there with illuminated eyes, taking in the details of Tadashi Kawamata’s public art. I felt giddy inside and was wondering what people were thinking of this so-called “intellectual,” photographing the trees.
The beautiful thing was that before I noticed, it didn’t look like anyone else noticed. When I began taking photos, people must have been wondering what I was doing and looked up. That was the point of Kawamata’s showcase. It is there for you to discover. It is up to the individual whether or not to go out searching. Never before was that so apparent.
That day helped change my attitudes towards art and even the way I think. It was apparent during my second cultural passport voyage.
“I wonder what he has to say,” I was asking myself before the beginning of a group conversation with David Holbrooke. It was only a few days after the Tree Houses epiphany and I was ready to listen and learn. I was not there to “just get it done,” like before.
Holbrooke was an imposing figure. Standing at over six foot four, he commanded the group’s collective attention. Not knowing much about what goes into the production of film, other than it was surely not easy, I was eager to learn about it for the sake of intellectual curiosity, even if I was never going to get into the business of film making.
Mr. Holbrooke provided commentary on several films, but the one that stood out to me was Hard As Nails. It presented a unique challenge for the director.
Holbrooke noted that Hard As Nails was the most difficult project he ever did because he did not agree with anything the person he was documenting did or believed in. He just let his subject “do his thing,” and the result was a fantastic look into extreme Christianity. In doing so, Holbrooke taught me a fundamental lesson of art. I will not like or agree with everything I see or hear, and that is okay. It does not hinder the value of that art or opinion.
I could see that not everyone in the room picked up on this insight. A lot of people were openly appalled by the documentary’s display of the extremes of Christianity. Some were angry and some were giggling, and they were missing the point. The point it that it’s okay to experience new things and disagree. Differing viewpoints are what drive intellect forward. They are another means of leaving one’s comfort zone to experience a spot of personal growth.
Revelation: The take home message of this is that to experience growth, a person needs to leave his comfort zone and see the world. The goal should be to expand one’s comfort zone as far as possible, and that is what I learned from my Cultural Passport project.
Point Of View: Turner vs. Monet
Art is the ultimate form of self-expression. It exists in several forms such as sculpture, theatre, music, and painting. For many, it provides a means to achieve what Maslow believed to be the highest human need, self-actualization. A skilled artist can depict and immortalize his or her feelings, what they stand for, major events, or even market something to the public. They may pass on, but their art, their calling remains, whether embedded in stone, on canvas or paper, or on film.
Water is the basic building block of life. In its liquid form, it is at the same time majestic as an ocean, conforming to a container, life-giving biologically, and life-taking ironically. Its flow serves as the thesis of microphysics and is extraordinarily difficult to recreate in the virtual reality of a video game. Needless to say, with water’s status as a vital force, artists have had no choice but to undertake the tall task of depicting water on canvas. Their methods are purely individual and bear results that are dramatically unique. We will be comparing two select works of art that are dominated by water, one by Joseph M.W Turner, and one by Claude Monet.
J.M.W Turner’s 1805 masterpiece, Shipwreck, is a stunning display of the otherworldliness of water. It depicts how something most view as calm and tranquil can claim countless lives during storms at sea. As the title implies, the painting depicts several ships being overtaken by the tempest. The first aspect of this marvel that comes to mind is extraordinary realism. It is a nearly photographical account of an event. Immediately, the viewer cannot help but to believe in the painting and feel empathy for the people doomed to perish. It could serve as a prime example of dire straits. Fascinated by the sublime force of the sea, Turner placed humans to dramatize their susceptibility of humanity to the natural world.
The water is the essence of The Shipwreck, and its grandeur is beautifully rendered. Commonly known as “The Painter Of Light,” (National Gallery) Turner decided to challenge himself with a morning storm. That concept forced him to use a greater variety of colors for the water, yielding extremely fine detail. The darker depths of water, the lighter waves, and the white foam on top of the waves is beautifully rendered. Somewhat resembling flash photography, the morning sun creeps through the storm clouds, illuminating the water and ships. At the same time, the light allows for a stronger, more personal visual account of the damage done. It appears to be the instant before the end, as the largest ship has toppled over, causing a wave that will momentarily engulf the remaining ships.
This and many other Turner paintings served as a source of study and inspiration for Claude Monet when he visited England in 1870, nineteen years after Turner’s death.(Pioch) In 1872/1873, Monet released his magnum opus, Impression, Sunrise. It was in reviewing this epochal painting that art critic Louis Leroy coined the term “Impressionism.”(Art Picture)
Monet depicted a calm sunrise at sea, definitely not sharing Turner’s zeal for the extremes of nature, but sharing his zeal for landscaping or in this case, “seascaping.” The visibility of a body of land in the background serves to illustrate tranquility and safety. The first major characteristic of impressionist painting is the presence of visual brush strokes, and Monet masterfully executed this technique. Unlike The Shipwreck, which lacks visible brushstrokes, Impression, Sunrise is built with them like a bridge made out of popsicle sticks and toothpicks. The sun reflecting off of the water is done with a linear series of parallel orange brush strokes, almost comical in simplicity, yet stunning in appearance. Small waves in the foreground are illustrated with dark blue brush stokes contrasting from the lighter sea, heavily dissenting from Turner in that the contrasting colors were the opposite for his waves.
Another aspect of Impressionist painting was the use of ordinary subject matter and the inclusion of movement. In stunning simplicity, a single boat is left for the mid-background of the painting and requires only a smudge of ink. However, a person is seen standing in the boat and rowing. Larger, more complex ships are anchored nearer to the landmass and Monet beautifully uses the illusion of a slight fog overlapping the ships to make them opaquely visible. Movement is included with the smoke blowing from the exhausts of the ship’s engines.
The last aspect of Impressionism is the use of unusual visual angles. Monet takes a high altitude viewpoint even though the point of view of the painting is at sea. That implies that Monet or the viewer is either a higher figure looking down or on top of a tall mast of a ship. I lean towards the higher power because the viewpoint is on the same level of the sun. A modern viewer could imagine that he was parasailing off of the small boat.
Overall, Turner and Monet both produced dazzling yet fundamentally different works of art and depictions of water. Which is better is highly subjective and it is safe to say that depicting water is extremely difficult to do and completely up to the artist. There are many ways to portray it, as frightening, as calm, as blue, as orange, as realistic, or as impressionistic. In the end, Monet was influenced by Turner and created his own distinct style, and that is the beauty of art.
Works Cited:
The National Gallery. “TURNER, Joseph Mallord William” (no author credited) http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/cgi-bin/WebObjects.dll/CollectionPublisher.woa/wa/artistBiography?artistID=702
Pioch Nicolas. “Monet, Claude.” WebMuseum, Paris 19 September 2002 http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/monet/
Art In The Picture , Impressionism – Overview 2008 (no author credited) http://www.artinthepicture.com/styles/Impressionism/
Turner, J.M.W “Shipwreck of the Minotaur,” 1805 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Shipwreck_turner.jpg
Monet, Claude “Impression, Sunrise” 1872/1873 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Claude_Monet,_Impression,_soleil_levant,_1872.jpg
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