Family Reunion

(at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City)

By ROBERT EDWARD BULLOCK, Special to the Sun | April 25, 2014

For the first time in nearly 230 years, a family of six from Madrid is spending time together. In "Goya and the Altamira Family" the Metropolitan Museum of Art unites a set of portraits commissioned by the Count of Altamira, the director of what is now the Banco de España. This small grouping highlights some of Goya's peculiar grandeur and melancholy.

Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes, b.1746, was a fabulously successful court painter in Madrid, a portraitist of the royal family and the Spanish aristocracy. Numbered among the last of the Old Masters while being the premier Modernist, his work possesses the repeating minor chord of a somber melody, as even his bright colors hold some tone of lament.

(Read the entire review at The New York Sun.)

^ Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes), 1746-1828, "Vicente Joaquín Osorio Moscoso y Guzmán, 12th Conde de Altamira (1756-1816)," 1787 (Banco de España, Madrid.)

^ Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes), 1746-1828, "Maria Ignacia Álvarez de Toledo, Condesa de Altamira and Her Daughter, MaríaAgustina," 1787-88 (The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Robert Lehman Collection)

^ Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes), 1746-1828, "Manuel Osorio Manrique de Zuñiga (1784-1792)," 1787-88               (The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Jules Bache Collection)

^ Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes), 1746-1828, "Vicente Osorio de Moscoso, Count of Trastamara" (Private Collection)

^ Esteve Y Marques "Portrait of Juan Maria Osorio" (Cleveland Museum of Art)

Sky's the Limit (originally entitled "A Little Bit of Sky")

(at The Morgan Library and Museum, New York City)

By ROBERT EDWARD BULLOCK, Special to the Sun | April 24, 2014

Though it seems obvious today, it was only after the mid-1700s that artists began painting directly from nature in the plain light of day -- a radical evolution at the time. Working outside the studio, painters were challenged to quickly capture the changes in light, clouds and atmosphere in the natural world around them.

Termed "plein air" by the French, this practice of working outdoors called for small, portable equipment and materials. The practice of oil sketching on paper was advantageous. Though the intention may have been to develop these small studies into larger works back in the studio, we value them today for their own merits.

(Read the entire review at The New York Sun.)

Eugène Isabey (1803-1886), 'Sunset on the Normandy Coast,' Oil on paper, mounted on canvas. 

Thaw Collection, jointly owned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Morgan Library & Museum; gift of Eugene V. Thaw, 2009.

Johan Christian Dahl (1788–1857), 'Cloud Study,' Oil on paper.
Thaw Collection, jointly owned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Morgan Library & Museum; gift of Eugene V. Thaw, 2009.

Jean-Michel Cels (1819–1894), 'Cloud Study.' Oil on cardboard.

Thaw Collection, jointly owned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Morgan Library & Museum; gift of Eugene Thaw, 2009.

Gauguin the Primitive

(The New-York Historical Society)

"Gauguin: Metamorphosis," presenting nearly 160 works reassessing the unusual career of Paul Gauguin, is, surprisingly, the Museum of Modern Art's first major exhibition to focus solely on the self-taught and influential 19th-century painter.

Gauguin's alchemical use of color and simplified forms would go on to greatly impact the Symbolist and Modern art movements. Viewing the exhibit one wonders what to make of the man, heralded by many as a great painter and disparaged by as many others as a retrograde.

(Read the entire review at The New York Sun.)

^ Paul Gauguin, "Mata Mua (In Olden Times)," 1892. (Carmen Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection, Madrid)

^ Paul Gauguin, "Tahitian Woman with Evil Spirit (recto)," c. 1900. (Private collection.)

                       ^ Paul Gauguin, "Ovri (Savage)," 1894. (Private collection.)