Norms of beauty in men: a comment – Πρότυπα ομορφιάς στους άντρες: ένα σχόλιο

Το κείμενο που ακολουθεί είναι ένα σχόλιο που δημοσίευσα σε ανάρτηση μιας καλής φίλης σε μέσο κοινωνικής δικτύωσης. Το θέμα της ανάρτησης είναι  τα πρότυπα της ομορφιάς, εγώ όμως αναφέρομαι μόνο στους άντρες. 

Το πρώτο πρότυπο ομορφιάς που διαμορφώνει ο αρσενικός στο φαντασιακό του είναι η μητέρα του. Το πρότυπο αυτό παραμένει εμβαπτισμένο στο υποσυνείδητο για πάντα. Αυτό όμως δεν σημαίνει ότι δεν αντιπαραβάλλεται μα άλλα. Κάθε παράσταση με λιμπιντικό περιεχόμενο αντιπαρατίθεται με το πρότυπο της μητέρας και το αμφισβητεί. Κάθε τέτοια αμφισβήτηση αποτελεί ένα βήμα προς ένα βίο με υγιή σεξουαλικότητα και μια αντίληψη ομορφιάς που είναι όλο και πιο κοντά στα πραγματικά βιώματα του αρσενικού και όχι τη βάσανο του Οιδιπόδειου.Αναφέρω ένα προσωπικό βίωμα. Μέχρι την ηλικία των 9 ήμουν κι εγώ δέσμιος του Οιδιπόδειου φαντασιακού και προτύπου. Μέχρι που μιαν ημέρα η οικιακή βοηθός μας, μια 18χρονη με το όνομα Μαρία, καλή της ώρα, έκανε εγχείρηση σκωληκοειδούς αποφύσεως και παρέμεινε κλινήρης εις το δωμάτιο της. Είχα λυσσιάζει από περιέργεια να δω΄γιατί δεν βγαίνει από το δωμάτιο της, κι έτσι ένα μεσημέρι που δεν υπήρχε κανείς στο σπίτι για να με εμποδίσει, έκανα εφόρμηση. Άνοιξα σιγά σιγά την πόρτα και μπήκα στο δωμάτιο της. Το φως ήτανε χλωμό, επειδή τα παντζούρια ήτανε κλειστά. Παρόλα αυτά το καλοκαιρινό φως έντυνε πανέμορφα το δωμάτιο και το ολόγυμνο κορμί της Μαρίας που είχε ξεσκεπαστεί από τη ζέστη και μου χάριζε την ανεμπόδιστη θέα του αλαβάστρινου μπούστου της, της καλοχτισμένης λεκάνης της και του οφθαλμού του Κύκλωπος. Η παράσταση αυτή αποθηκεύτηκε στη μνήμη μου και αποτέλεσε την πρώτη αμφισβήτηση της μητρικής ομορφιάς. Με την αμφισβήτηση αυτή δέχτηκε και το πρώτο πλήγμα σαν πρότυπο. Ισχυρίζομαι ότι η “ομορφιά” για τον αρσενικό είναι η συλλογή των παραστάσεων που συνέγειραν το λιμπιντικό σύστημα στη διαδρομή των χρόνων από την αρχή μέχρι τη λήξη της εφηβείας.

Marta Abba: Luigi Pirandello’s muse and unfulfilled love

Marta Abba

In February 1925, the 58-year-old world-famous playwright Luigi Pirandello met Marta Abba, an unknown actress half his age, and fell in love with her.

She was to become, until his death in December 1936, not only his confidante but also his inspiring muse and artistic collaborator.

Pirandello’s love for the young actress was neither a literary infatuation nor a form of fatherly affection, but rather an unfulfilled, desperate passion that secretly consumed him during the last decade of his life.

Benito Ortolani, Editor and translator of the letters, Princeton University Press 1994.

Luigi Pirandello in 1932

Pirandello more than any other playwright has been responsible for a revolution in men’s attitude to the world that is comparable to the revolution caused by Einstein’s discovery of the concept of relativity in physics: Pirandello has transformed our attitude to human personality and the whole concept of reality in human relations by showing that the personality- the character in stage terms – is not a fixed entity but an infinitely fluid, blurred and relative concept.

Martin Esslin, Reflections

Abba (second from left) and Pirandello (third from left) at the Grand Hotel de Bains, in Lido di Venezia in 1928

Introduction

Luigi Pirandello is one of my favorite playwrights.

Some time ago I wrote an article on Mattia Pascal, an absolutely brilliant novel written by Pirandello.

Today I want to share another dimension of the man’s personality, not necessarily and directly reflected in his plays. His love for Marta Abba. This love should, of course, be taken into context. Pirandello was a complicated man, and his life reflected this more than enough. Many dimensions of this complexity have been reflected in his relationship with Marta Abba, and even shaped it.

Marta Abba

Pirandello met Abba in Rome, in February 1925. She was 24, he was 58. He was a Sicilian gentleman, married with children, who at the time were older than Marta. His wife was seriously ill, and about to be confined to an asylum for the mentally ill.She was a young actress, embarking n her career. During the eleven years of their “relationship”, they spent relatively little time together. They both had busy lives, Abba with her acting and Pirandello with his travels around Europe and the American Continent.

The letters Pirandello wrote to Marta are the material I will use to present their relationship. As the editor and translator, Benito Ortolani, notes they had agreed to live in a “nonintimate intimacy”.

Abba (right) and her sister Cele on the terrace of the Grand Hotel de Bains in Lido di Venezia in 1928

The Letters

All the quotes that follow come from the Princeton University Press 1994 edition of the letters.

The period covered by the published letters is from 1925, when Pirandello met Abba in Rome, to 1936, when he died. Only Pirandello;s letters to Marta have been published. Abba did not approve of the publication of the letters she wrote to the “Maestro”.

Dear Marta,

….But what shall I do with the money? For that matter, what should I do with my life, if I don’t have anybody to whom I can give it? To me, life is of no use. I don’t ask for any more beyond the time I need to finish the works that are left for me to write; because I feel it as an imperative obligation of my conscience, that I must write them. Without this, who knows where I would be by now –  since that horrible night spent in Como….

Luigi Pirandello

The letter was written on the 20th August 1926.The reference to the ‘horrible night in Como’ is very important. Although there is no proof of the exact date, it was a night back in October 1925. We do not have any explicit description of what happened. Only in one of Pirandello’s plays, a young woman (presumably Marta) addresses an old poet (presumably Pirandello) and throws in his face the memory of a traumatic event between them. She had offered herself to him, but he declined, offering a rational explanation.

Pirandello's typewritter in his studioi in via Antonio Bosio, 15 – Rome.
Pirandello’s typewriter in his studio in via Antonio Bosio, 15 – Rome.

My Marta,

…. You say that I “do not believe in anybody”. That really is a reproach. What do you mean I don’t believe? If I did not believe, what would I be living for, so far away and living alone? I can still hold out in this life only because I believe. And your advice to stay in Rome “among people who still love me” sounded to me like a mockery! Should I concentrate on the complications of your advice, perhaps then would I recognize the terrible folly of feeling as I do and of living the way I do … or not living!….

Your disappointed Maestro

This letter was written on the 8th January 1931. Pirandello was in Paris, France, and Abba in Turin, Italy. Marta had written to Pirandello, suggesting that he moves to Rome to be with his family. His children loved him, but could not quite comprehend his infatuation with Abba, while their mother was confined in a asylum for the mentally ill. Two years later, Pirandello followed Marta’s “advice” and moved to live in Rome, where he died.

Pirandelloreads
Pirandelloreads “Trovarsi” to Marta Abba, Lido di Camaiore, August 1932 (2)

My Marta,

I am writing in bed, where I have been lying since I arrived. Right on the morning of my arrival, when we were already docked in the harbor of Naples… – suddenly I felt sick: a burning pain in the chest, which took away my breath and made my legs feel weak. … You did the right thing, my Marta, in not coming to Naples…. But now I have an immense desire to see you again.If I were not in this condition, I would fly to Salsomaggiore, but I cannot…. I must stop writing, because I am too weak. I will write as soon as I can to tell you the many things that I have to communicate to you…..

Your Maestro

The letter was written on the 14th October 1935, one day after Pirandello suffered a heart attack on the day of his arrival in Naples.

Portraits of Marta Abba in Pirandello's studio, via Bosio 15, Roma
Portraits of Marta Abba in Pirandello’s studio, via Bosio 15, Roma (2)

My Marta, 

…. I know that you are still in Italy. I know that in a few days, on the evening of Tuesday of next week, I will see you again in Milan; that still keeps me going. But what will happen to me on the evening of May 23rd when you leave for London? And what will happen to me in August, when you leave even Europe and depart for America?I fell as if I am slowly sinking, as if the ground is becoming soft under my feet; I do not know what to hold on to; I have no more support….

Your Maestro

This letter was written on the 16th May 1936. Pirandello was in Rome, and Abba in Milan. In May 1936 Abba signed a contract to perform in New York’s Broadway.In preparation for her New York appearances, she went to London, England.

Pirandello directs Marta Abba and Lamberto Picasso in
Pirandello directs Marta Abba and Lamberto Picasso in “La nuova colonia”, 1928. (2)

My Marta

…This letter is already long, and it is time that I send it to the post office. But when will it reach you? If I think about the distance, I at once feel that I am sliding into a horrible loneliness, like into an abyss of despair. But you should not think about that! I embrace you tightly, tightly, with all, all my heart.

Your Maestro

This letter was written on the 4th December 1936, six days before Pirandello died of pneumonia. He was in Rome, and Abba was in New York City. She announced Pirandello’s death on stage at Plymouth Theater.

Cele, Marta and Pirandello on the balcony of the Grand Hotel de Bains in Lido di Venezia in 1928

Marta Abba, a leading Italian stage performer of the 1920’s and 30’s and the lifetime companion of the playwright Luigi Pirandello, died after suffering a stroke on her 88th birthday Friday in a Milan nursing home, her family announced today.

The New York Times, 26 June 1988

Sources:

  1. Pirandello’s Love Letters to Marta Abba, Edited and translated by Benito Ortolani. Princeton University Press, Princeton New Jersey, 1994.
  2. A Marta Abba per non morire”: il ricordo di lei

“Dirty Corner” brings chaos to the order of Versailles, but is it the queen’s vagina?

The gardens of Versailles are notorious for their order and meticulous landscape architecture.

Jardins desTuileries-Buste d'André Le Nôtre
Jardins desTuileries-Buste d’André Le Nôtre

This order is the preeminent feature of the design of landscape architect Andre Le Notre. It is the same architect who in 1667 laid out the Champs-Elysee and its gardens.

Versailles, Garden Plan
Versailles, Garden Plan

In the midst of all this order, today there is an element of chaos: “Amish Kapoor’s “Dirty Corner”.

Amish Kapoor, Sculptor
Amish Kapoor, Sculptor

Amish Kapoor is a British-Indian sculptor, who has been invited to exhibit his art in the Versailles gardens. Kapoor is not the first to exhibit his works in Versailles. The first artist who exhibited was the American artist Jeff Koons, back in 2008. Before that, there had only once previously been a temporary exhibition at Versailles, one of 18th century furniture.

Amish Kapoor, Dirty Corner in the Versailles Gardens
Amish Kapoor, Dirty Corner in the Versailles Gardens

Among the works exhibited by Kapoor in Versailles is “Dirty Corner”.

The Versailles gardens without
The Versailles gardens without “Dirty Corner”

To get an idea of the impact of the installation on the gardens, lets have a look at how the gardens looked before Kapoor installed “Dirty Corner”. Everything is in the “right” place. But what is the “Dirty Corner”?

Amish Kapoor, Dirty Corner, Fabbrica del Vapore, Milan, Italy, 2011.
Amish Kapoor, Dirty Corner, Fabbrica del Vapore, Milan, Italy, 2011.

Dirty Corner is a 2011 work by Amish Kapoor, made of Cor-Ten steel, earth and mixed media. Its dimensions are 8.9×6.55×60m. The work was first exhibited in Fabbrica del Vapore, Milan, Italy. “… the sculptural work consists of a huge steel volume that measures 60 metres long and 8 metres high in which visitors can enter. upon entry, one begins to lose their perception of space, as it gets progressively darker and darker until there is no light, forcing one to use their other senses to guide them through the space.  The entrance of the tunnel is goblet-shaped, featuring an interior and exterior surface that is circular, making minimal contact with the ground. over the course of the exhibition, the work will be progressively covered by some 160 cubic metres of red soil by a large mechanical device, forming a sharp mountain of dirt in which the tunnel appears to be running through.” (2)

Richard Sera, The Matter of Time, 1994-2005, Guggenheim Bilbao
Richard Sera, The Matter of Time, 1994-2005, Guggenheim Bilbao

My first encounter with a massive steel sculpture was in Guggenheim Bilbao, where I experienced Richard Sera’s “The Matter of Time”. I recount the experience because these massive works engulf the spectator and create unique multidimensional experiences. Walking through the sculpture is an unforgettable physical experience.

I imagine “Dirty Corner” is also fascinating to walk into it and through it.

anishk05
Amish Kapoor, Dirty Corner in the Versailles Gardens

In an interview to Stephanie Belpêche, special correspondent of “Le Journal du Dimanche”, Kapoor said: “My work has no decorative purpose. I want to engage with the work of Le Nôtre, who ordered nature for eternity with perfect geometric perspectives. … I had the idea to upset the balance and invite chaos.” (3)

Red rock, part of the "Dirty Corner" installation in the gardens of the Versailles. Jacques Graf/Divergence pour le JDD
Red rock, part of the “Dirty Corner” installation in the gardens of the Versailles. Jacques Graf/Divergence pour le JDD

It’s very shocking!” an elderly Frenchwoman cries as she interrupts her promenade down the main axis of the Gardens of Versailles to point out a massive boulder, spray-painted a florid red. (1)

So far so good.

dirty_corner1
Amish Kapoor, Dirty Corner in the Versailles Gardens

But in the same interview, Kapoor dropped a bomb: “Facing the castle, there will be a mysterious sculpture of rusted steel 10 meters high (my remark: he refers to the Dirty Corner, weighing thousands of tons of stones and blocks all around. Again sexual nature: the vagina of the Queen who took power.” (3)

After this provocative statement, “Dirty Corner” in Versailles was no longer just about the almost “neutral” issue of chaos versus order, to be addressed over a cup of afternoon tea, it became a matter of royalty, gender politics, and sex.

dirty-corner-d-anish-kapoor-a-versailles-1_5354469
Amish Kapoor, Dirty Corner in the Versailles Gardens

Quite obviously, one is led to conclude that Kapoor in addition to being a great artist, he is also a great marketeer.

So, quite naturally, after he dropped the “vagina” bomb, he retracted his statement in a BBC interview:

“A work has multiple interpretive possibilities,” he said.

“Inevitably, one comes across the body, our bodies and a certain level of sexuality. But it is certainly not the only thing it is about.” (4)

Hmmmm…. nice try but not very convincing.

dirty_corner2
Amish Kapoor, Dirty Corner in the Versailles Gardens

Michele Hanson, an author and Guardian columnist, wrote on the 8 June 2015:

“…And it’s meant to be Marie Antoinette’s vagina. I know the queen had her faults, but it’s a very odd vagina – a vast, brutish, metal, grubby-looking, gaping funnel into a black hole. I must say I’m a bit fed up with this sort of idea of a vagina… We’ve had vagina dinner plates, vagina flowers, vagina canoes and even an “origin of the world” vagina. Now here comes a fellow who still thinks vaginas are big “dirty”, dark, wide open holes.” (5)

The artist responded angrily on Wednesday, 10 June 2015.

“Your columnist Michele Hanson has got completely the wrong end of the stick (A certain age, 9 June). My work at Versailles is called Dirty Corner and has nothing to do with Marie Antoinette or her vagina. Perhaps it would be good for Ms Hanson to use her eyes when looking at art, not her ears.” (6)

Amish Kapoor
Amish Kapoor

I agree with Ms. Hanson. I do not see the point of the artist associating “Dirty Corner” with a vagina at this stage of the work’s life. If “Dirty Corner” were associated in Mr. Kapoor’s mind with a vagina, he should have said so when he installed the work in Milan, back in 2011. Doing it now, can only be attributed to an effective marketing and publicity ploy.

Of course there is another explanation. That Mr. Kapoor just made a mistake and has subsequently tried to recover from it. This is a distinct possibility, but not a credible one, because of the way Mr. Kapoor reacted to Ms. Hanson’s comment.   Had he genuinely made a mistake, he should have acknowledged it and make a statement to that effect. Instead, he castigated Ms. Hanson for not narrow-mindedness!

Going back to the work itself, I must say that I like it, and I prefer the chaos versus order paradigm to the “Queen’s genitalia”. Sadly, the “vagina” association propagated by Mr. Kapoor in my eyes had the opposite effect. It distracted all attention from the work to a “forced and directed interpretation”. Something that goes against any notion of the liberating impact of art.

dirty_corner4
Amish Kapoor, Dirty Corner in the Versailles Gardens

Sources

(1) The Wall Street Journal, June 10, 2015

(2) “Amish Kapoor, Dirty Corner“, designboom, june 2, 2011

(3) “Amish Kapoor invites chaos in Versailles”, Le Journal du Dimanche, 31 May 2015

(4) Sculptor Anish Kapoor defends Versailles ‘vagina’ artwork, BBC, 5 June 2015

(5) Michele Hanson, Artists have done vaginas to death – will someone please tell Anish Kapoor, The Guardian, 8 June 2015

(6) Kapoor: Dirty Corner has no vagina in sight, The Guardian, 10 June 2015

Kallipygos: The nude female behind in Classical Greek and Hellenistic sculpture

venus_kallipygos_naples
Aphrodite Kallipygos, National Archaelogical Museum, Naples, Italy

“ήν καλλιπύγων ζεύγος εν Συρακούσαις”

Ήταν στις Συρακούσες ένα ζευγάρι κοπελιές μ’ ωραία πισινά”

“There was in Syracuse a pair of girls with beautiful buttocks”

Athinaeos, Deipnosophistae, 554d, Vol. 12

Athinaeos wrote a wonderful story about culture and dining in the Greco-Roman world of the 3rd century AD. His masterpiece is considered to be the first cookbook, but it is a lot more.

He tells a story about two girls with beautiful buttocks and concludes by referring to a temple in Syracuse, dedicated to Aphrodite Kallipygos.

Kallipygos is a composite Greek word, meaning the one who has beautiful buttocks.

Kalos = beauty

pygos = buttock, or behind, or arse

Aphrodite Kallipygos, National Archaelogical Museum, Naples, Italy
Aphrodite Kallipygos, National Archaelogical Museum, Naples, Italy

The statue of Aphrodite Kallipygos in the National Archaeological Museum of Naples is a Roman copy of the Greek original, dating back to the 1st century BC (1).

The woman lifts her dress and turns to see her buttocks reflected in the water of a pond or something like that.

She may be one of the two sisters mentioned by Athinaeos, but we will never know.

The original sculpture is attributed to 2nd century BC, and thus belongs to the Hellenistic period.

The attribution of a work to a period (Classical Greek or Hellenistic) is indicative. A lot of the information on the original sculpture is questionable, and the resemblance of the copy to the original is also subject to scrutiny. It is well known that the Roman copiers had quite an eclectic attitude towards making copies.

Aphrodite Cnidus, Glyptothek, Munich
Aphrodite Braschi, Glyptothek, Munich (Photo by Panathinaeos)

The works included in the post contain a representation of the female nude.

I use the word “nude” rather than “naked”, in reference to a distinction that originated in Kenneth Clark’s “The Nude” (2).

According to Clark, the “nude” is an invention of the Greeks, an “idealization”. The “naked” is the ordinary, the mundane.

I will use the term “nude” differently, to imply a multiplicity of layers of sense and representation, compared and contrasted to the “naked” that has a single layer, the physical / instinctual.

The first Greek sculpture depicting a female in full nudity was most likely Praxiteles’ Aphrodite.

It was the middle of 4th century BC when the Greek sculptor Praxiteles was commissioned by the island of Kos to produce a sculpture of goddess Aphrodite.

He produced two, one fully clothed, and another fully nude.

The citizens of Kos were too conservative to accept the nude sculpture, and it was purchased by the city of Knidos, on the Minor Asia peninsula just south of Kos.

Aphrodite Braschi, back, Glyptothek Munich
Aphrodite Braschi, back, Glyptothek Munich. (Photo by Panathinaeos)

The Aphrodite of the Glyptothek in Munich is one of the many copies of Praxiteles’ Knidian Aphrodite, made in the Roman period.(3)

It shows Aphrodite placing her drape on top of a “hydria” (water jar), as she is ready to take her bath. Her right hand (broken) covers her pubic area.

Until the depiction of the fully nude female by Praxiteles, Greek Art was only depicting full male nudity.

Even after the Aphrodite of Knidos, the dominant theme in nudity was male, be it athletes, warriors, gods, deities, and so on.

The Three Graces Roman copy of a Greek work of the second century B.C. Marble. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
The Three Graces
Roman copy of a Greek work of the second century B.C.
Marble. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

The impact of the Knidian Aphrodite on the Greek world was huge.

The three graces, surviving today as a Roman copy of the 2nd century B.C. Greek original, is a good example of the impact. The original belongs to the “Hellenistic” period. Its distinctive feature is that instead of one female figure we have a group of three in harmony.

The Hellenistic period was a “lighter” period compared to the “classical”, during which the artists celebrated the joy of life and emphasized earthly, hedonistic aspects of the human existence. They also depicted vices (e.g. The Drunken Woman) It is as if the classical period landed on earth.

The Three Graces Roman copy of a Greek work of the second century B.C. Marble. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
The Three Graces
Roman copy of a Greek work of the second century B.C.
Marble. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

We have three female figures, more relaxed compared to the rather uncomfortable Aphrodite of Knidos, ready to take their baths, as their towels indicate, enjoying the moment.

Notice that they do not attempt to cover their body. Their hands rest elegantly on the other graces’ shoulders.

The Roman copy sculpture was placed in a garden or  a public building like a bath.

The Broghese Hermaphrodite, Louvre, PAris, France.
The Borghese Hermaphrodite – front, Louvre, Paris, France.

Hermaphroditus was the son of Aphrodite and Hermes.

The marble sculpture that reclines on a marble mattress sculpted by Bernini in 1620 was discovered in the Church of Santa Maria della Vittoria in Rome. It is an early Roman Empire copy of a bronze sculpture created by Greek sculptor Polycles around the middle of the 2nd century BC.

The sculpture was sold to Napoleon and thus it found itself in the Louvre.

Another copy is displayed today in Villa Borghese of Rome.

hermaphrodite_back_750
The Borghese Hermaphrodite – back, Louvre, Paris, France.

This is a highly sensual sculpture.

The hermaphrodite is seemingly asleep, but there is expectation all over.

The breasts and male genitals are visible, leaving no doubt as to the hybrid nature of the creature, man and woman bound together.

A 18th century visitor commented: “This is the only happy couple that I have seen”.

Sources

1. The National Archaeological Museum of Naples. Electa Napoli, 1996.

2. Kenneth Clark. The Nude: A Study in Ideal Form.

3. Raimund Wuensche. Glyptothek, Munich.  C.H. Beck. Verlag, Munich 2007.

Balthus (Balthazar Klossowski) revisited

Parenthesis: The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York has a Balthus Exhibition “Cats and Girls“(September 25, 2013–January 12, 2014). 

“I never interpreted my paintings or sought to understand what they might mean. Anyway, must they necessarily mean something?” Balthus (2)

Balthus and his Japanese wife Setsuko
Balthus and his Japanese wife Setsuko

Back in 2009 I wrote an article on Balthus, one of my favorite painters of the 20th century, where I presented some of his paintings. I did not attempt (futility prevented me) to analyze them, I simply presented them, some of them with one sentence comments or questions.

Today I revisit Balthus after having seen three of his works at the Art Institute of Chicago. This time I will succumb to futility and write some purely subjective sentences, some borrowed, some mine.

Paraphrasing Gadamer’s central thesis of hermeunetics, objectivity is not a suitable ideal for understanding art, because there exists no correct or wrong interpretation of art.

One of Balthus' palettes, Metropolitan Museum of New York
One of Balthus’ palettes, Metropolitan Museum of New York

Born in Paris in 1908, Balthus spent the bulk of his life secluded from the public, produced some 350 paintings and 1,600 drawings and died in February 2001, 10 days before his 93rd birthday.Balthus came from an intellectually privileged environment. His father was a Polish art historian, painter and critic whose close friends included Andre Gide and Pierre Bonnard. Two years after his parents separated in 1917, his mother became the lover of poet Rainer Maria Rilke. Under Rilke’s tutelage, the young Balthus began to flourish as an artist. In 1921, when he was only 12, Balthus published a book of 40 drawings with a preface by Rilke. (1)

Cartier Bresson: Balthus and his cat
Cartier Bresson: Balthus and his cat

It was Rilke who, “showed me nocturnal paths, giving me a taste for slipping through narrow passages to reach The Open.” This concept of The Open, an ethereal crossing to a place of mystery, became the sought after truth of his art. Balthus referred frequently to his Catholicism, his prayerful approach. I suspect he could have used other rites or religions to arrive at The Opening. His faith, while sincere, became a part of his craft, a device as much as a dedication. (2)

In 1949, Albert Camus provided an introductory essay for an exhibition of paintings by his friend … Balthus. “We do not know how to see reality,” wrote Camus of Balthus’s strange and sometimes sexually suggestive paintings of adolescent girls, “and all the disturbing things our apartments, our loved ones and our streets conceal.” (4)

Balthus saw himself as a laborer humbly approaching his craft. He spent years on each canvas, usually painting on three at once so that a dialogue would evolve between them. “I often insist on the necessity of prayer. To paint as one prays…to accede to silence and what is invisible in the world. I am not sure of being followed or understood…given that a majority of morons make so-called contemporary art, artists who know nothing about painting. But that doesn’t matter. Painting has always taken care of itself. In order to reach it even slightly, I’d say it must be ritually seized. To snatch what it can offer as a form of grace.” (2)

Balthus with Frederique Tison by the window at the Chateau de Chassy
Balthus with Frederique Tison by the window at the Chateau de Chassy, 1956

Solitaire (1943)

The most known painting that I saw at the Art Institute of Chicago is “Solitaire”.

In the Art Institute’s website I read: “Balthus is best known for his mysterious, emotionally charged scenes of adolescents, which often place the viewer in the position of a voyeur. Solitaire was painted in Switzerland, where the artist returned during World War II. It reveals the influence of such Old Masters as Piero della Francesca and Paolo Uccello in its monumentality as well as its awkwardness, both of which Balthus used to underscore the irrational and disconcerting nature of unconscious human behavior.”

patience-1943.jpg!HD
Balthus, Solitaire, 1943, Oil on canvas, Art Institute of Chicago

In the next sentences I will try to deconstruct the painting with a view to revealing their underlying complexities and hidden contradictions.. Note: This is not an exercise in futility (I hope).

“Deconstruction, in other words, guards against the belief — a belief that has led to much violence — that the world is simple and can be known with certainty. It confronts us with the limits of what it is possible for human thought to accomplish.” (5)

Some of the key components of this painting are:  a young woman, cards (a game of “solitaire”), a chair, an armchair, a (jewel?) box (open),  a table, a candle, a window covered by a striped wallpaper, a folded curtain, a carpet.

Young women are consistently a subject in Balthus’ paintings. Points of interest: the tension of the muscles of the left leg as it extends backward in order to provide support to the leaning forward body. The hands. The horizontal face.

The light red – thick orange jacket. Compare the jacket to that of the “Sleeping girl”. By the way, the identity of the woman posing in the “Dormeuse” is not known, but she looks like the woman playing “solitaire”. The year is the same, 1943.

Balthus, Sleeping Girl, 1943, Tate Gallery, London
Balthus, Sleeping Girl, 1943, Tate Gallery, London

Solitaire: The aim of the game is to arrange the set of cards in order from ascending to descending, and sorted by suite. This is a game of luck. The probability of winning is low, which is good as the purpose of the game is to increase patience, a virtue that adds to one’s personality. (Wikipedia). I would like to suggest that Blathus is using the game metaphorically. He is one of the players of another game, one he plays with the spectator of the painting.

Balthus, Patience, 1954-1955
Balthus, Patience, 1954-1955

Armchair: a device of loose solitary confinement. Very often Balthus includes an armchair in his paintings (see “Girl and Cat”).

(Jewel) Box: In “solitaire” we see an open box on the armchair.  I cannot resist the temptation to recall Freud’s Dora: “Dora’s father wakes her up because the house is on fire. Dora gets dressed quickly to leave the house, but her mother wants to look for her jewel-case before going. Dora’s father exclaims that he will not let himself and his two children die to save his wife’s jewel case.”

Striped wallpaper: this appears to be a device of space manipulation.

Folded curtain: ITs curve complements the curved body of the player. It also covers something.

Carpet: Its beautiful patterns and colours introduce asymmetry in the picture. Something can always function in an unsettling way.

Balthus, Study for Solitaire, 1943
Balthus, Study for Solitaire, 1943

Japanese photographer Hisaji Hara has created a series of photographs inspired by Balthus’ paintings. (I thank the “arte facto” blog for the unveiling of Hara’s art).

 Balthus’s studies of girls in often stilted poses are certainly timeless in their strangeness, their evocation of a pre-adult world of dark childhood reverie. Now, Japanese photographer Hisaji Hara has made a series of images that meticulously recreate some of Balthus’s most famous paintings. Made between 2006 and 2011, they are beautiful in a quiet way, and give off not so much a sense of timelessness as of time stilled. Interestingly, given that they are photographs of a real young girl, they do not exude the same sinister suggestiveness of the originals. (4)
Hisaji Hara, Solitaire
Hisaji Hara, Solitaire

Artist Michelle Arnold Paine has published in her website a sketch of solitaire. She writes:

“I was particularly interested in Balthus’ close attention to the negative shapes – the spaces between the arms, between the torso and the table, etc. These are shapes of air — where there is no object, but just as important as the “positive” shapes (the objects in the painting).”

Michelle Arnold Paine's sketch of Balthus' Solitaire
Michelle Arnold Paine’s sketch of Balthus’ Solitaire

Diversion: Game of Cards (1950)

I copy from the highly informative text written by Paloma Alarcó and presented in the Thyssen Museum’s webpage (7):

“The Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza Card Game is a canvas in large format painted between 1948 and 1950, when Balthus resumed painting with renewed energy after the war. It shows two youngsters, a boy and a girl, playing cards at a table on which a candlestick stands, inside a simple, stark room. The austerity, monumentality, geometry and colouring of the painting clearly denote Balthus’s admiration for the work of Piero della Francesca. In the scene the light that enters from the right-hand side of the room coldly illuminates various objects and adds to the mystery of the picture.

Balthus, Study for The Game of Cards, 1947
Balthus, Study for The Game of Cards, 1947

In Balthus’s paintings girls are queens and are therefore always portrayed as the winners. Boys normally play a more secondary role in the scene as impassive companions or rivals in games which they invariably lose. Although in the present painting the boy is prepared to cheat in order to win, the girl’s veiled smile shows that once again the norms governing Balthus’s world will prevail and she will be the winner in the end. The boy’s disjointed pose, which combines a frontal and profile view simultaneously, had already been used by Balthus in the illustrations forWuthering Heights. The obscure childhood world of the main characters in Emily Brontë’s work, on which the artist made a large series of drawings in 1933 that were published in 1935 in Minotaure, the Surrealists’ magazine, is the origin of much of Balthus’s mature work.”

Balthus, Game of Cards, 1948-1950, Thyssen Bornemisza Museum
Balthus, Game of Cards, 1948-1950, Thyssen Bornemisza Museum

Diversion: The Cardplayers (1973)

This work was painted in Rome when Balthus, born as Count Balthasar Klossowski de Rola, was director of the Académie de France in the Villa Medici. It is said that Balthus started the work after visiting a Kabuki performance in Japan. This form of theatre features re-enactments of historical events and highlights moral conflicts in the love between man and woman. Because women were forbidden from taking part in these performances, the female roles were played by male actors. This perhaps explains the androgynous appearance of the figure on the right.

Balthus, The Cardgame, 1973, Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, Rotterdam, Netherlands
Balthus, The Cardgame, 1973, Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, Rotterdam, Netherlands

Untitled (1972)

This drawing (Graphite and charcoal on tan elephant paper) is an interlude between solitaire and the girl and cat.

 

Girl and Cat (1937)

Sabine Rewald writes in her article “Balthus’s Thereses”:

“The painter’s finest portrayals of adolescents are his series of paintings from 1936 to 1939 for which young Therese Blanchard served as model. Therese and her brother Hubert were neighbors of Balthus at the Cour de Rohan, near the place de l’Odeon in Paris… Therese Blanchard also posed for Girl with a Cat of 1937 and its later, more masterly version Therese Dreaming of 1938 in the Gelman Collection. With her kneesock falling down and her sleeves pushed up, Therese in Girl with a Cat looks as if she has been called away from play. Her pale skin and turquoise, white, and red garments stand out against the harsh background of the painter’s studio, in which the fat tiger cat blends perceptibly. Balthus has imbued her quite innocent exhibitionism with suggestiveness. The erotic mood is heightened by the strict discipline of the composition.”

Balthus, Girl with Cat, Art Institute of Chicago - detail
Balthus, Girl and Cat, 1937, Art Institute of Chicago – detail

Notice the asymmetry of the pulled up slieves.

Balthus, Girl with Cat, Art Institute of Chicago - detail
Balthus, Girl and Cat, Art Institute of Chicago – detail

Notice the aymmetry of the socks, one rolled down, the other rolled up.

Balthus, Girl with Cat, Art Institute of Chicago - detail
Balthus, Girl and Cat, 1937, Art Institute of Chicago – detail

The mysterious cat.

Girl and Cat
Balthus, Girl and Cat, 1937, Art Institute of Chicago

Diversion: Therese dreaming (1938)

With closed eyes, Balthus’s pubescent model is lost in thought. Thérèse Blanchard, who was about twelve or thirteen at the time this picture was made, and her brother Hubert were neighbors of Balthus in Paris. She appears alone, with her cat, or with her brother in a series of eleven paintings done between 1936 and 1939.

Balthus, Therese Dreaming, 1938, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA
Balthus, Therese Dreaming, 1938, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA

Diversion: Therese (1938)

Balthus, Therese, 1938, Metropolitan Museum of Arts, New York, USA
Balthus, Therese, 1938, Metropolitan Museum of Arts, New York, USA

No matter how many times I look at these pictures, I always fell that it is the first time. There is surprise, there is mystery, the unknown is lurking in the face of the subject(s), behing the curtains, under the chairs, in the eues of the cats.

Frederique Tison at the Chateau de Chassy, 1956
Frederique Tison at the Chateau de Chassy, 1956

In the end, Balthus remained secretive, held true to his word: To know him, know his art. He would explain neither. And that ambiguity is probably best. Impossible anyway to explain the source of his ripening nudes, peculiar portraits and resplendent landscapes. “To go toward The Open,” he said, “to approach and sometimes attain it by snatching deferred moments, and then return to passing time.” (2)

“I detest the word ‘artist’ and find the word ‘creation’–so often used by those who call themselves artists–pretentious. As for me, I would simply call myself a craftsman. The word artist is synonymous with individualism and the assertion of one’s personality, two predominant notions in today’s society. Of course, people often say, ‘One must be oneself.’ But what is ‘oneself’? Who really knows?” Balthus: In His Own Words (6) 

Balthus in his studio at the Chateau de Chassy, 1956
Balthus in his studio at the Chateau de Chassy, 1956

Sources

1. “Vanished Splendors: A Memoir” By Balthus, Dan Tranberg

2. BALTHUS: ALCHEMIST OF VANISHING SPLENDOR, A non-review by J. STEFAN-COLE

3. Balthus vs. Hisaji Hara,  arte_facto [hereges perversões]

4. Hisaji Hara – review,  Michael Hoppen Contemporary London, Sean O’Hagan, The Observer

5. Jacques Derrida and Deconstruction, Mitchell Stephens, The New York Times Magazine, 1994

6. Balthus was the Bomb, cara walz studio notes

7. The Card Game, Thyssen – Bornemisza collection

The Crouching Venus at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London

Some time ago I wrote about “A crouching Aphrodite in London“, a sculpure I saw at the British Museum. It is Roman, 2nd century AD; a version of an original from Hellenistic Greece.

Crouching Aphrodite, British Museum. London
Crouching Aphrodite, British Museum. London

Today I want to introduce “The crouching Venus” (1702) of John Nost the Elder, which I saw at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London.

Crouching Venus, V&A Museum, London
Crouching Venus, V&A Museum, London

I quote form the Museum’s website:

“The Crouching Venus is a remarkable instance of John Nost the Elder’s assured carving, and is a rare surviving example of a classical subject by the artist in marble. The sculpture’s scale and accomplishment give it a grandeur and presence which were truly exceptional at that date in Britain. Like the antique prototype, Venus is depicted ineffectually attempting to cover her nakedness, her gesture only succeeding in drawing attention to her sensual body. The goddess is thought to be bathing, or possibly adjusting her hair, and caught unawares. Nost’s sculpture suggests the sophisticated level of patronage of the wealthy gentry in Britain at the start of the eighteenth century, and tantalisingly evokes the way in which interiors of eighteenth-century country houses were adorned with sculpture.”

Crouching Venus - detail
Crouching Venus – detail

I must confess that I did not know of the artist before I saw the crouching Venus.

What attracted my attention to it was that it looked very similar to the crouching Aphrodite I Saw at the British Museum. As a matter of fact, it seemed to me that it was a copy of the Roman-Hellenistic sculpture.

(Quite interestingly, there is no mention of such likeness in the V&A description.)

Crouching Aphrodite - detail
Crouching Aphrodite – detail

Let us start from the left arm and the band around it.

Crouching Venus - detail
Crouching Venus – detail

The head is the next area of examination.

Crouching Aphrodite - detail
Crouching Aphrodite – detail

The face, the hair style and the expression are the same. However, Aphrodite turns to her far left her face and looks down, while Venus just turns and looks straight.

Also, Venus clinches loosely her right fist, while Aphodite’s right hand’s fingers are straight.

Crouching Venus - detail
Crouching Venus – detail

Venus is slightly slimmer than Aphrodite.

Crouching Aphrodite - detail
Crouching Aphrodite – detail

Aphrodite’s figure is sumptuous.

Let us now have a look at the left hand.

Crouchnig Venus - detail
Crouchnig Venus – detail

The hand in both sculptures is “locked” between the thigh and the elbow.

Crouching Aphrodite - detail
Crouching Aphrodite – detail

The only difference appears to be the angle to the thigh and the fingers. One should point out though that quite obviously, Aphrodite’s fingers are reconstructed, as they were broken in the sculpture’s journey through the centuries.

Finally, the back side.

Crouching Venus - detail
Crouching Venus – detail

This may be the final and concluding observation regarding the hypothesis that the V&A Venus is a copy of the British Museum Aphrodite.

Crouching Aphrodite - detail
Crouching Aphrodite – detail

The posture of the body, the support of the jug, the tension of the muscles.

It seems that Venus is a copy of Aphrodite after all! 

Which of the two do I like best?

 

A crouching Aphrodite in London

I was in London for a few days and had the opportunity to visit the British Museum.

This post is about a crouching Aphrodite in the Museum. All the photos are mine, unless stated otherwise.

The statue’s official description given by the Museum’s web site is:

“Marble statue of a naked Aphrodite crouching at her bath”

Roman, 2nd century AD; a version of an original from Hellenistic Greece

The woman portrayed is a young woman, who literally sits on a jug of water which she presumably used to bathe herself.

Aphrodite or not, the woman is ordinary. There is nothing exceptional about here.

There is a very strong sense of motion in her body.

The body is turned to the left, but the face is looking at something to her right.

There is a sense of surprise in her look.

Her right hand is almost touching her hair on the left.

The overall posture of the body seems to be unusual by today’s strandards, and this is not only because of the jug.

Why did she assume this highly uncomfortable position?

What was the reason she turned her head to her right?

Was her name Aphrodite? Or the artist named the model in such a way due to commercial reasons?

This statue is sometimes known as ‘Lely’s Venus’ since it once belonged to the baroque portrait painter Sir Peter Lely (1618-80). It was subsequently acquired by King Charles I (reigned 1625-49).

(Source: British Museum’s website)

The three-dimensionality of the statue is typical of Hellenistic sculpture, as is the hairstyle with its elaborate top-knot. (Source: British Museum’s website)

Other versions of the crouching Aphrodite are known: some have an additional figure of Eros, the god of love, while others show the goddess kneeling on a water jar to indicate that she is bathing. (Source: British Museum’s website)

The way of expressing the human figure is realistic.  The idealization of the classical period has gone.

Another classical feature that is absent is the focused sexuality of the female body.

I look at this body and it has strength, it has tension, it stands solidly on earth, but is not the body that invites to sexual pleasures by its posture or disposition.

Compare and contrast with this statue, which stands next to the crouching Aphrodite.

It is this unique ability of the artist to portray a normal woman taken by surprise after taking her bath that moved me. It is real, it is strong, it is right in front of you and makes a statement: “I exist”. The nakedness of the body is not shocking, or arousing. It comes naturally. This simplicity and directness and total respect for the unadulterated human body, makes this statue special.

 

Diane Arbus, American Photographer

Diane Arbus

Photographer

American

Female

“Diane was fascinated by weirdos,”

“Not just by their weirdness, but by their commitment to weirdness.” James Randi

“I go up and down a lot” Diane Arbus

…violent changes of mood…

 48 years old

fully dressed in a bathtub

her wrists slit

………….

Venice: A “Fluxus Eleatis” Discourse

Michel Foucault:  Discourse operates in four major ways. Discourse creates a world; discourse generates knowledge and “truth”; discourse says something about the people who speak it; discourse always incorporates elements of power.

Socrates und Alcibiades

 A poem by Friedrich Hoelderlin

“Warum huldigest du, heiliger Socrates,

“Diesem Juenglinge stets? kennest du Groessers nicht?

“Warum siehet mit Liebe,

“Wie auf Goetter, dein Aug’ auf ihn?

Wer das Tiefste gedacht, liebt das Lebendigste,

Hohe Jugend versteht, wer in die Welt geblikt

Und es neigen die Weisen

Oft am Ende zu Schoenem sich.

 

Gustav von Aschenbach: ‘What lies in wait for me here, Ambiguous Venice, Where water is married to stone, And passion confuses the senses?’

 

Farfarello: And so, if you’d like to give me your soul before its time, I’m here, ready to take it.

 

Luchino Visconti: The sky has to be orange, even if Fassbinder copies me in Querelle.

 

Mr. FFF:  I started my trip from the Northern Cemetery in Munich. I arrived in Venice by train. The Marathon run finished a few minutes ago. There are many visitors. The water of the lagoon has a dull grey color. It is chilly. It is cloudy but there is no rain. Mrs. T misses you already.

MM:  Do not get lost in the art farm that is Venice! I googled and saw that you have bad weather and it’s raining. Hope you got your wellies.

 

Apollo: Reason, control, and clarity

 

Gustav von Aschenbach: I am furious because I am forced to return, but secretly I rejoice.

 

Dionysus: Wander lust

 

Gustav von Aschenbach:  Vacillating, irresolute, absurd.

 

Thomas Mann: A life spiraling out of control.

 

Friedrich Hoelderlin:

Und immer,

Ins Ungebundene gehet eine Sehnsucht.

(And always,

there is a longing to dissolve)

 

Mr. FFF:   In Palazzo Grassi I met Mr. Dob, the Manga character that has been adopted by Takashi Murakami. He has three eyes and an energizing stare.  Mr. Dob inhabits Murakami’s masterpiece 727-272 (The Emergence of God at the Reversal of Fate). Mrs. T is in love with him but he ignores her.  For her, it was love at first sight. For him, she does not even exist.

 

MM:  Luckily today I will be on scrub watch so that should keep me busy enough not to think about not having the both of you around.

 

Don Giovanni:

 Deh vieni alla finestra, o mio tesoro,

Deh vieni a consolar il pianto mio.

Se neghi a me di dar qualche ristoro,

Davanti agli occhi tuoi morir vogl’ io.

Tu ch’ ai la bocca dolce piu che il miele,

Tu che il zucchero porti in mezzo il core!

Non esser, gioia mia, con me crudele!

Lascati almen veder, mio bell’ amore!

Friedrich Nietzsche: To experience a thing as beautiful means: to experience it necessarily wrongly – (which, incidentally, is why marriage for love is, from the point of view of society, the most unreasonable king of marriage). The demand for art and beauty is an indirect demand for the ecstasies of sexuality communicated to the brain.

 

Farfarello: Well, then, since of necessity you love yourself with the greatest love of which you’re capable, of necessity you desire your happiness as strongly as you can. And since this supreme desire of yours can never be satisfied even in the smallest degree, it follows that in no way can you escape being unhappy.

 

Gustav von Aschenbach: Time presses, time does not press

Constantine Cavafy: Πλαϊ στο παραθυρο ηταν το κρεββατι που αγαπηθηκαμε τοσες φορες. (By the window was the bed where we made love so many times).

 

Mr. FFF:  A Cretan Madonna in Santa Maria della Salute. It was taken from the Church of Saint Titus in the last minute before fleeing Candia and Crete, by the Commander of the Venetians Morozini. The Ottomans captured Candia immediately after. Crete and Venice, share a co-existence that brought El Greco to Venice before he continued his journey to go to Spain.

MM:  I can’t say I am doing such exciting stuff as you. I waited in line for an hour to change the tires on my car and now it’s being done. Nothing fun to report.  Of course I miss the both of you terribly. It seems like I cannot have meaningful conversation with anybody else, but you.  Not to mention the fact that we took our jokes and puns to a whole other level and now whatever jokes anybody tries to do is pointless.

 

Filippo Ottonieri: Except for the times of suffering, as well as of fear, I would think that the worst moments are those of pleasure because the hope for them and the memory of them, which occupy the rest of our lives, are better and much more pleasant than the pleasures themselves.

 

Thomas Schutte: Efficiency Men, Punta della Dogana, Venice

Jean Baudrillard: Everyday experience falls like snow. Immaterial, crystalline and microscopic, it enshrouds all the features of the landscape. It absorbs sounds, the resonance of thoughts and events; the wind sweeps across it sometimes with unexpected violence and it gives off an inner light, a malign fluorescence which bathes all forms in crepuscular indistinctness.  Watching time snow down, ideas snow down, watching the silence of some aurora borealis light up, giving in to the vertigo of enshrouding and whiteness.

 

Friedrich Hoelderlin:

 Wo aber gefahr ist, waechst,

Das Rettende auch.

(Where there is danger,

some Salvation grows there too.)

 

Gustav von Aschenbach : What if all were dead, and only we two left alive

Luigi Pirandello: The torment of imagining you far away – among other people who can have the joy of seeing you, talking to you, being near you while I am here without life because I can neither see you nor talk with you, nor be near you – can be mitigated only by the thought that you feel my presence within you and that even from far away you give me life, and that even in your silence you see me and talk to me; in one word, that I am alive and close to you, more than those who see you, talk to you, and are around you.

 


Mr. FFF:  Thomas Schuette’s “Efficiency Men” were waiting for me at the Punta della Dogana.  Their steel bodies were covered down to their knees by felt blankets. It was like a call to Joseph Beuys. His felt self is all over German Art.

 MM:  You realize I’m not having nearly as much fun as you are, but I expect to be entertained upon your return! So prepare lots of stories from Venice. You know the kind: money, blood and sex.

Giuseppe Ungaretti:

ECO

Scalza varcando da sabbie lunari,

Aurora, amore festoso, d’ un’ eco

Popoli l’ esule universe e lasci

Nella carne dei giorni,

Perenne scia, una piaga velata.

 

Luigi Pirandello: What life is there left for me? I don’t care anymore about anything. Only about you do I care, and all that concerns you, my Marta; if you suffer, suffering with you and for you; if you get angry, getting angry with you; if you hope, hoping with you and for you. And remaining – for as long as I stay alive, for as long as my eyes stay open, for as long as my heart keeps beating, for as long as the soul burns in me – with my eyes, my heart, my soul, enchanted by your beauty, by the charms of your person, by the divine nobility of your feelings and of your spirit.

Adele:

Whenever I’m alone with you

You make me feel like I am home again

Whenever I’m alone with you

You make me feel like I am whole again

Whenever I’m alone with you

You make me feel like I am young again

Whenever I’m alone with you

You make me feel like I am fun again

However far away I will always love you

However long I stay I will always love you

Whatever words I say I will always love you

I will always love you

Mr. FFF:  Fog everywhere. I boarded a U-boat where a rabbi was reading the Kaballah. Later, in Hotel Metropol during lunch I met an Indian Maharadja and his German maiden.

MM:  All these cultural encounters! We redid the kitchen; the hard part is over now. You may be interested to know that nothing works without me!

Gustav Mahler: I should not have cried on the train departing Venice. I should not have dismissed Alma’s music compositions. It is too late now.  I gave my name to von Aschenbach.

Discource Participants

Adele, English singer

Apollo, Greek God of light

Gustav von Aschenbach, German writer (through the pen of Thomas Mann, through the interpretation of Myfawny Piper, through the camera of Luchino Visconti, through the interpretation of Fluxus Eleatis)

Jean Baudrillard, French philosopher

Constantine Cavafy, Greek poet

Dionysus, Greek God of pleasure

Farfarello, character created by Giacomo Leopardi

Michel Foucault, French philosopher

Mr. FFF, wanderer

Don Giovanni, a young, extremely licentious nobleman (created by Lorenzo da Ponte)

Friedrich Hoelderlin, German poet

Gustav Mahler, Austrian composer

Thomas Mann, German writer

MM, partner

Friedrich Nietzsche, German philosopher

Filippo Ottonieri, philosopher created by Giacomo Leopardi

Luigi Pirandello, Italian writer and Nobel Laureate

Giuseppe Ungaretti, Italian poet

Luchino Visconti, Italian director

Awakening(s) – Ξυπνημα(τα)

The poetic mood is prevailing today. Poetic awakenings. Dedicated to Smaranda.

Εχω ποιητικη διαθεση σημερα. Ξυπνηματα ποιητικα.  Αφιερωμενα στη Σμαραντα.

Jalalu’ddin Rumi

Rumi (30 September 1207 – 17 December 1273) was a Muslim poet, jurist, theologist and Sufi mystic.

Rumi has influenced thousands of people across the centuries with his poetry and his vision of our relationship with God as a path of love.

His work unlock’s love’s precious secrets and initiates us into the mysteries of our most essential nature.

The Sufis understand the human heart to be the macrocosm, not just the microcosm, of the universe.

Whatever is in your heart is everywhere.

If you have anger in your heart, you will experience anger from others, ig hate, you shall be hated; if love, you shall be loved.

By knowing the mystery of your own heart, you begin to resonate with the mysteries of existence.

THE AWAKENING

A poem by Rumi

 In the early dawn of happiness

you gave me three kisses
so that I would wake up
to this moment of love

I tried to remember in my heart
what I’d dreamt about
during the night
before I became aware
of this moving
of life

I found my dreams
but the moon took me away
It lifted me up to the firmament
and suspended me there
I saw how my heart had fallen
on your path
singing a song

Between my love and my heart
things were happening which
slowly slowly
made me recall everything

You amuse me with your touch
although I can’t see your hands.
You have kissed me with tenderness
although I haven’t seen your lips
You are hidden from me.

But it is you who keeps me alive

Perhaps the time will come
when you will tire of kisses
I shall be happy
even for insults from you
I only ask that you
keep some attention on me.

Giuseppe Ungaretti

Ungaretti is one of my favourite poets. I wrote an article about him back in 2009.

I start with the poem “Awakenings” in the original language, Italian, and then with my interpretation in English.

RISVEGLI

Ogni mio momento

io l’ho vissuto
un’altra volta
in un’epoca fonda
fuori di me
Sono lontano colla mia memoria
dietro a quelle vite perse
Mi desto in un bagno
di care cose consuete
sorpreso
e raddolcito
Rincorro le nuvole
che si sciolgono dolcemente
cogli occhi attenti
e mi rammento
di qualche amico
morto
Ma Dio cos’è?
E la creatura
atterrita
sbarra gli occhi
e accoglie
gocciole di stelle
e la pianura muta
E si sente
riavere
David Hockney

AWAKENINGS

A poem by Giuseppe Ungaretti

My every moment

I lived

yet again

in a deeply rooted period

outside of me

Anselm Kiefer

My memory is back away

looking for those lost lives

Anselm Kiefer

I wake up in a bath

of things that are familiar and I care for

surprised

and at peace

Anselm Kiefer

I chase the clouds

that spread themselves smoothly

with watchful eyes

and I remember

a friend

who is dead

Anselm Kiefer

But what is God?

Anselm Kiefer

And the creature

buffled

with wide open eyes

gathers

star drops

and the silent field

David Hockney

And feels

to come alive again

David Hockney

George Sarantaris

Sarantaris  is another favourite of mine. I wrote about him back in 2010.
Ξυπνάμε και η θάλασσα ξυπνά μαζί μας
Γ. Σαραντάρης
Ξυπνάμε και η θάλασσα ξυπνά μαζί μας
Με όραση καινούρια προχωρούμε
Η μέρα έχει μαιάνδρους
Όπως η θάλασσα κύματα
Στην καρδιά μας αδειάσαμε (προσωρινά)
Την πόλη
Εμείναμε με την εικόνα τ’ ουρανού
O ήλιος εμέτρησε τη γη μας
Η μέρα τούτη όπου ξυπνήσαμε
Με θάλασσα και κύματα
Με όραση και μνήμη καθαρή
Τόσο μεγάλωσε
Που ο ήλιος δεν μπόρεσε να τη μετρήσει
Που ο ήλιος δεν μπόρεσε να τη χωρέσει
Henri Matisse
We wake up and the sea wakes up with us
A poem by George Sarantaris
We wake up and the sea wakes up with us
We walk with new vision
The day has twists and turns
Like the sea has waves
In our heart we have disposed (temporarily)
The city
We remained fixated with the picture of the sky
The sun has measured our earth
This day we are awake
With the sea and the waves
With clear vision and memory
It has grown so much
That the sun could not measure it
That the sun could not hold it