The only reason I would open up an LAWeekley is to catch the latest from Marc Cooper or Doug Harvey. Doug Harvey's art world reviews are consistantly fresh and open and generous while simultaneously sharp and critical, a tough balance. There are few writers like him in the artworld. This week's offering is a review of the getty exhibition: ?Jacques-Louis David: Empire to Exile".
The trouble is, I just can't get past this passage:
Posted by Dennis at April 4, 2005 11:47 AM
After all, if you?ve reached the conclusion that liberty and equality have to be imposed from above, you might as well go whole-hog with the authority thing.
Yes, a bit troubling. I saw the show...found it strangely intriguing because of some of the portraiture. His portrait from prison reached across time. A head of the emperor and the Tuilleries picture were oddly riveting to me, and so were some others. I had the feeling I was seeing these people as they were in their faraway time. I'm still sorting out conflicting feelings about it. But I like being affected that way.
BTW, your trip log was great and thanks for all the Goya Goya Goya!
Sherie'
Maybe he means that liberty really must begin among the people. When it's imposed from above it doesn't last, or it gets really monstrous. To paraphrase, "If you're going to force liberty, plan on forcing all the little interactions that support it on a street level." Plan on going whole-hog with the authority thing.
Possible example: the USA brought democracy to Iraq, imposed it from above (we could argue all over the place about how it's being implemented) but if the people can't recognize the way liberty must play out on a street level, in person-to-person interactions, it isn't going anywhere.
Hello Bill and Sheri?:
I've read Doug Harvey's stuff for many years now and I'm sure this was merely a humorous aside. But it reminds me of a conversation (politics, what else?) I had with an acquaintance many many moons ago where my sparring partner finally said that he just wanted a benevolent dictator and be done with it. We laughed, but the undercurrent of seriousness in the remark -or a lack of seriousness in lightly tossing off the desire to be ruled by authoritarians -struck me as odd.
It is this oddness that I wanted to highllight here too.
-D
Oh yea, more Goya to come!
Well, as I read the Harvey passage I smirkingly flashed on the Bush administration.
It seems to me the events of that time and place are so relevant today. Nowhere is it more apparent than in the magnificent work of Goya. His images hover on the periphery of my imagination, maybe more often than I'm even aware. Can't get enough of him.
Sherie'