An August Sunday in New York
We had a grand time today at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, exchanging corrective glances during a walking lecture on the arts, fine and decorative alike, of Eighteenth-Century France. Our leader’s art was sound, but his grasp of history was more blather and invention that we found digestible. The most egregious sins: Watteau was not of the same generation as Boucher and Fragonard (Watteau died some time before Fragonard was born); Louis XV did not return the court to the Louvre; and Mme de Pompadour did not inspire the invention of upholstery. Also, the French Academy of art (l’Académie de France à Rome) was never situated in Paris. It still isn’t.
LXIV was particularly exercised by the notion, broadcast by the curator, that André-Charles Boulle caught the attention of the Sun King by hauling his commodes out onto the Rue St-Antoine on days when the king was riding out to Vincennes.
Fossil Darling, in contrast, claimed to be entranced by the experience. But don’t worry; justice triumphed. He was made to pay half of my martini bill at lunch at the Trustees’ Dining Room afterward. Where I made up a wonderful word – it just came to me – in connection with a failed financier: lootocrat. “It just came to me.”
Then we went to see the pots, pictured above. Aren’t they amazing? These Qing beauties have not been on view for a while, yet they are without a doubt objects that the Museum should never, ever, put in storage. Whoever made them climbed the Mount Everest of garish bad taste – and then declined to jump.
It was a lovely day, with lovely company. I cringe though at the thought of an even half-educated Frenchman having possibly been in the entourage to hear the embarrassingly incorrect blather, bordering on historically illiterate, that our guide was spouting for the “education” of the museum attending populace. His information was so filled with inaccuracies, let alone manufactured fantasies, that it was impossible to listen without a groan, when not hiding a smirk; needless to say it was a treat, if not an education. If this is the best this preeminent cultural institution, in the country’s cultural capital, can dish up, then I fear America really is benighted.
I did enjoy the day, fascinated by the formation of the school for artists, something I knew nothing about.
It was even more fun turning to LXIV and RJ to see if the guide was off course, and he was, much of the time. LXIV and RJ know far too much about Louis for me, but then there’s baseball………..
I even enjoyed being dragged to the pots : gorgeous
It sounds like a tour by Letice an Lovage. However, even that pales in comparison to those delightfully atrocious jars! Good heavens, I can’t tell if I am more appalled or delighted. Your right, they should be permanently on view.
Those pots. Are. Gorgeous. Hey. What’s with the color of this type. It’s pale celery, like the background. How am I supposed to find my typos. Are you punishing me cuz I’m on a Mac?
Those pots are a wonder of almost bad taste elevated to high art through the medium of superlative craft and execution. I suspect that they would be fine in certain settings, such as a Russian palace, where solid malachite walls and an avalanche of gilt bronze for its own sake would tone down these pots; though truth to tell, I think they probably could hold their own even in a Vegas showgirl’s boudoir, albeit a “refined” showgirl. Paging Miss Rose Lee…