Stepping out of our saftey zone to the ST.Louis Art Museum

Yes, in these frightening times of the pandemic, going anywhere, which guarantees meeting up with people who might have the coronal virus, is challenging.  However, we were now into four months of our isolation and I especially wanted to see the St.Louis Art Museum's special exhibit "Millet and Modern Art".  It was well worth taking the challenge, and we were happy we went.  If we were careful we did not need to touch anything; museum staffers with big smiles opened the doors for us.  Inside everyone was wearing masks and there was no crowding, we were able to keep an appropriate distance from everyone. 

Jean  Francois Millet (1814-1875) was a French painter know for developing "innovative imagery of rural peasant and landscapes".  Any quotes I write here are from the informational signs accompanying the art work.  In 1885 Vincent Van Gogh wrote :"Millet is Father Millet, counselor, and mentor in everything for young artists".   Between 1869 and 1890 Van Gogh produced 20 copies of Millet's work.  You may be familiar with Van Gogh's painting "Starry Night".  Pictured below is the first one of that theme painted by Millet.  It is of a rural scene complete with with a farm wagon," shooting stars and constellations and planets".  The painting by Van Gogh is more of a town scene with a church in the background.  I would find it hard to make a judgment on either, I like them both!

 In his painting The Reaper Van Gogh sought to"translate"  the original painting by Millet into color.

The exhibit also included an art work from the American painter Winslow Homer (1836-1910) it is titled Return of the Gleaner.  The painting depicts a very confident female peasant out in the harvest field. 

I thought that I knew something of art history, and I was very surprised to learn in this exhibit how many artists copied Millet's themes and put their own interpretation on how they saw his paintings.  Besides the ones I mentioned here; there were also paintings by Claude Monet, Camille Pisaro, George Saurat, Edgar Degas and Salvador Dali.  And speaking of the latter painter, the picture of The Angelus (first one in this posting on the exhibit's display board) was redone by him with a totally different theme.  To me The Angelus is a peaceful theme of two peasants taking a moment to pray at sunset.  Dali put a different approach on it totally.  He drew a man embracing a nude woman.  Another younger kneeling man with a conical head is on the ground next to them  Apparently he is the couple's dead son.  And Dali painted the woman as a nude, hinting at an incestuous relationship with her son.  It is titled "Meditation on a Harp".