The American painter Arnold Friedman (1874-1946) once groused about the “cadging—pettifogging [and] lickspittling” typical of the art scene of his day. Some verities are eternal.
Friedman liked to vent his spleen by writing on the backs of his canvases. One note reads: “Modern aestheticism with its obscurantism and obfuscation bears the same relation to the Read More
The American painter Arnold Friedman (1874-1946) once groused about the “cadging—pettifogging [and] lickspittling” typical of the art scene of his day. Some verities are eternal.
Friedman liked to vent his spleen by writing on the backs of his canvases. One note reads: “Modern aestheticism with its obscurantism and obfuscation bears the same relation to Read More
Andy and Larry Wachowski’s The Matrix Reloaded has opened with so much cult-driven advance fervor online that a reviewer who presumes to evaluate the film would seem to require degrees in philosophy, theology, cosmology, computer science and metaphysical cybernetics-or is it cybernetical metaphysics? I’m tempted to dismiss what some of my esteemed colleagues regard as Read More
Regardless of how cool the weather gets outside, the dismal junk that’s showing up every Friday on theater marquees proves that at the movies, at least, the dreaded dog days of summer have arrived. Since it grieves me to watch accomplished artists like Ian McKellen and Hugh Jackman trashing their talents for cash and deferred Read More
There are times when we need to be reminded of the crucial role played by commercial galleries and private collectors in correcting the errors-especially errors of omission and indifference-of our leading museums. This is not a new problem on the New York art scene. It was the problem that Alfred Stieglitz addressed nearly a century Read More
