I am still at the museum,
still unable to take any snapshots of the paintings and other works because
dodo man at the kiosk says I can’t. He
also says he won’t chase me around if I do, but what the hell is the fun in
breaking the rules if no one is going to make me work for it?
After enjoying the
photographs of the Gate to Hell, because I did just come running from the
Basilica of the Immaculate Conception, I head over to the second special
gallery. This place is full of works by
a guy named George Deem. It’s all kind of
interesting – lots of perspective pieces and a bit of Escher-like designs with
a lot of patterns. He is very much into
art deco-like presentation.
In the midst of all the chaos, Deem steals. That’s right … STEALS. He actually has a multi-panel painting that
shows step-by-step how to paint a Vermeer.
In addition to showing everyone in the entire world how to paint a
Vermeer, he actually “borrows” Vermeer’s characters and places them together in
rogue paintings. For example, a woman
leaning against a wall in the Vermeer is now leaning toward someone’s ear
(another borrowed Vermeer character from a completely different painting),
telling secrets.
One painting that
fascinates me is Deem’s take on Matisse’s 1910 The Dance. The Matisse
original has nude figures dancing in a circle.
Deem adds in patterns and room decorations, but it’s still a painting of
naked people. And this totally
fascinates me because …
…. there is a busload of
eight year olds wandering around the gallery.
You know that insurance
commercial with the pig in the pool chaise singing, “Boots and pants and boots
and pants?” Well, I have that song stuck
in my head, only I imagine elementary school kids chanting, “Boobs and butts
and boobs and butts…”
I move away from that end
of the gallery, just in case, stopping by the four bricks with the continuous
colonial Americana painted on them, but still moving enough to keep ahead of the
potential boobs-and-butts chanters.
I stop at a far wall and
look up.
Suddenly, I see her. There she is in all her Da Vinci
perversion. It’s the Mona Lisa. Only – it’s not.
It’s Mona Lisa with her
head on sideways. The entire painting
has gone wrong. Reading it left to
right (which may have been hung the wrong way for this show), there’s the head shawl going one way, Mona Lisa’s head rolling in the
complete opposite direction, and then her neck and body continuing across the
canvas, disconnected from her head and disappearing into the side frame.
 | |
| (She was hanging the wrong way.) |
I have to admit, she looks
damn pleased with herself. That little
semi-smirk Leo gave the original? It’s almost
playful and somewhat bewitching when turned on its side. Maybe she’s laughing at the children seeing
the naked dancing counterparts across the gallery floor. Maybe it’s me she is laughing at. Maybe, just maybe, she knows I got lost an
hour ago and accidentally walked into a church, where I almost fainted when I
saw I would have to confess.
I have my new journal with
me. I picked it up at DSW in the
clearance section. That’s right – a journal
in a shoe store because the journal has shoes on it. It was 50% off, people! I decide to write a poem, so here is my poem
about George Deem’s painting. I’ll say
it in advance: You’re welcome!
This way
to George
Deem’s collection.
Look.
Mona Lisa
doesn’t have her
head on straight.
I admit she looks
damn happy
this way.
Perhaps she secretly
wishes
Da Vinci had painted her
this way.
It must be fun to look
this way
and that way
without concern for
decorum.
I suspect the Louvre
might shit itself.
Mona Lisa
smirks as her eyes
follow me.
“This way,”
she beckons.
“This way
to escape the frame.”
I tour the rest of the
museum but come back to see the sideways Mona Lisa before I go. It has been a long two-plus hour drive to get
here in addition to the time I’ve spent in the Mattatuck Museum, so I hit the
restroom before I head out on my next adventure.
The restroom is right
across from dodo man at the kiosk. Of
course he starts talking to me, preventing me from breaking away to go
potty. Eventually he ceases speaking
long enough for me to make a parting comment.
I make good use of my time, peeing in a few seconds flat. I’m afraid if I take too long, my new-found
buddy will start pounding on the door to make sure I’m still listening to him.
This is when I see
it. Yup.
Inside the bathroom on the wall next to the door near the sink, is a painting. It’s stuck to the wall, almost as if it should
be part of the tile work but is not. I
whip out my cell phone and snap a picture of the abstract art.
Aha! Victory!
Finally, I am able to snap
a picture of some kind of artwork here in this art museum!
I pop my head back into
the gallery and give a quick nod to sideways Mona Lisa with her head on all
wrong. I did it, my eyes tell her. I mocked decorum and will escape with my
photograph of a painting after all!
I secure my cell phone
back into my pocket and escape the frame by walking straight out the front
door, leaving my painted friend hanging on the wall behind me, grinning wryly
at the chattering young voices of children who haven’t the slightest inkling as
to who she is.
