Hodler ferdinand biography of mahatma
Keys to passion
Fondation Louis Vuitton presents the exhibition Keys to a Passion from 1st April to 6th July 2015 Installation view of Edvard Munch’s “The Scream” (circa 1893 or 1910) and one of Helene Schjerfbeck’s portraits (all photos by Martin Argyroglo for Fondation Louis Vuitton unless otherwise noted) PARIS — According to Sigmund Freud, a key that opens a room in a dream is unmistakably phallic. Keys to a Passionat the Fondation Louis Vuitton dances on the head of this repugnant patriarchal pin, delivering work that is hypnotically beautiful and perfect for summertime reverie. This phallic, less-than-benevolent, interpretation on my part merely places the work in Keys to a Passion within the male modernist canon, one that includes Alberto Giacometti, Claude Monet, Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Edvard Munch, Piet Mondrian, Kazimir Malevich, Constantin Brancusi, Fernand Léger, Mark Rothko, Francis Bacon, and Otto Dix. Dicks all the way down. There is only one woman included in the show, the Finnish painter Helene Schjerfbeck (1862–1946). Even given that obvious and sad historical fact, Keys to a Passion is something of an antidote to the recent pessimistic, ahistorical flop at the Museum of Modern Art, The Forever Now: Contemporary Painting in an Atemporal World, which seemed to posit that everything has been done, and all that is left for today’s internet-savvy artists to do is to recycle previous painterly discoveries. According to MoMA curator Laura Hoptman, “The obsession with recuperating aspects of the past is the condition of culture in our time,” thus offering no alternative technique or viewpoint. The implication that everything in the visual arts has been done by the men now in the basement at Fondation Vuitton is ridiculously lacking in ambition. If anything, the limitations inherent in their general preference for reductive abstraction may show young artists today that they are not doomed to merely recycle what came before them. But in comparing Keys to a Passion to The Forever Now, it becomes clear that, rather than serve as a key to future We seem to be constantly on the verge of impending catastrophe. COVID. Climate change. The collapse of Twitter. That last example is a bit tongue-in-cheek, but there’s some truth in it. The collapse of Twitter (if it happens) would have significant negative impact on some people’s livelihoods, health supports, advocacy networks, and more. But it’s also true in a different way: the way people are responding to Twitter’s demise reveals some of the social dynamics at play in the larger catastrophes we face. It seems to me there are two unhelpful responses to these catastrophes. One is to get swept up in the tidal wave of fear and despair—the hysteria—that accompanies any perceived catastrophe. There is even a kind of &#;culture of catastrophe&#; at work in some segments of society, where our way of being in the world, even our identity in society, is determined in relation to whatever the current catastrophe is. We are required always to be in a heightened state of anxiety and urgent action—a sure-fire recipe for mental ill health and societal conflict. The other unhelpful response, though, is to downplay or even ignore the seriousness of the problem. Catastrophes do happen. To suggest otherwise is to be naïve, or even to betray our historical or geographical privilege. Catastrophes have happened in history, and they are happening around the world. COVID and climate change are real problems. Injustice and inequity, bigotry and violence, disease and disaster, in all their forms, are real problems. So what should we do? In particular, how should we as Christians follow Christ into catastrophe? Well, we have some good guidance from Jesus himself in the Gospels. After all, Jesus predicted a catastrophe, and gave instructions for his followers on how to walk in that catastrophe. Let’s give a glance at Jesus’ “Apocalyptic Discourse” (yes, that’s what scholars call it) in Matthew’s Gospel. In Matthew , Jesus describes the destruction of the Jerus We seem to be constantly on the verge of impending catastrophe. COVID. Climate change. The collapse of Twitter. That last example is a bit tongue-in-cheek, but there’s some truth in it. The collapse of Twitter (if it happens) would have significant negative impact on some people’s livelihoods, health supports, advocacy networks, and more. But it’s also true in a different way: the way people are responding to Twitter’s demise reveals some of the social dynamics at play in the larger catastrophes we face. It seems to me there are two unhelpful responses to these catastrophes. One is to get swept up in the tidal wave of fear and despair—the hysteria—that accompanies any perceived catastrophe. There is even a kind of “culture of catastrophe” at work in some segments of society, where our way of being in the world, even our identity in society, is determined in relation to whatever the current catastrophe is. We are required always to be in a heightened state of anxiety and urgent action—a sure-fire recipe for mental ill health and societal conflict. The other unhelpful response, though, is to downplay or even ignore the seriousness of the problem. Catastrophes do happen. To suggest otherwise is to be naïve, or even to betray our historical or geographical privilege. Catastrophes have happened in history, and they are happening around the world. COVID and climate change are real problems. Injustice and inequity, bigotry and violence, disease and disaster, in all their forms, are real problems. So what should we do? In particular, how should we as Christians follow Christ into catastrophe? Well, we have some good guidance from Jesus himself in the Gospels. After all, Jesus predicted a catastrophe, and gave instructions for his followers on how to walk in that catastrophe. Let’s give a glance at Jesus’ “Apocalyptic Discourse” (yes, that’s what scholars call it) in Matthew’s Gospel. In Matthew 24-25, Jesus describes the destruction
The exhibition “Keys to a Passion”, to be hosted at Fondation Louis Vuitton from 1st April to 6th July 2015, marks the third phase of the institution’s inaugural programme and reaffirms the founding principles of its engagement with the arts.
The exhibition presents a selection of major works from the first half of the 20th century which paved the way for modernity. The works on display all share the particularity of “breaking the rules” and then becoming important art historical reference points. Many of them have acquired iconic status and are recognised as such by artists, professionals, art lovers, and the wider public.
The exhibition brings together exceptional loans from prestigious institutions and private collections. They include the State Hermitage Museum and the State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg, the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow, the Munchmuseet in Oslo, the Moderna Museet in Stockholm, the MoMA and the Guggenheim in New York, the MoCA in Chicago and Los Angeles, the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, the Geementemuseum in The Hague and the Kröller Müller in Otterlo, the National Gallery of Art and the Tate in London, the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, the Musée National d’Art Moderne — Centre Pompidou, the Musée d’Orsay, and the Musée National Picasso in Paris, the Fondation Maeght at Saint-Paul de Vence, the Národní Galerie in Prague, the Kunstmuseum in Stuttgart, and the Kunsthaus in Zurich, as well as many others.
Deliberately limited in number and hitherto seldom presented next to one another, these works offer the visitor the potential for a genuine intellectual, sensory, and emotional encounter. The aim is to make the public sense what the unique essence of the piece of art is and to appreciate its specific aura. In an age of ever accelerating channels of communication, this requires visitors Michael Pahl
Michael Pahl