Revisiting the Jacob Lawrence Show

Posted on by Barbara Lalicki

Of all the thoughts and emotions evoked upon first seeing Jacob Lawrence’s Migration Series in its entirety, a major one was, see it again. This time I promised myself to focus less on the history and more on his artistry.

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#23 And the migration spread.

The way the colors are positioned to engage and direct the eye flow is all the more astonishing when you know that Lawrence, at 23 years old, drew the scenes he’d conceived on 60 boards–and put all of a particular color down at the same time. The genius, advance planning, and concentration this took is beyond my imagining.

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Each picture has a succinct caption, powerful in its understatement

#38 They also worked in large numbers on the railroad.

#38 They also worked in large numbers on the railroad.

The tumult of thoughts this show provokes are hard to sort out.

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#52 One of the largest race riots occurred in St. Louis.

Ultimately, the history and the artistry are inextricably connected. I recently finished the second book in Ken Follett’s Fall of Giants series, moved to tears not only by the situation of the characters, but also in gratitude to Follett for harnessing his talents in service of telling a history we should never forget. I realize this is also true of Jacob Lawrence.

The show continues until Sept. 7th.

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#42

The chance to see the whole suite of 60 pictures at once should not be missed. MoMA owns the even-numbered panels and the Phillips Collection in D.C. has the other half of the suite. Peter Schjeldahl, in his 4/20/15 New Yorker review, calls this “a Solomonic division as misbegotten as would be, say, bisecting the ‘Mona Lisa.’”

Thinking about the Jacob Lawrence Show

Posted on by Barbara Lalicki

Viewing this show when it opened, I felt I wasn’t doing justice to Jacob Lawrence by looking at the Migration Series as history rather than as art. The overwhelming impact of the experience as laid out in the 60 small paintings had dominated my reactions. I wanted to go back to look more closely at the way Jacob Lawrence created these memorable images.

On my return to MoMA, I was captivated by “Untitled (Club Scene),” a huge (approximately 10 x 18′) painting by Kerry James Marshall in the Garden Lobby. I hadn’t known this artist—and his painting must have been exhibited as a tie-in to the Jacob Lawrence show. It’s a stunning piece that held my attention

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The more you look, the more people you see. It turns out to be the only full-color work by Marshall owned by the museum, and I hope it will be put on a permanent display and joined by others. Meanwhile, you can see paintings by Kerry James Marshall work at www.davidzwirner.com.

Things happened and I didn’t get upstairs to the Lawrence show that day.

Then I went to the Baltimore Museum of Art, mostly for Matisse. And I was struck by this image: Jacob Lawrence’s “Chess Players.” As this strangely engrossing painting suggests, Lawrence was a chess enthusiast. I don’t know the meaning of the spray of flowers, but they add greatly to the feeling of the piece.

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In the next room, Milton Avery’s “Interior with Flowers” has a similar spray of flowers.

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Whoever laid out the galleries must have been struck by how the two pictures work together.

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With mixed emotions, I thought about how Milton Avery is celebrated for his simple shapes and use of color; Jacob Lawrence is known for documenting the African-American migration. I determined once again to get back to the Jacob Lawrence show for a closer look.

The Tomi Ungerer Show

Posted on by Barbara Lalicki

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A cropped image from Moon Man, by Tomi Ungerer.

When I was assistant-to-the-editor, I was captivated by a picture on the wall outside Mr. Monjo’s office. It showed a costume party with one character standing out from the rest as not fitting in.  This little round white figure provoked my curiosity and sympathy.  Eventually I learned he was Moon Man, from Tomi Ungerer’s book of the same name.  Remembrance of that image kindled the desire to go see the artist’s work at the Drawing Center.

There is a blunt power to his line, and the show focuses on his political images (with a closed door, warning against the pornographic fare).

Most striking to me was the journal from his years as a student in Alsace under Nazi occupation, which began when he was about nine years old. Descriptive copy said that his boyhood talent for drawing was encouraged because, chillingly, “the Führer needs artists.”

 Hitler Ungerer

Since first learning of Tomi Ungerer, I’d heard that World War II influenced his work.

Seeing the journal made it impossible not to think more deeply about how war had shaped this man’s life.

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A Day at MoMA

Posted on by Barbara Lalicki

MoMA winter

Snow on the ground since December, white and gray. My eyes were hungry for color, so I went to MoMA with a friend.

Walking into the lobby felt strange. It was the lack of a crowd–the marvelous Matisse show was over and there was room to move around once more.

The permanent collection led off with two by Gauguin that I don’t remember seeing before.  Was their placement prompted the sale of one of Gauguin’s Tahitian paintings for over $300 million recently?

Gauguin

Not set in Brittany, as I’d assumed, The Washerwomen was done in Arles in 1888, when he had his infamous row with van Gogh.

Henri Rousseau’s The Dream always rewards a new look.

Rousseau

Ann Tempkin, the chief curator of painting and sculpture, likes to move the art around. Now I wondered: was the stunning Derain in the main gallery new, or had I just never noticed? I’m already eager to see  it again. MoMA, how about a show devoted to this Fauve who is overshadowed by Matisse, as Braque is by Picasso?

The lavish use of paint in Matisse’s The Serf, caught my eye, and my friend’s comment that she could walk right into Picasso’s Three Musicians let me see it in a new way.

Oskar Kokoschka

Oskar Kokoschka’s Art Critic Hans Tietze and His Wife Erika, 1909 has a strikingly innovative surface. It was a pleasure to be able to stand and look at it closely.  Amidst the riches, I began to wonder about those who are missing: female artists, David Hockney, Roy Lichtenstein….Here’s hoping the big new space addition will lead to filling in some gaps.

MoMA’s huge exhibitions are largely great fun–and the Matisse’s cut-outs show was inspiring on so many levels–but a low-key day wandering freely through the collection is a welcome adventure.

William Steig is a wonder

Posted on by Barbara Lalicki

Steig pix only Solomon's secret

How did I miss reading SOLOMON THE RUSTY NAIL until yesterday?  The genius of William Steig is everywhere apparent.  Here–at the dinner table with his family–Solomon is keeping “his secret, secret.” Hmmm… “Did any of them even begin to realize who was sitting at their table?  Not a one!”

 How those eyes and that smile conjure his thoughts!

Steig cu en Solomon's secret

Zingo!–which this program keeps “correcting” to Bingo–is just one example of the stimulating language Steig employs, for he is a master story-teller as well as an extraordinary artist.

I’ve often heard picture book author-illustrators compare creating the book to making a movie.  When you look at Steig’s pictures you see that he gives life to every detail. The tchotchkes were carefully chosen, and you know that items such as the yarn in the knitting basket will be used. I love the disheveled look he can give things, like the way the cushion doesn’t exactly fit on the chair in BRAVE IRENE.

In addition to the vibrant characters and household items, William Steig also paint scenes of breathtaking loveliness. They epitomize the beauty of the natural world and his characters appreciate it–even when, like Solomon, they are viewing it all from the vantage point of being a rusty nail in the side of a building.  When THE AMAZING BONE’s Pearl is sitting in the forest in springtime she expresses her expansive mood by saying,’I love everything.”

If you are looking for something special, don’t miss these treasures!

The Art of Martha Ives

Posted on by Barbara Lalicki

The Red Pail c 2015 Martha Ives

The Red Pail c 2015 Martha Ives

Several years ago, already an accomplished artist, my friend Martha Ives discovered that she loved making prints. The involved process of making etchings, woodcuts, and linocuts seemed to liberate her imagination. I remember that at the beginning of her explorations she was captivated by the challenge of expressing movement in a still picture.  Her latest piece, The Red Pail, does that beautifully. Looking at it, I have the sense of a mother taking her child to the beach for a splendid day in the sun and sand–two things not seen in the picture but powerfully suggested.

Bravo!

More of Martha Ives artwork can be seen at www.artofmarthaives.com

A loving voice

Posted on by Barbara Lalicki

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On Martin Luther King Day, I’m thinking about my friend, the children’s book author Mildred Pitts Walter.

In the late 1960’s when she was kindergarten teacher in Los Angeles and active in the Civil Rights struggle there, Mildred could not find books for children of color. When she challenged a representative of the local Ward Ritchie Press to find and publish black writers, he challenged her to become one, insisting that she write for their list. This led to her first book, LILLIE OF WATTS, published in 1969.

That same year two school librarians, Glendon Greer and Mabel McKissack founded the Coretta Scott King Award at an American Library Association convention.  The recognition provided by this award, which has grown in stature with each passing year, provides enormous encouragement and support to black authors and illustrators. It has played a large part in increasing the number of books published that feature young black people.

I began to work with Mildred in 1984 when I edited TY’S ONE MAN BAND, a picture book that drew on memories of a peg-legged man who sometimes appeared in her Louisiana community and enlivened the day with music. From the start, I knew that Mildred was passionate about the power of books to change children’s lives, and I couldn’t wait to see what she’d do next.

In 1987 her JUSTIN AND THE BEST BISCUITS IN THE WORLD was a Coretta Scott King Award winner, and it is perhaps her most endearing and enduring work. The beautifully evocative TROUBLE’S CHILD is the most autobiographical. But the novel that that made the deepest impression on me is THE GIRL ON THE OUTSIDE.

THE GIRL ON THE OUTSIDE is told from two points of view:  Eva is a black girl chosen to integrate a high school in Little Rock. Sophia is the white girl who finds the courage not join the mob who is jeering and spitting at her.  The understanding and love brought to the portrayal of the white girl’s emotions was sobering.  Later, Mildred undertook the painful retelling of events in Mississippi during the Civil Rights era. MISSISSIPPI CHALLENGE won the Christopher Award for Non-fiction, but it had required intense research and reliving tragedy upon tragedy.  How, I wondered, can she even be talking to me?

Happily, from our first meeting to the present day, the conversation has continued and the friendship has grown.  And, at 92, Mildred continues to actively work for reconciliation, the healing of the continuing harm slavery and guilt about slavery have brought to the nation.

She has said, “I have tried to show the dynamics of choice, courage, and change in my books so that white readers can, through the experiences of black characters, appreciate differences and become thoughtful; and so that black readers through those experiences, can not only become thoughtful, but aware of themselves as well.”

And she has just written:

Love is the gleam of light in the eye.

It is a warm touch in the silent night;

A feeling that every male is my brother

Every female my sister.

 

Love is dignity shown to all that is created;

The firm non-violent action for peace,

Justice and equality for all where at

Its center stands the principle of LOVE!

Seeing Schiele

Posted on by Barbara Lalicki

Egon Shiele’s “Portrait of Eduard Kosmack”

Egon Shiele’s  “Portrait of Eduard Kosmack”

The Egon Schiele show at the Neue Gallery focuses on his portraits. It’s exhilarating to experience this work in real life. Reproductions in books don’t capture the delicate variety of weight his pencil gives to details.

And seeing this body of work, created before Schiele’s death at twenty-eight from influenza—three days after his wife’s death in 1918— you can feel a voracious intelligence at work. The fact that some of his work could offend people certainly occurred to me as I looked at various images. I know that I’d been put off by this or that erotic image in the past. Yet, seeing the pictures in the context of a young man steadily working on an artistic vision was a revelation. I could only be glad that his work has outlived censure and is there for us.  The show includes the emotionally powerful “The Family,” impossible to look at without thinking of the war and the imminent deaths to follow.

Completed in the year of the death of the Schieles.

Completed in the year of the death of the Schieles.

Later in the day, I went to my gym class.  My hands looked so strange in the mirror—like Schiele hands.

Getting Started

Posted on by Barbara Lalicki

3 book white cat titles

A bookshelf filled with some of the wonderful books that followed my first day of work.

Fresh out of college, I landed a job as “assistant to the editor” F. N. Monjo. This dear man was then head of Coward, McCann’s children’s book department.

Early on that first day, he asked what I thought of a picture book.

“It’s nice,” I said.

“Nice!” The word withered as it passed his lips.

“Nice” was banned. (Fourteen years later I said it again.)

Mr. Monjo returned from lunch in an expansive mood. He wondered if I knew Russell Hoban’s Frances books. I didn’t. To educate me, he retold Bread and Jam for Frances, acting out all the parts and reaching his peak on the line, “She liked to practice with a string bean….” If this was work, why had I dreaded it?

The editor-in-chief for the adult department was a tall, flamboyant woman. That afternoon in the ladies room she was describing a meeting she’d just attended. Arm swooping she declared, “We sat there like flies in amber.”

Flies in amber!

Would I get to go to meetings and feel like that? I certainly felt hopeful.

This was the stuff of fiction, and here I was in the midst of it.