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ArtApril 2008 Arcadia at the Metropolitan by Karen Wilkin On "Poussin and Nature: Arcadian Visions" at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Gazing coolly and a little skeptically from a celebrated self-portrait, the painter himself greets us as we enter “Poussin and Nature: Arcadian Visions” at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.[1] The image, in the collection of the Louvre, is a paradigm of French seventeenth-century painting at its most high-minded and disciplined, all subdued, richly orchestrated non-colors and lucid geometry. Wrapped in an elegant black-gray cloak and framed by stacked canvases, the artist turns to stare at us, as he grasps a portfolio. An inscription on a canvas reads, in Latin, “the effigy of Nicolas Poussin, painter of Les Andelys, at the age of 56, in the Jubilee year of 1650.” Behind the artist, on a picture almost obscured by the canvases piled against it, we glimpse the idealized profile of an allegorical figure of Painting—identified by the all-seeing eye on her ... This article is available to subscribers and for individual purchaseSubscribe to TNC (Print and Online editions) Subscribe to TNC (Online only) This article originally appeared in The New Criterion, Volume 26 April 2008, on page 43 Copyright © 2012 The New Criterion | www.newcriterion.com http://www.newcriterion.com/articles.cfm/arcadia-at-the-metropolitan-3813
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by Karen Wilkin On “Rembrandt and Degas: Two Young Artists” at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, MA. by Karen Wilkin On "Stieglitz & His Artists" at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Marioni's liquid light at the Phillips by Karen Wilkin On “Eye to Eye: Joseph Marioni at the Phillips” at the Phillips Collection, Washington, DC. On "New Formations: Czech Avant-Garde Art & Modern Glass from the Roy and Mary Cullen Collection” at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. On “Ai Weiwei: Dropping the Urn, Ceramic Work 5000 B.C.–A.D. 2010” at the Victoria & Albert Museum, London & “The Flamboyant Mr. Chinnery: An English Artist in India and China” at Asia House, London. On "Johann Zoffany RA: Society Observed” at the Yale Center for British Art.
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