From Duccio to Ai Weiwei: The Multiple Lives of the Work of Art

Antonio, Allegri da Correggio, Leda and the Swan, around 1532
(Gemaldegalerie, Berlin) 

At a time when the sculptures and artifacts which have made their way to some of the finest institutions in the West are crying to be reunited with their country of origins, and the dealings behind these acquisitions are coming into daylight, I had the privilege of attending a lecture which presented the other side of the proverbial coin.  Philippe de Montebello, a legend in his own right, with numerous awards and honors including two Presidential medals and a Legion d'Honor, gave a riveting lecture, "The Multiple Lives of the Work of Art" at the Getty Museum in Los Angeles two weeks ago. His prose was captivating with interesting details and most surprising of all, a sense of humor. Although this should not come as a surprise, when Philippe de Montebello speaks, people stop and listen. Since this post concerns the lecture and not my personal views, I will try not to offer my own perspective, for now.

El Greco - View of Toledo

El Greco, View of Toledo,  1597-99
(Metropolitan Museum of Art)

El Greco's View of Toledo from the Metropolitan Museum of Art's collection, is  an engrossing landscape that captures  the essence of this city while proclaiming its grandeur through  the artist's unique and thoroughly modern vision.   There is a very interesting article, "View of Toledo" by distinguished scholars Jonathan Brown and Richard L. Kagan which refers to this painting as one of the most evocative landscapes ever to be painted. Brown and Kagan argue that  El Greco might have painted this landscape as part of a propaganda campaign to encourage Philip II to reinstate the court in Toledo after he abandoned it in 1561.  

El Greco - A 16th century Maverick

El Greco, Disrobing of Christ (El Espolio), 1577-79
(Cathedral of Toledo, Sacristy)

El Greco, the quintessential painter of the Spanish Reformation is one of the most remarkable figures in the history of art.  What makes El Greco so interesting is his success at a time and place where religious imagery was strictly regulated to conform to the edicts of the Counter-Reformation and the erudite style of his imagery that defies classification.   Born Domenikos Theotokopoulous in Crete, a colony of the Republic of Venice, in 1541, El Greco started his artistic life as a Byzantine icon painter, before moving to Venice  to study the works of Titian and Tinteretto. Three years later, he moved to Rome where he tried to further his education and exposure but at his lack of success in securing any altarpiece commissions, he decided to move to Toledo, Spain where he stayed till the end of his life. All the different styles he was exposed to seems to have been subsumed in El Greco's paintings, the early post-Byzantine training, the narrative compositional structure, painterly brushwork and the use of oil glazes he learned in Venice and exposure to the High Renaissance works of Michelangelo and Raphael as well as contemporary Mannerist art in Rome.