Thursday, July 2, 2009

Vienna, The Albertina


In the 1980s all the Albertina Museum had were wonderful drawings and etchings.  The new museum is really worth visiting.  They were recently given (on loan)  a large collection of impressionists and some modern works (Monet, Renoir, Cezanne, Matisse, Miro, Picasso, Kandinsky, Chagall, et al.) and a room of Paul Klee's work from the Carl Djerassi Collection, so now they have a permanent collection well-worth seeing. The Klees are in Austria, if I remember correctly, as sort of an offer of forgiveness by Djerassi, who was driven out by the Nazis.  Professor Djerassi, a chemist, helped develop the oral contraceptive (thank you!) and, not only has been given many awards, he writes "science-in-fiction" including plays.

My hostess and I viewed the museum today and then we had a delightful lunch in a bar-restaurant attached to the museum.  I really enjoyed the impressionists and post-impressionists, but some of the more modern pieces— well I think I need more education to understand what it is I'm looking at.  One artist seemed to just layer as much paint as possible onto the canvass.  The colors weren't even interesting, just muddy.  Oh well.

When I think of all the times, I've called my little Isabelle a foodie, and realize it's really the pot calling the kettle black.   Nearly everything I'm writing is about on this trip includes my eating and drinking experiences.

4 comments:

June Butler said...

Amelia, with the moderns, for me, it's not about understanding them, it's about experiencing them in either a pleasant or an unpleasant way. Or about not being moved by the art at all. I've come to admire more of the modern art than I once did, and now we're in post-modern times.

In truth, my experience of all art is weighted heavily to the emotional side.

motheramelia said...

Mimi, I certainly can buy the either being moved or not. I've always enjoyed some modern art even without understanding it, it's the ones that I get no reaction to that I'd like to understand why they are considered "good".

June Butler said...

Well, even when the reason why a work of art is "good" is explained to me, most of the time I don't change my opinion. I suppose the explanation is useful for educational purposes.

motheramelia said...

Hah, that is probably the nub of it. Doing something fro educational purposes always seem to work for me. But you're right, I probably wouldn't change my opinion either.