365 Days at the Met

February 28, 2019 Galley 351 is a small antechamber to the much larger gallery 350 (the gallery numbers should be reversed, if you ask me). It contains a relatively small number of objects, many of which come from East Africa. Specifically, there are a number of Christian objects from Ethiopia, including an illustrated gospel, a small icon worn around the neck as a pendant, and a bronze cross that could be mounted as a finial on a staff and used in processions. I am surprised to see that many of the faces have light skin tones and surmise that this is because, as the caption tells me, Byzantine and Italian paintings available at the ruler's court served as models for Ethiopian artists, and also because foreign painters were employed by the court. The gallery also holds an elaborately pieced-together silk hanging made in 2010 by a group of master weavers from Madagascar, which I suppose also counts as East Africa. While I'm in the course of writing,  a group of young ...

April 21, 2019 I embark on my exploration of the galleries devoted to Africa, Oceania, and the Americas, starting with gallery 350, which centers on sub-Saharan African art. And I realize that the first thing I need to learn is just where present-day Mali and Burkina Faso (to choose only two from a host of possible examples) are. I take a picture of a map of Africa helpfully posted near the entrance to these galleries; I expect I'll refer to it often. Most of the objects on display are masks or figurines carved of wood. In general, they depict humans, animals, or in some cases composites with both human and animal features. They largely date from the 19th and 20th centuries, although some are much older, bespeaking the continuity of some artistic traditions. According to the captions, many of the objects served ceremonial functions; they were used, for example, in initiation and healing rituals. Carrying one of these figures around in a religious rite initially strikes me a...

It's astonishing and somehow humbling to realize how little of the Met's Medieval collection I've seen over the past weeks -- so much of it (the preponderance?) is at The Cloisters. I feel a bit like a broken record as I write yet again about how much I am learning about what I don't know. But perhaps the most important thing I've come to realize is what an extended time period what we call "the Middle Ages" covers -- well over a millennium, longer than the Roman Empire -- and what a diversity of countries and cultures the term entails: from Byzantine Egypt to Viking Rus, from Celtic Gaul to Thomas-a-Becket's England.  What knits it all together is Christianity, and in this respect, at least, the iconography is far more familiar to me than that of Hinduism or Buddhism or Jainism. (For that matter, I can "read" a diptych showing scenes from the life of Christ more easily than I can read the Hebrew in an early -- or current-day -- machsor.)...

February 18, 2019 My jaw drops when I enter gallery 307, the last of the Medieval galleries, because the first thing I see is so unexpected: a large display case of ceramics, some simply painted, others more ornate, including some spectacular lusterware. Are they Spanish, I wonder? Or Italian? Both, the caption tells me.  The gallery is largely given over to objects made between 1300 and 1600 that are utilitaian but often elaborately decorated, including glass beakers, ivory chessmen, earthenware jugs, a wrought iron pothook and andiron, and bone boxes meant to contain game pieces. There's also a humorous15th century large brass plate from the Netherlands that depicts a wife straddling  her kneeling husband and beating his bare butt.  It's hard to guess whether some of the objects -- copper gilt spurs, for instance, and a pair of serving knives inlaid with mother-of-pear-- were actually used much or were just for show. But impress they must have.  Today's...

February 11, 2019 Gallery 306 is filled with late medieval treasures, many of them the gifts of J. Pierpont Morgan. The first thing I notice is one of two large multi-panel stained glass windows, and I immediately wonder which church they were wrested from -- what a loss it must have been. But I read that the different panels actually came from many different churches. They were then arranged by Met curators to form a stylistically harmonious whole -- very successfully, I think. There are many small ivory plaques, diptychs, and triptychs, usually depicting scenes from the life of the Virgin and/or Christ, that were often made for the private devotions of wealthy patrons. I also take note of two large enamel reliquary crucifixes which are purported to contain fragments of the True Cross. And I learn about a new craft, the carving of boxwood to portray tiny,  fantastically elaborate religious scenes.  So much on display is religious in nature that I'm tempted to...

February 6, 2019 Gallery 305 is even more enormous than the last one (it's the space where the Met erects its Christmas tree and the Neapolitan presepio each year). The room is largely devoted to sculptures of various sizes and various materials (mostly marble, limestone, and wood), although it also contains paintings and tapestries. I'm surprised to see tapestries with religious themes (the life of the Virgin or of Christ, for example); it strikes me that most tapestries I've seen have shown scenes of the hunt or the unicorn or the unicorn being hunted.  The standing statues of the Virgin holding the Christ child are notable for their curving forms and the use of contrapposto -- not entirely a Renaissance rediscovery, I realize.  I'm also surprised that many of the statues, even ones of marble, were painted. I suppose that was a relatively easy way to show the elaborate decorations on the borders of the Virgin's robes.  I'm struck by the emotional powe...

February 4, 2019 Gallery 304 is a huge room devoted to works from Western Europe (primarily France, Germany, Spain,  England, and Italy) made between 1000 and 1350. It is filled with objects large and small, from enameled coffers to ivory plaques to wood and stone sculptures to stained glass windows. I especially like the enamels, with their brilliant cobalt and turquoise pigments set in shining gold. I remember how much I responded to these objects when I visited the Musee du Moyen Age (back when it was called the Cluny), so seeing similar things in my own city is a pleasure -- and a revelation. There are several small objects-- including a reliquary casket, a pilgrim's badge, and a liturgical comb (!) -- that show scenes related to the martyrdom of Saint Thomas Becket, especially relevant to me because we are currently reading "King John" (Henry II's son) in my Shakespeare group.  I also admire a large rock crystal pitcher from southern Italy that, says ...

February 1, 2019 I circumnavigate gallery 303, a trove of medieval objects, in reverse chronological order, which initially strikes me as unfortunate.  But then I realize that I'm freshest for the objects I turn out to like the best, ivory plaques from the Ottonian Europe  (although it also strikes me as possible that I like them best precisely because I'm freshest for them). I do like some of the  pieces with earlier dates very much, too, particularly some  Frankish brooches and beads.  A couple of Frankish necklaces look as if they include some African trade beads, although I suspect that that is simply because of the beads' colors and geometric designs. Three ivory plaques, which were carved between 900 and 1100, two in Cologne and one in Milan, and which probably decorated the covers of holy books, are especially appealing. One depicts Saint Mark at work on his gospel,  seated under a splendid winged lion. A second shows Christ's entry i...