Day of Wyeth – Wyeth Walk #103

Lovely day today taking my three year old to the Brandywine River Museum of Art.  She asked where the pumpkin scarecrow was (Jamie Wyeth’s Pumpkinhead, no longer on display), and we had very interesting chats about all the NC Wyeth Treasure Island paintings and the Horace Pippin paintings- we went down each one as she asked me about them, talking about the kids, mothers, pirates, soldiers and others in the paintings and what they were doing and feeling.  I was also especially touched by her comprehension of death as we looked at Andrew Wyeth’s “Spring” (Karl Kuerner as an old man lying in an isolated snow drift).  She said she would be very sad if mommy or daddy left that way.  On his “Black Water” I thought she might comment on Siri being naked, but instead she noted that it looks like she might roll backwards into the water.  I also enjoyed the new 2015 Jamie Wyeth full-length portrait of Andy Warhol standing inside a red-white-and-blue screen door.  Very present and engaging!  In the end though, my daughter said her favorite part of the visit was the stairs and the elevator.

Left my phone off most of the day again, turning it on in airplane mode just for taking photos.  Was refreshing, and I got a bunch of reading in, finally finished Rethinking Andrew Wyeth edited by David Cateforis.  I particularly enjoyed the essays with commentary about avant-garde abstract artists contrasted with realist artists, and how Wyeth is a bit of both.  The concepts really resonated with me- with my lyrical “New Age” music blending with my love of avant-garde free jazz… I like to think my music is a nice blend of the two.  I will certainly keep pursuing this path and figuring out how to describe it, I think these essays helped!

June 13, Brandywine River Museum of Art, hot outside, temperate in