Starry Night
Adam loves Vincent Van Gogh's Starry Night. Since he was three. Morgan, his of his art "instructor" (we do art -- I'm a curator, what can I say), brings cards with various paintings and they talk about them. Adam loves to label even the more abstract ones, telling me that he has a sense of representation (symbol recognition is another way to say that). Morgan thought it would be good to begin with the impressionists. But when she pulled out Starry Night on the floor, he twisted his body and peered at it from various angles -- something he did when he reamed off his letters and numbers that were on the floor at 11 months of age. I believe the sweeping, rough, and swirling short lines (thus adding to the feeling of movment) must actually move for Adam -- the undulating night sky quivers.
Then, I saw a preview for Little Einstein. Eureka! There it was...the Rocketship swooshes into Van Gogh's sky -- the swirling starry night. Needless to say, Adam stops dead in his tracks when that preview comes on. There is this aspect of Van Gogh's art that leads me to think that theories he was autistic might be true. He created areas of flat unbroken colour -- a revolutionary approach to art-making that was viewed as crude at the time. His stark figures are outlined with dark cloisonne line against flat backgrounds or busy patterened walls that nearly distract the eye from the subject. Or consider The Night Cafe, or The Yellow Room, with seemingly distorted (but logically true) perspective, and harsh disharmonies of colour. Van Gogh "could not be taught" and therefore, was a self-taught artist. Today, he would be classified in the "Outsider Art" genre. He was later plagued with seizures, unsettled relationships, and except for a short, tumultous stint with Gauguin, lived alone.
So I have to wonder: does Van Gogh's Starry Night appeal to my little Adam for the reason that they might share a similar perception? Adam has expanded (on his own) his repertoire of painting techniques -- studying the brush and using various sides of it, and lately, splaying the paint on the paper like Jackson Pollock. So I eagerly wait and see if he can represent his experiences on paper.
When my eyes get tired these days, the outer edges of objects begin to quiver (I've made an optometrist appointment). Instead of finding it annoying (which it can be), I stop and revel in another way of seeing things.
Then, I saw a preview for Little Einstein. Eureka! There it was...the Rocketship swooshes into Van Gogh's sky -- the swirling starry night. Needless to say, Adam stops dead in his tracks when that preview comes on. There is this aspect of Van Gogh's art that leads me to think that theories he was autistic might be true. He created areas of flat unbroken colour -- a revolutionary approach to art-making that was viewed as crude at the time. His stark figures are outlined with dark cloisonne line against flat backgrounds or busy patterened walls that nearly distract the eye from the subject. Or consider The Night Cafe, or The Yellow Room, with seemingly distorted (but logically true) perspective, and harsh disharmonies of colour. Van Gogh "could not be taught" and therefore, was a self-taught artist. Today, he would be classified in the "Outsider Art" genre. He was later plagued with seizures, unsettled relationships, and except for a short, tumultous stint with Gauguin, lived alone.
So I have to wonder: does Van Gogh's Starry Night appeal to my little Adam for the reason that they might share a similar perception? Adam has expanded (on his own) his repertoire of painting techniques -- studying the brush and using various sides of it, and lately, splaying the paint on the paper like Jackson Pollock. So I eagerly wait and see if he can represent his experiences on paper.
When my eyes get tired these days, the outer edges of objects begin to quiver (I've made an optometrist appointment). Instead of finding it annoying (which it can be), I stop and revel in another way of seeing things.
1 Comments:
Charlie has a lullaby song book from the Metropolitan Museum of Art--he got it as a baby and used to turn the pages to certain pictures, to hear me play certain songs on the piano. Starry Night was definitely in the book; he did seem to have a preference for paintings with children, mothers, fathers, human figures.
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