Hello to everyone out there in the Do Art Nation. We hope you’ve been having a great summer–ours has been filled with art, inspiration, and plenty of WACKY drawings!
I got home from the East Coast leg of my trip on Friday. I wanted to relax over the weekend before another full week of workshops. But I also wanted to see an exhibit at the Art Institute.
If you’ve been following us for a while, you know that the Mexican painter Frida Kahlo is a huge inspiration to Jerry and I. She remains a powerful example of what art can do to shape identity and help us through difficult personal struggles. Her art itself is also daring, electric, & even whimsical! But she painted relatively few pieces in her lifetime, and while I visited Mexico City last year I was unable to see her home, the Blue House in Coyoacán, where most of them reside.
But THIS year the Art Institute (my favorite museum in the world) hosted an exhibit of her paintings, alongside work by the bookbinder Mary Reynolds & other surrealist painters such as Marcel Duchamp. Kahlo exhibited her art in Paris in 1939, staying with Reynolds and meeting other prominent European painters. Artists such as André Breton saw in her a living manifestation of their theories–known as Surrealism–and while Frida preferred to see her art as her own, rather than as part of a Surrealist “movement,” she was able to connect to other artists and be recognized for her work, rather than as the wife of celebrated muralist Diego Rivera.
I wandered the exhibit, paintings by Frida interspersed with letters, photographs, & artwork by Reynolds and other artists like Duchamp, Jean Cocteau, and Salvador Dalí. One letter stood out to me–a letter from Kahlo to a friend apologizing for having misremembered his birthday. It’s been over a year and a half since my first comic book workshop, and as I wandered among the artwork I couldn’t help but see the kinds of kids who come to libraries and park districts seeking outlets for self-expression. Some kids explore visual transformation, drawing themselves as animals or in wild dream scenes like Frida Kahlo. Some, like Mary Reynolds or Marcel Duchamp, embrace the craftiness of art, tearing up paper or mixing paints in ways I would never have thought of, bending rules and expectations to make something unexpected and original. Underneath the seriousness and dedication of these world-famous artists, I kept seeing this fundamental spirit of play, which animates artists old and young alike.
I stayed at the Art Institute until almost closing time. Then I headed north to Lincoln Park, to watch the Navy Pier fireworks. After so many hours in my car I loved just walking around, ambling north with no real deadline or specific destination other than the lakefront. Ended the day sketching the Chicago skyline while the sun went down.
“I really like your drawing,” said one kid sitting next to me. “You’re a really good artist.” I’d just been in a room with art by Frida Kahlo, so I was taken aback. “Thanks,” I said. “I practice a lot.” Which is true. The next thing I knew he was drawing pictures of airplanes in my sketchbook. We talked about art, & he told me that art is about expressing feelings inside, which is why abstract art is a thing. Smart kid.
The fireworks were spectacular, as always, though I was more fascinated by the idea that without knowing anything about me the kid came up with the idea of drawing my head all by himself. I gave him the sketch I’d been working on. He and his family headed home, & I started my walk back south. I couldn’t wait to start painting again.
