Nigger? Naw, no way! Or???: When Is (or Can) Humor Be Allowed Within Racist Reality?

Being an Aging, White Baby Boomer, former history teacher who knows things change but history is always peaking around the corner of the future and who longs for the 19th century in so many ways, and who was once adept at technology and now has given up (and often arming for the fight against) learning and adopting the endless “improvements” in AI, it still frustrates me that my quest to engage in the world, to appreciate all that man is capable of, to remain au courant becomes the most daunting of goals.

My love of Appalachian music and its roots in the Old World has taken me to many wonderful events and has allowed so many hours of sublime listening. That Aaron Copland understood its import to this country’s roots and culture, or that Country Music has to acknowledge its unique place, regionally and culturally is obvious, but that it has its own roots nationally in every country has led the likes of Yo Yo Ma to embrace the Silk Road Ensemble. A local phenom, Gus LaCasse, who has wowed the coast of Maine with his skills for years, is another advocate for historical roots and links to national music with his love of and competence in playing Acadian music. His skills have taken him to college in Newfoundland and his interests are far beyond music as he imbibes in political science, economics, philosophy and such to enhance his appreciation of all things human. He is currently covid distanced from Newfoundland and working with a good friend, Bowen Swersey on Mount Desert. We met up with the two in our socially-distanced visits while summering in Acadia. At one such lunch time meeting at Ted’s, our favorite goto food truck in Northeast Harbor, Gus came along for a visit. It’s always great to catch up with him as his interests are so wise and varied that bely his youthful status. As I appreciate his musical skills and his overlap of my Appalachian loves, I had recently run across a group called the Danish Quartet. They are a collection of young Vikings who pull bows across strings, or hit old-fashioned percussion instruments, or incorporate the most advanced digital musical enhancements and are just a few years senior to Gus. I thought he might know them and, if not, be guided to another group to enjoy. I mentioned them and he lit up, said he did know them. But, then asked if I knew the Dreamers’ Circus. The same Danish Quartet classic musicians also are the ones playing all this Scandinavian folk music and composing their own tunes. He knew all of the members’ bios and had been following them for years. So much for being au courant.

In that vain of failure, it has recently come to my attention that there are two comedians who have been available and widely known for over a decade, Desus and Mero, aka The Bodega Boys. They have been touted in the New Yorker, on NPR and many other media platforms. They hail from the Bronx and their urban slant on the world has become legendary. They have been approved by David Letterman and in the recent political world their platform is valuable to the likes of Kamala Harris. Their popularity earned them a slot on Showtime and their followers take in every bit of their Bodega Boy bravura. You can follow them on Twitter. Or their podcast on Spotify or TuneIn. Boy, do Black Lives Matter!

That their popularity is widespread is established, though their niche does not share the Venn Diagram with Trump voters. That said, many liberal Democrats might take issue with their approach to life. They are from the Dominican Republic and Jamaica and their immigrant upbringing, each being first generation American, is central to understanding their Bronxness, their values and their humor. In listening to a segment, the one that introduced me to them, on CBS Sunday Morning, there was a reference to the term ‘nigger’ that offended me. Actually offense is too strong a word. It is repellant, but its usage in their personal, private context for me is the most problematic. That the world knows its source and the force of its denigration of the black race is universal. But, in the past few decades its usage is now a thing of pride among many blacks. My question is whether this is a racist usage, fomenting the very racism many of us would like to avoid and eliminate. If there is an us against them, especially predicated on race when we should be celebrating ethnicity and what it can offer in terms of culture. I have written about this term before, but the two Bronx blacks’ open use and their support of such usage in public in their own grouping has brought me to the computer this time.

In my lifetime I have never used this word against another person. I knew this from an early age. My father, though he harbored endemic racism from his upbringing in the coal region of Kentucky, would also never denigrate another person directly, While he was capable of generalizations regarding race that were untoward and he was suspicious of that which was the other, his wartime experiences and love of the Japanese after fighting them in the hills of Okinawa belie his endemic upbringing and demonstrate that he was truly a decent human being. One of our best friends in our Vienna days was Bernard Stackhouse, an English teacher from Virginia; black and gay. He broke free of the classroom and started a restaurant selling Mexican fare. I, being artistic, was asked to decorate the inside walls. I could not resist the entrance hall being adorned with a Mexican farmer bringing a burro-load of watermelons to the restaurant. When my dad met him on a visit to Vienna after my mother passed away, he became good mates with Bernard. When my dad was buried some years later we had a Marine Honor Guard salute him into the new world at his gravesite. One was a black Woman Marine…..loved it. I’ve written about my own failures with race in my transitioning to adulthood and understanding, but I don’t believe any of my experiences and gathering of knowledge and wisdom support the notion that any use of the word nigger in close company is acceptable. 

That Mark Twain, or James Baldwin, or Spike Lee, or Quinton Tarantino use it is another thing. Cultural and artistic context offer different insights. But, hopefully those references do not legitimize the use of the term. I understand that it is a complex issue and that the current reaction, yet again, to blacks being subjugated in this country has brought out Black Lives and sometimes violent reprisals against an anonymous societal symbol of suppression by blacks when yet another example of racial treatment at the hands of a government institution surfaces. Tyler Perry, SNL and many other prominent directors, writers and comedians have discussed and some have pushed for a legitimization of the term. There is no consensus in the black world, which is heartening. I side with Maya Angelou when it comes to racist terms; it is not done…..ever.

My basketball career allowed my the privilege and opportunity to compete with many blacks in a sport dominated by them for the past fifty years. The culture they have developed within the sport is not lost on me and I was able to keep up with nearly all of the good players, black or other. While competing in San Diego, whose black district is called Lincoln Heights, it was there that I occasionally ventured with friends with whom I’d played in college and on the many courts of the county to play on the public courts in the YMCA gyms of Lincoln Heights. Though it wasn’t the outdoor courts of New York’s boroughs where so many fabulous players got their start, the caliber of ball was useful to our level of skill and we enjoyed the competition. Our reputations preceded us and we were always welcomed. Still, it was a segregated game on many levels and made me uneasy in that separation. Yet, I remember only respect for each others’ talents and the simmering racism was never outward or considered personal other than the confines of the societal context that existed in the 60s and early 70s. My own attitude was to always respect the player and never would I have issued a statement claiming a black player as “other” than me in any verbal way. I wish I could have dealt with that simmering racism better at the time. I hope it is much different in 2020 in Lincoln Heights and elsewhere on the courts of San Diego.

Enjoy the following links to expand your own understanding of who the Bodega Boys, Desus and Mero, are and what they offer. There are other links to expand on the issue of nigger in today’s society, too.

https://www.elle.com/beauty/makeup-skin-care/news/a47441/desus-mero-jeffree-star/

https://www.npr.org/2020/09/20/914949233/-the-bodega-boys-desus-and-mero-offer-life-advice-in-new-book

https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/style/longterm/books/chap1/nigger.htm

https://graduateway.com/use-of-the-word-nigga-in-society/

https://www.salon.com/2013/02/21/is_it_ever_okay_for_white_people_to_say_the_n_word/

https://www.salon.com/2012/12/27/tarantino_is_the_baddest_black_filmmaker_working_today/

Samuel L. Jackson Critiques Backlash Against Quentin Tarantino’s Use of N-Word

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2015/oct/13/quentin-tarantino-on-race-and-black-critics-the-hateful-eight

http://www.daveyd.com/spikepolitics.html

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-53657013

https://www.theodysseyonline.com/the-word-and-why-it-matters

Tyler The Creator Calls Spike Lee The N-Word In ‘Tamale’ Song

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-new-yorker-interview/desus-and-mero-have-conquered-comedy

A (Somewhat) Definitive List of the Bodega Boy’s Aliases from bodegaboys

Covid and Education and What Will be Different When We Return to the New “Normal”: First….What is “Education”?

The year 2020 has disrupted the lives of all the earth’s inhabitants. Nothing has escaped the impact the virus has had on living things, some outcomes positive and so many devastating. The field of education, as a philosophical and practical discussion, has been possibly permanently altered. As with so many of the impacts the virus has had on so many issues and interactions in societies, we know that we can’t do or approach them the way we had in the past, as the probability of a returning pandemic is very real and requires all individuals in all walks of life to take heed and prepare. There are also opportunities for change this radical disruption has opened up to us. Rarely does society get the opportunity to alter course because of forced accommodation, and so often when a major historical disruption intercedes do the leaders in charge take advantage to chart a better course.

History has taught us that wars, pandemics, natural catastrophes, human-induced economic failures, technological alterations affecting production of goods and transportation means, and new inventions that impact the very nature of what is valuable to society move the needle of existence in new directions. That the changes made are “progress” needs to be discussed incorporating many issues and paradigmatic considerations. The Amish, for instance, are not pleased with the changes in the past three centuries. Those in favor of a Green New Deal are also chagrined at those centuries’ impact on “progress”.

Education is an obvious area for exploration when considering how any society approaches its goals for education. Since Napoleonic, France adopted a centralized curriculum where the French are comfortable with a unified approach to education, often with disparately located schools teaching students on the same page in the same book on the same date. The Finnish enjoy a wonderful reputation for meeting the students where his or her needs are and supporting the whole child’s growth and potential as integral for the health of society. The British have their snobbish holdovers from the days of Aristocracy and the nurturing, or at least accommodation, of such as the Bullingdon Boys, demonstrates that system’s weaknesses. In many countries education is reserved for those who can afford it.

Here in the United States the Founding Fathers understood education’s importance and wished to offer it to the widest proportion of the pubic as measured by the societal sentiments at the time even though it was not something that made it into the Constitutional oversight of the Federal Government. Education in the United States is largely the purview of the states. Blacks and women were initially obstructed from getting an education, and most white males received a paucity of instruction in most places until into the mid-19th century, even though there were efforts in some regions to support public education. By the time we get to the Industrial Age of America in the late 19th century, child labor is attacked as un-American by many, though child labor restrictions did not finding federal support and legal standing until well into the 20th century. Public schooling support, while always an issue that had important voices in society and was evident even in the pre-independence colonies, becomes a major issue during and after Reconstruction. But, Reconstruction will cause a national racist backlash which exposed the endemic American problem that is still festering through this pandemic of 2020. It was from this time period, up through the First World War, into the Depression and again through another war before the Federal Government took a major lead in what should be done on a national level. Our very approach to education of our youth and the importance of dead, white males in our country’s history is testament to the need for an overhaul in the approach. But how to do this best and to what aim. We need to go back to those Founding Fathers to support what an “American” education should be.

From Plessy vs. Ferguson, to the GI Bill to Brown vs. Board of Education, which was followed by federal intervention through the orders of President Eisenhower in his attempt to segregate schools in the South, race has splintered America’s approach to education. Busing seemed to be the best solution to integrating the nation’s schools, with Charlotte, North Carolina, being its poster city. But by 1973 the real effect of busing was to see White Flight Schools pop up in the nation’s suburbs, as did many in Charlotte which now promote a “diversity” pledge in their mission statements. The oldest institution in Charlotte which preceded white flight even hired the first black head of school in the state’s independent schools system.

White flight or splinter districts, or now the support for Charter Schools or Federal intervention for elitism via Betsy Devos’ attempts at the helm of the Department of Education are other methods for manipulating the outcomes in educational achievement for America’s students. As 2020 rose onto the horizon, our schools were still grappling with inequity, economic disparity, wage starvation in many states for programs, benefits and teachers’ salaries which continued skewing towards the elite on one side of the economic divide and erratic approaches to solving public schooling’s problems in the States on the other.

The pandemic’s effects on the field of education are now becoming obvious and have also exposed, exasperated or highlighted the weaknesses and inequities of education American children receive. For the last few months of the Spring session of last school year when most schools closed due to the pandemic, education often became the responsibility of the parents. They found the job daunting for various reasons. Parents are not the best educators unless you can make the choice in a two-parent household to dedicate the life of one of the two to home schooling for a significant part of the process of educating your children, or do what is now happening in the new school year, pool several families’ resources together and hired a “Pod teacher” and find a place where isolated families and their children can be school by a qualified educator. This has been done successfully and any parent who has done this understands the investment and rewards from this Rousseauian conundrum.

What is the curriculum one should follow, how do you prepare your child/children to enter into the outside world, and what is one’s life worth in the hours upon hours it takes dedicated to finding the time, place and experiences to accomplish these goals? Note that the country may have different goals than many parents, but should those parents be left completely alone as they design the goals for their child’s future? Can the government finally step in and say to any parent, you cannot do it that way because something is missing from the approach? That takes us back to those Founding Fathers, who left it up to the States and often to the parents. It ain’t easy, or inexpensive. How many of us are willing to take on a Captain Fantastic existence for our family? We know there are many disparate paradigmatic approaches to the existential question of education with groups like the Amish and many other religious institutions preferring, or even demanding, their own curriculum that can fly in the face of national goals. Libertarianism was a strong factor in the nation’s founding, with all the Founding Fathers understanding its positives and negatives. The discussion of what to do in the future will continue with the argument about what those white men had in mind.

Take a look at a few….Bernie Sanders, but not in his own words,  David Frum, Andrew Lapore a minarchist, and getting to the bottom of this issue will not be resolved easily in this country. That the 2nd Amendment is also tied into the discussion and resolution of educational goals is also a problem. Many even wonder today whether the country will even survive the split apparent in the discussion and the violent responses already apparent are not positive harbingers of an outcome. But education and how it is approached in this country is the major factor in that positive outcome and Libertarianism as defined by those who formed a party after the debacle of Richard Nixon cannot take us in the right direction. What they have done to contribute to selfishness, misinformation, obfuscation, denial and that many are willing to walk over the body on the street because he was not their responsibility and that they felt the reason he was lying in the street was the body’s responsibility is wholly troubling. So, back to the post-pandemic world in America. Where do we go based on what it has taught us?

What we do know in an acute way from the past few months is that young children have suffered greatly from the impact of social distancing. No preschooler or Kindergarten to Second grade kid benefits or understands the world he or she sees behind a mask, or cannot hug, or cannot interact with to find out critical social cues that motivate, ameliorate and form who they are. Up until the age of five, psychologists look at critical growth phases to see if children are performing on language acquisition skills. These skills include how to speak, understand speech, whether the child is capable of differentiating signs, signals and such and whether her brain can “compute” those signs in a way that facilitates maneuvering the “real” world, the social world, the literate world. In the last couple of generations we are wondering if the educational system, and the physical world of chemicals and man-made products may have possibly changed our very nature and placed obstacles to the ingestion of knowledge. What we should agree on as a nation is that all individuals/children should be supported in their efforts and afforded some support from the government in terms of legal oversight, finances and institutional intervention to help. How much of each is the sticky discussion when you get into the many facets of this issue. But that is whole other blog. Let’s continue with the question of “what is education?”.

What the proponents of getting back to classes mentions often is the social and community interchanges that occur at school, especially for those in the elementary systems. Parents, of course, are both in need of relief so they can attend to their own employment and also feel inadequate to cover the needs and assistance to their child’s/children’s online instruction from various teachers. Keeping a calendar is now an major administrative feature of home life for families with children. For students entering their senior years, either in high school or college, are going to be in a bind if their last year in their major institution is online. Employment for college graduates from this past spring is already a major issue, one that could affect them throughout their lives. Another school year done online could be a major disadvantage in the hiring arena, an arena that is already anemic and one that may not improve for some time. For graduating high school seniors, they are in a netherworld of the admissions game that is not like anything found in our system prior to this year. And, if you are either a college athlete or high school athlete, the chances of enjoying your season this year are slim. For those whose professional prospects are tied to ACC basketball exploits, or SEC football accomplishments, you may either miss an entire year as a college athlete and face the choice of adding an extra year to your college careers, or, for the high school seniors, miss out altogether on a major portion of you high school experience as an athlete.

As for the classroom transfer of knowledge from educator to the students, the question of what is involved in the educational experience is front and center. That we have been doing a poor job of it as a nation overall has been discussed for decades and longer. That some schools have sought to alter the approach and to incorporate innovation, sometimes with the new technology, has been ongoing for the past few decades. Since the end of busing and other attempts to address gross inequities in the public system in the 70s, a whole ring of suburban mostly white schools has grown up in most American cities to complement those already long in existence in the independent school systems. That we have a countrywide acceptance of state control, established by the Constitution, is an obstacle on many levels. Then, the powerful states of Texas, California and New York dominate the publication of textbooks simply because of size. That some states, primarily Republican, have starved their public school system’s budgets also adds to the diminishment of sound education. Recent strikes in Kansas, Arizona, Kentucky and other states have sought to redress these inadequacies. The pandemic has only exacerbated the inequities found between urban and rural, and public and independent schools.

Let’s imagine a student at a well-endowed private school returning this year to the classroom. Will that be a hybrid system, one where faculty at risk are allowed to instruct from home and one that reschedules, forms pods, tests often, feeds the students in the classrooms, avoids sports and has the ability to improve busing students, getting everyone equal access to instruction and that no one gets sick during the year. What would this “education” look like? Is this the education of the future? What opportunities do we now have for approaching a new model, regardless of the appearance of the pandemic but possible only because the pandemic threw everything in the trash can?

As businesses are now finding that the costs of business can be decreased by decentralizing, so too can the school systems explore when education happens best, where it can take place, what is its purpose and then seek to address costs, outcomes, and the goals of making the best individual and citizen possible from the investments of time and money. If you look at the Finnish, for example, they have chosen to focus on this investment as central for turning out good, responsible citizens who are by and large happy. If that is a goal, then we should learn from them. But, to measure everything from one’s own navel will surely lead us back to another Trump-like presidency. Libertarians can be good neighbors, but take the altercation between Ron Paul and his neighbor as an indication that they can also have some serious failings if they take the individualism too seriously. From the time that the Kochs became involved in the movement, the country, in my opinion, has not been a better country. We should engage our students in the full understanding of what Emerson and Thoreau had in mind in our country’s early days. The more you dig into their lives and thoughts, you understand the complexity and conundrums that arise when discussing The Common and how to manage it. Education needs to understand those goals and require all citizens to do their part in forming a more perfect union.

The Conundrum Our Quotidian President Presents

The Quotidian Characteristics on Display in Our President: This Does Not Make for a  Citizen’s Comfortable Day 

As we count down the days until the November election, in spite of the polls, the logic of humanism, the excellent analysis of what is tantamount to a nearly complete condemnation of an inept human being in leadership by nearly all the objective media platforms’ pundits pointing out such ineptitude at every turn, our president continually and consistently worries those of us who care about democratic principles. The issues facing us now arise daily- or seemingly by the hour- yet the hopes are still there that the nation can still take on each and every instance while trying to avoid ad hominem retorts to those who espouse alternative visions or solutions.

It is maddeningly difficult to maintain decorum, though. The immense problems now facing the community or the commons that we inhabit locally, nationally and on this globe are critical and of the order that few have seen in their lifetimes. The unknowns and uncertainly strain all the fabric of social order. We worry that not enough of our nation’s citizens will…or will be able to…vote, or perhaps that some slight of hand by some nefarious entity, group or person will influence our democratic choices.  We now worry that long-standing and now the more egregious and immediate voter suppression attempts, or simply the fluke of a few thousand well-placed votes here or there will return this man to the White House in 2021. The Washington Post, who uncovered Nixon’s efforts to debase democracy, has openly called for Trump’s firing in an extraordinary condemnation.

It seems nearly impossible, but, yet, yet……what if. There are many citizens returning to the notion that leaving the country is the only option if this were to happen. The NYTimes and other media platforms are posting such opinion pieces on their pages. The turmoil on the streets and the conversations on the Sunday Shows is difficult to process, as hopeful as so many of the images convey. The country is still a beacon for much of the world’s refugees even in the era of the new Republican Party under Trump. While the past half year has made it impossible for new aspirant future citizens to come and apply, it is also a fact that because of this man we are forbidden to travel as American citizens to dozens upon dozens of countries.

What are your options between now and November to insure that the Republican Party is placed on its hind foot?  That those surviving Republicans who remain in the party and in power who remain silent or evasive or equivocating when Trump exhibits yet one more unbelievable uttering, tweet or conspiracy is truly exasperating to the core of the phrase’s meaning. One watches and listens to those Never Trumpers, or the ones that were initially hopeful that they could influence his decisions or mitigate Trump’s actions, or the ones who formed the Lincoln Project and the other Conservative groups placing some of the most effective adds challenging the country to see the truth, or other Republicans who wrote books about their time in the administration, or who worked for the GOP over the past fifty years in gerrymandering, race-baiting, organizing, campaigning and power-brokering and why they now accept their responsibility in destroying the democratic process in the sole pursuit of power.  These Conservatives now hope that some small part of that stubborn 40% behemoth they created will peel off and experience some epiphany that has here to fore somehow escaped them and that they will choose a better future for the country. One wonders what the future Republican Party will be. For certain the element that Trump exploited and that he is only the symptom of and not the cause, there will be a significant segment of this country that will simmer and fester into our futures. It seems those planning an exit have merit in their thoughts of a new home on so many levels.

For the next two months we are looking for markers or signs in the political crevices into which we can secure our pitons of hope. Stringing our rope to the cliff of decisions at present is truly an existential exercise, for each individual and now the entire country. At some point in the future, as those of us who have survived these past four years look back and collect our senses, our finances, our friends, and look to circling the new community in which we choose to live, it may be that some of us have jettisoned Facebook or other social media options because they are too dangerous or that we simply don’t want to be a part of their insidious sides. Perhaps some will take to communicating only with a typewriter or with their Mont Blancs. I have loved using social media and its opportunities for blogging, texting, emailing and all the other digital means that allow all of us to link our various pitons of life. It is the very nature of existence to do so by all these means and others. How will we all be keeping in touch as we past the post in November? It is my hope that we can exchange good thoughts, support each other, smile at each other’s accomplishments and offerings and that those of us who have successfully built their friendships, relationships, families, professions and communities can be supported in pursuing whatever futures each wishes to follow. It is sorely time to return to a period of discussion and discourse where the meetings on the future Pynx are useful and looking towards a collective vision. Please, please let us leave behind this turmoil and rancor.

Humanity has always pursued myriad approaches to life. So often we have destroyed those attempts. The arc we’ve followed has gotten us to this point and some claim, or at least hope, that its charting over time is pointed in a positive and inclusive- upward- direction. The markers chosen from the past are useful in building a picture to present to future generations. In speaking with my grandchildren the past couple of weeks on their visit here, I found the discussions we had both dispiriting and hopeful in so many ways. That we had to discuss their understanding of how a virus spreads, that they needed to understand why we would not allow them in our car or home and that all visits had to be outside and at a safe distance. That the disruption to their education, their friendships, their sports aspirations and experiences, or the absence of routine, normal human interchange and planning for a future must be uncertain for some time into the future is truly sad. Yet, the turmoil has pushed the conversations into arenas that offer discussions that normally aren’t accompanied by the caveats presented by the current malaise and threats. In some ways this pandemic, the actions of the past four years that have allowed the formation of movements for change, and the digital opportunities to reach out or to hook on to the myriad offerings on our various platforms is truly astonishing, empowering and gives us all glimmers of hope for that future we are all grabbing for at present. As always, the humanists are hoping for an all inclusive option in that future arc.

This blog was just a short stop to ponder the view at present as we cling the seemingly immense vertical wall of challenges we are all facing. Place your pitons well and choose the course that will keep you and yours safe and heading towards your own mountain top. I look forward to meeting all of our good and cherished friends on there. For history’s sake,  hopefully these people and events who gave us the past four years will all be events and moments to be found in the rear view mirror or on some ash heap somewhere. But…..

“I am of the belief that evil deeds, which Trump is committing, is the language of the traumatized,” she said. “And you can hate the deeds. Don’t hate the person because he wins if we hate him. Don’t even give him that much energy.”  Jane Fonda

If you hope for such a future sans Trump you may want to take a look at the links below. They are not fun viewing now, but hopefully will be so in December.

https://www.politico.com/story/2015/09/donald-trump-foreign-policy-gaffes-2016-213345

https://www.motherjones.com/anti-racism-police-protest/2020/09/trump-laura-ingraham-interview/

https://www.salon.com/2020/08/11/5-standout-moments-from-one-of-the-worst-trump-press-conferences-in-a-while_partner/

https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-05-10/Donald-Trump-is-the-worst-president-in-our-history-in-my-lifetime-Qn3togzLj2/index.html

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/12/30/worst-things-trump-did/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/04/23/12-trumps-worst-coronavirus-contradictions/

https://www.theatlantic.com/unthinkable/

unkept promises

https://www.thetoptens.com/worst-things-trump-has-done-as-president/

https://www.usnews.com/news/special-reports/the-worst-presidents/articles/where-would-donald-trump-land-on-a-list-of-worst-presidents

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/election-2020-historians-will-likely-rank-trump-as-one-of-the-worst-presidents/ar-BB16DEow

https://www.forbes.com/pictures/flji45elmm/donald-trumps-10-most-of/#3b1d87a970df

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/max-boot-donald-trump-worst-president_n_5e8a99c4c5b6e7d76c663267

https://bookriot.com/books-about-trumps-presidency/

https://www.ibtimes.com/top-10-best-books-about-donald-trump-2020-3000569

Fame and the Public’s Reaction to the Famous: The Famous are Not Always What They Seem

Art has always been a tool of the famous and powerful. Artists themselves can become famous and powerful. In exploring the relationship between power and art one has to always remain focused on which audience any artist is working for and hoping to influence. Sometimes artists specifically aim to the future audiences, but often there is a select audience and sometimes the only satisfaction an artist is seeking is from the sitter or client who has contracted a portrait. Sometimes he only seeks to impress himself and no one else at the time is capable of understanding his goals.

One of the most interesting artists to explore for his relationships to his clients is the French painter Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres. This artist was born into the last years of the Rococo style and just before the French Revolution. When he was a young student, the style changed to Classical and the master at that time was David, who brought Ingres under his wing. The Napoleonic years shaped his career, but the turmoil in French society created violent gyrations, not only in the political and social lives of France’s citizens, but to all manner of life and art. Ingres certainly lived in interesting times…..

Audio explaining the portrait

Throughout his life Ingres was reacting to the expectations of society, yet his choice, his main desire, was to produce large historical allegories that were the rage during his most productive years. These paintings are examples of how an artist can bend the will of the public into believing a past that is embellished, probably even false or non-existent.

But, to earn substantial commissions, he needed to do portraiture. The one chosen to illustrate this blog is of Louise de Broglie, Comtesse d’Haussonville, explained here much better than I by a curator from the Frick, where the painting now lives. In fact, at the point in his career that he took on this commission, he was so famous and accomplished he avoided portraits. But, Louise’ status in society and his relationship to this milieu required the commission to be completed. It took three years, over 80 drawings in preparation, and in the meantime the sitter became a Comtesse, pregnant and a mother. At the time when he completed this portrait and one of Baronne de Rothschild shown at the bottom, he was at the peak of his career. Both are exemplary of his skills with a brush. Close ups of Louise’ eyelashes attest to his meticulous attention to detail.

Yet, for all the realism apparent in this painting, it is also a grand example of slight of hand by the artist. Often Ingres will position body parts or add body parts to complete his composition as he sees fit. Aimee Ng points out examples in her presentation. In this particular example there is no physical way Louise could contort her right arm and shoulder to pose in this way. If you study the many drawings you understand how Ingres picks and chooses from his planning to cut and paste what he needs to portray the figure in the pose he desires.

In the painting of the Comtesse, Ingres presents a Comtesse who knows she is an alluring female. She is also confronting the viewer, at this intimate moment but also into the infinite future. Yet, she is not really prepared for this confrontation, having just returned from the opera to her home, and having just tossed off her wrap and removed her gloves, which have been placed behind her on the mantel. She has also started to let down her hair. Yet, the coquettish pose causes the viewer to pose his own question as to what is on Ms. de Broglie’s mind.

If you are sufficiently intrigued at this point to continue on, the real point of this blog is to introduce you to one of our favorite pastimes that have arisen out of the Covid era. The Frick Museum, now closed for half a year, decided to present its works to the public through a series of online platforms. There are three: Cocktails with a Curator, The Frick Five and Travels with a Curator. I hope you take twenty minutes or so of your day or evening to watch the one presented here and then move on to the many others available on YouTube. There are two curators at the Frick who present, Aimee Ng, who presents this one, and Xavier Salomon, who came up with the idea. Both are fabulous. Ms. Ng’s background on the painting, the Comtesse and the painter will surely entertain and inform you. The efforts the two curators represent one of the examples when Covid has pushed our creative buttons and allowed the world an intriguing opportunity to grow, learn and relish life in the time of pandemic……Stay safe

https://www.theartstory.org/artist/ingres-jean-auguste-dominique/artworks/

 https://www.nortonsimon.org/learn/multimedia/videos-podcasts-and-lectures/ingres-s-comtesse-d-haussonville-on-loan-from-the-frick-collection/  audio about the portrait