arthipstory

I think I need to spend more time researching Frida Kahlo’s friends. Trust me: there’s something very difficult about the dichotomy between “girl, do what makes you happy,” and “GIRL, CAN WE PLEASE TALK ABOUT THIS GUY?!”

I mean, Diego Rivera isn’t exactly known around art history as a “cool dude.” Or a “nice guy.” Or “so hot it’s worth it.”

Like, at all. 

But maybe that’s just what helped Frida get close with her girlfriends. I’m just going to assume that Frida and singer Chavela Vargas are laughing at his expense…

I love, love, LOVE Kendyll Hillegas. Look at how *beautiful* these illustrations are!

There is genuinely nothing I like more than Agnes Martin’s grids.

She’s such a bad bitch.

I mean, seriously, she starts thinking of a tree, and makes this:

Or friendship:

Can you imagine while EVERYONE ELSE is out there rockin’ those sweet, holographic BFF necklackes from Claire’s, Agnes is just out there giving out graph paper?!

“I dunno what you mean, Shannon, this is what friendship looks like to me!”

Sure, Agnes.

(And for all you SERIOUS people out there who are about five seconds away from getting in a tizzy regarding my calling Martin’s work graph paper, you can all relax. Her work is powerful, mathematical, and mystifying.)

What if women gave up the idea of revenge bodies and just went for total annihilation of their exes?

I mean, Judith thought so (jk, Holofernes wasn’t an ex, but a total creep).

Holofernes was all about Judith being a bombshell babe, but he also had plans to destroy her city. Girlfriend wasn’t about to let that happen, so she gets him wasted, he passes out, and then she cuts off his damn head.

In typical iconography, Judith rolls with her maid squad to distinguish her from Salome, another distinguished decapitator (she’s the one who ordered John the Baptist’s head on a silver platter, and girl got her wishhhh).

So while revenge bodies are legit (and also keep us out of, well, trials for murder), there’s something to be said about how they kept it simple “life and death” terms back then.

Was anyone else hoping that American Gothic was a catfish of a much better-looking couple?

Same.

William H. Johnson’s Self-Portrait with Pipe from 1937 is one of the most beautiful series of brushstrokes I’ve ever seen on a work. Hello!?, it’s so rhythmic, I don’t even know or care where his left hand goes from his wrist.

The Harmon Foundation (named after William Elmer Harmon, v rich from real estate) amassed a TON of Harlem Renaissance work. The Foundation dwindled in the sixties, and left most of its collection between the Smithsonian’s American Art Museum and the National Portrait Gallery (which was spankin’ new at the time).

There, friends, little tidbits that might help you win trivia tonight!

Did you know that when Basquiat was a child, he was struck by a car?! Seriously, broke his arm and had to have his spleen removed.

His spleen, y’all. At like, eight years old!

Basquiat killed time during his convalescence by reading Gray’s Anatomy. Proving that, real artist or not, we’re all killing time with flipping through old Gray’s…though mine is just spelled with a G-R-E-Y and boasts Meredith’s endless and annoying drama.

hmm…maybe Basquiat was onto something.

Just a reminder from Cindy Sherman that we’re all out here, trying to do our best. Even y’all clowns and fuckboys.

I’m minding my own business, keeping to myself, and then realize there’s a full work week ahead.

I was supposed to be somewhere forty-five minutes ago.