From: Betty Allen
To: Garnie Sumner
Sent: Saturday, January 31, 2009
Subject: Conversations
Garnie - Thank you so much for sending the latest from Maureen. Wouldn't it be great to be able to talk with her? I'd love to talk with her about copies. I'd love to share with her my experiences on that line. Many years ago, not long after I started taking the classes at Montgomery College, the Giant grocery store sold a series of reproductions of famous paintings, and I bought several, which I happily hung over the couch. One of them was a view of rooftops at Arles by Van Gogh. A year or so later, at a special Van Gogh show at the Baltimore museum, I had a chance to see the original. It was lit by a skylight, and it was as though it was alive. When I got home, the static reproduction over my couch had died on the wall.
Seeing slides of Jackson Pollack's paintings in art history class left me cold. I just didn't "get it." Later at the National Gallery in Washington, we went to a visiting exhibit from a collector in Chicago that included one of his "drip" paintings, and I stood there completely immersed in it until Uncle Bob practically drug me away by the collar. He insisted I had stood there for more than twenty minutes.
When the Mona Lisa was on loan during the Kennedy administration, there were long lines to see it. Once you got inside the room, there was plenty of time to look at it as the line moved slowly, and as you got nearer on the right side, her eyes were looking at you. Her eyes followed you as you slowly went out on the her left side. I was filled with awe the whole time, partly from amazement that I was actuallly seeing the painting. There were definite vibrations. That sort of experience and memory, those opportunities, are a part of the blessings for which I remain grateful.
Love as always,, Aunt Betty
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Going along humming a juggling tune,
Maureen Carlson
Detroit Area Polymer Clay Guild