Baroque Age

I can remember how it started. I wanted to see some Piranesi etchings that I had looked at 14 or 15 years ago. I found them in a book on the Baroque we had in the museum library. Flipping pages, looking at the pictures, stumble on a London church by Sir Christopher Wren. After the great Fire of London, 1666, he designed and built 51 churches just in London. And, of course, one really must check out the Bernini marbles. His "The Ecstasy of St Teresa" is stunning. You have to look at Rubens, you have to look at Rembrandt. The gestural brushstrokes by Rembrandt, at the end, when he was no longer filing in outlines, are phenomenal. The hands, in detail, a mastery that I see again in Sargent's hands and then again in a different way, in the way Chuck Close works. A quiet day at the museum, I spent some time in the library. Research, to make me a better docent, or as it happens, instructor to docents because there's no one better qualified in the building. The docent instructor by default. The Ohio, four feet above flood stage, is flowing at the volume of 506 thousand cubic feet per second. At this rate, it makes a noise. Up top, at the confluence, there's a walkway and small picnic area, a nice spot, I go there often, in summer, with a footer, and watch the rivers flow. Today, in the rain, there was no conclusion, just the thought that in the rain, river towns are all about water. I walked around this morning, looking down storm drains. Free lunch, at the pub, for hanging the signs yesterday, and the staff all tell me to come back at Happy Hour because it's the Chamber Of Commerce, "Business After Hours" event, free food and beer. Event hosted by the pub, Sponsored by Sherman Insurance, family of Josh the fireman friend. Why not? I get there and Anthony and Josh have saved me a stool at the bar, the place is already crowded, the food smells heavenly. Josh's father has cooked pork shoulders and there are mounds of pulled pork. As good as anything I could do. It's loud, lots of close physical contact. When you have a bar seat, at an event like this, you become a mediator between the free Guinness on tap and the people behind you. I know some of the people, and have a series of short conversations interrupted by other people. Anthony and I kept up a dialog through the whole thing. A testament to raising our voices, though often we'd just grunt and point. I have to leave, finally, before I get a headache. Bernini's "Angel With The Subscription" which is, I read, one of the instruments of Christ's Passions, and I know nothing about this, don't have a clue what they're talking about, dude seems to be holding some text, a vellum scroll. Look at his face, look at his hands, this is new. The gestural. I've already got a month's reading lined up. There's a dome you need to see, Chapel of the Holy Shroud, Turin. It's cribbed up in a way a stagehand might, sloppy, but close enough. The attachments would have worked, if you hadn't had to back out those screws. But by then even the anchor is in question, and we're drifting. Coffering is how eastern roof systems came to my attention. Shoring something. Give me long enough, I'll remember your face. I'm not so good with names, too many silent letters. The Farnese Ceiling. The first of the great painted ceilings of the Baroque Age. Illusionistic in detail. Annibale Carracci. A wonderful self-portrait, with his first wife Isabella Brant, again, look at the hands, her cocked hat, Rubens and his palette. One last image, for the night, a particular scene, we have it several times, but the one that takes me is George de la Tour's "St. Sebastion Tended by St. Irene." The painted figures look as if they were carved from wood. Then there's Velasquez and Caravaggio, Vermeer, for god's sake. I look at pictures until I fall asleep. Dream of fallen saints. Nothing prepares you for the real world world, where babies are born, and hips are broken. A no-brainer, what appears to be. The illusion of meaning. Sure, the water is high, but there's no reason to panic. Merely finding a place to stop.