Walk: AMC Kabuki (The Phoenician Scheme), Sunday Hood
Distance: 3.5 miles, 3 miles
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| Domenikos Theotokopoulos, called El Greco (crete, active in Spain), 1541-1614, Saint John the Baptist, ca 1600, oil on canvas |
Ciwt has no doubt the tabloids would be replete with stories of his exploits if the painter El Greco was alive today.
Born Domenikos Theotokopoulos in Crete in 1541, and trained as an icon painter, he could have had a satisfactory artististic life in that sought after speciality. But his youthful ambitions were larger, so he set off for Venice and from there the thriving and competive artistic hub of Rome. In Rome he worked and learned in the studios of the great Renasissance masters (Tintoretto even Michelangelo) eventually becoming a disciple of Titian. But here again in Italy his ambitions were thwarted, this time by a lack of important commissions. So, in his mid 30's he departed for Spain to seek work at the court of Philip II, then the most powerful monarch and patron in Europe.
Philip II though turned out to be at odds with the stylistic techniques the artist had developed and insisted on - the clashing colors, disquieting emotions, elongated figures. These offended Philip's aesthetic and religious views so he refused patronage.
The ambitious artist's response to Philip's rejection was to become the iconic and controvesial artist, intellectual and flamboyant businessman, popularly dubbed El Greco. The very techniques and personal religious views that alienated Philip were embraced by the clerical elite and intellectuals of Toledo. They clamored for his company, commissions for his work abounded and El Greco became El Greco.
With such reliably powerful patronage he was free to work from his own philosophical, technically masterful, personally expressive and some say "arrogant" genius. In other words El Greco was free to flourish. And flourish he did, establishing a large workshop and living in a 26 room mansion often with a full orchestra playing as he dined. And with incessant lawsuits. Learning that artists in Spain were paid the wages of ordinary tradesmen like brick layers and carpenters, El Greco would have none of it and began setting and demanding his own prices. Those who were unwilling or slow to pay - and there were many - were dragged to court and sued for all the monies owed him. Ciwt can only guess at El Greco's other behaviors and the level of his notoriety throughout Spain.
El Greco's famed highly idiosyncratic style is on full display in the above painting of John the Baptist commissioned by the Descalaced (Barefoot) Carmelites in Malagon, Spain.. Perhaps the cousin of Jesus, John is a central figure of Christianity and a worthy and oft-painted subjecr of El Greco - with this one in the Legion of Honor arguably the greatest. An Old Testament messianic preacher/prophet/zealot, John is said to have wandered the wild landscapes of the hill country around the Dead Sea heralding fire and brimstone messages. He is best known for baptizing penitents, declaring Jesus the Lamb of God and baptising him and then for his infamous beheading by King Herod at Salome's (Herod's stepdaughter's) entreaty.
With or without knowing Saint John's story, viewers of the painting easily perceive a man who lived an emotionally agitated, vulnerable, sorrowful but spiritually driven life. El Greco's deliberate elongation of Saint John, his freewheeling, daring perspective, distortions, audacious use of flickering colors, the entire canvas really, emphasizes John's austere, aesthetic, religious nature. The agitated sky, broken brushstrokes convey John's fervor and nervous, spiritual energy. El Greco has created an entirely personal, original and enduring artistic shorthand.
And, to Ciwt, this painting and much of the collective works of El Greco are some of - perhaps the - first works of modern art, 400 years ahead of their time.
