I am going back in time again. This time to Spain of the 18th and 19th Century. Francisco Goya was a master painter and printmaker whose work ranged from sophisticated royal portraits to illicit nudes to disturbing depictions of war and violence.
Francisco Goya – Self Portrait – 1795
Pretty and Sweet
He started out as an apprentice at age 14 and quickly moved up the ranks due to talent. He eventually came to the attention of King Charles III, becoming an artist on the royal payroll. He did pretty and sweet paintings of the Royal family to earn his keep. At least they look that way to us now. But at the time he was known for not sugar coating the looks of his subjects. He would be similar to a portrait photographer now who uses very little Photoshop on his work.
Francisco Goya – Duchess of Alba – Oil on Canvas – 1795
Francisco Goya – The Straw Manikin – oil on canvas -1792
Even while he was painting supposedly idyllic scenes he was also infusing them with sometimes satiric or critical commentary about the state of Spain.
Francisco Goya – King Charles IV of Spain and his Family – oil on canvas – 1800
The Fox in the Hen House
For example in the painting above the whole family is gathered but the Queen is in the center indicating greater power. And behind the King on the right is a painting of Lot and is daughters from the Old Testament, a very obvious allusion to corruption and perversion at the time. How he got away with these slights is a mystery, but he did.
Yea, so?
You might be asking, why do I love this guy anyway? He looks like a pretty average painter of pretty boring Royal portraits, so what’s the big deal?
Here’s the big deal. in 1792 Goya came down with a mysterious malady, still unknown to this day, that caused him to go deaf. It led him to become withdrawn, introspective and much more willing to create images that were filled with his dreams, nightmares, disillusionments, madness and violence. These were directed at humanity, at France, at Spain, and the ceaseless political intrigue and the brutality of war. We would almost certainly not care or no much about his work if he had not turned to these subject matters so decisively. He didn’t give up his work as a painter of society and royalty, but he did work alone and intensely on images that were the complete opposite of his public image.
Los Caprichos
During my Sophomore year at Brandeis University I was able to study the prints of Goya at the Museum of Fine Art in Boston. Two series really stood out to me.
The first was ‘Los Caprichos’. In these images he depicts the folly of society, satirically making fun of both the high and low.
Francisco Goya – Now They Are Sitting Well – etching/aquatint – 1799
Francisco Goya – Blow – etching – 1799
Francisco Goya – Pretty Teacher – etching – 1799
The Disasters of War
The second series that stood out even more was his ‘Disasters of War’. Spain had been invaded in 1808 by Napoleon’s army and conflict ensued for 6 years. In response Goya painted his most famous piece, as well as countless prints for his series.
Francisco Goya – The 3rd of May – oil on canvas – 1808-1814
This painting turned the corner in art from the classic world to the modern. With this image Goya inspired centuries of artists to come to be bold and unsparing in their depictions of the true nature of war.
Francisco Goya – This is Worse – etching – 1815
Francisco Goya – Bazan Grande with Dead – etching – 1814
These were not published until 35 years after his death.
The Black Paintings
Even when the fighting was over the Bourbon dynasty was restored to the throne, setting back many decades of enlightened liberal progress in Spain. Goya was distraught over this. But worse yet was the likely dementia he was starting to experience. His images became dark, disturbing treatments of not just society’s woes but his own internal struggle.
Francisco Goya – The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters – etching/aquatint – 1799
The etching above wasn’t done towards the end of his life, but it illustrates both the mental madness he might have been experiencing and his belief in reason as a bulwark against such monsters, in life and in society.
Francisco Goya – Colossus
Francisco Goya – The Colossus – oil on canvas – 1812
Francisco Goya – Saturn Devouring his Son – 1823
Madness
This image was painted on the walls inside his house, along with many others called ‘The Black Paintings’ from his later years.
I can just imagine the torment he had in his head. But the amazing thing, and the reason he is an artist I love, is he kept creating. He pushed forward and unflinchingly showed his vision of the world, for good and for bad.
The Secret Maja
And now, just so we don’t end on a completely macabre note, here are two very similar images of the same woman. They never were displayed publicly during his life but were displayed in the home of the owner and commissioner of the pieces. There is no consensus on who the woman is but some think she is the Duchess of Alba that is shown at the top of the article.
Francisco Goya – The Clothed Maja – oil on canvas – 1800
Francisco Goya – The Nude Maja – oil on canvas – 1800
It was quite the scandal for him to have painted the nude in the first place, but it was even moreso because there was no pretense of mythology or religion. It was an image of a real woman, not a long gone historical figure. It’s probably the first major European painting to be painted and presented in this way since the Roman era.
The images in this article are all from the fantastic site ‘WikiPainting‘. I highly recommend exploring it.
If you would like to read more about Goya I would recommend starting here at the Metropolitan Museum of Art page about him. Of course you will find the most information about him in Spain, primarily at the Prado Museum where many of his masterpieces are on display.
I have been all three of these kisses to women throughout my life. I liked being the exclamation point the best, and disliked being the question mark the most. Being a comma didn’t matter much, unless I thought I was an exclamation point, then it was a bummer. In general that is when you are hurt, when you think you are one type of punctuation, but the woman decides you are another.
I was a comma in 2002 when a woman I started to date had me in between some other guys she was dating. I could tell she was not going to stop her sentence with me.
I was a question mark many times. The thing about being a question mark is you don’t usually stay that way. The question is answered pretty quickly and you are either going to become an exclamation point, a period or a comma in short order.
And my ego would like to say I have been an exclamation point more than a few times, but I can at least say I have held that punctuation title twice, to the two women I married. Of course I turned into a very long comma to my first wife, but I was exclamation point for a while at least.
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Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman, who has given all 3 types in his life.
Quote by Mistinguett, 1875-1956, French singer and actress.
Take a look and listen to this, her only sound movie, from 1936.
I might be a man but I remember very well my first kiss.
I had gone to my very first dance. I was 12 years old and was going to be entering 7th grade. I went to a thing called ‘Sports Night’ at the Jr. High I was going to attend in Los Angeles. I suppose somebody somewhere was in a gym playing sports, but I was in the room with the band, the girls and the dancing. And then I saw the girl. My first over the top, heart beating fast, crazy puppy love girl. Her name was Lisa Millward and I was smitten the moment I saw her. I don’t remember how we met but I found out she was 1/2 grade ahead of me so she knew the ropes of the dances having gone before. She was my first ‘older woman’ as well as my first love.
We danced the night away and I fell in love with her in the course of those few short hours. It wouldn’t be the last time I fell in love with someone on the dance floor, but it was my first. Far too quickly it was time to go. We both went outside to wait for our parents to come pick us up. We talked for just a bit, then the moment came. She leaned in, I figured out what she was doing so I leaned in and we kissed. It was pretty unexpected on my part so I didn’t have enough time to really get nervous about it. It was just a smidgen longer than a peck but it was on the lips and that made it count. My heart was beating crazy fast, I remember that much.
Here is the kicker. My father and sister had just driven up in the car to pick me up and witnessed the whole thing. Of course, my sister made merciless fun of me, saying I was leaning in at some ridiculously awkward angle and looked completely dorky. I think my dad enjoyed the moment of his son taking that leap.
My Second Kiss
Back in those days you used the phone book to look everyone up. The listings usually just had the mom and dad’s names so I probably called every Millward in the book until I found her. We made arrangements to go bowling with a group of friends. It was a lot of fun but I was distracted the whole time because I wanted to have a real kiss with her, not in public view this time. I kept trying to think about how I could make that happen.
After bowling the two of us took a walk down to this 3 story office building at the end of the strip mall. There was an elevator that was all by itself, outside the building, connected by outdoor walkways to each floor. I decided it would be the perfect place to have a real kiss. We got in the elevator and went up. Then we went down. Then up again. Then down again. The whole time I was a nervous wreck, completely frozen in my inability to make the move. Finally, after probably about 5 trips up and down I did what any crazy in love 12 year old would do, I pulled the stop button on the elevator between floors and kissed her. It was glorious and wonderful and the highlight of my life up until that moment (and for quite a while after that).
The Aftermath
The first part of the summer was the best ever. I went to the beach or went swimming or did something else with her almost every day. We kissed a lot. But alas the fates were cruel. My father took a job 3,000 miles away in New York and before the summer was out we were gone to live in Connecticut. I pined away for her all the rest of the summer and well into the next school year. We sent love letters and I even got a Valentines letter with a big heart on the front that she had drawn with lipstick.
The letters started to dwindle off over the course of the spring, from my side as well as hers, but I still was madly in love with her. We drove across the country to visit California that next summer and I was crazy with anticipation about seeing her again. It didn’t turn out all that great. I found out my friends back in Calif had sent the Valentine’s letter as a joke to me (how I missed that it wasn’t from her I have no idea) and she really just wasn’t all that interested in me anymore. I was hurt but not terribly so. I had already started to realize this wasn’t going to be a lasting thing while back in Connecticut, having found other girls who peaked my interest in kissing.
What that relationship really taught me was how easy it was for me to fall in love with the idea of being in love! I have moderated that some over the years, but I don’t really ever want to leave it completely behind. After all, being in love is a feeling worth being in love with.
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Drawing and revealing biographical sketch by Marty Coleman, who has yet to find Lisa on Facebook.
Quote by Remy de Gourmont, 1858-1915, French Symbolist poet
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Trivia Question of the Day
If you were going to give a ‘nachkussen’, what sort kiss would you be giving?
Today is Day Two of How to Kiss week! You know what you can do if you don’t like it.
Kissing Ass
Way back when, in the last century, I worked at a restaurant called Eulipia in San Jose, California. I worked there for 13 years, most of those years with the same people. We were a very close crew and did some pretty funny things with each other after being together for so long.
One day a waitress/manager, who I had been working with for many years, was standing on a step stool, reaching up to turn on the stereo system for the day. I am not sure why that day I did this but I walked by and without thinking twice hugged her around the legs and kissed her jeans covered butt, which was just perfectly situated at my eye level. She turned around and screamed, ‘MARTY!’ with a bit of astonishment but also with a smile and a laugh. I looked up at her and said, “You always want me to kiss your ass, so now I have!” and walked on. We had a good laugh about it for many years after that.
Most of the time kissing ass is really not nearly that much fun. Do you have a kick ass kiss ass story, good or bad?
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Drawing and revealing biographical sketch by Marty Coleman, who, after all, does have a reputation to uphold.
I am in the minority here, but one of my favorite Super Bowl ads this year was the Go Daddy commercial featuring the supermodel Bar Rafaeli and the actor Jesse Heiman (playing a computer geek) kissing. The ad pretty much has become the most hated ad of this year’s crop but I love it and here is why.
Hidden and Exposed
I love it because it exposes people’s prejudices and they don’t even know it. Here is an easy question to ask yourself if you hated the ad. Would you have hated it if it was the supermodel Bar Rafaeli kissing the model from the Calvin Klein commercial that aired around the same time? Would you have hated it if it were Ms. Rafaeli kissing Ryan Gosling? Or any other very handsome, sexy, and otherwise attractive man? I am going to take a guess that you would not have hated it. If you say you still would have hated it, then I suggest you wouldn’t have hated it nearly as much. If you say you hated it, then do you also hate watching the Bachelor kiss 10 girls per episode with hot, wet kisses?
Taboo
I know there are all sorts of ‘reasons’ people have said it was disgusting. But what I think is the number one reason is that people made an unconscious judgment while watching that ad. The judgment came because the visual image had broken a taboo, a taboo of status, beauty and class.
Without knowing it, you just knew it was wrong. Why? Because hot supermodels are not suppose to like or be attracted to dorky, overweight, nerdy and unattractive geeks, that’s why. They do not belong to the same class. They are breaking as big a taboo as almost any other one. It’s disrupts and upsets how the world is suppose to be. And when that is thrown in your face, the result is anger and disgust.
Truth
But the truth is it’s your problem, not theirs. They are actors in an ad, yes. but I will take a guess that if they had been real lovers you saw on a park bench doing that, you would have had the same reaction. And in the park or watching it on TV, It is not they that need to change, it’s you. You are the one with the unspoken prejudice, not them.
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Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman, who kissed his first girl when he was 12 at a dance. Man, did I fall hard for her.
Quote by Sylvia Plath, 1932-1963, American poet and writer
Last we left the bodyless girl ghosts they were on their way to go skiing, which they do not do very well because they have no feet. But they had fun anyway, floating down the mountain again and again, pulling pranks on skiers, making them fall, blowing them over and generally confusing them. Two of the girl ghosts ran into trees head on (that’s all they have is heads so of course it was head on) and had to retire to the chalet. Ethel saw two big butted men and decided to cause some mayhem. She bumped one in his big butt which cause him to bump into the other big butted man. They both had cafeteria trays full of goulash that spilled all over the big busted women who were with them. It was funny to watch though they felt sorry for the women because they remembered back to when they had bodies and goulash was sometimes spilled down their blouses. It was not a fun feeling.
The two big butted men were very angry with each other as a result of this goulash mishap. Ethel, the fastest of the bodyless girl ghosts, flew up the mountain to find her friends and tell them to come watch the big fight in the chalet that she had caused. She found eight of them (5 others having gotten lost and consequently were currently floating over a dairy farm watching cows moo about 10 miles away). When they all got back to the chalet Sharita, the clumsy ghost who first hit a tree and stayed behind in the chalet because she had a headache, the only type of ache a bodyless ghost can have by the way, caught them up on what had happened.
The Food Fight
Sharita was just telling them how the one big busted lady had screamed and stripped of her top because the goulash was burning her when they heard a really loud clatter. The all pushed forward to watch as one of the big butted men slammed down his tray and punched the other big butted man in the jaw. They started to fight with a lot of punches thrown with the sound of the crunching of noses and teeth. The girl ghosts, along with all the other people in the chalet, were enjoying the fight when suddenly they saw one of the big busted women throw a whole bowl of goulash at the other big busted woman, who got it straight in the face. She responded by picking up a bowl of fruit loops that a little kid was eating and threw it back. All the fruit loops stuck to the other women’s face and looked very funny.
Pretty soon the girl ghosts were witnessing a full on food fight with flying spaghetti, many pieces of toast, at least 4 plates of chicken strips and french fries and more than a few bowls of cottage cheese, which was really gross to watch hit people.
The Aftermath
After the food fight was over the big busted woman with no shirt on and fruit loops all over her face started crying. The big butted man who was with her told her to shut up and help him to the infirmary since he probably broke his jaw. She slapped him, said ‘Fuck you’ and stormed out of the cafeteria. The girl ghosts thought she had to be the most tragic and ridiculous person they had ever seen, walking away as she was, covered in goulash and fruit loops and clad in only what had been a pretty sexy Victoria Secret bra and bright orange ski pants. Ethel felt a bit bad about starting it all but decided it was worth it because she had never seen so much flying food at one time before.
The girl ghosts all decided they had had enough fun for one day and went off to find their friends. When they found them they were learning how to milk cows from a farmer and his daughter.
The End
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Drawing and short short story by Marty Coleman, who ran into more than a few trees while skiing as a young lad.
I watched a TV segment about Edward Albee recently. He is the Pulitzer Prize winning playright whose most famous work is ‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf’. The interviewer was asking him if he considered that the subject matter would be offensive to some. His response was, yes he knew it might be but that the play was telling him what needed to be in it, not people who may or may not be offended by it.
Art Creating Itself
That is how it is with me as well. My imagination starts somewhere and then once I put pen to paper the images tells me where to go and what to do. It tells me what it wants to be. The more I listen to that the better the work. The more I listen to a possible future offended person the more I will create something self-censored, something that looks like someone else’s work, not my own.
That is why I often draw nudes. The content and message in the depiction of a nude says something I want to say. Clothing the person would take that element of the idea away and if I bow to that pressure I am diminishing my power as an artist to create something expressive and valuable. If someone is offended or interprets the work in ways I don’t anticipate that is ok, I even like hearing about that and learning from it. But I can’t try to extrapolate what that might be in advance just to save someone somewhere a possible hard thought or offensive reaction.
You Creating Yourself
So it is with creating your whole self as well as a work of art. Chisel and hammer out who you want to be, not who you would be if you offended no one. Because if you turn yourself into who someone else wants you to be, you become hard to know, admire and love. The world ends up seeing a watered down you, diluted with someone else’s ideas of who you should be instead of the full flavored you. And you’ll end up offending someone anyway.
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Drawing and Commentary by Marty Coleman, who is who he is.
I had a conversation yesterday with a beautiful and fit woman. The topic? How she gets judged and made fun of for being ‘perfect’. I have had this conversation before with other women as well. It’s almost easier to make fun of that ‘perfect’ person, isn’t it? None of the guilt or shame you feel when laughing at a person who looks funny or talks funny. That would be mean, cruel, hateful, immature, ignorant, and judgmental and we wouldn’t do that, would we?
Better Than
So what is it when the object of your derision or judgment is ‘better’ than you, not worse? What name do you give to your response when the person you are making fun of or cutting down somehow appears to be nicer, smarter, more fit, more thoughtful, more giving, more balanced, more conscientious, more diligent, more loving, more sensitive, wealthier, prettier, sexier, happier?
I have a few words we could use. How about mean, cruel, hateful, immature, ignorant, and judgmental? Perhaps we could add in jealousy and envy for good measure?
All That is Hidden
Let’s just focus on the word ignorant. We will focus on it because it applies to what you know. And guess what, unless you’ve taken the time to care, YOU KNOW NOTHING about any person’s insides. You don’t know the struggle she’s had to get up at 5am most mornings to exercise before the kids are awake. You don’t know about her garish stretchmarks. You don’t know the abuse she had at the hands of her mother. You don’t know the dyslexia she had to overcome in school. You don’t know the prejudice she felt being so tall and skinny and flat chested in 9th grade. You don’t know about the skin condition she has on her back that makes her itch like crazy. You don’t know about how hard she works to stay connected to her husband who is busy all the time. You don’t know about her debilitating fear of flying. In other words, YOU KNOW NOTHING about her interior and very little about her exterior.
Your Quiver
You see the facade and you make fun because she is an easy target. And she is an easy target. But if you can target her for derision, you also have the power to target her for love, compassion, mercy, patience, kindness, gentleness and more. But the truth is, it doesn’t matter who the target is, it matters what the weapon is. Are you aiming to be derisive, judgmental person? Use the arrow of hate. Are you aiming to be a loving and compassionate one? Use the arrow of love. You have both in your quiver, just bring out the right one and shoot. The more you reach for the right arrow, the more that arrow will end up in your hand without you even knowing it.
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Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman, who has a lot of scars.
You Don’t Say – a poster by The Napkin Dad at Zazzle. You can make other products with this image as well.
The Truth Sayer
Are you a sayer? Are you one that can often be heard saying, ‘Well, at least you know where I stand because I always say what I think.’ It always sounds so good. You are just being truthful after all, and telling the truth is important, right?
The Hate Sayer
But what if you don’t know if it’s true or not? What if what you are really doing is spouting hateful condemnation, judgment, self-righteousness and faux moral superiority about someone you don’t even know? Do you not do that? That is good. But think twice. What about the Miss Universe who stumbles over her words? What about the male bodybuilder who has muscles on muscles on muscles? What about the guy wearing a turban in Wal-Mart? What about the girl whose shorts are just a little too short and whose tattoos are just a little to garish? What about the short round kid and the skinny tall kid? What about that older actress dating that younger man?
The World Changer
Do you really, truly want to change the world? One way is to be quiet and not speak when you are about to make a judgment. If it is not about truth but instead is about you using words to step on someone’s back to lift yourself up then be quiet instead.
The Love Maker
I suspect you will find that the world didn’t go in the crapper because you didn’t say those hurtful words. You might find that your friends still like you in spite of you not having made the biting remark about the waitress with the bright blue eyeshadow. You might find that nothing changed at all except your attitude. Maybe you will find more love seeping into your heart, who knows.
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Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman, who loves all the people mentioned above. Especially the waitress with the bright blue eyeshadow.
Mythology Trivia Question from yesterday answered:
Question: Who is the Queen of the Underworld in Greek Mythology?
Answer: Persephone was the daughter of Zeus and the Goddess of the Harvest, Demeter. She was kidnapped by Hades, King of the Underworld and became his wife. Her mother Demeter found out that Zeus had conspired with Hades in the abduction. As a result Demeter refused to allow any growth on the earth until Persephone was allowed to return to her. Zeus relented and allowed Persephone to come back to the surface in the Spring. But since she had already married Hades and had tasted the fruits of the underworld she was compelled to live in the underworld starting in the Fall. The flowers and vegetation then failed as she disappeared, only to return when she did the following Spring. She became known as the Goddess of Vegetation as well as the Queen of the Underworld.
Persephone – Thomas Hart Benton
Here is a painting of an old farmer peeking at a young nude woman. It might seem a bit creepy but not if you know it’s really about the bittersweet feeling the farmer has at seeing Persephone discard her summer glory and disappear again for another year. He is grateful for the harvest she made possible but is wistful at her departure, just as we often are when we see autumn leaves start to fall.
