SHARING WITH ME

The first work I saw of Maurizio Cattelan (1960-) was this. 





I don’t remember which museum I was in. I think it was Beaubourg but can’t be certain. It’s a very long time ago. From the back, I thought it was a child kneeling and then I saw « Him » - yes it is definitely him with his distinctive moustache. Adolf Hitler looks more like a child with the body of a 10 year old and the head of an adult. Should I smile? Laugh? Or cry? There is no answer, but this time I knew what I was seeing. Who is this man? Maurizio Catelan. Firstly, the exhibition is called « Not Afraid of Love ». Why that? He closed himself off from the public for five years of early retirement struggling to avoid too many appearances. Not something that most artists would do. He has now come back to reveal himself. A lot of the work I knew already but in the Musée de la Monnaie with such fabulous space, it comes very much alive, to the extent that you look at a work twice if not three times...

I really am undecided how I felt about the Picasso/Giacometti exhibition. The one very special point was my friend from Finland was here for a few days and she wanted to visit the new museum. Renovated would perhaps be a better word. 

Picasso was younger than Giacometti - in fact 20 years younger. I don’t know if they were close during the years that they saw one another. For that matter, no-one seems to know too much about their relationship. We do know that they discussed their work in the context of post war arguments around the return to realism. There has been new research done but somehow I don’t find it very satisfactory. Their sculpture was shown together - but it didn’t seem to have much relationship even if we did see much more of both the artists’ work Giacometti Grande Femme - 1958 Picasso : La Femme Enceinte: deuxième état. 1950-1959 Giacometti :Tête de la mère - around 1925 Giacometti : Tête du père - 1927-30 Giacometti : Femme cu...