In 1989, it looks like a number of odd and seemingly random pieces of famous museum art from around the world traveled to Gotham City for an art exhibit, the theme of which I’m having trouble fathoming:
(watch the clip above from Tim Burton’s Batman (1989) starring Jack Nicholson as the art-defacing Joker)
Originally, I thought it would be fun to share the above video clip on my blog page that features one of my favorite series of art pieces, Francis Bacon’s Popes, because I was editing the page, and I saw, Hey, I have this photo of myself with this exact same painting as in the Batman movie; wouldn’t it be fun to ALSO post an image of Jack Nicholson as the Joker with this same painting?
As I did so, I realized I had a photo with another of the paintings in this museum show (I thought I had a third, but it turned out to be a different Degas ballerina painting than I had thought!) And then I started thinking, this movie creates kind of a fun scavenger hunt, to try and figure out all the pieces that were exhibited in this “show,” and then go to the actual museums that house them and get some photos with all these pieces. And next thing I knew, except for two pieces (one to the left of Lincoln behind a brick beam, and one between the Rembrandt and Hopper, both shown too distantly to see clearly and neither shown getting defaced), I was researching, ruminating, and writing for a full day’s work at this ridiculous and obsessive blog topic! Here are all the pieces that are identifiable in the video:
Let’s take a look at this bizarre hodgepodge of artwork: two ballerinas (both by Degas) – one a sculpture, and one a painting (nearby each other, so give the Gotham curators a little credit). Two pieces by Rembrandt – a self-portrait, and a meeting of cloth makers (?? Appointed by the mayor to regulate the quality of cloth sold in the city! So these guys have a serious duty to the public. This late piece in Rembrandt’s career is considered one of his greatest portrait paintings). (These pieces are nearby each other, but separated by a Vermeer – so they’re all same time period, at least, and both Dutch. Bravo again, curators!)
Then (in my opinion) an overly represented “patriotic theme” (more on why later) with a Revolutionary War scene next to Lincoln’s portrait (who was a Civil War not Revolutionary war participant, although the painting wasn’t created at the hundred-years-earlier period of the Civil War that it presents, but rather 10 years after Lincoln’s assassination – so does that make it thematically okay to group together??), and then Washington’s uncompleted portrait (and you may recall that Washington WAS commander in chief during the Revolutionary War) but NOT displayed next to either; instead it’s in a hall up the stairs, next to a British 1770 portrait by a British artist (?? Same era?? …but completely different subject matter from warring sides of the Atlantic??), who is in turn next to the Bacon pope (completely different era, but both portraits are blue-clad?? I feel like I’m having to reach worse and worse here…).
The first two patriotic images weren’t defaced (coincidence?, or would that just be too controversial and un-American for a comic book movie? Because I certainly wouldn’t have found it un-Joker-like – to deface symbols of the United States and freedom and liberty. The Washington portrait WAS defaced, but with the purpose of making it look like a dollar bill – so perhaps that kind of unpatriotic defacement is okay if it sends a message about our economy and the sins or temptations of greed for cash? Or is it just a message that Joker and his henchmen only think about money, and everything looks like or can be boiled down to money, to them?
So we have two paintings of kids, a painting of a bunch of buildings along a train track but no humans visible anywhere, an artist’s self-portrait, a painting of a woman weighing her jewelry on a scale, and sculptures from 4500 and 2000 years ago.
Are we to believe that these pieces in some way represent the artistic culture of Gotham City? In the film, The Joker (played by Jack Nicholson) invades Gotham City’s Flugelheim Museum, a name that clearly parodies or references New York’s Guggenheim. However, this is in name only, because none of the pieces on display in Gotham are from the real life Guggenheim. Similarly, The Guggenheim’s architecture has absolutely no similarities to the Flugelheim:
So where did the Flugelheim need to reach out to temporarily acquire this collection they’ve put together? A different museum in New York, The Rhode Island School of Design (That Degas ballerina sculpture looks a lot like Grande Arabesque (1885-90) owned by the Tate in London, and I was almost convinced that’s what it was – but the arm position – and the stand – just aren’t quite the same! If it were, that would have been four pieces from four different museums in London, but no such luck! “You know, I think this exhibit would be much stronger if we represent pieces from London and one from Rhode Island, because they’re from differernt museums and we couldn’t save on shipping anyway!”), four pieces from three different museums in Washington, D.C. (with this spread, why did they choose to have two pieces from one museum, and not make every piece from a different museum?? We can’t even argue THAT as a theme!), Chicago, and then a hop over to the Los Angeles area, three pieces from three differernt museums in London, and a piece each from the Hague, Netherlands, and then São Paulo, Brazil (??)!
And when were the pieces of this carefully crafted exhibition made? 1632, 1664, 1669, 1770, 1796, 1875, 1885, 1946, 1954, 37 AD, and around 2600 BC! So not much of a recognizable theme here.
Where are the works themselves, or the artists who made them, from? Ancient Egypt, Ancient Rome, a few pieces from a couple artists from the seventeenth century Netherlands, three pieces from two artists in France, and two British portrait artists that couldn’t tackle their subject matter more differerently except that their clothes are bluish/purple. And then one “modern” American.” I fail to see any weaving connections down this trail, leaving me stumped.
I picture the curators having a meeting, and saying, “You know what kind of show we need to exhibit this season, that will bring in some big crowds?” What the f&%@$?!?!
If I were to have “curated” this show, especially with the idea that the Joker were crashing the party, then I can see arguments to justify the Bacon and Caligula. And of course making a bust of a white marble (Caligula) head is a decent set-up for the payoff of painting his hair green and his lips red. And even the Vermeer, which is super subtle (and therefore really great), with the woman weighing her riches while a painting looms behind her of the Last Judment, suggesting the attention lavished on earthly treasures and eternal consequences. Those make a perverted sort of sense. And you could even make a case, I GUESS, an unsubtle case, for the ballerina because, Ha ha, wouldn’t that be hilarious if the Joker tried to dance like a girly-so-proper and poised ballerina? (It wasn’t for me.) Or that we need a painting where Joker can write, “Joker was here” like graffiti, and you write graffiti on big walls like over by the train tracks, so get it?? (Yes.) So was this purely a “here’s my list of art-destructive gags I plan for the villains to enact, ha ha, bing, bing, bing, aren’t these the funniest” (No, I didn’t find them very funny), and that’s it? And if that’s it, why wasn’t there a Pollock painting for example, and them throwing paint on it, and saying, “Ya know, I just can’t do anything with this one.” And then even IF SO if so, then what’s with the choices for all the rest of these paintings that are devoid of gags??
As is often the case, the mainstream portrayal of art saddened me here. There is a tendency to “be so funny” if you deface art – tearing and puncturing or cutting canvases, breaking them over people’s heads, throwing paint on them – ho ho ho, isn’t this hilarious because we’re supposed to revere all this art and instead we’re defasing it! But to me it instead feels like a tangible hostility against “art,” and I think you can find similar attitudes in a lot of pop culture if you look around, in particular when portraying the common man or woman and their feelings toward art. The art world, or art, is often stereotyped as snobbish, conceited, overblown in value, ridiculous, incomprehensible, stupid, and therefore it’s funny to “knock it down a notch, bring it down to a level it deserves, ha ha!”
Aw, what are you crying about, you over-sensitive artist? Can’t ya take a joke?
On the flipside, even if I disagree with the sentiment – If that is the purpose of the scene, how did the “curator” choose not to include Van Gogh or da Vinci or Michaelangelo or… Or if they wanted to really ridicule the art world, why not use the usual scapegoats of Pollock or Dalí or Picasso or… and why did they include Lincoln and the Willard if they didn’t want to make a statement about destroying them? Or is their not being touched part of the message of this scene? (Joker didn’t actively prevent these pieces’ destruction.) And do they think portraits of presidents – or that Willard – are of an artistic quality on the par to deserve to be viewed in a museum in the same room or next to a Rembrandt or Degas or Vermeer? I would argue that these pieces could make a case for being historically significant, but less so as being artistically significant. I would be surprised to see them shown in the Guggenheim – unless there were an exhibit on “patriotism” showing wide-ranging and interesting interpretations in art on the theme – these are pieces that belong in a different kind of museum (as they are in real life).
As an artist, I’m always asking, Why did the artist (in this case, the director of the film, or the set designer) make that choice? Every piece had to be chosen and “made” (as a set piece) and hung in the Flugelheim. Why were these pieces chosen? What does each choice mean? Was this a selection of art that the Warner Brothers lot had on hand in their warehouse, and by using this selection, they didn’t have to budget to have additional pieces re-created? I’m dying to learn who designed this museum set, and who chose these particular pieces, and what the logic was! I’m not seeing it!
But from a story perspective – I get it! It’s the Joker! He’s a criminal! He’s anti-establishment, and the art world is establishment! He’s an anarchist! He’s absurdist! (Why wasn’t the Mona Lisa in the museum, for him to paint a mustache on her lip, like Duchamp did seventy years earlier?) He’s a nonsensist out to destroy everything and turn it topsy-turvy! He kills people! He’s irrational! He’s not making a statement about art, so don’t over-analyze it so much! I guess…
But also films can aspire to be art, and comics can be art, and the Joker can be art, and his words can be art. This was an opportunity for him to speak amazing statements of mad geniuses and metaphorical brilliant logic. I was disappointed not to see a better use of him and his opinions about art in this film’s portrayal of art. It felt lazy. It felt too easy. It was a cheap shot. I was disappointed to see the same old hacking-down-of-art that seems to pop up in the exact same way I’d expect to see it in vapid mainstream sitcoms or the Three Stooges. In my opinion, it was a missed opportunity for something REALLY MAGICAL.
If this scene was hilarious for you, great! I’m glad that makes you laugh and you can enjoy that.
In the same way you may go crazy with enjoyment watching a baseball or football game, or a good movie, or seeing a great concert, or listening to a fantastic song, or reading an amazing book, or having a barbecue, or shooting your gun or going hunting, I go crazy with delight at a museum, looking at that art, studying those brush strokes, learning about the artists who made the pieces and what they were thinking about. Even with this truly bizarre exhibit in Gotham City, I would have gone crazy to see all these works there at the Fluggelheim, and I’ve thoroughly enjoyed sinking my teeth into this exhibit, researching it, and learning about the pieces in it. I find art fascinating to study and read about and discuss and admire. Rather than cheer or laugh with the destruction of art, I’d love to see it portrayed in pop culture in ways that make people excited and curious to learn more about art in the ways I am, and share its value and charm and beauty, and spread its fun and talent and intelligence and wonder.
As viscerally and negatively as I reacted about the Joker and his cronies in this scene, I have to acknowledge that I STILL can’t help but grin at the end of the scene, with Jack Nicholson’s Joker reaction to the Francis Bacon piece. As one of his thugs brandishes a knife to slash at it, the Joker blocks the attack and says, “Whoa! I kinda like this one, Bob. Leave it.” And that’s the magic of art, that even the art-destroying Joker can’t deny.
Read Chris Wisnia’s comic book, “Brush with Peril”:
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