Art, absinthe and aerial acrobatics. Reflections of a great night at the Essex Open House.

It was another great night at The Essex Studio's fall open house. With over 100 artists calling The Essex 'home', it is nearly impossible to take in the entirety of the event in one evening, and thus they have two nights (Friday, October 2 & Saturday, October 3, 6pm - 11pm). Even on a slow night, an Essex open house can be a bit overwhelming. This time however, there was a different kind of energy coursing through the event.

The Amazing Portable Circus

Upon approaching the entrance, one is greeted by a bevy of beauties, all bathed in the light of a million watt bulb while dangling from the ropes, circus rings and strips of cloth that hang from the entryway awning. Known collectively as "The Amazing Portable Circus", these women displayed their pseudo death-defying feats of acrobatics perilously over the concrete that leads to the mammoth doorway.

I watched as one girl climbed to the very top, with nothing more than two strips of cloth wrapped around her legs for support. At the summit of her climb, she inverted herself, and then suddenly slipped, nearly plunging head first to the ground. Of course, I was completely fooled. She had it under control the whole time. This apparently is the sort of thing that goes along with the choreography of what The Amazing Portable Circus does. A little thrill to go along with the grace of their art.

Heart beat returning to normal, I moved past the mini-Vegas that is the American Sign Museum and into the throngs of people looking at, talking about, bargaining for and making art. Its an easy thing to get lost in the cacophony and shear magnitude of the place, as it becomes a glorious assault on all five senses. A sort of old world bazaar of the bizarre and the wonderful.

'Gandhi' © Bruno Zabaglio

Pushing my way past a million sights and sounds, and having made it up one of the several secret flights of stairs, I arrive at my destination; studio number 260, better known as the studio of my good friend, Bruno Zabaglio. As if by psychic powers, Bruno is standing in the doorway, waiting to greet me. He points to the wall behind me and says, "Wish him a happy birthday". I turn to see Bruno's incredible portrait of Mohandas Ghandi. I bid the great man a happy birthday and then enter the studio to see what Bruno had on display.

Bruno's studio at The Essex is half art gallery and half workspace. Up front is the gallery area, ever-changing and yet carefully themed with Bruno's work on three walls. In the back, you're able to peer into his work area (or as I refer to it, 'the engine room'), where Bruno paints, using the natural light afforded by the bank of windows that line the back wall. None of this however, would have caught the visitor's gaze this evening. What first grabbed the attention of each and every newcomer to Bruno's studio, was his magnificent new piece, 'Reflections'.

'Reflections' ©Bruno Zabaglio

Commissioned by the local group 'Branch' for the cover of their latest CD, 'Reflections' is a stunning painting of color and gesso. At once, it is an explosion of color and texture that pulls you in. An organic Rorschach that makes you want to both define it's patterns and yet not dare to do so. As with any great painting, photographs are pale representations of the original. You must be in it's presence, up close and personal, to fully appreciate it's impact.

Throughout the night, visitors entered Bruno's studio and inevitably were drawn like moths to a flame to this beautiful new work. Everyone tried to place either a meaning or a price on this brave new work. While delighted with the interpretations, Bruno avoided all attempts at affixing a price to 'Reflections', stating only that the right of first refusal went to 'Branch'. My suspicions are that Bruno is reluctant to place a dollar value on anything he creates. To him, the world of commerce and the world of his art spin on entirely different planets and have nothing to do with each other.

Bruno illuminating a captive audience.

Here was the energy. People felt compelled to linger inside the four walls of Bruno's studio. After being dazzled by 'Reflections', they would inevitably wander over to his other works and inquire about their meaning or his process. Bruno would point out and say, 'That's my grandmother' or 'That's my daughter', and then begin educating his small audience, not only about his technique, but his motivations.

One man arrived and saw his own daughter in a painting of Bruno's. It wasn't that she was really in the painting, but something about the tone and imagery struck the chord of memory in him about his daughter. Like all men his age, he was proud of, and at the same time, missed his daughter, who he said worked in the theater in L.A. He was clearly affected by this painting and it was another wonderful example of the kind of energy blowing through The Essex.

I left Bruno with his would-be patrons and headed outside for a cigarette. On my return, I found that Bruno had wandered down to the studio of Lisa Molyneux another accomplished artist with a cozy studio. I found Bruno in the back work area with Lisa and her friend Ingrid.

Artist and Mixologist, Bruno Zabaglio.

"Do you want an absinthe, my friend?", asked Bruno as he was mixing up the green stuff in two plastic cups. I declined, having earlier had my limit of wine in Bruno's studio. Instead, I sat with Ingrid and we compared her relatively exciting college years in Manchester with my rather uneventful and pedestrian stint in college. I want a 'redo'.

Three hours had blown by in the blink of an eye and it was time to leave. I had to return to the world outside of The Essex. A world that seemed to have far less energy and delight in it. But alas, there was editing to be done, alone and in silence. Its how I do my best work.

As I sped home, I realized that I hadn't scratched the surface of all that was available to me at The Essex. That may both be the curse and the blessing. Like any good entertainment, you're left wanting more when it is over. In this case, you know there is more and you are compelled to see it. Thank God there are two nights, though upon reflection, that isn't nearly enough either.

Isaac Paul Zabaglio

Here is another great Masterpiece!  My grandson Isaac Paul Zabaglio, born on June 17th, 2009.

He was created by Walter Zabaglio and Andrea Bassett Zabaglio.

He is a work of art that keeps on growing and adds dept, size, and texture to his composition.

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Mis/Connections

Life is full of misconnections.
We cross each other but we don’t meet.
Our paths cross up and down stairs, in halls, and on bridges.
We rather meet on cyberspace then in the open space.
Watch Here

The Founding Of The Louvre Museum And How The Napoleonic Wars Affected Its Collections

by Bruno Zabaglio

In France during the sixteenth and seventeenth century, like in most of the Western world, royalties, aristocrats, and wealthy individuals collected and accumulated treasures and works of art in order to impress foreign and local visitors with their wealth, their social and political status, and their artistic and intellectual education.  On this account, art historian Carol Duncan, in her essay titled “From the Princely Gallery to the Public Art Museum: The Louvre Museum and the National Gallery, London”, states that: ‘Typically, princely galleries functioned as reception rooms, providing sumptuous settings for official ceremonies and framing of the prince’.  She also adds that by the end of the seventeenth century these types of art collections were widespread throughout Europe.

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July 14, 1789, the starting of the French Revolution, would be a turning point, not just in French social-political history, but also in the way museums were going to be established and perceived in the future by most of the European nations.
The opening of the Louvre in August 1793 as a public museum was not just the product of the fall of the monarchy in France; it was also an instrument necessary to support the development of the state authority and national identity, and therefore for the survival of the new government.  According to Eilean Hooper-Greenhill, author of “Museums And The Shaping Of Knowledge”, the French Revolution was a significant event because it brought to an end a society built on a hierarchic system and on the disparity in social and economic standings, and because it ended the old way of envisioning the world as a set of classification determined by religious and political reasoning.  The new society, which originally was supposed to be ruled by the people, ended up under the political control of the bourgeoisie and it introduced a set of new laws based on a democratic way of life.  The museum would become a political instrument for the new Republic, as well as a reminder of the oppression and decadence of the past regime.  Ms. Hooper-Greenhill states that the Louvre became one of the symbols of this new way of life.
Carol Duncan, who describes the Louvre as ‘the prototypical public art museum’, concurs with Hooper-Greenhill’s opinions on the social and political correlation in the creation of the French museum.  In her essay, she examines the history of the Louvre and the National Museum in London, and describes their influence on modern museums.  Ms. Duncan believes that even though the French museum was not the first one to use a royal art collection for a public art museum, it represents the most politically important and socially significant conversion of a princely collection into a civic one.  She describes the creation of the museum as ‘an opportunity to dramatize the creation of the new Republic state, nationalize the king’s art collection and declare the Louvre a public institution’.
Duncan asserts that the transformation of a royal palace into a public space and the display of royal possessions as public property denoted the new government’s commitment to the basic principles of egalitarianism.  At the opening of the Louvre, to emphasize these social-political changes, a commemorative plaque was installed above the entrance to the Galerie D’Apollon with the dates of the founding (September 16, 1792) and of the official opening of the museum (August 10, 1793), and a footnote that underlined and connected its creation to a decree approved by the L’Assemblée Législative (Legislative Committee).

[caption id="attachment_147" align="alignleft" width="240" caption="The Entrance to The Apollo Gallery"][/caption]

Another politically advantageous decision made by the new government was that the admission to the museum was free and that the entrance was allowed to everyone, not matter their social status or educational level; this was a move that gave people the perception that in the museum, and therefore in France, every person was equal, at least in principal.   According to the writer, the decision, beside achieving positive results on the social level by providing something for everybody (educational goods for the cultured portion of population and a sense of marvel and reverence for the uneducated), it also created a popular venue beneficial in the reshaping of the political relationship between ‘the individual as citizen and the state as benefactor’.
On the same subject, Eilean Hooper-Greenhill says that the museum became one of the political tools of the state because it could ‘….direct the population into activities which would, without people being aware of it, transform the population into a useful resource for the state’. The correlation between the ruling government and the art world, which has its roots from the Egyptian times all the way to end of the Eighteenth Century, was used mostly to maintain social discipline, serving as a reminder that the ruling party was rightfully in power because of its social superiority.  Dr. Nick Prior in the book  “Museums & Modernity”, writing on the subject of Revolutionary Culture: Rituals of Ceremony and State Art Museums, says that the state-art world relationship is directly connected to ‘the preservation of social order and to the consecration of a national culture’.  Dr. Prior points out that the liberal governments in Europe only started to be involved as supporters of the arts in the early nineteenth century because by sponsoring art related projects they came across as a benevolent guardian and a protector of the arts.  Carol Duncan believes that public projects such as museums help make a state ‘look good: progressive, concerned about the spiritual life of its citizens, a preserver of past achievements and a provider for the common good’.
Dr. Prior writes that the Louvre opened as a ‘Monument Dedicated to the Love and Study of the Arts’ with a collection totaling to 537 paintings and 184 objects displayed on tables.  In order to complete the symbolic message, the new museum had to adopt a new way of displaying its collection.  Duncan explains that the museum’s directors organized the collections into art-historical schools and exhibited them in a way that enhanced the progress and achievements of each school and its most prominent artists.  Contrary to the old gentlemanly culture in which the artists and the work would have to be identified by the cultured guest, each and every art object, because it was educationally addressed to ‘the people’, was properly identified and labeled.  This new system of art displaying has been considered by many museum history scholars as a more developed and logical thinking.

[caption id="attachment_148" align="alignleft" width="111" caption="Napoleon Bonaparte"][/caption]

After Napoleon Bonaparte came to power, from around 1799 to 1815, the museum collections increased due to the looting from countries that he invaded and conquered.  Famous valuable paintings and sculptures were taken from Italy, Egypt, Greece, Belgium, and the Netherlands and taken back to France.  According to Dr. Prior, with the justification of cultural security and a special requisition committee led by artist and archeologist Vivant Denon, Napoleon appropriated famous art works such as the Laocoon, the Apollo Belvedere, Raphael’s Transfiguration, Correggio’s St. Jerome, and many others. The precious cargos were safely transported back to Paris and brought to the Louvre with organized festive processions where supposedly the artworks would find their ‘natural’ place at the source of ‘liberty, creativity, and genius’.

Due to the sizeable contribution of artworks to the collections of the Louvre by Napoleon’s war acquisitions, in 1803 the museum was renamed the “Musée Napoléon”, and in 1810 it reopened under the management of Vivant Denon.   Both Carol Duncan and Nick Prior state that by this time the display of the paintings was systematically arranged by schools, such as the Italian, French, Dutch, and Flemish.  Ms Duncan adds that a new meaning was acquired by the iconographic possessions of the past, such as the trophies, the treasures, and the valuable works of art.  What once symbolized material wealth, power, and social status, now was being transformed by the power of the new museum into ‘spiritual treasures’: spiritual and cultural treasures gained and protected by the state for its citizens.
Dr. Nick Prior points out that by 1803, in the Musée Napoléon, the layout of the artworks was more in line with rules dictated in the Enlightenment.  The paintings were still exhibited by schools and also had related explanatory texts.  Furthermore, an official museum catalogue was introduced which was available and prepared for the common citizen.  She states that by then France seemed to have developed a museum that emerged as entirely secular, public and national, as ‘a monument to democracy, civilization and international cultural domination’.
In conclusion, Duncan observes that the museum of Louvre became the model for most of the new public museums founded later in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in many European cities and even in the United States, in cities such as New York, Boston, Chicago, and Cleveland.

Salvador Dali is Surrealism

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by Bruno Zabaglio

Surrealism is an artistic and literary movement officially born in France in 1924 with the publication of the ‘Manifeste Surrealiste’ by Andre’ Breton, who was a poet and a critic and a strong supporter of Freud’s study of dreams and the unconscious. In the manifesto the writer declares Surrealism as a movement of psychic automatism in its pure state and under the influence of thoughts freed by reason and both aesthetic and moral principles. The new movement was a derivative of Dadaism and was influenced by the ‘Pittura Metafisica’ of the Italian painter Giorgio De Chirico. Following the theories of interpretation of dreams and the unconscious, many artists enrolled in this new method of artistic creation. The concept of automatic writing was an important one in the development of the surreal because it involved the complete detachment from reality.
Surrealism attracted many artists, such as Man Ray, Meret Oppenheim, Hans Bellmer, Max Ernst, Alberto Giacometti, Rene’ Magritte, but without any doubt the most recognized name connected with the movement is Salvador Dali. Anyone unfamiliar with art history and Surrealism would never recognize many of those names except for one: Salvador Dali’.

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Dali was born at Figueras, in Catalogna (Spain), in 1904. He stated that the most traumatic event in his life happened the 11th of May, 1904 at 8:45, on the morning when he was born. Since his early years Dali’ showed signs of unconventional behavior; in fact as a child he used to wear a king’s outfit, and basically became the supreme ruler of the house. When he was a little older the artist set up a studio in an old laundry room that contained a large cement basin which he would fill with water and take long soaking baths in order to let his imagination work.
In 1921 Dali entered the School of Fine Arts in Madrid. During the years between 1921 and 1923 he was influenced by Cubism, Futurism and Purism, and it was also during this period that he became familiar with Freud’s book ‘The Interpretation of Dreams’. While in Madrid, Dali met Garcia Lorca and Luis Bu_uel, who were both part of an avant-garde student group, and it was with Bu_uel that he made the famous movie Un chien Andalou in 1928 (a milestone in surrealistic movie-making). The same year he met Joan Miro’ and Andre’ Breton and in 1929 he joined the Surrealist movement in Paris. During the years of involvement with the movement, Dali created many works that galvanized the Surrealist ideas, such as The First Day of Spring (1929), The Great Masturbator (1929), and the famous The Persistence of Memory (1931).
An important factor in Dali’s life was his encounter with the psychoanalyst Jacque Lucan, because it helped the artist in the development of his public and private individuality. With the development of his paranoiac critical method, the artist was able to use his obsessions as a base for his creations, such as the many references to the painting Angeluos by Millet, which he incorporated in many of his own works, including The Architectonic Angelus of Millet (1933), Meditation on the Harp (1932-34), Archeological Reminiscence of Millett’s Angelus (1933-35), and Perpignan Railway Station (1965).
In one of his most famous surrealistic paintings, The Persistence of Memory (1931), Dali depicts a vast and deserted beach with a rocky cliff in the background and a body of water that seems to fuse with the blue serene sky. In the foreground there are four elongated, soft looking watches that symbolize the irrationality of time. It seems that the concept of time in this composition is related to the notion that the expansion and contraction of time is relative to the singularity of each individual. The watch drooping across the fetus-like-shaped figure refers perhaps to the pre-birth traumatic memories of the artist.

[caption id="attachment_130" align="alignright" width="300" caption="The Persistence of Memory (1931)"][/caption]

By 1934 Dali’s notoriety was increasingly rising and so was his eccentricity, which started to derail him from the guidelines of Surrealism. By that time Andre Breton was becoming unhappy with Dali’s fascination with Hitler. So were the rest of the surrealist artists because of Dali’s egotistical declaration that he made at his arrival in New York: “I AM Surrealism”. In 1941 in the catalogue of his show in New York, Salvador Dali declared himself officially finished with Surrealism and announced that he was to become classic.
Salvador Dali lived a long, eccentric, and successful life. Anywhere he went he was recognized (his famous upward twisted moustache became a symbol for Dali himself). He met the most famous and connected people from everywhere in the world. Salvador Dali is one of my favorite artists not only because of his unusual public and private comportment (I am a fan of out-of-the-box thinkers), but also because I find his works, especially the ones focused on the nuclear mysticism and the Christian faith, fascinating and incredibly capturing. Dali’s approach to traditional religious subjects, in paintings such as Christ of St. John of the Cross (1951), Corpus Hypercubicus (1954), and The Last Supper (1955),

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show his artistic genius, talent and foresight in his choice of compositional structure, meticulous and precise renditions of figures and landscapes, and overall visionary aspect in the scene.
Unfortunately his artistic talent was at times obscured by his flamboyant personality, and his name was primarily connected with the extravagances of his personal and public life, secondly with his artistic accomplishments. His long-life companion and muse-like influence behind many of his paintings, Gala Eluard, died in 1982. Seven years later, on January 23rd 1989, Salvador Dali died.