An Incomplete Education - 3,684 Things You Should Have Learned but Probably Didn't

AMER

The principle of "clear and present danger" bec
tions for restraining freedom of speech (until the
correctness seemed like reason enough to some fol
used to deny the petition of John Schenck, a young
pamphlets arguing against the legality of the draft.
became the basis for prosecuting many people who
politically subversive.

BROWN v. BOARD OF
OF TOPEKA ( 1 9

The decision that, theoretically at least, ended sch
tle Rock was still three years down the road. Brown
five separate segregation cases from five differ
brought on behalf of eight-year-old Linda Brow
watching her take the school bus to a blacks-only T
there was a whites-only school within spitting di
home. The Court's decision overturned the princi
cilities it had established with Plessy v. Ferguson
equal was the doctrine that had, for sixty years, al
that they weren't implying that Negroes were inf
want to eat, wash up, or share a bus seat with one
sial than the Scopes trial, Brown attracted frie
everyone from the American Jewish Congress to
characters to remember are:

1. Thurgood Marshall, the N A A C P lawyer w
and who later became the Supreme Court

2. Dr. Kenneth B. Clark, the New York psyc
safe for psychosociology by introduci
famous "dolls experiment." Clark had sho
two dolls, one black and one white, asking
found prettiest and would most like
they thought looked "bad." The children's
the white doll was seen as proof that se
damaging to black children.

3. Chief Justice Earl Warren, who proved hi
herding eight feisty justices and nine mor
together to form one unanimous opinion;
tional facilities are inherently unequal."

4. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, who
cause of desegregation that the Court, kno

RICAN STUDIES 57

came one of the rare justifica­
1990s, that is, when political

lks). In the case at hand, it was
g man arrested for distributing
. In the Thirties and Forties, it
om the government considered

EDUCATION
954)

ool segregation, although Lit­
n, which was the umbrella for
rent states, was the petition
wn, whose father was tired of
Topeka school every day when
stance—so to speak—of their
iple of "separate but equal" fa­
n back in 1896. Separate but
llowed segregationists to insist
ferior just because they didn't
. Only slightly less controver­
end-of-the-court briefs from
the A F L - C I O , but the main

who argued for the petitioners
t's first black justice.
chologist who made the courts
ing as evidence his now-
own a group of black children
g them to choose the doll they
to play with, and the doll
s overwhelming preference for
egregation was psychologically

is talents as an orchestrator by
re or less dissimilar viewpoints
; to wit, that "separate educa­

was so unsympathetic to the
owing it couldn't count on him

5» AN I N C O M P L E T E

to enforce its decision
a whole year. A t that
mately disastrous, dec
undertake desegregati
which many Southern
the afterlife.

BAKER

All about reapportionment, bu
(unless of course, you'd like to
the election official, and the
claimed that this was the mo
tenure as chief justice. What y
ics had changed over the years
and rural areas were consisten
sented. This put power firml
groups, who were determined t
involved in the "political thic
plunged in and decided that u
violated the Fourteenth Amend
cases that followed, not only g
progressive historians would h
country's center of gravity from
decision helped open the can o
which, with its 1982 revision a
rymanders created for the spec
at political power in states noto
a much more conservative Sup
constitutional a particularly ey
a snakelike critter 160 miles lo
highway running through it.

MIRANDA

The rights of the accused, esp
silent when taken into custody,
at stake here. But you already
sion. You may also know that
D A ulcers. Miranda was the cu

E EDUCATION

n, put off elucidating the how-tos of the opinion for
point, in Brown II, it made the cautious, and ulti­
claration that the Southern school districts must
ion measures "with all deliberate speed," a phrase
n school districts chose to interpret as sometime in

R v. CARR (1962)

ut don't go away, we won't bore you with the details
know that Baker was the disgruntled voter, Carr

e setting was Tennessee). Besides, Earl Warren
ost important decision of his not unremarkable
you need to grasp: That the country's demograph­
but its election districts hadn't, so that small towns
ntly overrepresented while cities were underrepre-
ly in the hands of minority and special-interest
to keep it there. T h e Court had long refused to get
cket" of voting rights, but with Baker v. Carr, it
unequal election districts were discriminatory and
dment. This, and the armload of reapportionment
ave us the phrase "one man, one vote" (or, as more
have it, "one person, one vote"), it also shifted the
m the hinterlands to the cities. Paradoxically, the
of worms that was the Voting Rights Act of 1965,
and various related court rulings, legitimized ger­
cific purpose of giving African Americans a chance
orious for racial discrimination. In 1993, however,
preme Court suddenly got fed up and declared un­
ye-catching racial gerrymander in North Carolina,
ong and, in some spots, no wider than the two-lane

v. ARIZONA (1966)

pecially the right to counsel, the right to remain
, and the right to be informed of one's rights, were
know this if you've ever watched network televi­
the Miranda rule makes cops snarl and gives the
ulmination of a series of decisions designed to pro-

AME

tect the accused before trial, all of which got their
rule (i.e., throwing out evidence that doesn't confo
and none of which won the Warren Court much p
fans.

The issue is, in fact, a sticky one. Consider it, f
view of Barbara Ann Johnson. One day in 1963, J
candy-counter clerk at a movie theater in Phoenix
backseat of a car, tied up, and driven to the dese
rapist then drove her back to town, asked her to sa
go. Soon afterward, the police arrested twenty-thre
a high school dropout with a criminal record datin
teen. Miranda had already been convicted of rape
him in a lineup. Miranda then wrote out a confes
with full knowledge to his rights. H e was convic
fifty-five years in prison, despite his court-appoint
client had been ignorant of his right to counsel. A
court failed, but the Supreme Court's decision se
the A C L U were naturally appreciative of the Cou
Ann Johnson less so. But not to worry. Miranda wa
idence. He served time in prison, was released o
death in a Phoenix bar ten years after the Court's
the Burger Court didn't really make chopped mea
Warren Court rights-of-the-accused provisions, a
Rehnquist Court did.

A BOOK NAMED JOHN
"MEMOIRS OF A WOMAN O

v. MASSACHUSETTS

Fanny Hill goes to Washington, there to help clari
pronged definition of obscenity the Court had form
in Roth v. U.S. Since Roth, the burden had been
work under scrutiny (1) appealed to prurient intere
and (3) was utterly without redeeming social valu
seemed to have its own idea of what all that mean
ally involved harassing the manager of the local b
Fanny Hill, which was decided in a single day, al
cases, the court took great pains to speak slowly
when there was no question that a work fit the fir
declared obscene unless it was utterly without re

RICAN STUDIES 59

r muscle from the exclusionary
orm to tight judicial standards)
popularity with law-and-order

for instance, from the point of
Johnson, an eighteen-year-old
x, was forcibly shoved into the
ert, where she was raped. The
ay a prayer for him, and let her
ee-year-old Ernesto Miranda,
g back to the time he was four­
in the past. Johnson identified
ssion, stating that it was made
cted and sentenced to forty to
ed lawyer's contention that his
An appeal to the state supreme
et Miranda free. Miranda and
urt's libertarian stance, Barbara
as later reconvicted on new ev­
on parole, and was stabbed to
s landmark decision. Although
at of this and most of the other
s conservatives had hoped, the

CLE LAND'S
OF PLEASURE"

(1966)

ify the hopelessly vague three-
mulated nearly a decade earlier
on the censors to prove that a
est; (2) was patently offensive;
ue. But every small-town P T A
nt, and whatever it was, it usu­
bookstore or movie theater. In
long with two other obscenity
and enunciate carefully: Even
rst two criteria, it could not be
edeeming social value—not a

6o AN I N C O M P L E T E

shred, not a smidgen. A n d Fa
judgment went on, that doesn'
obscene under certain circums
the basis of its prurient appe
"medical films" prefaced by pas
to be deluged by obscenity case
turned the whole mess into a q
ing laws.

FURMANv.

Capital punishment outlawed,
tured (a 5-4 split and nine se
Never mind the gory details of
involving rapes, murders, and r
arate arguments the Court was
penalty unconstitutional:

1. T h e death penalty wa
showed that it was us
middle-class whites s
them off.

2. The death penalty wa
criteria for deciding w

3. Because it was so seldo
as an effective deterren

4. Society's standards ha
like branding and the
usual punishment."

To make matters more painful,
on executions in 1967, so that
ing the final decision. Even
squirmed at the idea of having

In the end, the Court took
was unconstitutional at that tim
posed. Only two justices out of
was cruel and unusual punishm
as to what to do next—but not
redesigned their death-penalty
public-opinion polls showed A
punishment, thereby disprovin

EDUCATION

anny Hill didn't fit that criterion. O f course, the
't necessarily mean that the book couldn't be ruled
tances, say, if the publishers marketed it solely on
al. That helped. Pornographers took to making
ssages from Shakespeare, and the Court continued
es for years, until it finally threw up its hands and
question of "community standards" and local zon­

. GEORGIA (1972)

, in one of the longest (243 pages) and most tor­
parate opinions) decisions in the Court's history.
Furman, which was only the lead case among five
rape-murders. More to the point are the four sep­
s asked to consider as bases for declaring the death

as imposed in a discriminatory manner; statistics
sually black and poor people who died, whereas
simply hired the kind of lawyers who could get

as imposed in an arbitrary manner, with no clear
who would live and who would die.

om used, the death penalty never really functioned
nt.
ad evolved to the point where the death penalty,

cutting off of hands, constituted "cruel and un­

, there had already been an informal moratorium
six hundred people now sat on death row, await­
those justices who favored capital punishment
that much blood on their hands.
the wishy-washy stance that capital punishment
me because it was arbitrarily and capriciously im­
f the five-man majority thought the death penalty
ment. The Court's decision left everyone confused
for long. Within three years, thirty-five states had
y laws to get around the Court's restrictions, and
Americans to be overwhelmingly in favor of capital
ng at least one of the petitioners' arguments: that

AMER

society had evolved beyond the death penalty. In
existing laws in five states and found only one (No
tutional. In 1976, it reversed its stand altogether; r
it found that the death penalty was not cruel and
Still, no one wanted to cut off the first head. It w
Gilmore broke the ice by insisting that the state o
firing squad, that anyone was actually executed. T
took place in 1979, with the electrocution of John
prieved by the Furman decision seven years earlie
around one thousand executions nationwide, mo
leads the country with the highest number of exe
you surprised?

ROE v. WADE (1

The decision that legalized abortion as part of a
though Justice Blackmun, who wrote the majority
trying to prove that abortion was part of the docto
ing to the opinion, the state only has the right to
has a "compelling interest," such as the health of th
rights can begin to be considered only after the tw
The Court thus tiptoed around the quagmire of
raging over the abortion issue and based its deci
ground of medicine. However, this was not the mo
opinions, and it came under constant, ferocious at
The state of Texas, for instance, filed a petition
Court's assertion that a fetus was not a person
pregnancy to the Court's 1857 decision that Dre
page 55). In speeches and articles preceding he
Court, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg publicly opin
avoided a lot of headaches if it had simply based
equality instead of privacy and had refrained from
medical details. Still, by 1993 the court had rea
to abortion so many times that the storm center
abortion itself to questions like who should pay fo
antiabortionists had given up on legal challenges a
the times, just started shooting doctors. Under
George W. Bush, abortion opponents shifted tac
2005, forty-four states had laws on the books requ
get consent from their parents before getting an

RICAN STUDIES 61

1975, the Court ruled on the
orth Carolina's) to be unconsti­
ruling on a batch of five cases,
d unusual punishment per se.
wasn't until 1977, when Gary
of Utah stand him in front of a
The first involuntary execution

Spenkelink, who had been re­
er. Since then there have been
ost by lethal injection. Texas
cutions per capita. Why aren't

1973)

woman's right to privacy (al­
y opinion, spent many months
or's right to privacy). Accord­
intervene when it can prove it
he mother. As for the fetus, its
wenty-sixth week of pregnancy.
f moral and religious disputes
ision on the relatively neutral
ost airtight of Supreme Court
tack for the next twenty years.

for rehearing, comparing the
before the third semester of
d Scott was not a person (see
er ascension to the Supreme
ned that the Court might have
its decision on the grounds of
getting enmeshed in the gory
affirmed women's basic right
had shifted from the issue of
or it. Meanwhile, some radical
altogether and, in the spirit of
Presidents Bill Clinton and
ctics to focus on teenagers. By
uiring teens either to notify or
n abortion. Most states allow

6z AN I N C O M P L E T E

adolescents to go to court for
say, alcoholics or abusive. S o f
enough to go to court on her o
can still consider abortion an

UNIVERSITY O
v. ALLA

The clearest thing to come ou
was that it probably was not a
Burger Court decision.

The story line, in case you
Bakke, a thirty-eight-year-old
to the University of California
grade-point average, which wa
and the 2.1 required for minor
cause of Davis' strict minority
Supreme Court, charging rev
Bakke, in part because it was t
the courts, and everyone was a
had changed—for better or wo
Court's somewhat shoddy civ
whole affair.

The outcome, however, was
scratching their heads. The C
affirmative action, but just as
school. In effect, it said: Prin
groups decided to take this as
ditto for the opposition. Some
action measures (there are oth
systems, the Court pointed ou
to take race into account as on
cant's qualifications). Others i
and universities to discriminat
out inconsistencies and downri
ions (the Court was split 5-4);
half-a-baby decision a fine exa

Although the haziness of Ba
gnawing on affirmative-action
really left holding the bag. S

E EDUCATION

a waiver if they can show that their parents are,
for the moment, any fifteen-year-old who's savvy
own and persuade a judge of the merits of her case
option.

OF CALIFORNIA REGENTS
AN BAKKE (1978)

ut of this, the Court's first affirmative-action case,
a good idea to try to stage a media event around a

lost it in all the confusion, was as follows: Allan
white engineer, had twice been refused admission
a's medical school at Davis, despite a 3.5 college
as well above the 2.5 required for white applicants
rities. Concluding that he'd been passed over be­
y admissions quota, Bakke took his case to the
verse discrimination. T h e media jumped all over
he first time affirmative action had been tested in
anxious to see how much the mood of the country
orse—since the Sixties; in part because the Burger
vil-rights record promised to lend an edge to the

s a two-part decision that merely left most people
ourt declared itself firmly behind the principle of
s firmly behind Bakke's right to get into medical
nciples, yes; quota systems, no. Some civil-rights
s a resounding success, others as a crushing blow;
e said it left the door open for future affirmative-
her ways to promote racial balance besides quota
ut, and no one was ruling out an institution's right
ne factor among many when deciding on an appli­
nsisted it left an even wider margin for businesses
te against minorities. Some legal scholars pointed
ight lapses of reason in the justices' opposing opin­
; others declared the everyone-gets-to-take-home-
ample of judicial wisdom.
akke pretty much ensured that the courts would be
cases for years to come, it was the press that was
creaming headlines that contradicted each other

AMER

("Court Votes Tes' to Bakke"; "Court Votes Tes
made a lot of newspapers look silly and, after a cou
specials, T V reporters had to conclude that legal
optimum prime-time fare. The rest of us got a taste
Court decisions would be for at least the next fiftee

RICAN STUDIES

' to Affirmative Action") just
uple of frustrating go-nowhere
ambiguities did not make for
e of how unsatisfying Supreme
en years.

CHAP

RT H

TER

HISTORY

TWO

Contents

• Ten Old Masters 66
D The Leonardo/Michelangelo Crib Sheet 79
• Practical Italian for the Gallery-Goer 81
• Six -–isms, One –ijl, and Dada: Your Personal Gu

Movements Between 1900 and Hitler 85
• Thirteen Young Turks 93
• Raiders of the Lost Architecture: A Sprinter's Guide

Gothic Cathedral 102
D Real-Estate Investment for the Aesthete 104
• Snap Judgments 116

Marcel Duchamps L . H . O . O . Q i (a cheap French
got a hot ass"), a.k.a. M o n a Lisa with a Moustac

uide to European Art
e to the Greek Temple and the

pun translating roughly to she's
che

66 AN I N C O M P L E T E

Ten

I'n a way, we're sorry. What w
.favorite painters. Then we
whose stock is currently highe
bartenders way. (Whichever, y
ravaggio, Velasquez, and Mane
if you were anything like us, w
jama party or a year in finishi
suppose that means something

GIOTTO (G
(c.

Giotto's Deposition As t
By w
in p
som
pron
any
from
auth
Also
abou
to's o
natio
anyw
m th
into
there narrative, mere colored s
volume, and his native Florenc
250 years. No painter would
Giotto for six centuries, at whi
porting on life might not be th

KEY WORKS: T h e Arena Chap
lives of Christ and the Virgin M

E EDUCATION

Old Masters

we had really wanted to do was talk about our ten
got to thinking that it should be the ten painters
st, who are most in vogue in a crudités-and-hired-
you'd have heard about Piero della Francesca, C a -
et, all notably absent here.) Then we realized that,
what you really needed was remedial work, not a pa-
ng school. So, here they are, the ten greatest—we
g like "most seminal"—painters of all time.

GIOTTO DI BONDONE)
. 1266-c. 1337)

the little girl said in Poltergeist. "They're heeere!"
which we mean artists who sign their work, travel
packs, and live lives about which something, and
metimes too much, is known. Before Giotto (that's
nounced "JOT-to"), the artist hadn't counted for

more than the stonemason or the glassblower;
m here on in, he'd be accorded a degree of respect,
hority, and press unknown since ancient Greece.
o in abeyance since the Greeks: the human body,
ut which the courtly and rigid Byzantines—Giot­

only available role models—had felt some combi­
on of deeply ashamed and not all that interested
way. Giotto, out of the blue (and we're waist-deep
he Middle Ages, remember), turned mannequins
people, dry Christian doctrine into vivid you-are-
shapes into objects that seemed to have weight and
ce into the art world's red-hot center for the next
prove either as revolutionary or as influential as
ch point Cézanne opined that eyewitness-style re­
he ultimate artistic high.

el frescoes in Padua, thirty-three scenes from the
Mary and her folks.

COLLEAGUES AND RIVALS: Duccio, from neighbori
servative, aristocratic, and refined, and where ballo
than truth.

MASACCIO
(TOMMASO DI SER GIOVA

(1401-1428?)

Played Elvis Presley to Giotto's Frank Sinatra. Tha
Masaccio took his predecessor's three-dimensional
ism and put some meat on it, encouraged it to fle
muscles and swivel its hips, enlarged the stage it
playing on, and generally shook the last vestige
middle age(s) out of the whole performance. Thus
gins the Renaissance, the era that rediscovered Gr
and Rome; that posed the questions "Why?" "Ho
and "So what?"; that promoted such novelties as
manism, freedom, and the idea of leading a full
and that—casting its gaze on the lot of the arti
came up with a support system of studios, patrons,
apprentices. With Masaccio (a nickname that equ
roughly with "Pigpen"), we're at that Renaissan
heroic beginnings, smack-dab in the middle of bo
town, no-holds-barred Florence, and we're watc
as the new sciences of perspective and anatomy
courage painters to paint things as they appear to
eye. That doesn't, however, mean you're going to
off on Masaccio the way your parents or grandpar
got off on Elvis. For one thing, Masaccio died
twenty-seven, before he'd really done all that m
For another, until recently most of his extant work
in rough shape or badly lit (those darned Ita
churches) or both. Most important, few of us t
days are wowed by perspective and anatomy. A s a
sult, Masaccio is what art historians call a "scho
painter." But it was his stuff and nobody else's
Leonardo, Michelangelo, et al., back in the m
fifteenth century, were ankling over to the Branc
Chapel to take a long hard look at.

Masaccio s T h e Expulsion from Paradise

ART HISTORY 6z

ng Siena, where life was con­
ots were cast for beauty rather

ANNI DI MONE)
)

at is,
real­
ex its
was
es of
s be­
eece
ow?"

hu­
life;
ist—
and
uates
nce's
oom-
hing
en­
o the
o get
rents
d at
much.
was
alian
hese
a re­
olar's
that
mid-
cacci

AN I N C O M P L E T E

KEY WORKS: The Holy Trinity
Novella, Florence), The Tribu
Brancacci Chapel, Sta. Maria

COLLEAGUES AND RIVALS: In
Brunelleschi, and a sculptor, D
naissance in the visual arts.

RAPHAEL (
(

Button up your overcoat. That
you took History of Art 101,
Christmas vacation, means tha
Raphael comes up, the way you
the two contemporaries with w
naissance what turkey, ham, an
about Raphael is—and has alw

Raphaels T h e
School of Athens

EDUCATION

with the Virgin, St. John, and Donors (Sta. Maria
ute Money and The Expulsion from Paradise (both
del Carmine, Florence).

this case, not fellow painters, but an architect,
Donatello. Together, the three ushered in the Re­

(RAFFAELLO SANZIO)
(1483-1520)

t chill you're feeling, coupled with the fact that, if
he was the one you got hit with the week before
at it's impossible to smile brightiy when the name
u do with Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo—
whom he forms a trinity that is to the High Re­
nd Swiss are to a chef's salad. That said, the thing
ways been—that he never makes mistakes, fails to

achieve desired effects, or forgets what it is, exacd
next Thursday morning. H e perfected picture pain
fected bridge building or canal digging or satellite l
is an exercise in balance, in organization, in clarit
and gracefulness. For four hundred years, right thr
Raphael was every painter's idol; lately, though, he'
as well as a lot sticky-fingered, absorbing and ass
other artists (especially Michelangelo) rather than
himself. Note: With the High Renaissance, paint
from Florence to Rome, where the papacy will take
Warbucks role, and where Raphael—handsome, ta
sense of timing—will earn his reputation as the cou
at the dinner parties of popes and princes.

KEY WORKS: T h e early Madonnas (e.g., Madonna
rence), the portrait of Pope Leo X (Pitti Palace,
Stanza della Segnatura (Rome), then the Pope s pri
entitled The School ofAthens.

COLLEAGUES AND RIVALS: Michelangelo and, to
weren't constantly at each other's throats), Leonard

TITIAN (TIZIANO VE
(1477-1576)

Welcome to Venice—opulent, voluptuous, pagan,
to the Orient, given to both civic propaganda and
where light and color (as opposed to Florence's s
name of the game. With Titian, the most importa
becomes a dog-eat-dog profession with agents and
ings, a business in which religious and political d
those of the carriage—make that gondola—trade.
everything an oil painter could do, from altarpieces
traits to complex mythologies) and obscenely long
bring him down, at something like ninety-nine), an
for seventy-five years, with his flesh-and-blood, hig
He presided at the divorce of painting from architec
easel, and assured that the primary medium of th
canvas. Don't expect rigor or even real imagination

ART HISTORY 69

dy, he's supposed to be doing
nting, the way engineers per­
aunching; each of his canvases
ty and harmony, in coherence
rough the nineteenth century,
's begun to seem a little bland,
imilating and extracting from
trying to figure things out for
ing packs its bags and moves
e over the Medicis' old Daddy
actful, and possessed of a good
urtier among painters, a fixture

of the Goldfinch, Uffizi, F l o ­
Florence), the murals in the
ivate library, especially the one

a lesser extent (at least they
do.

ECELLIO)

on the profitable trade route
d conspicuous consumption—
structure and balance) are the
ant of the Venetians, painting
d PR people and client mail­
demands are nothing next to
. Titian was versatile (he did
s to erotica, from straight por­
g-lived (it took the plague to
nd he dominated the art scene
gh-wide-and-handsome ways.
cture and its remarriage to the
e new union would be oil on

from the man, though; what's

on display here are energy an
Titian, whose eyes weren't wh
strokes and fudged contours, e
profundity and cite him as the f
things, not how he knew them

KEY WORKS: It's the corpus, n
there, though: Madonna with M
ofEuropa (Gardner Museum,
and Christ Crowned with Thorn

COLLEAGUES AND RIVALS: Gior
Titian's long-lived, Spirit-of-th

E
(DOMENICOS

(

H e was, in the words of Mane
co's been positioned as the sea

nd expansiveness. Prestige point: In his old age,
hat they used to be, began painting in overbold
ncouraging modern critics to praise his newfound
first Impressionist, a man who painted how he saw

to be.

not the individual canvas, that counts. Right up
Members of the Pesaro Family (Frari, Venice), Rape
Boston), Venus ofUrbino (Pitti Palace, Florence),
ns (Alte Pinakothek, Munich).

rgione, who played sensualist, die-young Keats to
he-Age Wordsworth.

EL GRECO
S THEOTOCOPOULOS)
(1541-1614)

et, "the great alternative." Though of late El Gre­
asoned thinker, rather than the God-happy wild

man, either way he was too much of an anomaly to
temporaries—or to found a school of Spanish pa
have to wait for Velazquez to come along, a few y
twentieth century that made El Greco's reputation,
especially those gaunt, tense, strung-out figures—a
fire-and-ice world, complete with angst and hal
through the young Picasso and the German Expre
Abstract Expressionists of the Forties and Fifties, a
be-me streak, El Greco has served as a patron sain
was the nickname given to this footloose Greek ("G
of rarefied, decaying Toledo, Spain, when he arrive
among Byzantine icons, followed by stints in Ven

ART HISTORY

o have real impact on his con­
inting. (Both of those would
years later.) In fact, it was the
, applauding his distortions—
and his creation of an inward,
llucination. From Van Gogh
essionists, up to the American
all of whom had a big I-gorta-
nt. A little history: "El Greco"
Greco," get it?) by the citizens
ed there after a boyhood spent
nice (where he glanced at the

El Greco's Toledo
in a Storm

AN I N C O M P L E T E

Titians) and Rome (where he
Which is funny, inasmuch as w
anybody's but Cervantes'. For
Mannerists" (those anticlassica
the perfection game, and decid
"most disturbingly personal p
"incandescent"—some prefer
a painter you'll always be able
world.

KEY WORKS: First and foremost
largest and most resplendent E
de Guevara (both at the Metrop
menacing, utterly unholy-look

COLLEAGUES AND RIVALS: Lik
forms, with Velazquez and Go

PETER PAU

Not an anal retentive. From
then still the Spanish Netherla
his billowy, opulent, robust, an
ical tableaux, and mythologica
vate patrons, and virtually eve
was as much a diplomat as an
others, the Infanta of Spain,
palaces.) To be associated wit
body's wildest dreams: financi
painting, which began with th
and Brueghel, and reached its
full-tilt Catholic sumptuousne
was becoming more and more
the baroque, the organizing
dynamic, emotional, exuberant
classicism of the High Renaiss
ciple that, among other things
the sum of its parts. Anyway, R

EDUCATION

e offered to redo Michelangelo's Sistine Ceiling).
we tend to think of his vision as more Spanish than

art historians, he holds two records: "Last of the
al eccentrics who knew you couldn't top Raphael at
ded to put all their chips on weirdness instead) and
painter ever." Critics go into raptures over his
"phosphorescent"—spirituality. Whatever: Here's
e to recognize on any wall in any museum in the

t, Burial of Count Orgaz (Santo Tomé, Toledo), the
E l Greco. Also: Toledo in a Storm and Cardinal Nino

politan, New York), the latter a portrait of Spain's
ing Grand Inquisitor.

ke we say, none among his contemporaries. But
oya, the trinity of Great Spanish Painters.

UL RUBENS (1577-1640)

factory headquarters in Antwerp (now Belgium,
ands), Rubens, the "prince of painters," purveyed
nd sensual portraits, altarpieces, landscapes, histor­
l treatments to the Church, the town fathers, pri­
ery royal household in Europe. (It helped that he
n artist, entrusted with secrets of state by, among
and hence provided with entrée to all the best
th the name Rubens: First, success beyond any­
ial, professional, and personal. Second, Flemish
he restrained van Eyck, proceeded through Bosch
culmination now, an art that was drumming up a
ess even as its north-of-the-border Dutch cousin
e Protestant and bourgeois. Third, the concept of
principle behind all seventeenth-century art—
t, and asymmetrical in all those places where the
sance had been static, poised, and balanced; a prin­
s, decreed that the work of art was greater than
Rubens created and created and created, and if his

altarpieces didn't seem particularly mystical or his
crazy, still, there was enough sheer activity in each
ally squawk. For the conscientious: There's alway
which painting is Rubens' and which is Titian's (a
impossible because the two men are separated by a
rope is lying). Just remember that Titian subordin
to its parts, Rubens the parts to the whole; that Tit
orgy scene, Rubens tumult; and that Titian pain
coeds, Rubens Ziegfeld showgirls.

KEY WORKS: A S with Titian, it's the shooting ma
However, The Judgment of Paris (National Galler
wife in the middle); the Marie de' Medici series (L
worth of commemoration); and the late landscape
Rubens family chateau in the background, will giv

COLLEAGUES AND RIVALS: A rung down the ladder
traitist of aristocrats, especially English ones, and

ART HISTORY 71

Rubens'
The Judgment
of Paris

s bacchanals all that wild and
h of them that you couldn't re­
ys the chance that you'll forget
and anyone who tells you that's
a hundred years and half of Eu­
ated the whole of his painting
tian valued serenity, even in an
nted the equivalent of Vassar

atch, not the individual shot.
ry, London; that's his second
Louvre, Paris; thirty-six panels'
es (various museums), with the
ve you a sense of his range.

, Anthony van Dyck, the por­
Rubens' one-time assistant.

AN I N C O M P L E T E

REMBRAND

•H^HHBHBBHHR The

famo

liken

every

The

you)

Rem

most

floor

of pig

out h

were

brand

sion.)

mode

us us

monp

chant

and d

Rembrandt's ^ ° ^n a t n e Rembrandtian outpu

Self-Portrait Giotto, an affair for ordinary m

brandt s still the answer most g

asked to name a famous painter.

of the seventeenth-century Dut

missions) turned out the first

types, paintings that were to be t

the living-room sofa.

KEY WORKS: Many. T h e ones
and The Syndics of the Cloth G
gars folks; both, Rijksmuseu
(1659, National Gallery, Lond
one of the religious paintings
Leningrad). But beware: Since
Amsterdam, has been reassess
pus. A m o n g the casualties: Th
The Girl at the Door, each now

COLLEAGUES AND RIVALS: Lots
evidence in seventeenth-centu
Florence. You should know Fra

E EDUCATION

T VAN RIJN (1606-1669)

son of a miller and a bakers daughter, with a face—
ous from over a hundred self-portraits—much
ned to a loaf of bread. But, as Miss Piggy, herself
y inch a Rubens gal, might say, quel loaf of bread.

man who manipulated tonality (lights and darks, to
and eschewed contour better than anybody ever,
brandt was also the painter who realized, first and
t fully, that the eye could take in a human figure, the
it was standing on, the wall behind it, plus the flock
geons visible through the window in that wall, with­
having to make any conscious adjustments. (If we
talking automotive rather than art history, Rem­
dt would be the advent of the automatic transmis­
) More than that, even, Rembrandt was the very
el of the sensitive and perceptive person, as some of
sed to say sophomore year, taking the sober, com­
place Dutch panorama—guildhall and slum, mer­
t and beggar—and portraying it in all its poignancy
detail; even Christianity, the inspiration for the other
ut, becomes, in his hands and for the first time since
men and women. And if all that's not enough, Rem-
game-show contestants would come up with when
. Historical generalization: Rembrandt (and the rest
tch, who had no popes or patrons farming out com­
art to be consumed exclusively by us mere-mortal
tucked under your arm, carried home, and hung over

that come up over and over are The Night Watch
Guild (the latter adopted by the Dutch Masters ci­

m, Amsterdam) and a pair of late self-portraits
don; 1660, Kenwood, London). And you'll need
s, perhaps Return of the Prodigal Son (Hermitage,
e 1968, the Rembrandt Research Project, based in
sing the authenticity of the entire Rembrandt cor­
he Polish Rider, The Man in the Golden Helmet, and
w attributed to a different student of Rembrandt's.

s of them; painting and painters were as much in
ury Holland as they'd been in fifteenth-century
ans Hals (impulsive, with a predilection for people

hanging out and getting drunk) and Jan Vermeer
for people opening mail and pouring milk). Ever
"Little Dutchman," a genre painter specializing
traits, or interiors.

CLAUDE MONET (18

The problem is, you're dealing with two legenda
counting M^net, Monet's hip contemporary). Th
Impressionism. You remember Impressionism:
movement that grabbed an easel and a handful of p
was going outdoors; that attempted to capture the s
fects of light and color by painting with the eye (
with the mind (and what it knew to be true); that
form, in the sense of either composition or solidit
the conservative French critics and artgoing publi
ing, in our time, the most popular, most cooed-ov
second Monet is the great-uncle of Modernism, th
sively blinder and more obsessed with reducing the
light—eventually gave up form altogether and to

ART HISTORY 25

(intimate, with a predilection
rybody else is categorized as a
in landscapes, still lifes, por­

840-1926)

ary reputations (and that's not
e first Monet is the Father of
the mid-nineteenth-century
paintbrushes and announced it
spontaneous and transitory ef­
(and what it saw), rather than
couldn't have cared less about
ty; that was initially reviled by
c; and that wound up becom­
ver style of painting ever. T h e
he man who—getting progres­
visible world to terms of pure
ook out the first patent on ab-

76 AN I N C O M P L E T E

straction; it s this Monet the
wondering what happened to
get about it, but any hundred-y
teau is stricdy optional.

KEY WORKS: For the Impress
Sainte-Adresse (1866, Metropo
Musée Marmottan, Paris). Fo
are the Rouen Cathedral series
Fine Arts, Boston, among oth
Museum of Modern Art, New
burgh, among others).

COLLEAGUES AND RIVALS: T h e
sarro and Sisley. Manet is a pro
Renoir are quasi-Impressionis
post-Impressionists. And Tou
knees, with his feet strapped to

PAUL CÉ

This is a test. Pass it—that is,
it—and chances are you'll have
ation, and all. Flunk it—that i
diately on to Van Gogh and/or
you. A s to what Cézanne was
ism (note that he's an exact co
to transience and to truth-as-w
geoisie and the boulevards;
grandeur, back into painting. S
spective, which makes the view
for whom everything is done.
of choices, not a product. (He
form; geometry, not the need
of representation to be revokab
ing the pendulum swing towar
in motion six hundred years be
count for more than what you p
the illusions he can bring off. G
paintings are sensuous, inviting
ding gets rougher with Picasso

E EDUCATION

avant-garde has tended to prefer. Note to those
the eighteenth century: You shouldn't exactly for­
year period whose biggest box-office draw is Wat-

ionist Monet: at your discretion. Try Terrace at
olitan, New York) or Impression—Sunrise (1872,
or the proto-Modernist Monet: The touchstones
s (1894, Metropolitan, New York, and Museum of
hers) and the water lilies series (1899, 1904-1925,
w York, and Carnegie Institute Art Museum, Pitts­

only "true" Impressionists besides Monet are Pis­
oto-Impressionist, among other things. Degas and
ts. Cézanne, Seurat, Van Gogh, and Gauguin are
ulouse-Lautrec is played by José Ferrer, on his
o his buttocks.

ZANNE (1839-1906)

, "get" what Cézanne was up to, maybe even like
e no trouble with "modern" art, abstraction, alien­
s, wonder what the fuss is about and move imme­
r Gauguin—and you've got big problems ahead of
up to, exacdy: First, he was rejecting Impression­
ontemporary of Monet), not only its commitment
hat-the-eye-sees, but its affiliation with the bour­
Cézanne wanted to infuse some gravity, even
Second, he was refuting classical "one-point" per­
wer the person on whom everything converges and

For Cézanne "seeing" was a process, a weighing
e also decreed color, not line, to be the definer of
ds of composition, to be its basis; and the laws
ble at will.) Third, he was single-handedly revers­
rd representational "accuracy" that Giotto had set
fore; from here on in, how you perceive is going to
perceive, the artist's modus operandi for more than
Granted, this is pretty heavy stuff, but at least the
g, and still of the world as we know it. The sled­
o and the Cubists, up next.

KEY WORKS: Any still life. Ditto, any view of
Mont Sainte-Victoire, in Cezanne's native
Provence, the mountain in art history. Ditto,
any and all scenes of card players. And the
portraits of his wife and himself. In general,
the later a Cézanne, the bigger a deal it's
likely to be—also the more abstract. A lot
of people consider Bathers (1898-1905,
Philadelphia Museum of Art) the painter's
summa, but follow his example and come to
it last.

COLLEAGUES AND RIVALS: T h e other three Ceza
Post-Impressionists: Seurat (the one with
the thousands of little dots), Van Gogh
(him you know), and Gauguin (of Brittany
and Tahiti).

PABLO PICASSO (18

Try to rise to the occasion. God knows, the critics
ing Picasso, among other things, "the charging bu
schean monster from Malaga," and "the walking
stud of the Côte d'Azur." Be all that as it may, yo
thing about Cubism (which has nothing to do wit
to do with seeing things in relationship to one ano
more than one vantage point at a time, with the re
looking at a teacup, say, or a birdcage, both hea
something about celebrity (Picasso, toward the en
not even worldlings like Raphael and Rubens, ha
bastard heirs, sycophantic dealers, and Life mag
two basics there's the energy, the fecundity, the f
penchant for metamorphosis and the consequen
counted eighty of them, and that was back in th
gizing (watch for Minotaurs, nymphs, and river g
the womanizing (he was notorious for classifyi
"goddesses" or "doormats"). You should know th
sculpture of Africa and pre-Christian Spain were

ART HISTORY 71

anne's Still Life with Apples

881-1973)

s and commentators try, label­
ull of modern art," "that Nietz-

scrotum, the inexhaustible old
ou've got to understand some­
th actual cubes, and everything
other, simultaneously, and from
esult that you may find yourself
ad on and from the air). And
nd, enjoyed a fame no painter,
ad ever known, complete with
gazine covers). Beyond those
frankness, the no-flies-on-me
nt welter of styles (one critic
e early Fifties), the mytholo-
gods), and, in a personal vein,
ing his lady friends as either
at Cézanne and the primitive
e big influences and El Greco

a lesser one; that the "patheti
bism per se; that the appeal
scraps of modern life right in
"paint forms as I think them,
that the painting after 1950 (n
lacking in intensity.

KEY WORKS: Les Demoiselles d
York), arguably the most "radi
last of the great "political" paint
seum of Modern Art), all meta

COLLEAGUES AND RIVALS: Geo
Picasso were "roped together
Ashley Wilkes to his friend's
nand Léger are the two oth
"Fauvism"), the other great pai
native role model (see under "
vador Dali (see under "Surrea
and the high life even more tha

c" Blue and "wistful" Rose periods predate Cu­
of collage—literally, "gluing"—was that it got
nside the picture frame; that Picasso claimed to
not as I see them" (let alone as they looked); and
not the sculpture, however) was once judged to be

d'Avignon (1907, Museum of Modern Art, New
ical" of all paintings, and Guernica (1937, Prado),
tings. Also, a sculpture; try The Guitar (1912, M u ­
al sheets and empty spaces.

orges Braque, who once commented that he and
like mountaineers," but who wound up playing
Rhett Butler. For the record: Juan Gris and Fer-

her ranking Cubists; Henri Matisse (see under
inter of the century; Marcel Duchamp, the alter­
"Dada") for young—and subversive—artists; Sal­
alism"), the fellow Spaniard who valued publicity
an Picasso did.

The
Leonardo/
Michelangelo
Crib Sheet

Full Name Leonardo da V
Dates 1452-1519
Address Florence, then
finally Paris
Nickname "The First Mod
Quote "Intellectual pa
out sensuality."
Mind-set
Universal and d
The Italian Word for the enigmatic and
Above, Approximately
At Heart Not a Painter So Misteriosità
Much as a . . .
He Most Wanted to . . . Scientist and p
The Work Celebrated the
World Over Understand
Mona Lisa, The

ART HISTORY 79

Vinci Michelangelo Buonarroti
Milan, 1475-1564
Florence, then Rome

dern Man" "II Divino"
assion drives "The more the marble
" wastes, the more the
statue grows."
diffuse, Narrow and single-minded,
elusive passionate and thorny

Terribilità

philosopher Sculptor and architect

e Last Supper Create

The Sistine Ceiling (especially
The Creation of Man),
the statue of David

8o AN I N C O M P L E T E

The Leonardo/Michela

The Works You Can Get One of the scienti
Points for Knowing About drawings from the
Notebooks, as belo

Italian Art Term Most Likely Sfumato (see page
to Crop Up in a Discussion
of His Work

When He Wrote, H e . . . Jotted down descr
his experiments

Gay? Yup; major boyfri
hustler who stole
drawings and then
them, ditto the ou
Leonardo bought

Beard? Right, like the on
bag person in the
Station men's roo

E EDUCATION

angelo Crib Sheet

ific One of the lesser sculptures,
e like an unfinished Slave,
w or something architectural,

like Rome's Campidoglio

e 83) Contrapposto (see page 81)

riptions of Composed sonnets to his
lovers
end a
his Yup; major boyfriend
n sold handsome, learned, thoughtful,
utfits and from a good family; affair
him said to have been "platonic,"
however
e on the
Penn Sure, like the one on the
m pot dealer in Washington
Square

Practical Italian

Gallery-Goer

Artwise, New York may have recently had a fi
High Renaissance. Which means that if it's
going to have to learn to roll your rs a bit. Here's

CHIAROSCURO (kee-ahr-e-SKEWR-o):
Literally means "bright-dark" in Italian
and describes the technique, in painting or
drawing, of modeling three-dimensional
figures by contrasting or gradating areas
of light and dark. Leonardo da Vinci
was among the first to use chiaroscuro to
break out of the tradition of flat, one-
dimensional outlining of figures. One of
the great achievements of the Renaissance,
chiaroscuro soon became part and parcel
of painting. Rembrandt is the acknowl­
edged master of the technique; if you
want a more recherché example, try C a -
ravaggio.

CONTRAPPOSTO (kohn-tra-POH-stoe):
In sculptures of the human form, the
pose in which the upper body faces in
a slightly different direction from the
lower, with the weight resting on one
leg. Contrapposto was originally the
Greeks' solution to the problem of
balancing the weight of the body in
sculpture. The earlier formula had been
the frontal, static pose, in which the legs
were treated like two columns with the
torso set squarely on top of them and
the head balancing on top of that. The
Greeks, rightly, found this boring and
stupid. Renaissance sculptors revived
the Greek formula, renamed it, and
added dynamic tension by making the
placement of body parts more extreme

ART HISTORY 8l

for the
r

ield day, but it's Italy that had a
snob appeal you're after, you're
your basic lesson.

Chiaroscuro:
Caravaggios
The Musicians

Contrapposto:
Cristofano da
Bracciano's
Orpheus