The Power of Piffle
In the preview I read of Simon Schama's Power of Art (BBC2), the writer admitted to never having heard of Jacques-Louis David! What do TV previewers know? The Prof's ignorant tirade against David - one of the greatest Neoclassical painters France has ever produced - wouldn't have enlightened anyone. Proving he is an historian, not an art critic with a genuine feeling for art, Schama preferred rewriting French history to giving us an appreciation of David's talent, and the BBC indulged him! We were shown a mere handful of David's masterpieces, jumbled up with art by other painters, such as Boucher and Greuze, and with interminable re-enactments of revolutionary uproar. David's iconic Napoleon Crossing the Alps (1801) received a quick sneer, as did his magnificent The Intervention of the Sabine Women (1799). His influential Mort de Joseph Bara (1794) was completely ignored. Schama gave us prejudice and trite melodrama. Prof, as an art critic you're a fraud. Click the title link to read Wikipedia on David and learn the truth.
posted by Unknown @ 11.11.06
2 comments
2 Comments:
Schama went off on the wrong tack by criticising David's character and behaviour, rather than reviewing his art. I like David's paintings, and I think most of us can filter out the political propaganda element.
I agree that those of us who admire David's art will have filtered out the Prof's prejudice, but what about the TV previewer who'd never heard of David? What impression was he left with? And why waste our time with all those actors and extras hamming it up as French revolutionaries? What a waste of money!
By the way, did you know that David and his wife were reconciled and remarried? This didn't fit Schama's prejudice. He gave us the wife divorcing David and vanishing forever. How to distort history to conform to a bigoted view!
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