Meeting the Masters
Skin on curves shimmers
Pearly on grandiose curves
In baroque poses
It’s hard to capture one of Western art’s master’s works in just a few lines. He himself didn’t even try to do so. Layering finishing touches of white paint over vivid, bold colors, shaped along well-formed and pre-colored sketches. He had an entire atelier to help him bring his visions to reality. Maybe that’s what I admire so much in him: his ability to rise above his own personality without losing that personality, that vision. To deliver paintings that to this day move people and have meaning even in our contemporary context, and to do so through the talents of a host of other painters and atelier workers, is no small feat.
Two summers before covid hit, I coddiwompled in Antwerp once more. It had been years since I could roam these streets with a free and empty mind. No to-do list pressuring me, no time to be back home to pick up the kids, no deadline to meet. I could just walk and be.
So often, as a student, had I walked these streets, that I barely paid any attention to where I was going. And then I found myself in front of his house, his atelier. Still standing after centuries, smack in the middle of this city I love so much. When he returned from Italy to attend to his mother’s funeral, he never thought he would stay here – but he did and he left his mark for the ages.
I have nothing to do but to decide what I choose to do, I thought.
Or something like that.
So in I went, waited behind a few Asian tourists, and then bought my ticket.
To go into Peter Paul Rubens’ house.
I loved it. I took my time, imagining what it would have been like, to live here, to walk here, to come to work here.
But the moment that impressed me most, was when I stood in front of one of his works that has left the city and crossed the ocean.
Rubens is known for many things, one of which is how large his works are. Monumental. Fittingly so, as they often were commissioned for cathedrals and castles.
This one was large, life-sized, yet not humongous. Still, the way it was positioned in the room, drew me to it above all other paintings I had seen from him and his atelier, his peers and teachers.
The Massacre of the Innocents is one of Rubens’ master pieces, no doubt.
Peter Paul Rubens, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
I spent a long time with this painting. Looking at the details, the explanations, going closer and moving away. Dissecting the impact it had on me. The horror, the dread, the pain, the despair that emanates from the women’s faces, bodies, eyes is so real, it becomes almost tangible. The sight of the babies and toddlers being scattered around on the ground and held up to be thrown to the ground or sword is devastating.
We can see this every day in the news. Yet standing in front of this 1600s painting, depicting a story of over a millennium and a half earlier, somehow brings it closer.
I never thought a painting could be so gripping – I never realized until now how scary this story is.
Skin on curves shimmers / Pearly on grandiose curves / In baroque poses — beige letters on a close-up of one of Rubens’ paintings, depicting a man falling in battle.
But those thoughts were far away when I took my oldest son and my daughter to Brussels, yesterday, for them to discover three of the great Flemish Masters: Van Eyck, Bruegel and, of course, Rubens. I just wanted to get out of the house, and do something that wasn’t’ another walk in the fields for a change. In these semi-lockdown times, there aren’t’ too many options, but luckily, museums and exhibitions have been allowed to reopen.
What better chance to force-feed my darlings some culture than on a day when no other options are available, right? No nagging to go see a movie instead, or go eat at a crappy fast-food restaurant, no scheduled activities. I love the freedom our empty schedules give us.
Plus, this exhibition came recommended by a mom I trust, so I knew it was worth a try.
Did my kids like it?
How does one know – it was something planned by mom, after all, and they hadn’t been consulted; admitting they liked it is risky and carries some danger that mom might think she has good ideas…
Yet they were perky, and interested, and even answered a few questions about their experience. Even better – they are coming along with me to a follow-up exhibition. One I had wanted to visit on my own, but hey, I’ll take my innocent ones along and hold them tight while I can.
