"When people enthuse about him, I can't help feeling that they're phoneys at some level. I'm sure I am wrong. But on Poussin, I'm a philistine and fear I always will be."
http://xrl.us/bgdeie -- Jonathan Jones in 'The Guardian'.
There are plenty of reasons why an intelligent & sensitive art-buff such as Jonathan Jones should feel cut-off from the paintings of that admirable painter Nicolas Poussin. But it sounds as tho it's thee current enthusers who are the real target for his dislike.
I remarked this morning in an email to a friend:
that part of the more recent arty public perception
of Poussin as an elite interest is probably due to
the information flow more about the market than anything else -- & the sky-high prices, the recent discoveries of 'lost' works, their scarcity outside public collections & hence the large amount of interest among scholars who are implicated in the market in attributions, copies, paintings existing in 2 versions --
& that's before you get to the insistent drone of 19th century [& 20th century idealist] aestheticism that still clings to this great 'classical' artist -- & the insistent hermeneutics of difficult erudite subjects that is still the mainstay of scholarly writing"
Be assured: you are not alone, Jonathan Jones, in an aversion to that version of Poussin -- that's the version that has [almost completely ] monopolised writing for 40 years --
there are a number of writers currently trying to change that version -- there's at least one important publication in the pipe-line -- [there's something going on there, but you don't yet know what it is...] -- apart from TJ Clark's close-up of 2 landscape paintings -- there's David Carrier's 'Poussin's Paintings' [1993].
Try a dose of 'Poussin's Humour' -- see if it doesn't give you reason to think again & actually get to enjoy paintings that a number of contemporary non-snobs do enjoy.
http://www.nicolaspoussin.co.uk/index.html
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