CAPTURING NUREYEV
JAMES WYETH PAINTS THE DANCER
On View at the Farnsworth Art Museum and Wyeth Center in
Rockland, Maine
From June 9, 2002 to January 5, 2003

By Laurie Meunier Graves

There is an old saying, perhaps even a cliché, that familiarity breeds contempt, and in Maine we are very familiar with the Wyeths. It seems that we have had Wyeths here forever, although in truth they came from Pennsylvania. First there was N. C. Wyeth, the grand patriarch, who is best known for painting rousing illustrations for children’s classics. Then there is Andrew, his son, who bought property in midcoast Maine and proceeded to paint austere pictures that made the area look as though it were in a permanent state of late November. Finally there is Andrew’s son James to continue the dynasty. James Wyeth’s paintings seem to be a blend of his father’s and his grandfather’s with dashes of his own style thrown in.

Incredibly, the tourists find Andrew Wyeth’s paintings quaint and have made him so popular that he is snubbed by much of the art world. They have also helped turn Rockland, an old fishing town, into a Wyeth epicenter. It might not be quite fair to say that the Farnsworth Art Museum, where many of the Wyeth paintings have settled, is a shrine to the family. There are, after all, other exhibits. However, I think it’s safe to state that the Wyeth collection dominates the museum to the point where there is an actual Wyeth center, which is housed in a lovely old church not far from the main building. And, in the main building itself there are plenty of Wyeth paintings to satisfy the clamoring tourists.

Wyeth aftershocks go as far as Portland, where there are Wyeth paintings sprinkled in the main collection of the Portland Museum of Art. To the bemused art museum patron in Maine, Wyeths seem to be everywhere.

However, sometimes the familiar can be strong and powerful and even surprising. This is the case with Capturing Nureyev: James Wyeth Paints The Dancer, which is being shown at the Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland. In the pamphlet accompanying the exhibit, it states, “Wyeth spent a year observing and painting Nureyev…The dancer was such a captivating model for Wyeth that he has returned to Nureyev as a subject of his paintings for 24 years.”

Captivated is certainly no exaggeration; entranced might not be too strong, either. The exhibit bristles with sexual energy as the dancer is shown in various poses and various states of dress and undress. In most of the portraits, Mr. Nureyev, with his crested hair and fierce face, looks like a bird of prey. Indeed, even Mr. Nureyev’s eyebrows look like feathers.

There are a few exceptions. In Black Leotard (study #3) and Black Wash Background, Torso, Nureyev (study #14), Mr. Nureyev looks like a Greek god or Michelangelo’s David.

In Portrait of Nureyev, Mr. Nureyev is in furs, and he has the same austere look as Andrew Wyeth’s paintings of old men.

Then there is the horrifying Automaton. Mr. Wyeth crossed an automated clown, a toy bank, with Mr. Nureyev’s features. With its chalk-white face, blood-red lips, and scarecrow hair, the figure is neither a dancer nor a bank; it is a grotesque hybrid. And the result is terrifying.

I overheard a woman say to her young son, “Isn’t that neat?”

I, of course, made no response, but I thought, “Yes, neat like a nightmare.”

It is impossible to define true art, although much has been written on the subject. We know some of the things it isn’t. It isn’t quaint, it isn’t merely beautiful, and it doesn’t aim to be nice. For me true art is illuminating, arresting, powerful. Over and over, I think of it long after I’ve seen it. This exhibit of Mr. Wyeth’s is certainly all of these things, and it has also taught me that the familiar can be worthwhile.
 

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