Barnes Rune 2012 (Decoding the Mysteries of Pennsylvania’S Barnes Foundation, a Special American Place)
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BARNES RUNE 2012 (Decoding The Mysteries of Pennsylvania’s Barnes Foundation, A Special American Place) Richard Ralph Feudale Table of Contents Prologue ................................................................................................................ 1 Chapter 1—Telltale Art (Through the Looking Glass) ....................................... 7 Chapter 2—Wisteria sinensis .............................................................................. 13 Chapter 3—An American Home ...................................................................... 17 Chapter 4—Angels in the Architecture ............................................................. 21 Chapter 5—A Diving Platform near Pourville ................................................. 29 Chapter 6—The Founder’s Circle—The Tears of St. Lawrence ....................... 37 Chapter 7— The Founder’s Circle—In Flanders Fields, The Cret Connection ..................................................................... 43 Chapter 8—The Founder’s Circle—Then We All Went Home ....................... 55 Chapter 9—The Founder’s Circle—Something Happened .............................. 59 Chapter 10— The Founder’s Circle—The Gate that Looketh toward the East ............................................................................. 63 Chapter 11—The Founder’s Circle—Gallery IV, The Chapel .......................... 79 Chapter 12—The Founder’s Circle—The Order of the Knights Templar ..... 87 Chapter 13— The Founder’s Circle—“The Flanders 43” (between Heaven and Hell) .......................................................... 93 Chapter 14—The Founder’s Circle—Gallery VI, Welcome Home! ............... 103 Chapter 15—The Founder’s Circle—The Circle Complete ............................ 111 Chapter 16—Through the Eyes of a Child ...................................................... 115 Chapter 17—The Interlude .............................................................................. 119 Chapter 18— “Angels and Horses in Hilly Landscape—Fantasy” ................. 123 Chapter 19—Becken Backen ........................................................................... 127 Chapter 20—Passages ...................................................................................... 135 Chapter 21— The Eternal Flame, the Soldier, and the Knight by Jacques Copyright © 2010 Ali A Dashti Lipchitz ....................................................................................... 139 All rights reserved. Chapter 22—The Passage of A Group of Personages through a Dry Canal .... 143 Chapter 23—The Synapse ................................................................................ 145 ISBN: 1453625496 Chapter 24—The Pirate, The Cyclops, and The Cauldrons of “Ker-Feal” ..... 147 ISBN-13: 9781453625491 Chapter 25—The Monkey Puzzle Tree ............................................................ 155 Chapter 26—St. Michael Defeats the Devil ..................................................... 159 Chapter 27—The Circle of Heaven and Earth in Merion ............................... 165 Chapter 28— “While the Children Were Smothered on the Stair by the Door” ....................................................................... 171 Chapter 29—The South Wall, Gallery XIV (A Scene from a Dry Canal) ...... 181 Chapter 30—The Double ................................................................................. 187 PROLOGUE Chapter 31—The Crypt .................................................................................... 195 Chapter 32—The Water Bearer’s Formal Education ..................................... 209 Chapter 33—The Barnes Curse? ...................................................................... 217 Chapter 34—The Accursed? ............................................................................ 237 ecently, former Pennsylvania Governor, Edward G. Rendell, told Fox News that Chapter 35—The Three Wise Men ................................................................. 243 he thought that keeping The Barnes art collection in its Merion Home would Chapter 36—The Place of the Skull ................................................................ 273 Rbe a disgrace. My goal is to persuade Americans to encourage Pennsylvanians Chapter 37—Two Nudes .................................................................................. 281 to preserve The Barnes and its art collection intact in Merion. Some Pennsylvania poli- Chapter 38—A Legend of Modern Art ............................................................ 289 ticians hope to promote The Barnes as a museum and move the Barnes art collection Chapter 39—The Holy Grail of Modern Art? ................................................ 295 of Renoirs, Matisses, Picassos, etc., into a new building in the art museum area of the Chapter 40—The Missing Link? ...................................................................... 303 city of Philadelphia. Interests sympathetic to moving The Barnes to Philadelphia have Chapter 41—A Portrait of a Painter, after El Greco? ..................................... 309 prized it open and managed to progress to begin building a new “home” for the art Chapter 42—The Book of Life ......................................................................... 325 collection. The state of Pennsylvania has quietly earmarked over $100,000,000.00 in Chapter 43—Time Past, Time Present, Time Future ..................................... 331 public funds to move The Barnes. The problem is that, in my opinion, The Barnes isn’t CONCLUSION ................................................................................................. 347 a museum, it is an oracle of modern times and is inextricably tied to its original home EPILOGUE ........................................................................................................ 351 in Merion. I believe that The Barnes is a great American composition that belongs where the good doctor, Albert C. Barnes, M.D., put it and ordered that it remain. In my opinion The Barnes has no one to defend it who can defend it because the powers supporting this Move have nearly inconceivable power and wealth. Even all the might of its potential savior, the Pennsylvania taxpayer, has been leveled against it. So, I have written this story to at least tell you what you’ll be missing. Hidden on The Barnes Foundation’s Merion estate and in its dazzling ar- ray of art is a story for modern times written in images and completed by the garden and arboretum. In my opinion The Barnes is an historic work of human hands designed to allow a visitor to step into and to become a part of the artis- tic experience. I believe that its founder crafted The Barnes to be a memorial to those who died in the wars and labor struggles of his time and that he left im- ages corresponding to those themes of memorial carved on the stone walls of his Mansion. I also believe that the doctor somehow had a glimpse of the future and that he intended The Barnes to be a place of hope in these times in which we find ourselves. Most of my discussion will focus on the paintings in a way that I hope will bring the collection to life. BARNES RUNE 2012 PROLOGUE This text is organized like a walking tour of The Barnes. I vary from the order, the imagery of the stair at The Barnes and the memory of those who died in The Italian but I have provided a reasonable facsimile of the gallery layout in the appendix to Hall Massacre of 1913, a shameful chapter in American labor history. I talk of a modern help keep the reader oriented as I talk about different pieces of art. I make significant champion or guardian of The Barnes whose coming Dr. Barnes may have foreseen and proposals about The Foundation that, despite their importance to American culture, of a lesson that Barnes may have left for that champion. I describe the possibility that have not been previously made. I believe that these mysteries were not revealed during there may be a curse associated with The Barnes and how to break it. I tell of a great Dr. Barnes’s time because he felt that in a perpetual Foundation there would be time mystery about Picasso and of the possible origins of modern art. Finally, I propose that enough to reveal these secrets and that they should only be revealed when the time was Dr. Barnes may have foreseen his Foundation under siege and the Move planned for right as a defensive measure to save The Barnes. I think Barnes was working on big completion in 2012. Has he left his tale on the wall of Gallery XVII in defense of keep- things and that his view is a multi-generational, epoch-making approach. ing The Barnes in Merion? We shall see that Dr. Barnes’s message is one of hope for this generation and for I think The Barnes is an oracle for modernity. There is even imagery in the paint- future generations. It is a message from reflective people who thought deeply of the ing arrangements that suggest a psychic interest and even a possible 2012 connection. long range possibilities for humanity in simpler, less complicated times before the cata- If you want treasures beyond imagination, mystery and authentic American charm and clysmic mechanized wars and countless atrocities of the twentieth century irreparably flavor, The Barnes in Merion is it. This book will guide the reader through some of the traumatized modern civilization and robbed us of our innocence. I believe the doctor highlights and then the reader should go and see what they can find on their own be- meant The Barnes to be instructive in our present