On this day in 1950, the first Peanuts cartoon was published. Now, it is easy to discount Peanuts because it certainly is not as good a comic as Calvin and Hobbes or Bloom County. But it can’t be judged like that. It has to be compared to Beetle Bailey — which started less than a month before Peanuts. Or the dreadful Family Circus, which was launched a decade later. When I was a kid, I read the comics every day. I didn’t like Family Circus from the age of 8 onward. And Beetle Bailey was always meh. But Peanuts was consistently enjoyable — and that was 25 years after it was created.

My only distaste for Peanuts comes from the television shows. And it’s not the fault of the cartoon. In fact, It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown is really quite good — wonderfully written. But why the producers decided to get really bad child actors to do the voices, I’ll never know. It’s just ghastly. But again, it looks great and the writing — as with the strip — is solid.

On this day in 1501, Michelangelo started carving very possibly his greatest work, David. The work has a special meaning to me. When I was 17 years old, I found myself in Florence and I saw it — that actual sculpture, not a replica. I had seen pictures of it before. But I was not prepared for it. It was probably the first time I had a truly transcendent experience with art — something almost mystical. I found myself unable to leave. It’s was like being psychically fed as I saw more and more of the work. I’ve had the experience a number of times since.

I fully admit that this has something to do with my extreme introversion. I’m not that clued into the outside world, so it really does take me a long time to begin to see things. But I only go through this process with things that strike me on a very deep level. And the first time I had that experience was with Michelangelo’s David.

There really is nothing more to add. I’m not that great with visual art as it is. It’s more that I know what I like and I’m really open to new things — even when they’re really old. But I don’t much understand why. Why am I so taken with Bernard Frouchtben? I don’t know. To some extent, I don’t want to know. To some extent, I don’t think anyone really knows. It’s just that some people have a vocabulary to talk about it. But ultimate it works or it doesn’t; it is transcendent or it isn’t; it affects me or it doesn’t. David does all of this and more for me.

On this day in 1899, the great Mexican painter Rufino Tamayo was born. He is from that great period of revolutionary art in Mexico. But he rebelled against it. This was not because he was conservative. But any clear-eyed view of revolution shows that it almost always most hurts the people it is intended to help. Certainly during his early years, Tamayo was criticized for this although no one seems to have ever questioned the brilliance of his work.

As a result of this, he left Mexico in 1926 to live and work in New York. In 1949, he moved to Paris for a decade. But after that, he returned to Mexico for the rest of his long life—he died a couple months short of his 92nd birthday in 1991.

It’s hard to categorize Tamyao’s work. Wikipedia calls it “figurative abstraction,” which I suppose is as true as anything. But his work is quite varied over his long career, so any one description is certainly insufficient. I see a lot of Paul Klee in his work—especially in Tamyao’s use of colors. See, for example, Watermelons. But I’m fascinated by this painting that is rather different, Hombre Mirando Pajaros (“Man Looking at Bird”):

Happy birthday Rufino Tamayo!

This is a reposting from last year.

On this day in 1911, the Mona Lisa was stolen from the Louvre. It was taken by an Italian loyalist who felt that painting should be in Italy. But that didn’t stop the authorities from first arresting and incarcerating the poet Guillaume Apollinaire. Regardless, the Mona Lisa is representative of everything that is wrong with the art field. Why is it such a great painting? Because everyone thinks so!

I’m not saying that it’s bad. And I loved it when I was a kid. Now, well, not so much. Certainly it is a great example of High Renaissance portraiture. But I find the background disturbing — and fake. I think people love it most because they don’t appreciate it. It’s just this painting of a woman with a smirk. And let’s be honest: there’s nothing mysterious about it; that’s all it is: a smirk. I know this because most pictures of me have the exact same expression. I hate posing for pictures and as a result, that’s the face I make.

There are things that I greatly admire by Leonardo da Vinci. But he was the Orson Welles of the High Renaissance — he didn’t finish much of anything. That’s why his sketches are often the most interesting of his work. And that’s why I can hardly think of a more boring thing to do than go to the Louvre to see the Mona Lisa — especially when there are so many more interesting works in that very same museum.

On this day in 1631, Mumtaz Mahal died in childbirth. It was her 14th child. She was the star of that early television show, “14 Kids and Dying.” Interestingly, her last baby — a girl, Gauharara Begum — lived to be 75 years old — the second oldest of her children. Mumtaz Mahal was married to Shah Jahan. He was only a couple of months older than she was, and she was the love of his life. When Jahan became the Mughal Emperor of India, she because empress. But none of this is why we remember her.

Jahan was so heartbroken when Mumtaz Mahal died shortly before her 38th birthday, he started to build the Taj Mahal to house here tomb. It took 21 years to build (although it was mostly completed after 11). It is unquestionably one of the greatest architectural achievements in the history of the world. and it is a touching story as well. But I would add that most great art created by men was done to impress and honor what is objectively the better sex.

Happy anniversary the beginning of the Taj Majal!

On this day in 1894, the great pin-up artist George Petty was born. You certainly know his art, because it copies of it were used to decorate planes used in World War II — most notably the Memphis Belle. His father was a successful photographer of women — so maybe it was in the blood. Or maybe seeing dad’s nudes had an environmental impact on the young man.

He is known for having created a kind of iconic figure: the Petty Girl. It sounds sexist: the women in the images have smaller than normal heads and longer and normal legs. I don’t especially see the smaller head. But the ridiculously long legs are hard to miss. These were created for Esquire magazine when it had centerfolds — the predecessors of those later found in Playboy. I assume they were thought rather racy in their day. Today, they look downright homey.

All right, not quite:

Happy birthday George Petty!

On this day in 1820, the Venus de Milo was rediscovered. I have to admit to being completely ignorant of this. I had just assumed that the sculpture had always been around and that the missing arms were the result of age. But no, the whole thing was lost in a buried niche on the island of Milos in the Aegean Sea. When it was discovered, the left arm was present — although broken. The left left apparently held an apple.

There is a fascinating story of how the Venus de Milo became such a well known piece of art. It was rediscovered five years after France had returned the Venus de’ Medici to Italy (it had been stolen during the reign of Napoleon). It is a greater piece of art, if you ask me. But as with most things in the art world, the greater reputation of the Venus de Milo is the result of a propaganda campaign. France wanted to feel better about the fact that they had lost the Venus de’ Medici. And now we are all supposed to think that it is a great sculpture. And it is — just not uniquely so.

Happy rebirthday Venus de Milo!