Welcome to Poetry Friday, this week hosted by poet Tabatha Yeatts Here. Be sure to stop by her blog to see what she has for us this week. Yesterday she posted about drawbridges with photos, ancient, interesting, and beautiful. Thank you Tabatha!
I traveled last week to the west coast to see my son and daughter-in-law and we visited the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
I usually feel overwhelmed in art museums. I want to learn about and remember everything! But that is impossible. So I took some photos to jog my mind later. On my visit, I discovered several artists new to me. One of them is Wayne Thiebaud (1920-2021), whose work is often considered pop art, though he wasn’t apparently a fan of Andy Warhol’s repetitive paintings of consumer items.
Wayne Thiebaud is known for his colorful, luscious paintings of cakes, pastries, ice cream and other eye-catchers such as bright lipstick, using repetition and exaggerated shadows. Here’s a Youtube video featuring the artist speaking on his path to becoming an artist. How does did he decide what ideas he will bring to the world? If you have time it’s worth seeing.
Thiebaud paintings feature bright lucious colors that are mouth watering, styled as in an advertisement. Why?
Looking more deeply, his bright objects say something about the essence of consumerism. I saw his 1963 painting, THREE MACHINES, and wondered what might be represented by gumballs? Why gumballs?
What do these mean? I wondered. Next to the painting, the museum posted this description.
"Gumballs are the common-denominator of penny candy--a sort of atom particle of American consumer culture. They also represent, in microcosm, a common cycle of American consumerism, which spans from an imagined ideal, to the pleasure of possession, to a state of diminishing returns--and finally to the sense of loss--until the cycle begins again."
It seems Thiebaud spent his time thinking about more than gumballs. An excellent metaphor, the gumball as an “atomic particle of American consumer culture.” Like candies such as M & M’s, which I love, one just keeps wanting repetitive experience of pleasure. I buy M & M’s whenever I go to a movie, I simply have to, and the empty box is always disappointing.
I wrote a tanka to share:
THIEBAUD'S ATOMIC PARTICLES Gumballs glistening tangy red, blue, green sharp fruity flavor-- desire alternated with an aftertaste of loss. © Janice Scully 2024
That’s one reason we look at art, why I return to art museums–because art touches indirectly what it means to be human. Why do we buy the things and do the things we do? Why do we always want more?
Have a great weekend. The winter is rushing past! Thank you, Tabatha, for hosting.
What an excellent post Janice! I’m familiar with Wayne Thiebaud and have admired his work for a long time. I’ve seen videos on him and shared them with students but I hadn’t seen the one here–very good, loved hearing about his early challenges and thought process!
You’ve asked so many wonderful questions-areas to ponder on. I love the title of your tanka, you say so much in these two ending lines,
“desire alternated
with an aftertaste of loss.”
Thanks!
Thank you for sharing your visit, Janice, about Thiebaud, and his opinions, too! My daughter is the programming director our Museum of Contemporary Art, so I have the pleasure of seeing many ideas of presentation through artists’ eyes. I love the way you made a connection this time, that “aftertaste of loss” shows an emotion “art-fully”!
Ahhh, the things we learn, the way artists see the world! I will not look at a gumball machine the same again. Your tanka and its aftertaste bring to mind a number of sweet addictions. Thanks for your tanka!
Such an unexpected and interesting end to your tanka!
Janice, you made great use of your visit to the museum in San Francisco! I like this poem a lot, from the title to the last line.
Thanks for the video! Fascinating. I always try to visit an art museum any new place I go. You’re right, you cannot capture everything. But, usually, there’s a piece that just won’t leave me alone. It captures me in some way. I love that. The idea of atomic particles and gumballs is fun and smart. I would love to get painters and poets together to talk in a big room with all the materials of their craft and see what happened after an hour or so. I think it would be cool.
Oh I love that ending “aftertaste of loss.”
Such a delight to hear about your visit to the museum. Envious that you saw some of Thiebaud’s work (am a longtime fan, because FOOD). 🙂 Appreciate your tanka and thought-provoking take on American consumerism.
“an aftertaste of loss”–yes. Thank you for that and for your questions to ponder, Janice!
Three cheers for the art museums…and, of course, the artists, who give us such diverse mirrors in which to view ourselves.
Janice, I am intrigued that the artist calls himself a draftsman. Back during the 1940s, my mother had to stop her fashion studies as a fledgling designer/seamstress in NYC to come back to Rome, NY and earn money for her family. She became a draftsman at the air force base. She was the only woman in the office. I like the idea that a draftsman is an artist. I found the video to be enlightening. I always like listening to artist explore their feelings in their field. Your tanka has wonderful ending lines. Thanks for this different way to introduce a poem.