Goyaesque

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Originally uploaded by writer_mama.

This morning I flailed about getting ready so I could leave the pad soon after my family left for school in order to go to my beloved Trader Joe's for groceries (to be delivered at the end of the day), so that I could make it on time to meet Shelley at the Frick for Goya's last works' show, set to close this Sunday.

Walking through the pristine and "rat-and-puddles-of-blood-free" upper east side, I thought: Isn't it ironic that I always have to see the work of artists who, in their work, privilege the poor and the crazy and the desperate and deranged in a neighborhood that fiercely rejects all of this things?

Sigh. Art museums are for the rich, too. I stood in line to pay the fifteen-buck cover, which made me sigh again. It was so crowded that the entrance to the Goya was timed, and we couldn't see the show for another hour.

While we waited, Shelley and I--and our other friends (Lori and Adriana)--perused the permanent collection of the mansion, for that's what the Frick is-- a huge frickin(eek!) aristocratic mansion on 70th Street build at the turn of the last century.

Children under ten are never allowed in, which is why I haven't been to the Frick in eight frickin years. (There I go again with my bad punning.)

Late Goya is wonderful: all these little black crayon sketches on paper: witches, mothers, asylum residents (these titled "loco furioso").

On the subway home, a man begging for change on the subway was straight out of Goya. In fact, his was the face above, albiet darker. He had that smile. How strange to be painted 200 years before you are born.