Introduction

What is The New Yorker? I know it’s a great magazine and that it’s a tremendous source of pleasure in my life. But what exactly is it? This blog’s premise is that The New Yorker is a work of art, as worthy of comment and analysis as, say, Keats’s “Ode on a Grecian Urn.” Each week I review one or more aspects of the magazine’s latest issue. I suppose it’s possible to describe and analyze an entire issue, but I prefer to keep my reviews brief, and so I usually focus on just one or two pieces, to explore in each the signature style of its author. A piece by Nick Paumgarten is not like a piece by Jill Lepore, and neither is like a piece by Ian Frazier. One could not mistake Collins for Seabrook, or Bilger for Goldfield, or Mogelson for Kolbert. Each has found a style, and it is that style that I respond to as I read, and want to understand and describe.

Thursday, July 19, 2018

Wayne Thiebaud, Draftsman


Wayne Thiebaud, "Nine Jelly Apples" (1964)
















A special shout-out to Johanna Fateman for her “Goings On About Town: Art: Wayne Thiebaud, Draftsman” (The New Yorker, July 9 & 16, 2018), which begins, “Oil paint lends itself to Thiebaud’s canvases like buttercream to cake, and his works on paper are every bit as delectable.” That’s a great opener, perfectly evoking the thick luscious texture of Thiebaud’s iconic cakes, pies, and ice-cream cones. He’s the creator of at least eight New Yorker “Food Issue” covers, including the superb “Food Bowls” for the September 5, 2005 issue – my choice for the best single New Yorker of the last twenty years. It contains, among other gems, Judith Thurman’s “Night Kitchens,” John Seabrook’s “Renaissance Pears,” and Burkhard Bilger’s “The Egg Men.” 

   

Fateman’s note tells of a new exhibition at the Morgan Library and Museum, titled “Wayne Thiebaud, Draftsman,” exploring Thiebaud’s works on paper, from quick sketches to pastels, watercolors, and charcoal drawings. Some of these items are on display at the Morgan’s website, including the deliciously colored “Nine Jelly Apples” (1964) shown above.  

No comments:

Post a Comment