Visit to the Phillips and Braque Show

Georges Braque, 1943, Pitcher, Candlestick and Black Fish

Georges Braque, 1952, The Philodendron 

Georges Braque, 1952, The Shower

Milton Avery, 1954, Morning Landscape

Marsden Hartley, 1936-38, Off to the Banks

Yesterday I went down to D.C. to check out the Braque still life show at the Phillips Collection.  It was  a good show, I especially enjoyed the last room with his works from the 1940s.  The one at the top of this post was really nice in person.  He painted the yellows over the darks and it had a slow glow that burned across the entire room.  

The other pieces here are from the permanent collection and the works that gave me the most pause this trip.  Of course I spent time with the Bonnards, Diebenkorns and Matisses, they are like old friends.  But these paintings were poignant for me this time in a way that they weren't before.  The harsher and simplified shapes are things I am needing in my own work more and so I think that is why these stood out.  It's hard to tell a day later but I'm hoping something in them seeps into my studio for a while.  Either way, I am never sorry I spent a day in this museum.