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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
And then there's that pesky foot. Compared to similar details in some of Rubens' other works, it offers a "striking difference" and an obvious "contradiction" that even a "child can see," AfterRubens.org points out.
Samson's entire, extended right foot is clearly visible in the Matham engraving and in Francken's tableau, with an ample amount of space between the tips of the sleepy strongman's toes and the right-hand edge of each respective image. In the National Gallery's painting, though, the toes of Samson's extended right foot are cut off at the picture's edge. Doxiades and her colleagues argue that the real Rubens "Samson and Delilah" that Matham and Francken would have copied would have depicted Samson's right foot just as they did. However, senior curator Jaffe scoffs about the hair-shorn hero's truncated toes: "Oh come on! It's what artists do! It's called mannerism. It's a normal part of 16th century aesthetics."
Jaffe admits that he often finds "that contemporary painters, of whatever ilk, or conservators, who look at things totally differently, have valuable things to say which you learn from." But, for now, he still dismisses the challengers of the National Gallery's "Samson and Delilah" as dissenters who are merely "trying to boost their own fame and fortune."
Nevertheless, some significant critics have submitted comments to or have been quoted on the AfterRubens.org Web site voicing their concerns about the museum's celebrated painting. There, the Renaissance-art historian Richard Fremantle is quoted remarking, "It is so vulgar. The crudeness of the picture, the color, the manner of portraying it is like no highly intelligent sensitive artist could have painted. Rubens is a great painter. This is not by a great painter."
Similarly, Michael Daley, the director of ArtWatch U.K., a branch of an international monitoring organization that tries to prevent works of art from being harmed by renovation or conservation efforts and which looks after what it calls their "integrity," notes: "It does seem astonishing that the National Gallery ever considered buying this picture as a Rubens. Everything that could be wrong with it is."
Other presumably less authorative art lovers also jump into the fray on the Web site's discussion boards, including Monty Python's Terry Gilliam, who writes, "Cutting off the toes of a hero's foot is a clear sign that this painting is not the work of a master. Rubens was a great respecter of naked feet and I am shocked that the National Gallery can hang a painting by someone who has such contempt for the sensitivities of modern, art-loving, pediphiles." Marc Deblois, a truck driver from London, Canada, is another critic of the painting: "A master surely would not unveil such awful tripe," he writes.
Niki Mardas, Doxiades' son, who studied classics at Cambridge University and designed AfterRuebens.org, hopes the Web site will help to ignite another round of debate about the painting in the art world. "The government says we just need to have trust in the National Gallery. That's fine, but ... at what point are we allowed to criticize and get a debate going? ... To me that just seems like you're shutting down debate in the place where you ought most to be having it."
As Doxiades herself puts it, also focusing on the issue of institutional trustworthiness, "I believe museums should be like doctors -- you trust them. So when the public trusts a museum like the National Gallery and is told, 'This is a great masterpiece,' but it turns out that maybe it isn't, that's an insult to the Rembrandts, van Goghs, Vermeers and all the other highlights of the collection. It's the miseducation of the public that I don't like."
It's also a high-priced embarrassment for any museum, although, of course, misattributions of historic artworks do sometimes occur. Still, when they come to light, the authority of recognized "experts" can be rudely knocked down a notch. And that, for some ordinary museum-goers and art-world powers alike, is downright scandalous.
