Will Gompertz returns to the Fringe Festival ten years after his first lecture.
Gompertz show is a journey through time – from an old overheard projector to a somewhat outdated narrative of modern art. Don’t get me wrong, Gompertz’s presence on stage is light-hearted and engaging, however, the art history he is presenting is certainly simplified and out of touch with recent academic research. His emphasis on Monet, Cézanne, Matisse, Van Gogh and other male European artists blatantly avoids talking about the global connections that were at heart of modernist innovation. Whether these were Japanese woodblock prints, African artefacts or Islamic arabesques, these objects managed to captivate the minds of the above mentioned artists and therefore played an essential role in the development of art in the early twentieth century.
The same applies to Gompertz’s lengthy explanation of Marcel Duchamp’s famous fountain without even a hint at how highly-debated the authorship of this work is – in fact, recent research suggests that Duchamp stole the idea from Baroness Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven. And whilst Gompertz did state that recently ‘museums have realised something extraordinary – women also make art’, his own presentation only showed the work of three female artists – Berthe Morisot, Tracey Emin and Agnes Martin.
On the whole, the concept itself is successful, entertaining and pedagogical – the public was having a good time and left with knowledge that is likely to make their next visit to a museum a better experience. But a more critical and global approach would have also pleased the art historians.
- Franco Building with Jonathan Meades (BBC 4) - 28th August 2019