Posted by Steve Price on March 15, 1999 at 10:10:26:
In Reply to: Re: Musical metaphor posted by R. John Howe on March 15, 1999 at 05:27:46:
Dear Folks,
John's mention of Haydn-like qualities in rugs reminded me that one of the things I like about so
much of Haydn's music is the unpretentiousness, the sort of gentle good nature that emanates
from much of it. The almost childlike human and animal images that we talked about during
Marvin Amstey's Salon a little while back exemplify this unpretentious charm in textiles. This
tends to be more prominent in rustic than in tribal rugs, although there are tribal examples, too.
To go farther into left field, some of us see the same appeal in other art forms. Paul Klee's work
shows much of this. In African art, I have a particular weakness for stuff from the Cameroon
grasslands, in which this aesthetic element is very pronounced (intentionally or otherwise). The
image is a pair of terra cotta pipe bowls from that region. They were prestige objects, but I
perceive an ebullient good humoredness in them.
Regards,
Steve Price