Prep Work...

...or yet another reason why I'm an art/design geek...

There's a few new exhibits coming to our Fine Arts Museums early next year, and I'm doing my best to prepare myself so at least I'll sound like I know what I'm talking about when the time comes. First, I know everyone is excited about the Jean-Paul Gaultier exhibit, because really, people just want to see the Madonna costumes. Second, there's the exhibit about the Victorian Aesthetic Movement that should be the intellectual counterpoint to Gaultier's extravagance.

In an effort to ramp up, I'm trying to refresh my brain on all of the art and design I learned so long ago, especailly regarding the Aesthetic Movement. It's a complicated mélée of intellect, painting, design, socialism, free love, and poetry in one. Even Gilbert & Sullivan wrote an operetta about it all, called Patience, or Bunthorne's Bride. Plus, since it covers about 40 years of art history there's no Cliffs Notes...and there shouldn't be.