sundown the crossing....

[thoreau]

What is it, then, between us?
What is the count of the scores or hundreds of years between us?
Whatever it is, it avails not—distance avails not, and place avails not.
from "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry" from Leaves of Grass - Walt Whitman

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One of the unexpected surprises yesterday was finding Harvey Dinnerstein's amazing painting "Sundown the Crossing" - on the wall in the Deyoung in a hallway by the giftshop. I have long obsessed about this painting.

click the photo to see larger version of it, to see the details

this is the entire painting zoomed out:



The piece is related to the Walt Whitman poem Crossing Brooklyn Ferry, from Leaves of Grass, 1891-92. with Whitman standing on the steps staring at the viewer while other characters from Whitman's poetry and Dinnerstein's portraits perform or stare out at you as well.

Dinnerstein is considered one of the leading representational painters in the United States. Elizabeth Broun, Director of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, says of Dinnerstein: "In our traveling exhibition Scenes of American Life, we included him in the section with Edward Hopper and George Tooker because of Dinnerstein's talent for capturing important historical movements by painting intimate details of every day people and places."

This piece just haunts me. the use of colour, lighting and the reality of it - it's almost like a painting of a posed photograph.

There is a companion piece "Sunrise Crossing" that shows Whitman down on deck interacting with his characters:



I just love unexpected treats like this - and to have such an amazing piece - literally outside the gift shop on the wall like decoration.... stopped me in my tracks.

Comments

[bukephalus.livejournal.com]

Very nice. I'm glad you got to see it.

[mark-monroe.livejournal.com]

*agog*

Wow...I'm...wow.

[low-fat-muffin.livejournal.com]

I thought you'd chime in on this one. :) The main piece - that I photographed? with Whitman up on the stairs by himself - is really quite haunting isn't it?

[mark-monroe.livejournal.com]

It's breathtaking...wow.

[major7.livejournal.com]

nice