CLARK VS. CLARK AT THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART!

There's still time to see squabbling brothers Sterling Clark and Stephen Clark battle it out in Impressionist and Early Modern Paintings: The Clark Brothers Collect, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art through Sunday, August 19, 2007.

I can't remember a more interesting ticket since Matisse/Picasso, back in '03. The Clark brothers, inheritors of the Singer Sewing Machine fortune, spent long stretches of time estranged from each other while amassing significant art collections including works by Degas, Homer, Renoir, and Seurat, among others. The Met exhibit offers selections from both collections.

During a recent visit my companion Louvre and I kept track of the bout using the official point system traditionally used by art referees. As we progressed through the exhibit, we agreed that Sterling was scoring higher but we couldn't quite rule out Peter Arno collector Stephen—not when he packed surprise punches such as this Thomas Eakins portrait of Professor Henry A. Rowland, its frame festooned with arithmetical scrawlings.






























Set aside about an hour to enjoy this exhibit and read about the Clark family, which left New York City with The Dakota, Williamstown with the famous Clark Institute, and Cooperstown with the Baseball Hall of Fame!

I do have one quibble: The exhibit includes a magazine caricature of a Clark art party...but the museum neglected to provide a key to the people in the picture!


Art Credit
Thomas Eakins (American, 1844–1916)
Professor Henry A. Rowland, 1897
Oil on canvas; 80 1/4 x 54 in. (203.8 x 137.2 cm)
Addison Gallery of American Art, Phillips Academy, Andover, Massachusetts, Gift of Stephen C. Clark, Esq. (1931.5)