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So is Brown. Rings unites 129 paintings, sculptures, and other art forms from all over the world to explore the five emotions of love, anguish, awe, triumph, and joy. Like the Olympic logo itself, the "rings" of emotion in the show interlock. The exhibit illustrates how one feeling can arc into another. Love has its disappointments, triumph has its euphoria.
Brown has incorporated the exhibit's powerful visual images into Rings: Five Passions in World Art, a book filled with lavish photographs of the show's art. Chairman of the fine arts channel Ovation, he wants the book to "reach people literally where they live and give them the opportunity to become aware of the arts. With the book, you can get the excitement of knowing more but can't get the thrill of the original, and that's what will impel you to see the exhibit."
While tradition dictates that art books and exhibits take an analytical approach toward the work -- its line, its style, its influences, Rings appeals to the emotions. "We want to nudge people into a fresh way of looking at art. It's less a matter of art in and of itself than what it says to your heart. It's totally new," he says. "It's fun to shake people up." Emotions are what unite us, Brown asserts, no matter what our nationality. "The wonderful aspect of this show is that it's a complement to the atmosphere of the Olympics. Competition divides. This show brings things together."
Not only see it but hear it and sense it in ways that have hard-line academic art critics in a lather. Rings combines visual art with literature and music. As people go through the exhibit, they hear music evoking the five emotions, read works ranging from the familiar -- Emily Dickinson's poetry -- to the extraordinary: an ancient hieroglyphic tablet in its original and in translation.
Brown had the thrill of single-handedly selecting the art for Rings, all of which are favorite pieces. "The traditional show tries to bring things as near like as possible, so we went at it from the other end of the telescope and purposely brought things together from widely divergent cultures, styles, scales, materials, from 17 feet to three and a half inches, art from the 1990s and going back 7,500 years ago."
Though not all the countries participating in the Olympics are represented in Rings, enough are to put muscle behind Brown's claim that the show is "egregiously impolitically correct-we're saying all these people have things in common. It's an anathema. If you mention the word 'universal,' you have shown how benighted you are. It's taboo. But this resonance of internationalism and polyculturalism is the spirit of the Olympics. It's a pretty important subject even if the Olympics weren't happening."
Representing the United States in the Olympiad of art are famous artists like Mary Cassatt and Georgia O'Keeffe as well as lesser-knowns, such as contemporary sculptor Ulysses Davis, whose powerful bust of Martin Luther King, Jr. reflects the traditions of African and American folk art. Brown wants to be sure when visitors from other countries see the book or exhibit, they realize "this country isn't just about manufacturing and sports, that it does have some culture."
Blithely professing "zero talent" as an artist, his approach to art is both passionate and unsnobbish. "Art is infinitely rich," he says and includes in the book's introduction words from Ernst Gombrich of London's Warburg Institute, "I do not think that there are any wrong reasons for liking a statue or picture." By creating an exhibit illustrating emotions and encouraging audiences to respond emotionally, Brown debunks the myth that only art critics can appreciate art. It's easy to see why under his leadership, attendance at the National Gallery soared.
"For people in universities, art bears witness as to how the poor are exploited by the rich. There's Marxist art history, or some see it through the optic of sexism or any other form of oppression," he says, sounding both weary and amused. "Art often can be interpreted as political, and it's deeply trendy at the moment, but I think art is too great to be pigeonholed. It's too bad if you lose sight of the emotional impact of art. In this show, form and feeling are intertwined."
People have left the Rings exhibit moved to tears, and for Brown, nothing could be more rewarding. After serving as the National Gallery's director for 23 years, he believes museums have a responsibility to preserve great works but also feels they must "put the art to work so it has the chance to communicate with people and enrich their lives and broaden their understanding and bring joy. Joy isn't illegal in this country, despite our Puritan ethic," he teases.
Happy to tweak the highbrow and equally willing to make fun of himself, Brown does take one thing seriously-art. He hopes both Rings the book and the stunning exhibit it documents will create "a sense of the centrality of art in our lives. It is not a frill, it is not peripheral entertainment, it speaks deeply to us of human concerns, speaks to us better than arguably any other way can."
Ellen Kanner is a freelance writer in Miami and a frequent contributor to this publication. She can be reached at ellen_kanner@bookpage.com
©1996, ProMotion, inc.