The war on Renoir was finally launched by a group of protesters this Monday in front of Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts. The French impressionist painter, known for his ethereal and lively depictions of mainly upper-class women, had his artistic credibility questioned by demonstrators chanting, “Other art is worth your while, Renoir paints a steaming pile.” This is the First Amendment at it’s finest, ladies and gentlemen.
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To anyone involved in art criticism, them are fightin’ words. So, The Creators Project took time to hear out the case against Renoir by sitting down with Max Geller, one of the movement’s leaders, and the man behind the eponymous Instagram account, Renoir Sucks At Painting.
“What I really like about good art, or art worthy of the term ‘fine,’ can give you a new perspective and a new way to think and feel about your problems and what’s really going on in your life. If you look at a Renoir painting, on the other hand, you feel nothing at all,” Geller says. “And I don’t think that’s subjective.”He continues, “Like many vulgar things, Renoir is popular and sells tickets. But [The Museum of Fine Art’s] job isn’t to sell museum tickets, its to attend the high altar of art, and in that regard they are letting themselves and the people of Boston down.”Renoir is a figurehead of the Impressionist movement, and Geller doesn’t deny Impressionism’s importance to art history. He just really, really hates Renoir. “If you were to take Renoir’s word for it, trees would be nothing but a collection of disgusting, green, squiggly lines. But in reality, trees are beautiful. Renoir just sucks at painting,” Geller states.The Museum of Fine Arts, which currently houses six Renoir paintings including the famous Dance at Bougival, heard the protesters cries and have responded by posting Instagrams of Renoir’s art in the days following the protest. While The Boston Globe’s resident art critic Sebastian Smee responded to the protest, calling it “funny, but sophomoric”, chiding the protest as, “not so much a protest as a coordinated cry for attention.”
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This cry for attention is echoed in the allusions to the Westboro Baptist Church, most evidently depicted in the “God Hates Renoir” sign. “[Renoir Sucks At Painting] is a movement against elitism—curatorial elitism. And sort of, misogyny. But also against the sort of polarized and absolutist nature of American discourse,” says Geller, explaining the protest’s satirical element. “I think a lot of people were either bewildered or bemused.”
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