My Favorite Paintings at Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA)

What I enjoyed most at Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) were paintings from modern German masters.  My favorite was Bridge and Wharf (1945) by Max Beckman. This was a typical mature Beckmann in his most probing mold. This landscape confronted us with a section of a massive industrial bridge, bold and strong chrome colored beams imprisoned by thick black outlines, chilly looking, partially blocking the view of a narrow wharf, in which haphazardly moored ships of various sizes, shapes and placements. Behind this chaotic yet impressive tableau, there was an almost angry leaden sky, whose pale purple color, together with muted earth brownish green over the static water in the central strip of the canvas, heightened the brightness of the colors in the wharf, predominantly rich red on the bodies of some ships, and on an edge of a boat a small patch of thalo green, which also lent its special chilling allure to some celestial elements in the sky.  All those bright colors were also boldly outlined, similar to those beams of the bridge, with massive black strokes, which bound together the diverse elements and colors with its inexhaustible reaches like slithering arms of a giant octopus. A beautiful rendition of a disrupted world.


Bridge and Wharf, 1945, Max Beckmann (1884-1950)

Cows in the Lowland (1909) by Emil Nolde was an apparently idyllic pastoral world, with several cows gazing in a lovely meadow; yet, nothing was as apparent as it was — dark grass, unnaturally colored noble beasts, scattered flowers, a wall of light pink and blue sky, all in heavy impasto and painted with determined palette knife, verging toward disintegration, and formed a world in the shadow of hallucination and madness. A prophetic work.


Cows in the Lowland, 1909, Emil Nolde (1867-1956)

My Favorite Museum Collection Series
>> My Favorite Museum Collection Series 155: My Favorite Paintings at Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA), Los Angeles
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List of My Favorite Artworks in the Museums I've Visited

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