As the Pop Goes the Salon exhibition comes to an end, I have been thinking about what my ideal gallery exhibition would look like. Below are ten works of art I would most like to exhibit. On the Stendhal's Shock Meter, they all scored ten.
The main criterion for this list is the force of the first encounter: the immediate shock of seeing a work in its proper setting rather than through reproduction. That electric moment matters.
The second criterion is truth. These artists are trying to tell the truth as they see it: Dürer and Rembrandt about themselves, Sargent about a sitter whose image was censored, Turner about the way the world actually appears, Michelangelo and Van Gogh about unbearable inner pain.
The truth in art is rare, but standing in front of a great work, it is unmistakable.
1. Albrecht Dürer, Self-Portrait with Fur-Trimmed Robe, 1500
Alte Pinakothek, Munich
The most Christ-like self-portrait ever painted by an artist who knew exactly what he was doing. I'd hang it opposite the entrance, so visitors confront Dürer's gaze before they've even seen the first caption. He's not just an artist; he’s his own PR manager, complete with brand logo. The artist as rock star. The thrill of walking into that room in Munich is still with me.
2. Rembrandt, Self-Portrait with Two Circles, c. 1665–69
Kenwood House (Iveagh Bequest), London
The late self-portrait from Kenwood: Rembrandt at 59 or older, standing in front of two mysterious circles, holding brushes and a mahlstick. It's not in a grand museum; it's in a neoclassical villa on Hampstead Heath, which makes it feel more like a secret. Rembrandt can be seen in many great collections, but the Kenwood House self-portrait made the strongest impression on me, only equalled by the first visit to the Frick in the eighties. There, at the end of a corridor, this late work appears almost quietly. He looks tired, unwell, financially ruined, and yet it is unsparing, even a little brutal. What remains is truth, delivered by perhaps the greatest painter of truth who ever lived.
3. El Greco, The Agony in the Garden (Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane), c. 1590
Toledo Museum of Art, Ohio
Christ kneels in prayer as an angel appears above him with the chalice; below, the disciples sleep while soldiers approach from the right. The National Gallery’s version caused outrage when acquired in 1919, with critics claiming it looked like the work of a madman. That intensity is precisely why it belongs here.
A framed copy of this image hung outside my bedroom when I was a child, placed there by my deeply Catholic mother. It depicts one of the most terrible moments in Christ’s life: he knows what is coming, knows he could stop it, and knows he will not. To convey that agony requires a rare kind of artist. El Greco found a visual language equal to the subject. It’s the only one in this list I’ve never seen, just the copy in London. Maybe one day.
4. J.M.W. Turner, Rain, Steam and Speed – The Great Western Railway, 1844
National Gallery, London
A train hurtles through rain and smoke, barely visible as the scene dissolves. This is the start of a movement to which I am largely indifferent: Impressionism. But unlike the softness that came later, this is full of real movement. This is how he saw the world, and to paint how you really see things is the ultimate truth.
5. Édouard Manet, Olympia, 1863–65
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
This is a rarity in art: a real person who stares at us with a ‘you looking at me?’ expression. For anyone who confuses the two: Manet was a great painter; Monet painted chocolate boxes.
6. Vincent van Gogh, Self-Portrait with Bandaged Ear, 1889
Courtauld Gallery, London
Van Gogh painted this shortly after leaving hospital following the mutilation of his ear. This is the mark of a real artist, because to be great you have to be ruthless. And what’s more coldly ruthless than taking your misery, shame and humiliation, and making it into art.
7. Diego Velázquez, Portrait of Innocent X, c. 1650
Galleria Doria Pamphilj, Rome
For me, this is the greatest portrait ever painted: not merely a likeness, but a glimpse into a formidable soul. Innocent X was no ordinary sitter; he was Pope, Bishop of Rome, and heir to the authority of St Peter. The famous story that he recoiled from the image may be embellished, but the shock is believable. The eyes are indeed the window to the soul. If it wasn't available, I'd be happy to hang Bacon's 'Study after Velázquez's Portrait of Pope Innocent X' 1953 (which was painted from a photo). A very strange cove, he once gave me an oddly penetrating stare as we passed each other in Piccadilly. The other reason to visit the Palazzo's cabinetto (which Bacon eventually did in old age) is that it contains yet another great work, a bust of the Pope by Bernini.
8. Jean-Honoré Fragonard, The Swing (Les Hasards Heureux de l'Escarpolette), c. 1767–68
Wallace Collection, London
All Rembrandt and no Fragonard makes life a dull boy. I love eighteenth-century painting, and although Boucher, Oudry, and Lancret are all marvellous, Fragonard stands apart. The Swing, in the Wallace Collection, is technically brilliant and joyfully theatrical. It is art as narrative: mischievous, elegant, slightly improper, and enormous fun. Unlike those works that shock you, this one makes you smile.
9. John Singer Sargent, Madame X (Portrait of Madame Pierre Gautreau), 1883–84
Tate Gallery London
John Singer Sargent was a superb painter, and Madame X is a perfect example of artistic truth under pressure. In the original conception, one dress strap was shown slipped from the sitter’s shoulder, provoking fierce feminine criticism. Sargent, shocked into cowardice, repainted the strap (the fake version is in the Met) and bolted puritan Paris for sophisticated London, where he redeemed himself by painting this unfinished version. Its lesson is simple: pursue the artistic truth, withstand criticism, and do not surrender the original vision.
10. Michelangelo, Pietà, 1498–99
Saint Peter's Basilica, Vatican City
The greatest work of art in human history.
The Virgin Mary holds the dead Christ, while his body lies lifeless across her lap. Michelangelo carved it when he was only twenty-three, and it remains the only work he signed.
I first saw the Pietà in Rome at twenty, when it was protected only by a railing. I wandered (and wondered) the city from my sister’s flat and often ended up in Piazza Navona, dreaming of owning the penthouse opposite the Tre Scalini bar, with its sunny terrace and orange awnings. Not buying it remains one of my great failures — so far.
This is vastly superior to Michelangelo’s David, who looks as though he belongs on Venice Beach cultivating his physique. And if David is that large, one wonders how enormous his version of Goliath would be. Bernini's version is superior, with its twisting moment of release. As a draughtsman, Michelangelo is sui generis; Leonardo, by comparison, can sometimes look like a Verrocchio knockoff .
Michelangelo attempts to portray grief with extraordinary restraint. Mary is not weeping, yet her sadness is unmistakable. The work is also a meditation on death: the heaviness and lifelessness of the body are rendered with astonishing sensitivity. Painting can be studied and understood as a process; one can grasp how colours are mixed, blended, layered and applied. But to look at a block of marble and have the ability to see this masterpiece hidden within it is beyond my comprehension.
Artists and works that almost made the list
Vigée Le Brun’s self-portrait came close. She is often mistakenly grouped with the usual suspects in discussions of ‘forgotten/overlooked/oppressed/surpressed women artists’ like Morisot (although Degas* rated her, and she was Fragonard’s great niece), Cassatt, Gentileschi (once compared to Caravaggio!), Gwen John, Kahlo (if she's a great artist I'm Trotsky's murderer), O’Keeffe, and others. If there was a great female painter, I’d be happy to put her on the walls. But there isn’t, so I can’t. Having said that, if Joni offered me something, it would be on the wall before you could say knife.
Bosch, Bruegel and Memling would make it, plus Cranach, Holbein, and van Eyck, but not Hals, Rubens, or Vermeer, given that anyone who can be forged as easily as this (by van Meegeren) must be a bit dodgy. Giotto leaves me cold, but Fra Angelico I like.
Rafaello and Romano, yes, the Palazzo del Te in Mantua is a mind-blowing experience, well worth the detour.
Titian, Botticelli and Veronese yes, Tintoretto and Tiepolo no; although I once stayed at the Villa Valmarana ai Nani near Vicenza, and his trompe-l'œil stuff there is excellent. Canaletto & Guardi no; they are best thought of as postcard artists, although I have a sentimental attachment to his 'View of Whitehall, New Horse Guards', as I used to pass it frequently in the little waiting lobby outside the Cabinet Room in Number Ten.
Goya, Murillo, Gainsborough, Reynolds, Hogarth, even Lawrence, but not Constable, who is emotionally unavailable.
Ingres, Géricault, and Delacroix definitely, but not Jacques-Louis David, a truly disgusting human being. Friedrich definitely, for example, 'Der Wanderer über dem Nebelmeer' (but definitely not Munch).
No intellectually shallow and invariably pretentious Pre-Raphaelites, despite their storytelling skills. No Klimt, now more famous for his prices than his talent; I prefer Schiele.
Whistler, Courbet, Corot, Rodin (and Claudel), Degas, and Degas’s pupil Lautrec also came close. Cézanne, Gauguin, Renoir (ugh!), and Seurat did not.
Matisse would also probably make it if the Salon had room for twenty works, as would Modigliani; but the hugely overrated Picasso wouldn’t (nor Giacometti, for the same reason), although I do like the Spaniard's ceramics. However, I do have an attachment to his Blue period. First, because there was a print of the guitar player hanging in the art room at school that fascinated me. Second, because I once had a bath in a room with a Blue Period painting hanging on the wall.
Hopper was also a serious contender, but absolutely no abstract expressionists — especially the boring Rothko. I do, however, own a rather good Jackson Pollock tea cosy I could exhibit.
Among post-war artists, I first loved Lichtenstein after seeing Whaam! at the Tate as a teenager and spending my pocket money on a two-part poster reproduction. Lucian Freud would be welcome (not least because of the great kindness he showed my artist sister). I was once lunching at the River Café, and he was at the next table. I told my Italian-born, football-mad nephew to turn and look at the old man behind him, as he could then tell his grandchildren he'd once seen England's greatest living artist. He was resolutely unimpressed. If it had been Roma's Giuseppe Giannini eating the Calamari ai Ferri, he would have fallen to the floor in a dead faint. So, one must ask oneself one of the most important questions about oneself: 'iz you iz, or iz you ain't, an arto-holic'?'
Warhol, by contrast, never seemed more than a very good commercial artist, with excellent marketing skills. Basquiat, Koons, Emin and Haring perfectly illustrate Stoppard's dictum that “Skill without imagination is craftsmanship. Imagination without skill gives us modern art” and are equally perfect examples of dealer-driven greed and curatorial herd instinct. At least Cindy Sherman has ideas and wit. Ai Weiwei was once compelling, though now he has started to believe his own publicity.
*btw can we please stop saying Day-gah! There is no accent, so it’s Duh-gah.
It's almost as bad as all those idiot Americans quoting 'Knee-chee' and then invariably getting both the quote and its meaning wrong: "Was mich nicht umbringt, macht mich stärker" means "What does not kill ME makes ME stronger." Kneech-er meant that this resilience applies specifically to what he called "nature's lucky strokes"—rare, inherently strong individuals. He argued that while adversity breaks or traumatizes the weak, a fundamentally strong person ("the man who turned out well") can use serious accidents and hardships to their own advantage.