One place I have never spent time in is the American wing. I found some interesting things there, along with the expected. In some ways, it reminded me of visiting places like the Danish national museum; you see works very much in the style of what was being done first elsewhere in the world. (American art only really gets original as the 20 century proceeds.) But there are some quirky and fascinating things, as well as the familiar icons.
So who is this, garbed in ancient Roman attire in a marble bust?
It's George Washington, better known in this image, right next to the bust:
And, speaking of Geaorge, here is the famous crossing of the Delaware, reminding me of the huge paintings in the Louvre: it might as well have been Napoleon. Very large, dramatic, and there was nobody else in the room with me so it had full impact. It was painted in Germany!
I ran across this quirky painted collage, more to my taste, entitled "A Bachelor's Drawer" by one John Haberle:
This is all meticulously painted in a trompe l'oeil style, not mixed media, painted around 1890. And something similar by a different painter:
Was there a school of painting in this style? Yes, it turns out that trompe l'oeil was very popular in the US at this time.
And there are dangerous creatures of all kinds:
and abstract expressionism?
Not really, just part of a Winslow Homer seascape.
And this mish-mash of ancient ruins by Frederic Church, where St. Sophia abuts the Parthenon, etc. Part of a larger picture:
And you also get lots of pictures glorifying manifest destiny and white man's triumphs and much more. The American wing, finally, is a fascinating experience, a virtual museum itself, hidden in the back of the Met, and far from the crowds around Van Gogh.
(Maybe if more American painters had mutilated their ears, they would have been more famous.)
