HOMAGE TO JS BACH
GEORGES BRAQUE, 1911-12
There's a name printed on this one. BACH. Block capitals, a J and an S underneath. Not painted freehand. Stenciled, the way you'd letter a shipping crate. The least readable style of painting anybody ever invented, and the one thing you can read is the part he didn't draw. You can see it from across the room. And the whole painting is smaller than a card table. Watch what the letters do. Everything around them splinters. Violin scrolls, strings, shards. The letters just sit there. Flat on the surface, refusing to play along. The cheapest trick here is the one telling the truth. This whole thing is a flat piece of canvas. Now look at the left edge. See those ochre stripes, combed like oak? Braque knew how to do that because Braque painted houses. His father painted houses. His grandfather painted houses. Georges did the real apprenticeship, ladders and all. Decorator work. Fake wood grain, fake marble. Making cheap walls look expensive. No brush did that. That's a decorator's graining comb dragged through wet paint. The grooves are still in there. Far as anyone can tell, this is where fake wood grain enters Cubism. It got in because Braque owned the comb. Of course he did. He painted houses. Why Bach? Braque actually played. Flute, piano. His dealer swore he claimed he could get through Beethoven symphonies on an accordion. And Bach was his favorite. Past that, he never said. Then look at the other name. Bottom left, in cursive: G Braque. Something he hardly ever did in these years. Bach. Braque. Pretty good. For a house painter.