Observations placeholder
Parrish, Maxfield - Le Bassin
Identifier
029181
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
Ken Johnson in "Kitsch meets the sublime — illustrator Maxfield Parrish" Art in America (March 1996)
However rationalistic his motives, Parrish's elaborately artificial methods give his pictures a good deal of aura and a surrealistic, even slightly hallucinogenic feeling, which puts an odd spin on the otherwise generically picturesque imagery and its …. eulogizing of the rural past. ….. But Parrish himself was innocent of ironic intent, and the heartfelt romance and hard-won beauty of his calendar-art vision offers a gratifying break from late-modernist cynicism. What Parrish made may have been kitsch, but it was great kitsch.
A description of the experience
