Wednesday 30 January 2008

HIGH ART

Overheard in an art gallery...

WOMAN (To Friend): Yes, well, he reminds me of Canaletto...

CHILD (Interrupting): Who's Canaletto?

WOMAN: You remember, dear, the painter who did all those pictures with water in them

CHILD: No...

WOMAN: Yes, you do! It was that exhibition we went to when you were too short to see the pictures...

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

"the painter who did all those pictures with water in them", (jajaja) good description of Maestro Giovanni Canal...:)

Anonymous said...

Ah! Kids in museums... I remember taking my girls (then quite small) to a museum in France - a small local thing for children about the history of France. They had never heard of Napoleon then and I had to explain to them all about him... sotto voce because we were surrounded by French people and my British/Belgian take on the little guy was probably not quite what the French wanted to hear!

Anonymous said...

Oh, some parents are terrible like that, aren't they? I was at Tate Modern over the weekend, and heard a father criticise his 3 year old son (who was looking at a pop-art picture of an aeroplane releasing a missile) for making flying and exploding noises.

"It's supposed to make you look at things in a different way - to think about the colours, and even the textures!"

To a 3 year old. *humph*

Brian Sibley said...

EUDORA - One imagines how she would describe other artists: Turner, "The painter who did all those skies"; Rubens, "The painter who did all those bums"!

SUZANNE - Difficult bit of diplomacy that!

QENNY - With a bit of luck that child will grow up to be another Brian Sewell!