Vincent Desiderio's "Pantocrator' at PAFA

Two years ago I came upon an article by Stephen May in the American Arts Quarterly concerning Philadelphia-born and Pennsylvania Academy-schooled painter Vincent Desiderio. The article described Desiderio as a "postmodern master," considered by many to be "the most important painter among living Academy alumni." Who is Vincent Desiderio, I wondered as I thumbed through some lovely reproductions of his work in the magazine, and why haven't I heard more about him?

So it was with great pleasure that I happened upon one of Desiderio's masterpieces, Pantocrator (2002), a seven-by-16 foot triptych, at the Academy's current "Legacies" exhibition. It's rather modestly situated just to the left of the staircase in the Samuel M. V. Hamilton Building on Broad Street, sandwiched with the other legacies, between teacher Sidney Goodman's expressive virtuosity of the human condition, The Man in the Mirror, and teacher Elizabeth Osborne's exquisitely composed and relentlessly experimental body of work, The Color of Light.

The two teachers are in the spotlight in this exhibition, and justifiably so, because teachers do so much to shape students' progress. But the danger is that the viewer will reach an observational saturation point after considering and enjoying all that Goodman and Osborne have to offer, not to mention Desiderio's fellow alumni legacies. Desiderio's work deserves far more than just a casual encounter.

Christ and the starship Enterprise

Pantocrator, which translates loosely as "Christ, ruler of all," is painted and constructed like an altarpiece, with the traditions of the Renaissance in mind. The central panel contains an image of a "starship Enterprise" spaceship with a camera eye, suspended statically yet buoyantly in a marvelous star speckled sky.

The panel to the left contains an image of a young woman, arms raised desultorily above her head, behind a transparent shower curtain studded with tropical fish. Light plays gently upon her flesh through the curtain.

The right panel is a representation of a section of the beautiful Santa Maria del Fiore Cathedral in Florence, a visually complex architectural treasure hearkening back to the early Renaissance. The entire work is richly painted in umber, golden and sepia tones, further underscoring the work's rootedness in tradition despite the past, present, future themes of its subject matter.

Happiness defined

"The happiness of man," Goethe observed, "is to have probed what is knowable and to have revered what is unknowable." Pantocrator reminds me of that line because it inspires wonder and curiosity. The viewer is invited to guess at the connection between the three images, and what the story in the painting might be. Its enigmatic quality invites one to fill in the blanks, yet feel satisfied in the viewing without being able to tightly sum it all up.

This painting beckons toward a prolonged engagement with the viewer, and naturally so, given that Desiderio carefully considers the subject matter for his works over lengthy periods of time. There is no randomness or haphazardness in the choice of his images or his themes. His painting method is careful and meticulous. This is slow painting, much like the global Slow Food movement. It's meant to be savored thoughtfully over time.

A liberal arts background

The Pennsylvania Academy isn't the only source of the richness and depth in Desiderio's paintings. He was educated at Haverford College with an emphasis in course work not only in the fine arts, but also in philosophy, literature and religion. Desiderio believes that a liberal arts education "was the best preparation for being an artist."

Aside from four years of study at the Academy, Desiderio spent a year at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Florence. His early experimental work during this period included abstractions and paintings influenced by Cézanne and Picasso. Whatever his influences within a given period of time, Desiderio always has sought to convey an "intensity and vitality" in his work. His themes, he says, are "emotionally driven."

It was the Academy's teacher and painter Sidney Goodman who encouraged Desiderio away from abstraction to a realistic style with allegorical subject matter. Some critics have described his mature painting style as "postmodern history painting."

A Duchamp admirer

Given Desiderio's painting style, I find it interesting that he regards the controversial Marcel Duchamp to be an "amazing figure" in the history of art. Duchamp, Desiderio suggests, "shook up the art world and the ways of painting" in a way suitable to the times that he lived in. But Desiderio also warns that artists who admire Duchamp shouldn't be "sucked into his academy."

This is an artist with a thinking mind. The thoughtful viewer won't want to miss being amazed at just what Pantocrator, a "postmodern history painting," looks like. â—†



For another review of "Legacies" by Anne R. Fabbri, click here.