Grand Tour 2007: Bringing art to the people

I was sort of bored yesterday: there was nothing that new to read on my Google Reader and I was pretty much done re-organizing my stuff here in my room. So I thought I'd check the television for a change and switched through channels yesterday in search of something interesting to watch.

That's when I saw something being shown on BBC that I found odd: a framed painting by Monet--or at least a full-scale facsimile of it--hanging not in a museum but on the outside wall of a building. And then came another, this time a portrait of Spain's King Philip IV by Velasquez hanging on some street corner apparently somewhere in London. A third was a magnificent painting of a famous horse named Whistlejacket by a painter named George Stubbs. Still another was a self-portrait by Rembrandt. Every time a new painting--each hanging on some wall out of doors--was shown a reporter came along to comment on it.

By this time, I was intrigued and couldn't resist looking up the Whistlejacket painting on the Internet (which is a habit of mine whenever I want to find out about something). That's when I learned about the National Gallery's (in London) Grand Tour 2007.

A press release by the Gallery about the special "exhibition" reads:

For twelve weeks, the streets of London are being turned into a Gallery - as around 30 full size recreations of National Gallery paintings are hung on the walls, in the most unexpected and unusual of places.

Masterpieces from Caravaggio to Constable will be vying for position among the bustling streets from Soho to Seven Dials. Celebrating the richness, diversity and stories of the National Gallery's permanent collection, the Grand Tour aims to encourage people to make the short journey to visit the genuine works, and many more, for free.

Each picture will be in a replica frame, and have an information plaque next to it - just as it has in the real Gallery. The plaques will also include a phone number, which people can call to access a specially recorded audio guide to that particular painting, and its artist.

Isn't that an wonderful concept? Although it's some sort of advertisement for the National Gallery's impressive art collection, it's an innovative way of introducing and educating the public about these masterpieces.

I wish they could do something similar here in this country to at least help familiarize our people with our local (professional) artists or even about classical music in general.

I've heard of the likes of Juan Luna, Felix Resurrecion Hidalgo and Fernando Amorsolo and have seen a few their paintings mainly in pictures in books or postcards and, in a few exceptional cases, in special art exhibits. But that's it. I think nearly the rest of their works are hidden in some expensive museum or remain unseen by the public in someone's private collection--which is a pity to say the least.

Plus I'm sure there are a lot more Filipino artists from the Spanish times whose body of work has been sadly lost or at best is virtually unrecognized nowadays. (I should know: My family's got a few intricately painted portraits whose creators are little known painters in the 1800's.)

Such art should be more accessible to the general public for it to be better appreciated as well as for the people to be more familiar with the long history of Filipino art.

Actually, I must be an old soul: I am partial to the neoclassic--not sure if that's the right term as I'm no art expert--works of Luna, et al., to that of the modern ones like those of Manansala, Baldemor or Sanso or those that I see on the covers of PLDT phone directories. And I think the younger generation is getting too much into the Japanese anime type of artwork, though I admire the style myself.

Anyway, I for one would love to see more of Hidalgo's paintings. I saw one of his portraits, that of an old friar, at the Bangko Sentral museum a couple of years ago and my jaw dropped at the sight. I never realized what a talented painter he was until then. In fact, after seeing that painting and a few more others at the same museum, I now prefer his style to Luna's.