When I was six years old, my mom got me some library books from a series called “Getting to Know the World’s Greatest Artists.” Written by Mike Venezia, the series profiled artists alongside whimsical illustrations. One day, I twisted my ankle playing outside and sat inside feeling sorry for myself until I picked up one of the books. I grew up taking ballet classes, so Edgar Degas’ depictions of dancers grabbed me immediately, and I quickly dove into the rest of the series, taking a special liking to the Impressionists and Post-Impressionists.
Two years later, when I was eight, my elementary school art teacher introduced a game for our class called “Mystery Artist.” Each week, she’d show a painting and share facts about the artist until we guessed who it was or she revealed it herself. Periodically, we would have a contest to see who could recall the most facts about the artists. I was a competitive kid, and I strove to win Mystery Artist every time. Looking back, I’m deeply grateful for my exposure to art history at such a young age, especially the opportunity to learn about female artists like Louise Nevelson, Faith Ringgold, and Louise Bourgeois.
That summer, my parents and I visited the National Gallery of Art, and I tried to touch a Monet. I was strategic about it—it was in the corner of the gallery, partially obscured by an adjoining wall, and I got so close! The security guard trailed me the rest of my visit. I’ve thought about this painting every time I’ve returned to the museum and much of the time in between.
When I was growing up, trips to the National Gallery and The Phillips Collection made me feel cosmopolitan, creative, and inspired, and I treasured them dearly. At 22, I started working in Washington, D.C., within walking distance from the National Gallery and four other museums. It was an exciting time, but it often was a lonely one, as young adulthood can be. Many of my friends were still in college, and I struggled to connect with them and with my hobbies in the same way I had when I myself was in school. I tried to brighten my long days with a lunchtime museum visit whenever I could. I had the opportunity to revisit old friends—Impressionist paintings and sculptures I remembered from my beloved childhood books, along with more contemporary art I learned about through Mystery Artist—and to make new ones.
Over the years, I’ve been especially interested to learn about the relationships among artists, particularly the tight-knit Impressionists. In 2014, an exhibit at the National Gallery of Art on Edgar Degas and Mary Cassatt illuminated the relationship between these two painters and helped me see beyond Cassatt’s surface identity as a painter of women and children. In 2017, the museum hosted an exhibit on Frédéric Bazille, a bright young Impressionist with whom I wasn’t familiar, in part due to his untimely death at 28 in the Franco-Prussian War. Bazille was close with Claude Monet, Édouard Manet, and Alfred Sisley, and the exhibit depicted his work alongside his peers. My favorite painting was “Studio in Rue de La Condamine,” an intimate peek into Bazille’s studio that depicts him at work alongside Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Manet, and several Impressionist canvases.
And later that year, I went to an exhibit at The Phillips Collection literally called “Renoir and Friends,” which highlighted the intersections among the Impressionists and their rich network of connections and patrons.
But not all the connections were positive. I think of Vincent van Gogh, who spent a turbulent two months living in Arles with Paul Gaugin in the fall of 1888, culminating in Van Gogh cutting off his ear and Gaugin moving out. I devoured the movie “Loving Vincent” when it came out in 2017, and, during the COVID-19 pandemic, I became especially interested in this artist. Depressed, lonely, unlucky in love, struggling to establish a creative voice after a period of religious fascination, he still managed to see the world with deep awe and reverence, a quality clearly evident in his letters to his brother and supporter Theo.
When museums and my office reopened after the worst of the pandemic, Van Gogh’s paintings at the National Gallery of Art—his iconic self-portrait, the windswept wheat fields in Auvers, the deep contrast of bright lemons against a pair of rich blue gloves, and his tender rendering of baby Marcelle Roulin—were some of the first friends I wanted to see.
In 2023, I visited an exhibit at The Phillips Collection called “An Italian Impressionist in Paris: Giuseppe De Nittis,” the first major retrospective of this artist outside of Italy. I was taken by De Nittis’ gentle blend of Impressionism and realism, his loving depictions of his wife, and especially his kinetic depictions of cities. A quote on the placard for “Westminster Bridge (Study)” caught my eye; it turned out De Nittis’ paintings of London had caught Vincent’s, too. Van Gogh saw a De Nittis painting in Paris, while working for the Italian painter’s art dealer, and wrote Theo:
“A couple of days ago we got a painting by De Nittis, a view of London on a rainy day, Westminster Bridge and the Houses of Parliament. I crossed Westminster Bridge every morning and evening and know what it looks like when the sun’s setting behind Westminster Abbey and the Houses of Parliament and what it’s like early in the morning, and in the winter with snow and fog. When I saw this painting, I felt how much I love London.”
I felt tears in my eyes as I reflected on how much seeing De Nittis’ work meant to Van Gogh, just as I felt stirred by the art more than a hundred years later. Knit together by a common thread, Van Gogh and I and countless others know what it is to find a friend in art. Even when people disappoint us or we feel alone, art of all sorts—fine art, movies, music—can provide companionship and tie us to others, past, present, and future. It’s that sentiment I hope to explore through this series. I’d like to thank Elliott for the idea, and thank you for reading it.