Every movement of consequence, however far-reaching, has a beginning. Surrealism’s birth was full-blown from the mind of French poet Guillaume Apollinaire, who in 1917 was quoted about this new spirit in the air thusly: “When a man wanted to imitate walking, he invented the wheel, which does not look like a leg. Without knowing it, he was a Surrealist.” But it was Andre Breton who appropriated the word in his Manifesto and set himself up for over 50 years as its leading proponent. 

Alice Neel's long overdue retrospective, People Come First, is currently drawing hordes of visitors at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It’s no surprise, considering she based her entire life and career around the intimates and strangers that surrounded her. Every class, race, and gender came under her razor-sharp gaze.  And no human being encountering her subjects comes away unscathed. 

Not surprisingly, when you arrive on the site, you are greeted with “A Message to Our Community.”  The foundation is “creating paths that lead to a more inclusive and diverse museum and workplace.”  Nearly a year ago, it launched a Diversity, Equity, Accessibility and Inclusion Initiative.  It’s a high order and we can only hope that they can live up to the founding belief that “art can embrace the spirit and transform human behavior.” One example on the website of genius at work is a brief artist’s video profile of Simone Leigh.

A not-to-be-missed portion of the exhibit are 17 plates (never before seen in their entirety) for an 1828 publication of Faust by Goethe.   It was an early undertaking that elicited this response from the great author himself: “Monsieur Delacroix has surpassed the mental images that I made for myself from the scenes that I wrote.”  There are plenty of opportunities in his drawings to study his aptitude for classical form and his lifelong love for the Greco-Roman aesthetic (inspired in no small part by the 400-year-old Greek War of Independence against Ottoman rule that ultimately led to the demise of his Greek sympathizer friend Byron).  

The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s current exhibit, Vigee Le Brun: Woman Artist in Revolutionary France, fast on the heels of its showing at the Grand Palais in Paris, is long overdue.  Katherine Baetjer, Curator in the Department of European Paintings, remarked to Roberta Smith in the New York Times’ own coverage, that it was the first time in her 40 years in the Department that a monographic exhibition has been held for a woman artist.