{"id":11320,"date":"2015-09-11T09:40:30","date_gmt":"2015-09-11T07:40:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/?p=11320"},"modified":"2015-09-11T13:30:03","modified_gmt":"2015-09-11T11:30:03","slug":"at-the-show-with-the-killer-patrick-bateman-alias-american-psycho-visits-george-stubbs-show-at-the-met","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/2015\/09\/11\/at-the-show-with-the-killer-patrick-bateman-alias-american-psycho-visits-george-stubbs-show-at-the-met\/","title":{"rendered":"At the show with the killer: American Psycho visits George Stubbs&#8217; mini-show at the Met"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\t\t<style type=\"text\/css\">\n\t\t\t#gallery-1 {\n\t\t\t\tmargin: auto;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t#gallery-1 .gallery-item {\n\t\t\t\tfloat: left;\n\t\t\t\tmargin-top: 10px;\n\t\t\t\ttext-align: center;\n\t\t\t\twidth: 33%;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t#gallery-1 img {\n\t\t\t\tborder: 2px solid #cfcfcf;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t#gallery-1 .gallery-caption {\n\t\t\t\tmargin-left: 0;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t\/* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes\/media.php *\/\n\t\t<\/style>\n\t\t<div id='gallery-1' class='gallery galleryid-11320 gallery-columns-3 gallery-size-thumbnail'><dl class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<dt class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/2015\/09\/11\/at-the-show-with-the-killer-patrick-bateman-alias-american-psycho-visits-george-stubbs-show-at-the-met\/b1981-25-621\/'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"118\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/CFA-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/yale_stubbs_5-480x378.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-11323\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/dt>\n\t\t\t\t<dd class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-11323'>\n\t\t\t\tGeorge Stubbs, Turf, with Jockey up, at Newmarket, 1765. Oil on canvas, 96.5 \u00d7 124.5cm. Courtesy of Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection.\n\n\t\t\t\t<\/dd><\/dl><dl class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<dt class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/2015\/09\/11\/at-the-show-with-the-killer-patrick-bateman-alias-american-psycho-visits-george-stubbs-show-at-the-met\/cropped-to-image-recto-unframed-2\/'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"112\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/CFA-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/yale_stubbs_8-480x358.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-11324\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/dt>\n\t\t\t\t<dd class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-11324'>\n\t\t\t\tcropped to image, recto, unframed\n\t\t\t\t<\/dd><\/dl><dl class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<dt class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/2015\/09\/11\/at-the-show-with-the-killer-patrick-bateman-alias-american-psycho-visits-george-stubbs-show-at-the-met\/cropped-to-image-recto-unframed\/'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"120\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/CFA-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/yale_stubbs_1-480x385.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-11321\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/dt>\n\t\t\t\t<dd class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-11321'>\n\t\t\t\tGeorge Stubbs, Two Gentlemen Going a Shooting, with a View of Creswell Crags, Taken on the Spot,1767. Oil on canvas, 101.6 \u00d7 127 cm. Courtesy of Yale Center for British Art, Given by Paul Mellon in memory of his friend James Cox Brady, Yale College, Class of 1929.\n\n\t\t\t\t<\/dd><\/dl><br style=\"clear: both\" \/><dl class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<dt class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/2015\/09\/11\/at-the-show-with-the-killer-patrick-bateman-alias-american-psycho-visits-george-stubbs-show-at-the-met\/b1976-7-88\/'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"120\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/CFA-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/yale_stubbs_4-480x383.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-11322\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/dt>\n\t\t\t\t<dd class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-11322'>\n\t\t\t\tGeorge Stubbs, A Repose after Shooting, 1770. Oil on canvas, 102.2 \u00d7 128.3 cm. Courtesy of Yale Center for British Art, Given by Paul Mellon in memory of his friend James Cox Brady, Yale College, Class of 1929.\n\t\t\t\t<\/dd><\/dl><dl class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<dt class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/2015\/09\/11\/at-the-show-with-the-killer-patrick-bateman-alias-american-psycho-visits-george-stubbs-show-at-the-met\/b2001-2-122\/'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"119\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/CFA-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/yale_stubbs_7-480x381.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-11325\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/dt>\n\t\t\t\t<dd class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-11325'>\n\t\t\t\tGeorge Stubbs, Lustre, held by a Groom, ca. 1762. Oil on canvas, 101.9 \u00d7 127 cm. Courtesy of Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection.\n\t\t\t\t<\/dd><\/dl>\n\t\t\t<br style='clear: both' \/>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n<p>There is old money and new money and new money can buy old money.\u00a0Patrick Bateman<span lang=\"it-IT\">, t<\/span><span lang=\"en-US\">he protagonist of acclaimed 1980s Wall Street frenzy <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/1991\/03\/06\/books\/bret-easton-ellis-answers-critics-of-american-psycho.html\" target=\"_blank\">novel American Psycho<\/a><\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">, would probably agree on that. A clue: his office at the investment firm he works for is adorned with a 18th century British painting by George Stubbs, a symbol of antiqued nowness, celebration of how time-honoured classiness and taste can be bought by with a quick signature on chequebooks or a fast credit card swipes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The world of those privileged 1980s financial sharks (or wolves for that matter) might look very far from English 18th aristocracy like the one portrayed by Stubbs. Yet what the former ones do is swallowing everything luxury regardless of eras and geographies of origin, enjoying it with overflowing consumerist pleasure and quest for peer recognition.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span lang=\"it-IT\">It<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">\u2019<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">s not only paintings of course. All the objects Bateman keeps are first of all his belongings, which are always acquired in view of their price, brand, or the exclusive retailer that sells them. There is no trace of their real stories. They get shuffled as they were cards, and Stubbs artwork is not spared this game. Here is how it makes its appearance in the book:<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em><span lang=\"en-US\">The Stubbs painting should probably go over the life-size Doberman that<\/span><span lang=\"fr-FR\">\u2019<\/span><span lang=\"en-US\">s in the corner ($700 at Beauty and the Beast in Trump Tower) or maybe it would look better over the Pacrizinni antique table that sits next to the Doberman. I get up and move all these sporting magazines from the forties<\/span>\u2014<span lang=\"en-US\">they cost me thirty bucks apiece<\/span>\u2014 <span lang=\"en-US\">that I bought at Funchies, Bunkers, Gaks and Gleeks, and then I lift the Stubbs painting off the wall and balance it on the table then sit back at my desk and fiddle with the pencils I keep in a vintage German beer stein I got from Man-tiques. The Stubbs looks good in either place.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><span lang=\"it-IT\">George Stubbs owed his fame to his pictures of expensive horses, painted with scientific realism acquired from studying equine anatomy. Even though there is n<\/span><span lang=\"en-US\">o indication<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\"> in the novel<\/span><span lang=\"en-US\"> of what the painting <\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">in Bateman<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">\u2019<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">s office <\/span><span lang=\"en-US\">really depicts<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">, we can fantasise it is one of Stubbs<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">\u2019 <\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">horses. Bateman must have liked to own this double symbol of wealth show off: an expensive commodity (the horse) within another expensive commodity (the painting).<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span lang=\"it-IT\">Fast race horses also represent the great performance, a run towards a goal. From a poster in <a href=\"http:\/\/www.metmuseum.org\/exhibitions\/listings\/2015\/george-stubbs\" target=\"_blank\">current exhibition of George Stubbs at the Metropolitan Museum<\/a>, here is how <\/span><span lang=\"en-US\">a 18th Century English jockey<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\"> speaks about his foal:<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>I was mounted on the noblest that the earth contains \/ had him under my care \/ and was borne by him over hill and dale \/ far outstripping the wings of the wind.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span lang=\"it-IT\">The distance between <\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">\u201c<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">old money<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">\u201d <\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">and <\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">\u201c<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">new money<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">\u201d <\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">bluntly reveals itself in these words. Nothing in Bateman is so romantic or fond of nature like in Stubbs<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">\u2019 <\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">view or his patrons<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">\u2019<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">. Rather Bateman<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">\u2019<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\">s actions in the book reveal all the nihilism and individualism of the modern financial rich, who in the case of Bateman cannot even find real ecstasy in surpassing his colleagues in terms of success. As the book unravels, the reader realises that t<\/span>he<span lang=\"it-IT\">re is no<\/span><span lang=\"en-US\"> real escape for such character<\/span><span lang=\"it-IT\"> but crude violence and miserable insanity.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There is old money and new money and new money can buy old money.\u00a0Patrick Bateman, the protagonist of acclaimed 1980s Wall Street frenzy novel American Psycho, would probably agree on [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11324,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1796],"tags":[376,2022],"class_list":["post-11320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mapping-the-artscape","tag-art-in-novels","tag-george-stubbs"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11320","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11320"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11320\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conceptualfinearts.com\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}