There's no Cy Twombly at the NC Museum

But there's lots of other things, marvelous paintings by Diebenkorn, Stella, Morris Louis (advertised on the website but not out in the gallery), Robert Motherwell, a gigantic Kiefer (that outdoes the one in Atlanta for ostentation, encrusted paint, dangling objects embedded the surface, and obtuseness of meaning); as well as a Kirchner, a Nolde, a Jawlensky (or a Schmidt Rutloff); along with some Wyeths; plus a wealth of European, Egyptian, and Ancient works. It was greatly pleasing, a fine culmination to a Sunday trip back from Smithfield. In our little corner of the South a fine artistic experience can be cobbled from the Ackland in Chapel Hill, the Nasher at Duke, and the North Carolina Museum at Raleigh. Still All of these places are trumped by the Chicago Art Institute, any museum in Manhattan (Imagine if you wanted to visit three collections there - the Frick, MoMa and the Met or the Guggenheim, plus any gallery hopping you might want to do), the MFA in Boston (plus the Gardener). A person could spend years gleaning the ultimate artistic experience: visiting Russia, Austria, Germany, Italy, Spain, England, NY, Boston, DC, LA, Santa Fe - not to mention seeing such monumental things as the pyramids, Angor Wat, the Forbidden City, various cathedrals, the Dome of the Rock, the mosques of Cordova and Granada. Human culture is rich in aesthetic expression and we scratch the surface of it in our ordinary lives, where we seem oddly contented.
We were walking around the museum in Raleigh and what did we find 10 minutes before closing? Peter Aertsen's The Meat Stall of 1551. I was taken aback because my copy of Janson's Art History (the piece of ballast every art student taking a survey course carries in a backpack to place on tiny coffee shop tables for perusal with cappuccino in hand) says that the painting is in Uppsala, Sweden. It is the very same painting down to the twirling sausage casing and the ascendant pig's head. A magnificent calf's head dominates the painting. In the background: the holy family flies into Egypt on layover from Beirut. This painting is a wonderful celebration of all things carnivorous: all things bright and beautiful - our Lord God broiled them all. Here is the answer to the question What would Jesus grill? Would he today turn hot dogs into Brats? Would Moses hit the rock and a Dogfish Head 90 minute IPA or a Duvel pour out? An updated Leviticus should have a verse reading "he that pisseth water and call it beer, shall be acursed; for weak watery beer that has no umph (which only virtue is that it's cheap) is an abomination."
I spoke with my friend Joe this afternoon and he told me that Twain's has a Rye beer that is like drinking a ham. I almost rent my garments: how appropriate for the town of Smithfield, where the streets are decked with tenderloin, that it should have a hamish beer.
Smithfield does have a wonderful German restaurant called Edelweiss where an ex-serviceman and his German wife cook up authentic German food. It's meat heaven. I had a Roulade, which is a beef rolled with sausage, served with fat and sauerkraut. I had a dark wheat beer with that: not Meisel but the other one.
I can't wait to return to the NC Museum of Art. I love looking at paintings. I especially love looking at crazy paintings (not the typical gallery line up of "please buy me; you'll never know I'm there" offerings). If only the Woodruff in Atlanta were as accessible by car.