
Sam Rindy, right, with her attorney in French courtroom. (art-damaged.tumblr.com)
One of the late Cy Twombly’s untitled paintings, a canvas entirely white, was kissed by French artist Sam Rindy, 30, leaving on the work the red imprint of her lips – the only arguably artistic thing about the painting, which nevertheless was valued, in 2007, at some $2.4 million (before Miss Rindy’s applique). She was arrested for her kiss at the Collection Lambert in Avignon, France, and the news ended up in a post I wrote for my Providence Journal blog back in 2011, when the paper published an obituary editorial about the famous artist.
I thought the post was history, swallowed up in the pit of the evaporation of my Journal blog, but somehow it survived, and I found it. Since it represents my first entry into art criticism, and I have just posted on a controversy involving two art museums, I thought I’d repost my old post here. I also am posting the New York Times story about Miss Sam “A Kiss Is Just a Crime” Rindy exercise in cooperative artistic endeavor, lest readers disbelieve my post’s account of her crime.
About David Brussat
This blog was begun in 2009 as a feature of the Providence Journal, where I was on the editorial board and wrote a weekly column of architecture criticism for three decades. Architecture Here and There fights the style wars for classical architecture and against modern architecture, no holds barred.
History Press asked me to write and in August 2017 published my first book, "Lost Providence." I am now writing my second book.
My freelance writing on architecture and other topics addresses issues of design and culture locally and globally.
I am a member of the board of the New England chapter of the Institute of Classical Architecture & Art, which bestowed an Arthur Ross Award on me in 2002.
I work from Providence, R.I., where I live with my wife Victoria, my son Billy and our cat Gato.
If you would like to employ my writing and editing to improve your work, please email me at my consultancy, dbrussat@gmail.com, or call 401.351.0457.
Testimonial: "Your work is so wonderful - you now enter my mind and write what I
would have written."
- Nikos Salingaros, mathematician at the University of Texas, architectural theorist and author of many books.
A kiss Twombly would have liked, I think.
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