Most sources will list Gustave Dore', born on this date in 1832, as an illustrator. And indeed, he was a brilliant wood and steel engraver, best known for his illustrations of the English Bible (1866) and of Cervantes' Don Quixote (1863).
But I know him best as a painter through one particular and surprising work. One familiar with his popular illustrations would hardly suspect him as the author of Scottish Highlands, a large oil on canvas that is among the most popular paintings at the Toledo Museum of Art. Brilliant color, deft brushwork, and a brooding, evocative mood make this a compelling--if entirely non-threatening--work for novice and sophisticated museum visitors alike. This picture took on a very surprising role on September 13, 2001. At 9 in the morning, a devastated TMA staff (of which I was then a member) gathered in the galleries to try to process what had just happened to our nation and world through our deepest common language: art. My cherished colleague Susan, the best gallery educator in the business, first led us through our own reflections on a very difficult Anselm Kiefer painting that uses a (literally) burnt image of Hitler's Berlin Chancellery courtyard to evoke man's inhumanity to man. And then, our sadness, grief, disbelief, outrage, despair all aired, she moved us to the Dore'. Here we wandered together, in the cool, unspoiled atmosphere of this vast and quiet place, surrounded by powerful mountains and transcendent clouds. Through the shared experience of this fictional space, we experienced calm, hope, the awareness that the world is bigger than we are and that it will last beyond our immediate crises and concerns.
So I am grateful to Susan, still, and to Gustave Dore', for the healing power of art in this unexpected picture.
