Theater of the "Really?????": In defense of architecture at the expense of the overdramatics of painting (or, Bravo TV rendered in oil on canvas, 2012, yolo)

How completely hilarious the difference between painting and architecture. In response to the difference between “non-theatrical” artforms such as painting and the theatre of the absurd which is architecture. In order to do this, I will compare Robert Morris’ Red House, a vanguard of arts and crafts architecture, and The Slave Ship by JMW Turner. Both are noteworthy, "vanguards" in their field in some way, white, English, males, and socially conscious for their time.

The Red House was created by Robert Morris, for himself and his new wife (who got married in a ceremony literally described by wikipedia as “low-key” lmao). Morris was a father of arts and crafts architecture, which held craftsmanship in the highest esteem - often to a spiritual level. The house is constructed by hand-carved railings, hand-made bricks, intricately painted murals and printed wallpaper. For all of the individuals which contributed to this house, it comes together in a singular artwork - Mitchell rightly reminds us of the term Gesamtkuntswerk. And while each individual received a paycheck for their singular work, their personal narrative is present, but flat. They exist in the railing, in the bricks, in the murals - and they exist as anecdotal evidence of a life lived, and nothing else. There are no theatrics to their lives or contributions, there is only the reality of their work which defines their existence. What else could make an artist?

The Slave Ship is a painting which depicts a distant ship preparing for an oncoming typhoon. Its methods of preparation include unfurling its sails and unloading its cargo (its cargo was slaves to be sold). Turner developed a painterly style attributed to early modernism, distinguished by explorations and declarations of color for the sake of painterly experiment. So much so, the BBC (hallmark of visual culture) says he “set painting free” (i know right lol). And in this vaguely figurative work, he depicts slaves, people without rights. Individuals who, at this point, were only people solely because they could do the work of other men. And here, we have theater. An orchestra of colors, cacophoneous as they crescendo and crash into the horizon. Within the sea are black bodies (which were rarely depicted in painting at this time), floating within our reach, able to be saved - but would a viewer from the 19th century save them? Caught between the horizon and the slaves is the ship - furled and prepared to weather a typhoon. Caught between humanity and God. Caught between existing systems of oppression and the reality that we all, ultimately, surrender to the same god. The storm is rolling in. The ship sinks. The slaves drown. Turner tells us.

And so, ultimately, what is theater? So long as history painting, or painting as a form of image recording has existed, so too have personal narratives underpinned the existence of a still image rendered in oil on canvas (ugh). And what is wrong if a painting is theatrical? And what is wrong if we need an oil painting to tell us what happens when a slave ship expects a typhoon? And if there is an architecture that will be remembered uniquely by refugees because of temporary housing measures, who is to blame? And if this architecture is cramped, and musty, and makes gives children night tremors, and they create memories in homes they will never remember the name of, address of, or whether it really had an address or name or existence beyond their temporary occupation of the space, is this any less an architecture? Is their life less deserving of theater? We may limit access to architecture and to paintings through capitalism and exclusion (read: Cheeto-in-Charge), but we may not limit the ability of narrative to exist in these mediums, and for these narratives to speak to real, human existence - which are, in essence, theatrical.