Wednesday, October 14, 2009

NPR on Finding Frida Kahlo

Paddy Johnson gives us the Cliffs Notes version of a recent KCRW piece on what she calls "the so-called new Frida-Kahlos." Her bottom line: "I suppose my deepest annoyance with this story is that it embodies the kind of false myths that create art world controversy where there is none. Resting one’s case on the fallacy of experts 'who haven’t seen the work in person' isn’t an argument for its legitimacy. It’s an argument meant to discredit the expert. But what kind of specialist flies to examine obviously fake documents? It’s like accusing an Anne Frank expert of malpractice for failing to fly to Germany to examine the long lost chapter about her iPod. There’s no point."