The art of the stare

There is an art to everything. Even how you look at art is a form of art in itself. March saw Dubai turn into a bit of an art capital and I into the point of contact for friends when it came to the subject of paint on canvas.
It's my personal belief that art is imperative to a city to ensure the growth and survival of great ideas. In saying that, it's always interesting (and frustrating) for me to see how people who don't know or aren't interested in art experience it. Experience is the key word here. People often look at art and expect to simply 'get it' and when they don't, deem it pointless. Judgment rather than attempting to create a connection becomes the point.
So, how does one connect with a piece of art? Reading about the artist and the work is an obvious place to start. But there's something much simpler that you can do. Stare. Look at it. Really look at the artwork, without interruptions, without preconceived notions, without prejudice, without expectations.
To elaborate I have to take you back to the year 2000, during an incredibly hot summer, at the start of the school year where I was sitting at the back of my Art History class. I was 16 and I'd just finished reading The Colour Purple by Alice Walker for the third time and I thought I'd never read a book as good as that again. Then, the teacher Mrs. Perry, who prided herself in the secret knowledge of deciphering every students character by the way they styled their hair, stormed in and ordered everyone to "shut up!"
Closing the curtains of the classroom, she made her way to her desk which, in an almost clichéd manner, had an abundance of books about every art movement imaginable stacked all over it. She then switched on the overhead projector and an illuminated image appeared on the wall. 'No one say a word until I say so,' Mrs. Perry said while she unpeeled a mandarin and sat in her cage of books 'you're too stare at that until I'm done with my morning tea.'
At first I saw a woman lying on a long sofa looking out at us. The woman wasn't really lying, she was reclined, her head turned to look back at us. The room was bare but for the ornate chaise lounge she was on, a thin lamp to the left and a footrest. The bareness of the room forced me to look back at the woman. I continued to stare. There was an elegance and femininity in her pose, the line of her neck, the curls dangling on her forehead, the white sleeveless dress draped beautifully on her. My eyes followed the drapes that were realistically painted and I noticed that her feet were bare - she wasn't wearing any shoes. I found that odd.
I stared back at her face. Her expression was in direct contrast with what the qualities her pose, style and manner seemed to indicate. The woman looked back as though she were waiting, with no expression, expecting us to gaze at her voyeuristically. I found this alarming, as though I were intruding some private moment.
Mrs. Perry told us that this was a portrait of the socialite Madam Recamier painted by Jacques-Louis David in 1800. Renowned for her beauty, Madam Recamier married a Parisian banker thirty years her senior. With a long list of admirers (and rumored lovers) from Prince Augustus of Prussia to the Romantic author François-René de Chateaubri, she became the greatest muse of her time. Madam Recamier was both a result of and a distraction from the French Revolution.
Though the painting and Madame Recamier herself weren't overly seductive at first glance the more I looked the more I sensed from her gaze and the small hints David had planted, that there was nothing straightforward about this painting. I would never have understood this if I hadn't stared at the painting for almost three minutes.
The truth is, art intimidates people. If it's not a painting of a landscape, a sunrise or a person who looks like a person then we feel stupid for not "getting it" straight away. But understanding something at a glance has never been the point.
In the same way we take the time to get to know a new friend we should take the time to get to know art. How? Stare at the artwork for no less than 30 seconds and no more than three minutes. Generally, this is the magic formula I've found that should, if at all, bring out some kind of visceral understanding or emotion when you look at a piece of art. There's a reason why art galleries are often quiet places with a lot of space and light. It's all for you to make a connection, to experience art with no expectations and no judgment. Who knows, if you're lucky you might find yourself mesmerized by a woman painted over 200 years ago.