In the spring of 2014, the Crocker Art Museum in Sacramento featured a one-man show called Jules Tavernier: Artist and Adventurer: a French painter (1844-1889) famed for his depictions of American West. The show included “50 oil paintings and 50 works in other media including drawings, magazine illustrations, and historical documents and ephemera.”
After attending it, I wrote this poem. I’ve always enjoyed light verse. Happy spring!
IN THE MUSEUM
After lazing through brunch on a sun-dazzled day,
We inspected the works of one Jules Tavernier—
Trouble, clearly: A boozer, a cad and roue,
Crazy handsome and hounded by debts he couldn't pay,
And (stashed somewhere) a wife, four kids, one on the way—
And so charming! The toast, so we're told, of the Bay.
By the time he was your age, my dear, he was dead.
But let's not dwell on that. Look around, for instead
Of a worker and dad of the type that we know
Jules was born to be wild—regrettably so,
But it couldn't be helped: With a brush in his hand
So sublimely facile, so much in command,
That in painting—and life—he got carried away.
(What were 'savings' and 'playdates' to Jules Tavernier?)
Back in France, he blew through the Ecole de Beaux Arts,
Joined a war, and—soon bored—set his wandering heart
On the far-away port San Francisco, CA
And proceeded to go there and paint, night and day:
Spanish missions, the waves crashing off Monterey,
And Yosemite's peaks looming over the fray.
Buying canvas on credit—well, what can you say?
Life was grand for the brilliant young J. Tavernier.
On assignment out West, he perfected the tepee.
Coloradans and cows, he could etch in his sleep. He
No sooner espied three men in a balloon
Than he made them immortal, was finished by noon.
Then, ignoring his critics (mon dieu, what did they know?)
He sailed to Kaua'i to contemplate the volcano.
That red, roiling inferno he 'got' right away—
No one could convey lava like Jules Tavernier.
But as the 19th century drew to its close,
He succumbed to the ills of the life that he'd chose.
A blaze too soon snuffed out—the old story. One sighs.
And to this day, his energy can't but surprise.
Now the crowds mill around, all entranced by his art—
But when I turn away to quite primly depart
A particular passage in which just we two
Are alone for a minute—why, what do you do?
Take my hand, pull me back, twirl me close—a ballet
Sadly long out-of-reach for poor Jules Tavernier.
And how roguish, to kiss me in this public space!
(Not that I could resist, any hour or place.)
Our adventure is love, only that—you and I
Work in time, not in oil, acrylic, or dye—
And the canvas is free, and like sand in the spray,
Our designs shine a moment, then wash clean away.
This read trippingly! 😊 I bet that exhibit was amazing!