Eye of the Beholder Dept.

Now I have a reason to get to the Metropolitan Museum of Art sooner rather than later: a spectacular exhibition of Chinese scroll paintings.

The curator, Maxwell K. Hearn of the Met’s Asian art department, has given the museum’s lofty Chinese painting and calligraphy galleries the intimacy of a teaching collection, with a limited number of objects accompanied by short labels and photographic enlargements of details. The labels are thematic and ruminative, approaching paintings through ideas rather than dynasties. The photographs are a revelation.

The exhibition runs through August 10, which gives me plenty of time to check it out in the company of a certain very good friend that I know will enjoy this.