Ascending and Descending

Both these works of art, now considered 20^th century classics, aroused controversy when first exhibited.

What do they have in common?

Marcel DuchampMarcel Duchamp’s “Nude Descending a Staircase” (1912) was rejected by the French Academy and caused an outrage at the 1913 Armory show in NY.   M.C. Escher’s “Ascending and Descending” (1960), which like many of his drawings confounds order and gravity, has been dismissed as clever, but not art.

Their common feature?  Besides being iconic 20^th century controversial art works, they both depict staircases.

We’re still writing about architecture, real and symbolic, and the topic today is stairs. 

Staircases                                                         Runner                                    

       Steps                                                       Falling

          Treads                                             Up Down

              Risers                                     Spiral

                 Flight                             Railings

                                 Landing

Duchamp wrote of his painting, “My aim was a static representation of movement.”

A great description of a staircase: a static representation of movement.  It’s nailed in, anchored, solid.  And its job is to move you.   The steps stay standing, and off you go. 

M. C. EscherPerhaps these two very 20^th century artists, Duchamp and Escher, intentionally chose this ancient solid form, the staircase, and then made it shimmer with a nude, or defy gravity by going up and down at the same time, to show how crazy and new was this century and this art.

I couldn’t draw a staircase, but I can sing about one.  Most people would call “Stairway to Heaven” the iconic stairway song, the Led Zeppelin classic, 1971, named by Rolling Stone one of the top ten songs of all time.  The odd lyrics, inspired by Tolkien and Celtic myth, suggest a path, an opening, a journey to the new and unknown. 

But I’m more of a Gershwin fan. My favorite stairway song is “Stairway to Paradise.” You may recall the great scene, in the movie American in Paris, where the dapper Frenchman sings while climbing a magnificent staircase, each step lighting up in turn, gorgeous white-gowned chorus girls leading the way:

All you preachers
Who delight in panning the dancing teachers: Let me tell you there are a lot of features
Of the dance that carry you through The gates of Heaven!
It’s madness
To be always sitting around in sadness
When you could be learning the steps of gladness.

You’ll be happy when you can do just six or seven—
Begin today! You’ll find it nice—
The quickest way to Paradise!
When you practice, Here’s the thing to do:
Simply say as you go:

I’ll build a stairway to Paradise
With a new step every day!
I’m going to get there at any price:
Stand aside, I’m on my way!
I’ve got the blues And up above it’s so fair!
Shoes! Go on and carry me there!
I’ll build a stairway to Paradise,
With a new step every day.

Stairways, in art and song, move us onward and upward into the new. Go on and carry me there.Where? To a better place, Heaven, Paradise. A new step every day, gladness not sadness. Up above it’s so fair!Oh sure, stairs go down also. We fall down the stairs, there are also stairs down to hell. But for today, as I walk up the stairs and even down, I’m humming about Paradise, and the steps of gladness.

Copyright © 2015 Deborah Streeter