Art Review: “Paws on Parchment” Show at Walters Art Museum in Baltimore

I was in Baltimore recently for the second of two memorial services for my dear old friend Julia Alexander, the longtime director of the Walters Art Museum, who died suddenly and shockingly on May 4. Today, cats are on the agenda, in part because Julia loved hers as much as I love mine.

From Baltimore I went to Washington for a swing through four Smithsonian museums and a tour of the White House’s ceremonial rooms. For my Labor Day pleasure, I’m reading a catalogue of the White House’s historic furniture and watching Mrs. Kennedy’s 1962 televised tour and Harry Truman’s TV tour from 1952. Better these than reflect on my slog through the Smithsonian, with so much great art but a curatorial vision that, more often than not, is arid, exhausting, and heavy on doom and gloom.

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Brian T. Allen

Brian T. Allen is National Review’s art critic.

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I was in Baltimore recently for the second of two memorial services for my dear old friend Julia Alexander, the longtime director of the Walters Art Museum, who died suddenly and shockingly on May 4. Today, cats are on the agenda, in part because Julia loved hers as much as I love mine.

From Baltimore I went to Washington for a swing through four Smithsonian museums and a tour of the White House’s ceremonial rooms. For my Labor Day pleasure, I’m reading a catalogue of the White House’s historic furniture and watching Mrs. Kennedy’s 1962 televised tour and Harry Truman’s TV tour from 1952. Better these than reflect on my slog through the Smithsonian, with so much great art but a curatorial vision that, more often than not, is arid, exhausting, and heavy on doom and gloom.