FanStory.com - Jesus in the Modern Art Museumby estory

I was walking around in one of my favorite places; The Museum of Modern Art in New York. I went from room to room admiring the colors of the paintings on the white walls, brightening the sunlit halls, looking for something. I went to the museum every January to visit my favorite paintings, almost as if they were old friends. As always, the museum was full of people meandering through the galleries or standing at the overlook of the atrium at the art lovers and the paintings below. The galleries echoed with the footsteps and murmur of subdued, focused voices. The paintings themselves were splashes of color in darker or lighter tones, moments of joys and sorrows, the hopes and despairs and mysteries of life that were presented on the famous canvasses there. Of course this is what we all had come for, a glimpse of the genius of these great masters; Monet, Mondrien, Picasso, Matisse, Warhol, Jackson Pollock and DeKoonig and Georgia O'Keefe. Most of the people were crowded around around 'The Waterlillies', 'Three Musicians,' 'Blue Poles' and 'The Starry Night.'

As I wandered from gallery to gallery I found myself looking into the faces of the people moving past me, almost as if I were looking for someone among them or hoping to recognize someone there. But the faces were the faces of strangers, and they looked at me in the same way as I looked at them, without so much as a word exchanged, even though one might presume that we all shared at least a love of art.

As lively as the pictures were, they seemed never to come to life out of the solemn quiet of that museum.

I walked out of one gallery filled with the admirers of Cezanne and into another in which there was only one other person beside myself. There was a single picture on one of the walls. The painging was entitled: "Madonna with Child." In the painting Mary the Madonna had a pale, serene face and she was covered in a bright, jewelled robe and wearing a golden crown that seemed to elevate her out of the realm of humanity. In her hand was a box of gold, at her feet, an orb of frankincense and a flask of myrrh. The child was standing between her knees. He looked insignificant next to those valuable treasures of man. An angel rose into the air behind her.

There was only one other man in the room with me, and he was a strange looking man; he appeared to have come from some other world or some other time. He was dressed in white robes and sandals, and he had long, brown hair with side curls hanging under his ears, with a short beard. he was wearing a yarmulka emblazoned with a bright star of David. He was looking up at the picture when I walked into the room and then he turned and looked at me.

There was a bright, almost fiery sharpness in his rather dark eyes. He seemed to look into me as much as at me. I thought he recognized me, but I had never seen him before. Then he looked back up at the painting. He looked thoughtful, even sad; maybe disappointed somehow.

Looking at the picture of the young mother made me think of my own mother, who had died of alzheimer's a few months before. I found myself remembering all the things my mother had done for me over all the years; the tomato soup and grilled cheese she used to make for me when I was sick, the sandwiches she packed into my lunchboxes, the Thanksgiving dinners and the Easter hams she cooked for many hours each year, and all the Christmas presents she wrapped for us while we were kids.

I turned to the man and asked him: "What was your mother like?"

He didn't answer right away. He looked from the painting to me, and I saw that there were tears in his eyes.

Then he said: "You people seem to think of my mother as a queen in golden robes, sitting on a throne with a crown on her head. You seem to want to take her to Rome, to show her the works of art that Michaelangelo and Davinci made of her. Don't even mention the word Rome to my mother. For my mother, that name means only suffering and death. My mother was a simple, Jewish girl, a girl with a simple, devout faith. My mother was a teenage mom. Then, when her husband died many years before she grew old, she was dependent on his family for support. She lived simply, in a little apartment.

"But let me tell you something about my mother, since you asked me about her. My mother liked to cook, and it didn't matter if you were family, a friend, or a stranger; if you walked by my mother's door and you were hungry, she would make you something to eat. And my mother made good bread; chala bread like the Jewish woman make, baked fresh every morning. It was not like the bread you people have today, that comes from a bag, cold and kneeded by machines. That bread was warm, warm from her hands as much as from the fire in the oven. It was so good we ate it plain; we didn't need butter and jelly like you people today. Sometimes if we were blessed, we had some olive oil with it. And my mother could make fish. She showed me how to grill that fish, over olive wood, with just olive oil and some garlic.

"Now I know that you have come to see these pictures, these beautiful pictures made by these famous artists, but see what you are thinking of now? This painting reminds you of your own mother. We did not have a place like this, full of beautiful pictures, where I came from. But my mother was not a queen from far away, counting her gold. She was a temple of life. And I hope you understand that it was the mother and father who loved you like my father and mother loved me, who made your life a joy, and not these pictures hanging on the wall. It is you who brighten these galleries."

And I wondered who this strange looking man could be.

* * * * *

I walked on through the galleries, studying the pictures of Toulouse LeTreque, Edvard Munch and Vincent Van Gogh. I began to notice that many of the people walking around with me among the pictures seemed similar to the troubled, garish portraits in the frames. What was strange was that I could begin to recognize some of the people; I had seen some of these people around town or at work or school. Some of them I thought I could recognize from TV: actors and actresses whose personal stories of divorce, drug abuse and alcoholism I had read in the tabloids. Then there was one of the girls who worked as a cashier in our store, the girl with the angry, frowning face and green hair; the college professor who had been rumoured to have cheated on his wife with one of his students, and lost custody of his kids; the supervisor of our company who always gave us a hard time; the black kid from the fresh air fund who spent the summers with us out on the Island, the kid who had once told us he wanted to be an artist until he got busted dealing pot; the milkman who had the affair with the lady across the street and got beaten up by her husband; and the guy next door who drove the little, Volkswagen bus, who never spoke to anyone when he came home.

I remember thinking, 'What are all these people doing in the Museum of Modern Art today? And why do they look so much like the portraits in the paintings?'

Suddenly I noticed the strange man in the robe and sandals standing there, in a corner of the gallery, watching the people jostling around him to look at the paintings. Most of them seemed to be crowded around Van Gogh's self portrait, for some reason. No-one spoke to him, even though in his outlandish garb, he stuck out like a sore thumb. Even the security guard didn't ask him who he was or what he was doing there. They appeared to not even see him, there. He looked sad. I wondered why he was looking at all these people who ignored him, instead of the art that everyone else was so preoccupied with.

I walked over to him: "Why aren't you looking at the paintings?" I asked him.

Again he looked at me with those eyes that I will never forget; dark but bright with some kind of inner fire, staring right into me. "I am not here for the art," he said.

"Then what did you come to this museum for, then?" I asked.

He looked thoughtful. He pointed to the painting everyone was crowded around, Van Gogh's self portrait. "Do you see this famous painting, that everyone seems to have come to see? Do you know who painted this picture?"

"Vincent Van Gogh," I answered.

"Do you know that this man, a very great artist to you people, who painted this painting and many other famous paintings that many others admire, shot himself?"

"It's a sad story," I said to him.

"Yes, it's a sad story," the man said. "I have not come for the pictures, but for all these sad stories of the artists who painted them, and the people who see these sad stories in themselves. This picture of the prostitute that this man Toulouse LeTreque painted, and this screaming madman crossing the bridge which was painted by Edvard Munch.

"These people who have come here to look at these paintings feel much like the artists who painted them. I have come for them, to feel their pain, to take it away from them for good, to wipe the tears from their eyes, so that they can feel like the Starry Night, or like the peaceful moment of these Waterlillies at sunset."

"But how can you do that?" I asked him.

He turned and looked up at a painting of a crucifix hanging on the wall.

* * * * *

I walked into another gallery, this one hung with street scenes of every day Parisien neighborhoods filled with everyday suburban passers by. There were pictures of children playing, lovers sitting in gardens, people picknicking in a park, girls picking flowers, the somber parade of a funeral leaving a church.

Again I was struck by how similar they looked to the suburban patrons of the art museum looking at the paintings. One of them seemed to have forgotten the pictures and sat on a bench staring into a cellphone with a frown on his face. The girl with the green hair was there again, wandering around the room as if she was looking for someone. The security guard leaned against the wall, as if wishing he were somewhere else. An art student shook his head at the impossibility of ever reaching the same level as this lofty, venerated talent.

The strange man in the robe and sandals was there again, standing in the background with his hands clasped in front of him. I noticed then that he had scars on the backs of his hands. He seemed to be looking through the crowd at me, with that penetrating gaze, as if he wanted to talk to me, and I walked over to him. "What's happened to your hands?" I asked him.

"I had them pierced for the people you see here," he said, "And the artists who painted all this beauty and pain."

"Why?" I asked him.

"Because I don't want them to be trapped here, fastened to the walls like these paintings, doomed to only look at beauty, or never see beyond pain." There was a sad look in his eyes, but also something of a spark of hope, as he stared steadily at me.

I wondered if he expected something of me. I felt I should say something, but I didn't know what to say, so I asked him: "Why are they doomed to this museum forever?"

"They cannot see the way out," he said softly, almost under his breath. "They are all looking for the way out, even though they thought they came to look at these paintings. But they can't find it."

"Where is the way out?" I asked him.

"I am the way out," he told me, his voice tinged with disappointment, as he watched two young men walking past him arguing.

"If you are the way out," I said, "Then why don't you tell them that you are here? Why can't they see you? Why can't you talk to them?"

He shook his head. "I cannot talk to them," he said, "Because they do not believe that I am here." He looked straight into my eyes as if he knew what I was feeling, what I knew and what I should do. "Some of them do not even know who I am."

"I don't understand," I said. "Why don't you tell them?"

"My friend," he said to me gently, his dark eyes brightening, "It is for you to tell them who I am. It is for you to tell them that I am here."

* * * * *

All around us in the gallery all sorts of people seemed engaged in all the little, hard moments of life we often try to overlook or forget, but that seem to weigh on us as we go on in our lives like a ball and chain dragged by our ankles. The man who never spoke to us when he came home was on one side of the gallery, arguing with his wife about something, waving his hands and raising his voice. A boy was tugging on his mother's hand as she stared into her cellphone, crying that he was hungry. The demanding supervisor who always gave us a hard time was complaining to a curator about the quality of the collection of paintings. The girl with the green hair and grim face was walking around asking people if they had seen her mother.

The strange man with the pierced hands and robe watched them as they walked by or went about their business as if he was not even there. Nobody noticed the scars on his hands, or the scars across his forehead. No-one asked him who he was or what had happened to him.

"I still don't understand," I said to him. "If these people can't see you or talk to you unless I tell them that you are here, and if you are not here for the art, then why are you here? What are you waiting for?"

"Do you see that man?" he said softly to me, pointing to our difficult, demanding supervisor, complaining to the curator.

"Yes," I said.

"You know him, yes?"

"He is our boss. He is very hard to work for and he always gives us a hard time."

The man in the yarmulka looked straight into my eyes. "Did you know that his son has a problem with drug addiction? Did you know that his son is in what you people call 'rehab' for the second time?"

"No," I answered, shifting my weight from foot to foot, uncomfortabley squirming. The man never took his eyes off me. He seemed to be reading my thoughts and feelings as I stood there.

"And that man there," he said, pointing to the man arguing with his wife, "Do you know that his wife wants to divorce him, and that they will divide their children between them, from now on?"

"That's terrible," I said, trying to sound sympathetic. But the strange man kept his piercing eyes on me, as if waiting for me to say something more, or do something.

"Now I must tell you," he said to me, "This is why I told you that it is for you to tell these people who I am and that I am here. You came into this museum to look at these pictures, these pictures of the souls of people in the joys and pains of life. But what is really important, to look at these pictures, or to help these people understand who I am and that I can wipe the tears from their eyes, so they no longer have to celebrate these moments of pain? So that they can live in the light of the Starry Night? These are the people you work with, people you know, people who are like brothers and sisters to me."

"I don't know if I can do this..." I started to say, looking around the room at these angry and upset people in the midst of their problems.

The man's eyes seemed to shine. "Do you see that young woman there?" He pointed to the girl with the green hair who was looking for her mother. "Do you know that she has not spoken to her own mother for years? Do you know what pain she is in?"

"No," I said sheepishly, closing my eyes.

The man went on talking, and I opened my eyes. "This is why I have come to this museum," he said, waving his arm at all the people. "This is why you have come here, and why I have told you that it is for you who have come here today with me, to tell these people who I am and that I am here."

"If I tell them that you are here," I asked him, as if trying to make myself sound willing to help him, "What is it that you can do for them?"

I saw then that he had something like a cellphone in his hand. "I have that young woman's mother right here," he said excitedly, smiling.