Bob Dylan, I think we can all agree as a songwriter, doesn't fit into a neat box.
He started life really being a folk singer, Woody Guthrie type, you know, following in those steps,
and then R&B and the blues and rock, Christian music and then back to rock. And he,
I think just glides among different genres. And he does the same thing with his artwork.
From Mondo Scripto, which is almost Talmudic in its detailed calligraphy, must have taken forever
to write out his lyrics and then to create works of art that accompany those lyrics,
to his more contemporary painting. And much of his painting it defies chronology. Even he said that.
He doesn't really quite remember when or where he had made some of these works of art.
They're not of a particular time or place. They're kind of America. Some of it you see classic sign
for a motel, cafe, the kind of signs that you see when you take a road trip across the US.
You can't quite remember which state you're in. That's what he really captures.
And I think that's why we love Bob Dylan. He is timeless.
I'm Jordanna Pomeroy, director of the Patricia and Philip Frost Art Museum FIU. I'm thrilled
to have this exhibition retrospectrum, Bob Dylan. It is the debut of his artwork in the USA. He is
obviously a lover of words. He's crafted words his whole life and thought about meaning. It doesn't
really mean anything. Retrospectrum certainly sounds like a retrospective. But I think it
really goes to his adoration for, I don't know, turning over words in his mind and his mouth, and
it just probably sounded right. And that's what it means. ♪ Once upon a time you dressed so fine ♪ ♪
Threw the bums a dime in your prime ♪ ♪ Didn't you ♪ I think a lot of people, they didn't know
that Bob Dylan is also a visual artist. But those who really follow Bob Dylan know him as a visual
artist, obviously a poet, a lyricist, a singer, and a filmmaker as well. So he's really a very
much a renaissance man. We have paintings from the 90s and then all the way through the pandemic,
he was making a new series, Deep Focus, based on film stills. And those are in our grand galleries.
And it's really quite extraordinary to see them all cheek by jowl, to see them one next to the
other, because it's like a film unto itself. It feels like what is 19th century experiences of a
film that sort of surrounds you. And they are detailed, they are meticulous,
they're fun to think about, try to guess where the film still is taken from. ♪ Like a rolling stone ♪
You dive right into his series, Mondo Scripto, the writing is binary and calligraphic, and then
his draftsmanship is beautiful. So the images that accompany the lyrics don't necessarily illustrate
the lyrics. So it demands making a story on your own between what is the sort of bridge between the
image and the lyrics. And then as you go upstairs in the second floor, you're treated to quite a
large number of works that are really about his travels. I mean, at that point, he's traveling
widely through Asia. So you have a series that's based in Asia and Europe. And we see some of his
works in metal, which I think in some ways the most surprising and delightful because they are,
I think of them as like watch mechanics. You know, the sort of if you opened up the back of a watch,
they're very detailed. I like to think he scavenges for some of the metal pieces that
he puts in the work and it's like a big puzzle. And if you come into our grand galleries, you see
what I think of as Americana, the iconic signs that are really only associated with the United
States as if you're on a road trip from these coast to the west coast. This is what you see.
And then we move into his more contemporary work. He's working like crazy. I mean, these works,
Deep Focus, are based on film stills. And these are the works that he's been really producing,
well, I'm assuming kind of quietly, you know, as sequestered as we've all been
during the pandemic. So you really see a lot of different work.
I think he's somebody who probably doesn't sleep a lot. And so all I can say is that the hours in his
day must, his day must just look a lot different. I imagine he just wakes up and just starts to
create something new. But I think he has a very rich Rolodex in his mind of artwork and especially
by iconic American artists like Edward Hopper, the Ashcan School, and you know, the Ashcan
school and Bob Dylan. And he, you know, a lot of artists don't want to talk about who were their
great influences. I think sometimes artists find that a painful subject. You know, they're crafting
their own path. They're carving their own place. It's not that they don't like to pay homage.
But they are finding their own voice. And I think his voice is unique, but definitely American in a
certain sense. And that's where you see the Edward Hopper and the Ashcan School I think most clearly.
I think his work is very relatable. He doesn't like to be boxed in. But what he offers is his
song writing and now his visual art and in the sense that's a piece of himself. And so
we can kind of better understand this, really this icon, this genius of the 20th and 21st centuries.