Brooks to Picasso: 'Art hurts'

Chicago is celebrating two grand anniversaries this year: 1) Gwendolyn Brooks's centennial and 2) Pablo Picasso's iconic sculpture in Daly Plaza turns the big five-oh. Our friends at DNAinfo remind us that Brooks and Picasso (or at least his sculpture) were brought together fifty years ago when Brooks wrote a poem to commemorate the statue's installation. We'll give you a glimpse of what Brooks was attempting in the poem, and then allow you head over to DNAinfo to read the poem in full:

In an 1969 interview, Brooks talked about her poem. In her book "Conversations with Gwendolyn Brooks," she responded to interviewer George Stavros' question of whether the poem represented her "feelings about art and the position of the poet."

GWENDOLYN BROOKS: "Well, in the 'Chicago Picasso,' first of all, I was asked to write a poem by the mayor of Chicago about that statue, and I hadn't seen it. I had only seen pictures of it, and the pictures looked very foolish, with those two little eyes and the long nose. And I don't know a great deal about art myself; I haven't studied it. So I really didn't feel qualified to discuss what Picasso was doing or had intended to do. So I decided to handle the situation from the standpoint of how most of us who are not art fanciers or well educated in things artistic respond to just the word art, that it's not a huggable thing, as I said here: 'Does man love Art? Man visits Art.' ...  And we visit it, we pay special, nice, precise little calls on it. But those of us who have not grown up with or to it perhaps squirm a little in its presence. We feel that something is required of us that perhaps we aren't altogether able to give. And it's just a way of saying, 'Art hurts.' Art is not an old shoe; it's something that you have to work in the presence of. It urges voyages. You just can't stay in your comfortable old grooves. You have to extend yourself. And it's easier to stay at home and drink beer."