It is easy to sit back and enjoy Herb and Dorothy, the documentary about the Vogels, as a portrait of a couple of New York City characters, the kind Joseph Mitchell wrote about. They're elderly, they dress funny, they have New York accents, they live in a cluttered one-bedroom, rent-controlled apartment with cats and turtles, and they have a secret life the sharpest What's My Line? panel would never discover. You wouldn't know it from the look of them, but this cute man (who never finished high school) and woman (a librarian) are obsessed with collecting art, mostly the work of post Pop New York artists. They used his modest post office salary to buy art and her city government salary to pay the bills, and thanks to an intuitive and profound understanding of what is good and what will be considered good in the future, the Vogels amassed what is probably the most important private art collection from that era in the country.
You will also be moved by their generosity of spirit and their lack of monetary greed. They donated their priceless art collection, donated!, to the National Gallery, because they liked that that museum didn't sell off work in its collection, was free to the public and government run--as lifelong government employees, this made them happy. They never sold a work of art, and if they wanted to live a life of luxury, or a life of comfort, even, because their life doesn't look very comfortable in that crowded apartment of theirs, they could have sold a Chuck Close and bought a swanky home in the suburbs. But that isn't their desire. They just wanted to have the art, and they liked the process of attaining the art. Befriending up-and-coming artists and staying friends with them throughout their careers was as important as purchasing art from them. (Make no mistake, the Vogels are greedy for art, and I suspect they know how to drive a hard bargain.)
But I was most struck by something that became evident while the Vogels walked through The Gates in Central Park. They discuss Christo’s work and marvel at his determination--The Gates did take something like 16 years to go from concept to reality. "To think it is one thing, but to do it is something else." They are seemingly oblivious to the fact that what they have done is as remarkable, if not more so. Over the course of more than 40 years they collected about three tractor trailers full of art. It was a singular focus (they have no children; the art works are their children), but unlike Christo and Jean-Claude, who had a goal--make The Gates a reality--to them, collecting art was kind of like breathing, but a special breathing, breathing with a passion. Sure, buying the art and looking at it or just knowing that they owned a piece gave them joy, but mostly, it was simply a passion they followed unquestioningly.
We should all be so lucky to have such a passion. And I suspect we are. And that's why I love this moment of the film; seeing the Vogels' blind spot may just inspire the viewer to discover that they too are doing work that is vital and monumental. Maybe it doesn't get the P.R. that Christo’s work does, but it's just as important.
Herb and Dorothy is currently in select theaters. It was funded in part by ITVS and I suspect it will air on PBS's Independent Lens at some point. Look for it.
