New York’s Museum of Sex

Today is Valentine’s Day, so what to write, what to write? There’s Fragonard’s Progress of Love series at the Frick, commissioned by Madame du Barry, Louis XV’s last mistress, in the early 1770s. It’s bouncy and lush and gauzy, with a lovely young couple flush with romance. It’s suitable. There’s a dark cloud, though. Madame du Barry rejected Progress of Love. We don’t know why. Too fluffy? Too unreal? Du Barry, after all, had actually worked in a brothel and knew hard knocks before she met the king. Heck, Ethel Merman played her in Du Barry Was a Lady. And the romance between Madame du Barry and the king was cooling, from love to “Friendship, Friendship, Just the Perfect Friendship.” Write about chocolate? Making it is an art. Flowers? Growing them is an art, as is arranging them.