Displaying items by tag: Modernism

Once derided as a slavish admirer of Renoir, the painter and illustrator William Glackens is among the most intriguing and underestimated participants in the first wave of 20th-century American modernism. That perception is confirmed by the enlightening and overdue, if still deficient, survey of his dappled canvases and dazzling drawings at the Parrish Art Museum here. It should be required viewing for anyone interested in the period.

Glackens, who was born in Philadelphia in 1870 and educated at that city’s prestigious Central High School, was briefly affiliated with a loose group of urban-conscious realist painters known first as the Eight and later as the Ashcan School.

 The Cranbrook Art Museum in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, is currently hosting “Paul Evans: Crossing Boundaries and Crafting Modernism,” the first comprehensive survey of the designer’s work. Paul Evans (1931-1987), a leading figure in the midcentury American studio furniture movement, used metal to create stunning sculptural pieces that defied what everyday objects looked like and how they were made.

“Crossing Boundaries and Crafting Modernism” features 68 works spanning Evans’ varied career. Evans, who studied at the Cranbrook Academy of Art, a leading institution of American contemporary design, began working with metal in the 1950s. During this time, Evans shared a studio with fellow furniture designer Phillip Lloyd Powell in New Hope, Pennsylvania. The pair often collaborated on pieces that melded Powell’s wood prowess and Evans’ metalworking skills. A number of objects from this period are included in the exhibition.

Beginning on July 12, Neutra VDL Studio and Residences, the former Los Angeles home of the Austrian-American architect Richard Neutra, will replace all mid-century furnishings with their Cold War-era counterparts from Eastern Europe. The objects, including chairs, tables, lamps, phones, pictures, books, and cooking utensils, will be provided by the nearby Wende Museum, which is devoted to preserving the Cold War artifacts of Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. Although the two design cultures share aesthetic tendencies, they have often been examined separately. The provocative installation, titled “Competing Utopias,” will present modern design from the East and West in a unifying context.

According to the Neutra House, the installation is meant to raise more questions than it could possibly answer. For example, Why do design objects from the East fit so seamlessly, often invisibly, into a high design mid-century home from the West? The exhibition looks at the Cold War era from a broader perspective than the typical political lens, focusing on the global competition that took place to see who would define what modernity looked like and how it functioned.

From quick sketches to watercolors and finished masterpieces, works by artists such as Eugène Delacroix, Jacques-Louis David, Edgar Degas, Edouard Manet, Paul Cézanne, Vincent van Gogh, Egon Schiele, Piet Mondrian and Pablo Picasso are brought together in Mind’s Eye: Masterworks on Paper from David to Cézanne (on view through October 26, 2014). Organized by the Dallas Museum of Art, the exhibition features more than 120 works on paper—many of which have never been exhibited publicly—by 70 artists. Drawn in part from the DMA’s collection, but with significant loans from private collections in North Texas, Mind’s Eye, offers new insights into the working methods and practices of these artists, providing an intimate view of their approach to art making while also presenting the drawings and watercolors as finished works of art in their own right.

“One of the goals of the Dallas Museum of Art is to encourage collecting within the community. There is no better example of how to do this than to highlight the Museum’s graphic holdings together with those that have been assembled in private homes throughout our area,” said Maxwell L. Anderson, The Eugene McDermott Director of the DMA. “Mind’s Eye: Masterworks on Paper from David to Cézanne presents a rich and fascinating array of works in various media by artists from the Austro-Hungarian, Belgian, British, Dutch, French, German, Spanish and Swiss schools, spanning nearly 150 years—from the French Revolution to the dawn of modernism.”

In fall 2015, the Minneapolis Institute of Arts will present “Eugène Delacroix and Modernity,” the first major exhibition to explore the legacy of the celebrated French painter, an influential trailblazer and one of the first modern masters of the form. The exhibition takes Cézanne’s observation that “we all paint in Delacroix’s language” as its starting point to reveal how Delacroix revolutionized French painting for the next generation of artists, leaving an indelible mark on Matisse, Van Gogh, Gauguin, Renoir, Degas, Monet, and others. The MIA is partnering with the National Gallery, London, for this unprecedented survey, featuring important works from the museums’ collections as well as rarely seen works from private collections. The exhibition opens at the MIA on October 18, 2015, and runs through January 10, 2016. It is on view at the National Gallery, London, February 10 through May 15, 2016.

By the time of his death, Eugène Delacroix (1798–1863) was one of the most revered artists in Paris and a hero of the avant-garde. By challenging the status quo by pushing the boundaries of the “Grand Style” of painting into the realm of modernism, he paved the way for younger artists. His large-scale paintings were the first to use the expressive, improvisational markmaking of the Impressionists, the dreamlike allusion of the Symbolists, and the bold colors of Morocco made famous 80 years later by Renoir and Matisse.

From the Village to Vogue: The Modernist Jewelry of Art Smith features 26 pieces including silver and gold jewelry created by African American artist, Art Smith, as well as select pieces by his contemporaries. Inspired by surrealism, biomorphism, and primitivism, Smith was one of the leading modernist jewelers of the mid-twentieth century. His work is dynamic in both size and form.

Design Miami/Basel, a global forum focused on collectible design, offered select guests a sneak peek of its offerings during a VIP preview on Monday, June 16. The event, which takes place alongside Art Basel in Switzerland, is open to the public from Tuesday, June 17 through Sunday, June 22.

Bringing together collectors, gallerists, designers, and curators, Design Miami/Basel celebrates design culture and commerce through museum-quality exhibitions, educational lectures, and commissions from the world’s top emerging and established designers and architects. The marketplace portion of the fair features celebrated design galleries from around the world exhibiting furniture, lighting, and objets d’art. Offerings range from 18th- and 19th-century antiques to early Modernist objects and contemporary design.

Whitney Museum of American Art Director Adam Weinberg spoke with The Chronicle while visiting the Bay Area for the opening of "Legacy: The Emily Fisher Landau Collection," a major show at the San Jose Museum of Art of contemporary works on loan from the New York museum.

Like the Robert and Jane Meyerhoff Collection sampled in "Modernism from the National Gallery of Art" at the de Young Museum in San Francisco, the Landau Collection includes works by many names considered safe, if not already canonical: Andy Warhol, Cy Twombly, James Rosenquist, Willem de Kooning, Jasper Johns and Agnes Martin.

As it approaches its 25th anniversary, the Wexner Center for the Arts is set to feature a variety of works this fall, as well as give visitors a peek into the personal gallery of Les Wexner and his wife, Abigail.

Beginning Sept. 21 and running through Dec. 31, the Wexner Center is set to celebrate its 25th anniversary with “Transfigurations: Modern Masters from the Wexner Family Collection,” displaying works from the art collection of the businessman and Ohio State alumnus.

Pieces to be on view include original masterworks of artists Pablo Picasso, Alberto Giacometti and Jean Dubuffet, who are known virtuosos in their respective art movements, including cubism, expressionism, surrealism and modernism.

Firefighters in Scotland were able to salvage most of the Glasgow School of Art from a fire last week, except for its iconic library located at the top of the building, said Duncan McKenzie, a press officer for the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service on Monday. The cause of the fire, which began on Friday and was extinguished a day later, remained unknown, he said.

“Ninety percent of the structure remains viable and firefighters recovered around 70 percent of the items inside,” Mr. McKenzie said.