Artists

What About The “Art Strike”? It’s Not So Simple

A group of artists, critics and gallerists have called for an art strike on Jan. 20. Inauguration Day. Names like Cindy Sherman, Barbara Kruger, Julie Mehretu, Richard Serra, Joan Jonas and Lucy Lippard have asked for a shutdown of museums, galleries, studios, etc. (see picture) They have every right to do so, and I have no quibbles if they want to. These are extraordinary times.

But I do quibble with the idea that museums should join in–at least public museums. It’s going to be counter-productive in the long run. Museums will need public support in the four years–the broader the better.

Besides, it sends the wrong message. If the arts are to be inclusive, museums have to welcome people of all ideologies. Otherwise, they are just as bad as the other side.

Jonathan Jones, in The Guardian, makes other points, including:

…the notion that museums will help anything by closing their doors, or students will scare middle America into its senses by cutting art classes, tastes not of real hard-fought politics but shallow radical posturing by some very well-heeled and comfortable members of a cultural elite. These eminent artists come across as people who are used to being listened to without having to try. Worse, there is something nostalgic about the petition, as of this were the 1960s all over again.

Rather than close their doors, they should open them wide. Take the high road.

In fact, I admire what Adam Weinberg, the director of the Whitney Museum, told the press last night at a press reception (also a nice touch)–the Whitney will remain open on Jan. 20 and it will be free.

Perhaps others, if they are in a fit fiscal position, might follow his lead.

The Art Emerging In A New(ish) Museum

Come along with me to see a new museum filled with contemporary art that, for the most part, hasn’t been overexposed.

My recent trip took me to Morocco, where I was pleased to find a museum of modern and contemporary art in Rabat, the capital. It’s just two years hold, named after King Mohammed VI, the current ruler. If you can read French, take a look at its website. The building, whose design reflects a modernized traditionalism, is quite handsome–spacious and airy, with nicely sized white-walled galleries on two floors. There’s a tea room and a bookstore, too.

The permanent collection resides on the second floor, and consists (I believe–I did not check every label) of works by Moroccan artists–many of whom have, btw, succeeded on the global markets. There’s a beautiful triptych called Converging Territories (2005) (below) by Lalla EssaydiÂ , who lives in the U.S. now and is represented in New York byÂ Edwynn Houk Gallery. The photo doesn’t do the piece justice, though–there’s writing throughout the background, for example, and I clipped the edges of the large-format work. She is one of the best-known artists on view here, I would guess.

I found many other works to be very appealing if not revelatory.

The first floor, however, was more interesting to me. Its galleries housed a special exhibition of works by women (including two more by Essaydi). Here’s a look at one of the galleries with a variety of works.

One provocative artist is Fatima Mazmouz, who examines the female body, and in a couple of works here, the pregnant woman in the Arabic culture–these are, I’d guess, pretty transgressive for part of the audience.

There were both figurative and abstract works among the others in the show, too. One I liked is by Najia Mehadji titled Sublimation No. 1.

It was quite fun to see this budding museum; I hope it gets many, many visitors.

Comes the Revolution!

Don’t let that word “revolution” scare you this tense Election Day. I’m not talking about the USA. I’m referring to the wonderful exhibition now on view at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Paint the Revolution: Mexican Modernism, 1910-1950. It’s a massive show–more than 280 works by 70 artists, filling several galleries.

Tamayo's "Lion and Horse" — Tamayo’s “Lion and Horse”

And it’s more than good, as I write in a review that is published today in The Wall Street Journal, Fight for Creative Culture: Political upheavals paralleled bursts of artistic progesss.

The museum says that the last time a museum organized such a sweeping show of Mexican modernism was 1943, and then, too, it played the role of a benign HernÃ¡n CortÃ©s, revealing “uncharted territory” to the established orders. But, as the show documents. Mexican modernists played an important role in the development of international modernism. We know it, maybe, but we don’t know it well, and we don’t know too many names beyond the big five–Rivera, Kahlo, Tamayo, Orozco andÂ Siqueiros.

Paint the RevolutionÂ shows them off very well, and addsÂ many more to their ranks. I wish I could have dropped more names into the review. I mentioned eight other Mexicans (if the link above does not work, try this one, which will), plus a few Americans who worked in Mexico. But if I had had more room, I certainly would have cited Dr. Atl, especially for his wonderful self-portrait; Angel Zarraga, for Cubist works including the funny “Monkey Painter”; Roberto Montenegro–for several works; Adolfo Best Maugerd, for his self-portrait and “The Powdered Woman,” among others; and many more.

1158px-saturnino_herran_-_the_offering_-_google_art_project — Saturnino HerrÃ¡nâ€™s â€œThe Offeringâ€

The entire photography section is terrific, a small but splendid array, a mix of Mexicans and foreigners who moved there, that shows the range of modernism and that is, lead exhibition curator Matthew Affron said, a microcosm of the entire exhibition.

Affron, the museum’s Curator of Modern Art, headed a team that included Mark A. Castro, assistant curator of European Painting, Dafne Cruz Porchini, a postdoctoral researcher at Colegio de MÃ©xico, Mexico City; and Renato GonzÃ¡lez Mello, Director of the Institute for Aesthetic Investigation, National Autonomous University of Mexico.

Kahlo's "The Suicide of Dorothy Hale" — Kahlo’s “The Suicide of Dorothy Hale”

There are a lot of memorable artworks in this show and many good or interesting works, too. I’m posting some of each (you can decide for yourselves).

Rivera's "Dance in Tehuantepec" — Rivera’s “Dance in Tehuantepec”

4a5326bd4ff8cfcf7e298a22973db178 — MartÃnez’s “Poverty Vendors”

Zarraga's "Monkey Painter" — Zarraga’s “Monkey Painter”

Dr. Atl's "Self-Portrait with Popocatepetl" — Dr. Atl’s “Self-Portrait with Popocatepetl”

And many more. The museum has a slide show of several other pictures here.

A Star Turn for Giovanni di Paolo

Ever since I first saw Giovanni di Paolo’s Â TheÂ Creation and the Expulsion from the Paradise in the Robert Lehman Collection at the Metropolitan Museum*, I’ve been a huge fan of the Sienese painter. That wall of six of his works at the Art Institute of Chicago, which I visited again in August, is also stunning. As are the works I’ve seen by him at museums like The Walters in Baltimore.

That’s why, when I saw a while back that the Getty Museum was reuniting parts of the Branchini Altarpiece–the central panel of which I had seen at the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena–in an exhibition called Shimmer of Gold: Giovanni di Paolo in Renaissance Siena–I knew I wanted to see it. Thankfully, The Wall Street Journal agreed, and my review of the exhibition went online Wednesday and will be in Thursday’s paper.

It’s a glorious show, and I loved speaking about the works in it with curatorsÂ Yvonne Szafran, the Getty’s senior conservator of paintings conservation, andÂ Davide Gasparotto, a senior paintings curator at the Getty. The third curator,Â Bryan C. Keene, an assistant curator in the manuscripts department, wasn’t available when I visited.

They told me a fascinating tidbit that I looked up in the Museum of Modern Art’s newly available exhibitions archive–and discovered more details. In 1936, when Alfred H. Barr, Jr., the first director of the Museum of Modern Art, organized an exhibit called “Fantastic Art, Dada and Surrealism,” he included Giovanni’s “Saint Nicholas of Tolentino Saving a Shipwreck” (1457) from the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

You can see what I discovered in the MoMA exhibitions archive* here. Â The catalogue, checklist and press releases are all there for anyone to access at any time, day or night.Â It’s a fabulous resource.

And the Getty exhibition, a small show that nonetheless involved several loans from European museums I’ve never visited, certainly added to my visceral appreciation of Giovanni.

Photo Credits: Courtesy of the Getty–the Madonna at right and a predella panel at left

*I consult to a foundation that supports these institutions and, specifically, at MoMA, the exhibitions archive.

What Makes A Good Collector? And What Is Craft vs. Art? Two Stories

Usually, the most noteworthy collectors–aside from those, like J. Paul Getty, with the wherewithal to buy anything they want–are the ones that go their own way, that collect a field that’s out-of-fashion but full of worthy artworks. Usually, they both self-educate andÂ they seek expert advice.

One such person is Walter O. Evans (at right), a retired surgeon who began purchasing works by African-American artists back in the late 1970s. He now owns one of the best such collections in the United States. Perhaps you have heard about him–part of his collection was on tour. The Walter O. Evans Collection of African American Art,”Â customized for each venue and managed by Evans’sÂ wife, Linda, visited about 50 museums between 1991 andÂ 2012.

EvansÂ also donated about 60 works to the Savannah College of Art and Design in 2005, though his trove still numbers in the hundreds. As I wrote:

Evans now owns works by virtually every important black artist up to and including Modernism icons Romare Bearden, Elizabeth Catlett, Archibald Motley, Robert Scott Duncanson, Mary Edmonia Lewis, Henry Tanner, Beauford Delaney, Alma Thomas, Norman Lewis, Benny Andrews, and Aaron Douglas.

IÂ saw a number of them myself earlier this year, when I visited his townhouse in Savannah’s historic district on assignment for Traditional Home magazine, whichÂ published my article in its October issue. More than one person I spoke with called the collectionÂ “museum-quality.” One of his works by Jacob Lawrence is at left.

Evans is an interesting guy, a pioneer in more ways than one. You can read my article about him and see more of his art collection here.

In the same issue of Traditional Home, I write about a quilt artist named Victoria Findlay Wolfe. She helped start the modern quilt movement, and is also has a very interesting story. She started as a painter and she draws inspiration from artists including Matisse.

Furthermore, for those of you who prefer to think aboutÂ quilts as craft rather thanÂ art, she has another art connection. That “Findlay” in her name refers to her husband Michael, Findlay, a director at Acquavella Galleries and author of The Value of Art.

You can read her story and see some of her quilts here.

Photo Credits: Courtesy of Traditional Home

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