Real Clear Arts

Judith H. Dobrzynski on Culture

Why Tanzania And Portland, Maine Suddenly Mix

MedicinecontainerIn tomorrow’s Wall Street Journal, I review an exhibition that opened at the Portland Museum of Art on Saturday: Shangaa: Art of Tanzania. It is, according to its curator, Gary van Wyk, the first exhibition in the United States devoted to Tanzanian art, and one of the few period. This material has been shown in Germany, and that’s about it. History is the culprit, as I explain in the article, headlined Objects that Amaze.

But what’s it doing in Maine? Maine is the whitest state in the country, with 96.9 percent of its population described as white in the 2010 census. So many museums nowadays are programming to their populations — a trend I have some qualms about — that it seems a lot contrarian, if not a little odd. (Ok, it’s true, I learned someway into the story that this show originated at Queensborough Community College in New York City’s most-diverse borough.)

MaskHeheBut always there’s a reason — and in this case it is a fortuitous personal connection. The Portland museum’s director, Mark Bessire, was a Fulbright Fellow in Tanzania. He and his wife, Aimee, who now teaches courses in African art and culture, African photography, contemporary art and history of photography at Bates College in Maine, lived there for two years. As van Wyk, a transplanted Zimbabwean who at first specialized in South African art, tells the tale, in 1997 he commissioned Aimee as well as Mark to share their experiences for The Heritage Library of African Peoples, which he edited. That’s when he first encountered Tanzanian art, quickly realizing that it was understudied, underexposed, and therefore underappreciated.

Through Shangaa, he convinced me. I’m posting a couple of pictures here of items that I don’t talk about in the review — because the notables were too numerous to mention.

But there’s a larger point here, about museum programming: what if the museum director had not lived in Tanzania? Would this show ever have been seen in Maine? I hope this exhibit does so well that museums learn that they can mimimize, rather than emphasize, identity exhibitions and identity acquisitions. I wish the public shows them that if it’s great art, it doesn’t matter which tribe, which nationality, which race created it.

I also hope that there are more such serendipitous connections out there, bringing art to places it might not “logically” go.

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Photo credits: Courtesy of the Portland Museum of Art

 

Renaissance Sculpture, And Palazzo Strozzi, Get More Credit

Regular readers of RCA know that I love Old Master sculpture, and they may perhaps remember that a couple of times in the past I have lauded the Palazzo Strozzi in Florence for its excellent exhibitions. Now those two threads have come together, as the Palazzo is currently showing The Springtime of the Renaissance: Sculpture and the Arts in Florence, 1400 – 1460. And here is a payoff: the show, after closing in Florence on Aug. 18, will move to the Louvre, from Sept. 23 through Jan. 6, 2014.

BEN80042That’s a pretty nice endorsement, in part because the Palazzo Strozzi doesn’t have its own curatorial staff to brainstorm or organize, but rather relies on hiring outsiders. In this case, that meant Beatrice Paolozzi Strozzi, director of the Bargello, and Marc Borman, curator of sculpture at the Louvre. (Their names need no explanation or embellishment.)

The premise of this exhibition is that the “miracle” of the Renaissance occurred predominantly through sculptural masterpieces. Among the artists whose works are on view are Ghiberti, Donatello, Lippi, Brunelleschi and Mino da Fiesoli. It has ten sections, starting with “The Legacy of the Fathers” and ending with “From City to Palace: The New Patrons of the Arts.” Loans, meanwhile came from all over — the V & A, the Bode, the NGA in Washington, in particular.

But I won’t repeat what is in the website material; it’s here.

The Palazzo Strozzi excels in putting a lot of material online, including, in this case, the wall texts, all 48 pages (one question: why green?), an exhibition walk-through — and other things (layout, conservation activities for this show, etc.) that you’ll see at the link above. Speaking of conservation, one of the most significant initiatives here was the restoration of Donatello’s St. Louis of Toulouse, 1425, from Santa Croce (pictured here).

Now, a couple of these pieces were in the Metropolitan Museum’s The Renaissance Portrait from Donatello to Bellini last year, I think. I am particularly thinking of Marietta Strozzi by Desiderio da Settignano, but that one is certainly explainable. And the Met show included 160 items, with more paintings than sculpture, I think — this one has 140 pieces, all sculpture.

I wish I were there to see it, but I all have is the next best thing — the catalogue, which comes in at 550 pages. It’s going to keep me busy for some while.

Photo Credit: Courtesy of Museo dell l’Opera di Santa Croce 

Philbrook Launches A Satellite With High Hopes

Sometimes, but not all that often, a museum satellite does make sense. Later this week, we’ll see the opening of one that does. Friday is opening day for Philbrook Downtown, an industrial space in the Brady Arts District of Tulsa that the museum is turning into a new arts center.

PhilbrookDowntownThe Philbrook itself, a villa built in the 1920s on a 23-acre site, makes for a lovely house museum, with spacious rooms and wide corridors. I visited about seven years ago, and was impressed with the overall feel (though I don’t remember any masterpieces). And I loved the grounds and garden.

But it’s true that modern, contemporary art and Native American art probably don’t look their best there. They’ll go into the new building, for which architect Richard Gluckman has taken an early 20th-century industrial warehouse and turned it into an art center of 30,000 sq. ft. Contemporary art and new media will go on the first floor, and Native American art will go upstairs. Near those galleries will go the Eugene B. Adkins Study Center, which “integrates Philbrook’s outstanding artwork, special collections from the  Museum’s H. A. & Mary K. Chapman Library, and Eugene Adkins’s personal archives.” I’m not sure what that means, but we’ll find out.

According to the Tulsa World:

The inaugural exhibits for Philbrook Downtown will be “Opening Abstraction” – abstract paintings and sculpture from 1945 to the present drawn from the permanent collection, on display on the first floor – and “Identity and Inspiration: 20th Century Native American Art,” which presents items from the museum’s extensive holdings of American Indian art in a uniquely thematic way in the main gallery space on the second floor.

Also on display in the smaller galleries will be “Adolph Gottlieb: Sculptor,” showcasing a little-seen facet of the work of this pioneering abstract artist, and “Sirens of the Southwest,” featuring works by influential women artists who lived and worked in this region of the country, including Georgia O’Keeffe.

The addition also gets the Philbrook, which can seem a little remote, into Tulsa’s downtown, which I recall as full of art deco buildings and touches. That is likely to mean a new audience, patrons of the existing Brady Arts District, an old section of Tulsa that claims to be “rich with cultural icons such as the Cain’s Ballroom and the Ole Lady on Brady. The buildings in the area that are still standing are primarily red brick and have been utilized as warehouses.” Over the past 20 years, it has gentrified and attracted new cultural institutions.

So while I think some satellites don’t add much more than costs — and it’s harder to manage two spaces than one — the Philbrook Downtown seems to add a new dimension and to have a real purpose, not just expansion. Let’s see how it all turns out.

Meantime, here’s what NewsOn6 in Tulsa is saying and check out the slide show with the Tulsa World article.

Photo Credit: Courtesy of the Philbrook

 

 

Koshalek’s Goal: Inflatable Bubble Redux

Some people agree with Richard Koshalek, departing director of the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, D.C., that the world could use a cultural think tank, perhaps even one in an inflatable bubble. Just see the comment from Luis R. Cancel after my last post on the Bubble idea that was killed last week by the Smithsonian. In my opinion, the idea that Koshalek described to me in 2010 was impractical and unlikely to lead to a cultural policy or change (except perhaps for the participants — as with Davos and TED talks, ideas were to be exchanged, but networking opportunities were a key reason people would have attended).

genesisTent1So it will come as good news to them that Koshalek isn’t giving up. Rather, when he leaves the Hirshhorn later this month, he plans to head to the west coast and try to sell the idea, in a diminished form, to a university in Southern California or somewhere else in the country. Jori Finkel of the Los Angeles Times got the story last week, noting that he’s “floating…a similar but less expensive pop-up space…He calls it a “Tech Tent” and describes it as a near-sister of the Bubble.”

The article continues:

There has been interest from university presidents in developing a similar concept to foster public dialogue within the academic setting, [Koshalek] said, noting that the tent would also be “packed with information technology” to serve that community.

Although he has not firmed up an architect yet, he predicted that this idea would be easier to realize than the Bubble, which had to reach 15 stories to fit into existing Hirshhorn architecture. “It would be less expensive to build and to put up and take down — also  less expensive to run because half of the participants in programs are already there on university campuses.”

I’m not sure why this idea needs a new space (a few event tents are posted here, but presumably they would not be substantial enough) — universities have plenty of places for meetings and speeches — but maybe he will pull it off.

Tent1More interesting, to me, is that Finkel asked him about an idea I first proposed here in March: LA-MOCA should retire director Jeffrey Deitch and bring in Koshalek, who ran the museum in the ’80s and 90s, as interim director until they can find a long-term managerial solution to their woes.

And what about rumors that he might take on the job of MOCA director if current head Jeffrey Deitch steps down? He said he has had conversations with museum leaders about the beleaguered institution’s next steps but would not discuss details.

“I don’t think I would return as director,” he added. “But if there’s the possibility that I could make a contribution in some other form, I would seriously consider it.”

That’s a yes, trustees.

 

 

University of Iowa Museum Takes A Step Forward

Iowa is again experiencing spring floods, which reminds us that five years have passed since the devastating 2008 deluge. Coincidentally, yesterday, the Iowa Board of Regents voted to give the University of Iowa permission to plan for a new museum to replace the one inundated in 2008.

UofIowaMuseumTo recap events: The museum’s collection, which includes Jackson Pollock’s Mural, was moved ahead of the 2008 floods and now resides at the Figge Art Museum in nearby Davenport. But when the university applied for funds from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to rebuild in a new location, away from the floodplain, the request was denied. FEMA said that since the existing — and flooded — museum (at right) wasn’t more than 50 percent damaged, it did not qualify for federal funding for a new building — just renovations. But the university could not get insurance on the collection, valued at some $500 million, in the old location on the Iowa River.

Despite many appeals, which were exhausted last March, the University could not convince FEMA to pay up.

Now, according to the Associated Press,

…The university said it will study a range of potential sites for the museum near its campus in Iowa City and options for funding the building through donations and partnerships with the private sector. While the project is still years from completion, the approval for planning by the Iowa Board of Regents gives hope that the university’s art collection of 12,400 paintings, sculptures and other objects will one day return to campus…

…[University treasurer Douglas]  True said the university plans to pursue a “public-private partnership” for the new building, which could be used to display the collection and for other purposes. He said the university would soon send out “a request for information” to developers who may have ideas on where the building could be located and how it might be financed and operated….

…The university has not set a price tag for the building, and told the regents that the amount of university funding provided for construction and operation will depend “upon the nature of the financial ownership.” In the past, the school has said a new museum could cost $75 million.

The old museum, which now serves a few other functions including those of the music school, was again evacuated this week, threatened by flooding.

 Photo Credit: Courtesy of the AP