MoMA 2020: Upcoming MoMA Exhibition Will Explore Political And Social Engagement And Radical Experimentation In Early 20th-Century Avant-Garde Art Movement

The Museum of Modern Art announced Engineer, Agitator, Constructor: The Artist Reinvented, a major exhibition that will present the political engagement, fearless and groundbreaking visual experimentation, and utopian aspirations of artists in the early 20th century. On view in The Robert B. Menschel Galleries from May 10 through September 12, 2020, Engineer, Agitator, Constructor will showcase the activities of historical avant-gardes, including galvanizing works of Dada, Bauhaus, De Stijl, Futurism, and Russian Constructivism, and highlights such figures as Aleksandr Rodchenko, Lyubov Popova, John Heartfield, and Hannah Höch.

Drawn from the Museum’s outstanding holdings from this period, the exhibition will mark a recent acquisition of more than 300 works from the Merrill C. Berman Collection, one of the most significant collections of early 20th-century works on paper in private hands. Engineer, Agitator, Constructor: The Artist Reinvented is organized by Jodi Hauptman, Senior Curator, Department of Drawings and Prints, MoMA, and Adrian Sudhalter, Consulting Curator, with Jane Cavalier, Curatorial Assistant, Department of Drawings and Prints, MoMA.

Hannah Höch, German (1889–1978). Collage (Dada). c. 1922. Original collage: cut-and-pasted papers, printed papers, ink (postmark), and postage stamp on board, 9 3/4 × 13″ (24.8 × 33 cm). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. The Merrill C. Berman Collection

The historic acquisition in 2018 from the legendary Merrill C. Berman Collection transformed MoMA’s holdings of early 20th-century avant-garde art from Soviet Russia; Weimar Germany; the newly constituted Poland, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia; the Netherlands; and Italy, securing the Museum’s position as the unmatched repository of art of this period. Containing both individual masterworks and rare contextual material, the Berman Collection at MoMA offers standout strength and unparalleled depth in its area. With its capacity to fill gaps and diversify modernism’s narratives, this acquisition is particularly urgent at this moment of the Museum’s expansion, offering exciting opportunities to share new and compelling stories, including those that are explicitly political, of the early 20th century.

John (born Helmut Herzfelde) Heartfield (German, 1891–1968). The Hand Has Five Fingers (5 Finger hat die Hand). 1928. Lithograph, 38 1/2 × 29 1/4″ (97.8 × 74.3 cm). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. The Merrill C. Berman Collection

MoMA Announces The 2022 Exhibition Just Above Midtown: 1974 To The Present, Highlighting Artists And Artworks Championed By The New York City Gallery

The Museum of Modern Art announces Just Above Midtown: 1974 to the Present, for fall 2022. It will be the first museum exhibition to focus exclusively on Just Above Midtown (JAM), an art gallery and self-described laboratory for African American artists and artists of color that was led by Linda Goode Bryant from 1974 until 1986.

Initially located in the heart of New York’s major commercial gallery district, JAM was founded by Linda Goode Bryant with the explicit purpose of “being in but not of the art world.” By the time JAM closed its doors, it had established itself as one of the most vibrant and influential alternative art spaces in New York, embracing work by abstract, self-taught artists, organizing groundbreaking exhibitions that thematized the idea of mixture in art and society, and fostering critiques of the commercialization of art.

JAM’s legacy continues today through the work of artists it supported early on in their careers, such as David Hammons, Butch Morris, Senga Nengudi, Lorraine O’Grady and Howardena Pindell. The MoMA exhibition will present works previously shown at JAM, in a wide range of mediums. Archival material and artist interventions will contextualize the experimental ethos that defined the gallery. In addition to the expansive exhibition, the project will include performances, screenings, and public programs.

Senga Nengudi performing Air Propo at JAM, 1981. Courtesy Senga Nengudi and Lévy Gorvy.

JAM’s founder worked at The Metropolitan Museum of Art and The Studio Museum in Harlem before founding Just Above Midtown at age 23. After closing the gallery, Goode Bryant dedicated herself to filmmaking, directing the critically acclaimed documentary Flag Wars (2003) with Laura Poitras. In 2009, Goode Bryant started Project Eats, an urban farming initiative for black and brown communities in New York City that, like JAM, uses existing resources to provide cultural sustenance.

Thomas J. Lax, Curator, Department of Media and Performance and organizer of the exhibition explains, “This exhibition acknowledges Just Above Midtown as the efflorescent space where many of the artists who now are recognized as the most important figures of the second half of the 20th century were first supported. This ambitious project not only historicizes JAM’s importance, but also brings its relevance to the present.”

MoMA Announces Latest Iteration Of Artist’s Choice Series, The Shape Of Shape, By Amy Sillman

The Museum of Modern Art will launch the new MoMA building(s) with Artist’s Choice: Amy Sillman—The Shape of Shape, an exhibition of nearly 75 works from MoMA’s collection selected by Sillman (b. 1955), an artist who has helped redefine contemporary painting, pushing the medium into installations, prints, zines, animation, and architecture. On view from October 21, 2019, through April 20, 2020, the exhibition includes a wide array of works, many rarely seen, installed in a unique shelving display on the fifth floor of The Jerry Speyer and Katherine Farley Building.

Installation view of Artist’s Choice: Amy Sillman—The Shape of Shape, on view at The Museum of Modern Art, New York from October 21, 2019, through April 20, 2020. © 2019 The Museum of Modern Art. Photo: Heidi Bohnenkamp

In this exhibition, Sillman presents a highly personal exploration of shape—the ever-shifting boundaries that define what and how we see—in modern art. Works spanning vastly different time periods, places, and mediums engage the eccentric forms and unpredictable contours of bodies, fragments, gestures, and shadows. Sillman examines the creation of shape as an act of subjective choice—in contrast to art made by following systems, rules, or grids, conventions that have often dominated artistic practice throughout the 20th century. The Shape of Shape is organized by Amy Sillman with Michelle Kuo, The Marlene Hess Curator, and Jenny Harris, Curatorial Assistant, Department of Painting and Sculpture.

Installation view of Artist’s Choice: Amy Sillman—The Shape of Shape, on view at The Museum of Modern Art, New York from October 21, 2019, through April 20, 2020. © 2019 The Museum of Modern Art. Photo: Heidi Bohnenkamp

The Shape of Shape includes works by a diverse range of artists, including Henri Matisse (French, 1869–1954), Ernst Ludwig Kirchner (German, 1880–1938), Louise Bourgeois (American, born France, 1911–2010), Romare Bearden (American, 1911–1988), Thomas Mukarobgwa (Zimbabwean, 1924–1999), Lois Lane (American, b. 1948), and Charline von Heyl (German, b. 1960), among many others.

Installation view of Artist’s Choice: Amy Sillman—The Shape of Shape, on view at The Museum of Modern Art, New York from October 21, 2019, through April 20, 2020. © 2019 The Museum of Modern Art. Photo: Heidi Bohnenkamp

The Shape of Shape is the 14th installment of MoMA’s Artist’s Choice series, in which a contemporary artist organizes an installation drawn from the Museum’s collection. Recent participants in the series, which was inaugurated in 1989, include Peter Fischli (2018), David Hammons (2017), Trisha Donnelly (2012), and the architects Herzog & de Meuron (2006).

Installation view of Artist’s Choice: Amy Sillman—The Shape of Shape, on view at The Museum of Modern Art, New York from October 21, 2019, through April 20, 2020. © 2019 The Museum of Modern Art. Photo: Heidi Bohnenkamp

Reflecting on her curatorial process, Sillman said, “Even though shape is everywhere, we don’t talk about it much; it’s not a hot topic in art, like color or systems. So I decided to look for works in MoMA’s collection in which shape does prevail over other considerations. I found a wealth of artworks, far too many to include here, by artists who dig into life’s surfaces, who start with physical perception rather than abstract logic. Often eccentric, poetic, or intimate, these works are like bodies that speak, operating at the hub of language and matter, signs and sensations.”

Installation view of Artist’s Choice: Amy Sillman—The Shape of Shape, on view at The Museum of Modern Art, New York from October 21, 2019, through April 20, 2020. © 2019 The Museum of Modern Art. Photo: Heidi Bohnenkamp

The Artist’s Choice Exhibition Series is made possible through The Agnes Gund Artist’s Choice Fund endowed by Iara Lee and George Gund III, Lulie and Gordon Gund, Ann and Graham Gund, and Sarah and Geoffrey Gund. Additional support is provided by the Annual Exhibition Fund.

Nordstrom Unveils New Fall 2017 Fashion Campaign

Retailer Showcases Fashion Through The Lens Of Photographer Max Farago And Director Clara Cullen

Today, Nordstrom, Inc. launched a new national brand campaign shot by photographer Max Farago with video by director Clara Cullen, which celebrates the best of fall fashion. The campaign will debut on August 7 in the U.S. and on September 4 in Canada with print, digital, social, out of home and video components.

Nordstrom Fall Campaign – Clara Cullen, Max Farago

The campaign vision and concept was developed by Olivia Kim, Vice President of Creative Projects at Nordstrom, who has set the creative tone for the retailer’s last five brand campaigns. Kim along with her creative team tapped Farago and Cullen, the husband and wife creative duo favored by the fashion world, to bring their vision to life.

Nordstrom Fall Campaign – Clara Cullen with her mother, daughter, sister + niece

The campaign features intimate and honest portraits of models and non-models alike, minimally edited and styled how people really dress to depict a modern and relevant perspective on a high-fashion campaign. The full campaign imagery and videos can be seen at Nordstrom.com/Fall2017. Highlights of brands featured in the campaign include 3.1 Phillip Lim Acne, JW Anderson, Simone Rocha, Studios adidas, Lemaire, Sophie Buhai, Alexander Wang, A.P.C., Levi’s®, Tibi, Dr. Martens, Molly Goddard, Tomorrowland, FRAME, Norse Project, Topman, Isa Arfen, Officine Generale, Ovadia & Sons, J.Crew, Vans®, Vejas, Richard Malone, and SATURDAYS NYC.

With her creative mind and unique perspective as a merchant, Kim took on the role of setting the vision for the company’s brand campaigns in Spring 2016, the retailer’s first in 15 years. Following her inaugural “See Anew” campaign, “We Are Here” from Fall 2016, and “Love, Nordstrom” from the holiday season, and the Spring 2017 campaign shot by Petra Collins. The Fall 2017 campaign marks Kim’s fifth developed for Nordstrom.

The cast includes:

Nordstrom Fall Campaign – Hailey Gates

• Actress and television journalist Hailey Gates, host of VICELAND’s series States of Undress, in which she explores geopolitics through the lens of fashion. Her work takes her to conflict zones around the world for international fashion weeks.
  

  Nordstrom Fall Campaign – The Hiplets – Camryn Taylor, Lourdes Taylor, Nia Parker, Nia Lyons

• Camryn Taylor, Lourdes Taylor, Nia Parker, and Nia Lyons, classically trained ballerinas of The Hiplet™ and the most senior dancers at the Chicago Multi-Cultural Dance Center. The Hiplet™ have appeared in a CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund Show, TEDxSanFrancisco, the New York Times and CNN. Their YouTube videos have gathered over hundreds of thousands of views.
• Homer Hans Bryant, the artistic director and founder of the Chicago Multi-Cultural Dance Center who conceived dance group phenom The Hiplet™ which showcases dancers en pointe interplaying hip-hop movements with classical styles.
  

  Nordstrom Fall Campaign – Saam Emme, Vejas Kruszewski

• Designer Vejas Kruszewski (in his collection) and Saam Emme, the creative team behind the label Vejas. Their designs redefine conventional streetwear, breaking borders and blending youth culture with studious fashion history. Vejas was awarded the LVMH Special Prize in 2016.
  

  Nordstrom Fall Campaign – Angela Goding

• Contemporary art curator Angela Goding, who has a formidable reputation in the New York art world for her instincts and distinct fashion sense.
  

  Nordstrom Fall Campaign – Jane Moseley

• Twenty-nine-year-old painter, sculptor, and model Jane Moseley, who spent six years in New York resisting the lure of the modeling industry, then became a fashion sensation after walking in Balenciaga’s fall 2016 show. She has a collection of horror-movie-inspired tattoos, and a dog, five cats, a lizard, a hedgehog and two pet rats.
  

  Nordstrom Fall Campaign – Creative Growth – Elizabeth Rangel, Tom di Mara, William Scott

• Tom di Maria, director of Creative Growth Art Center, which provides studio space, representation, instruction and opportunity for personal expression to adult artists with mental, developmental or physical disabilities. Artists from the center exhibit in museums and esteemed collections worldwide.
• Elizabeth Rangel, a self-taught artist, and designer who works in textiles and fashion.
• William Scott, a self-taught artist whose work appears in the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Oakland Museum of California.
  

  Nordstrom Fall Campaign – Ian & Marc Hundley

• Marc and Ian Hundley, artists and twin brothers. Marc creates text-based posters incorporating references to literature, lyrics, and film; he also makes furniture. Ian constructs colorful, large-scale quilts based on topographic maps.
  

  Nordstrom Fall Campaign – Hayett McCarthy

• French-born Londoner Hayett McCarthy, a former dog groomer, record-label intern, bartender and sandwich-board carrier, now a model for top fashion brands including Hermès, ACNE Studios, Burberry, COACH, and Vetements, among others.
  

  Nordstrom Fall Campaign – Ebonee Davis 

• Twenty-three-year-old Seattle native Ebonee Davis, a model, and activist advocating for more diversity in the fashion industry. In a TED Talk, she discussed her path to self-acceptance and her case for creating positive, inclusive imagery.

Philadelphia Museum of Art Receives Gift of Five Sculptures from Cy Twombly Foundation

The Philadelphia Museum of Art (2600 Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Philadelphia, PA 19130, 215-763-8100) announced the acquisition of five major sculptures by Cy Twombly, one of the foremost American artists of the 20th century. This generous gift of the Cy Twombly Foundation will make these works, which were initially selected for exhibition at the Museum in 2011 by the artist himself, a permanent part of the Museum’s collection.

Rotalla, Zurich, 1990. , Cy Twombly, American, 1928 – 2011, Bronze, 27 15/16 x 26 3/4 x 19 11/16 inches, Base (pedestal): 41 × 34 × 27 inches. © Cy Twombly Foundation

The Philadelphia Museum of Art contains one of the country’s most important collections of Cy Twombly’s works. In 1989, the Philadelphia Museum of Art became the first public institution in the United States to devote a room to the permanent display of Twombly’s art with Fifty Days at Iliam. From April 2012 until March 2016, a selection of six sculptures, including the five works recently given to the Museum, was placed on view in the Atrium Gallery of Perelman Building.

Anabasis (Bronze), 2011., Cy Twombly, American, 1928 ‑ 2011. Bronze, 46 1/16 x 19 1/8 x 19 5/16 inches, Base (pedestal): 39 × 26 1/4 × 26 inches. © Cy Twombly Foundation.

These bronzes including Untitled, Rome, 1980; Rotalla, Zurich, 1990; Untitled, Rome, 1997; Victory, conceived 1987, cast 2005; and Anabasis (Bronze), 2011, were chosen by Twombly because they complemented his masterful Fifty Days at Iliam, 1978, a suite of 10 monumental canvases that the Museum acquired in 1989. Varied in size and shape, with richly textured surfaces, these works, although fundamentally abstract, are informed by a classical sensibility and clearly reflect the artist’s sustained engagement with the art of the ancient world. On November 19, 2016, the sculptures will be placed on view in galleries 184 and 185, alongside related loans and works by Twombly from the collection.

Untitled, Rome, 1997. Cy Twombly, American, 1928 ‑ 2011. Bronze, 32 1/2 x 29 1/8 x 13 3/8 inches, Base (pedestal): 38 × 36 × 20 1/2 inches. © Cy Twombly Foundation

Timothy Rub, The George D. Widener Director and CEO, stated: “The Museum is deeply grateful to the Cy Twombly Foundation for this extraordinary gift. Like the artist’s Fifty Days at Iliam, this remarkable group of sculptures evokes the timeless themes sounded in Homer’s account of the Trojan War and offers a profound meditation on both classical history and the nature of modernity. They represent an enormously important addition to our holdings of work by this great artist, who is a key figure in the history of contemporary art. They will be united with a sixth sculpture by the artist, which is a promised gift of Keith L. and Katherine Sachs, and two important paintings from the bequest of Daniel Dietrich.”

Untitled, Rome, 1980. Cy Twombly, American, 1928 ‑ 2011. Bronze, 15 3/16 x 16 9/16 x 7 5/16 inches, Base (pedestal): 42 × 34 × 27 inches, Base (small platform): 3 1/2 × 16 × 21 1/4 inches. © Cy Twombly Foundation

Carlos Basualdo, the Keith L. and Katherine Sachs Senior Curator of Contemporary Art, said: “For more than 25 years our Museum has dedicated a gallery to the display of Twombly’s work. The generous gift of this extraordinary group of sculptures deepens even further the strong connection between Philadelphia and the work of an artist whose influence and legacy are more than ever strong and alive.”

Cy Twombly (1928–2011) was born in Lexington, Virginia. He attended the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (1947-49), Art Students League, New York (1950-51), and Black Mountain College, North Carolina (1951-52). He lived much of his later life in Rome.

Victory, Conceived 1987, cast 2005. Cy Twombly, American, 1928 ‑ 2011. Patinated bronze, 12 feet 1 inches × 35 inches × 13 1/2 inches, Base (platform): 4 1/2 × 60 × 37 inches. © Cy Twombly Foundation

UBS celebrates Art Basel Miami Beach 2016

First Major Publication About UBS’s Renowned Art Collection In Nearly A Decade – UBS Art Collection: To Art Its Freedom, Published By Hatje Cantz – Debuts At Art Basel In Miami Beach

Accompanying Display In UBS Lounge Will Showcase Seminal Works Featured In The New Ubs Publication Including Those By Artists Cy Twombly, Alex Katz, Ed Ruscha, Tracey Emin, Sarah Morris And Doug Aitken

UBS will celebrate the opening of Art Basel Miami Beach 2016 by releasing its first major print publication on the UBS Art Collection in nearly a decade. UBS Art Collection: To Art its Freedom is a 274-page, deluxe hardback overview of the UBS Art Collection that includes a text on the history of the collection written by Mary Rozell, Global Head UBS Art Collection, as well as an essay by noted scholar Dieter Buchhart. The volume features more than 200 color illustrations of works by acknowledged masters such as Cy Twombly, Alighiero Boetti, Mary Heilmann, Ed Ruscha and Christopher Wool alongside a number of the collection’s recent acquisitions and works by emerging artists.

© 2016, ProLitteris, Zurich Alex Katz, Good Morning I, 1974 (Photo: Business Wire)

This publication, which will be launched at Art Basel Miami Beach 2016, provides the inspiration for the selection of artworks on view within the UBS lounge. UBS Art Collection: To Art its Freedom will feature more than 200 color illustrations and includes the text: “UBS Art Collection: A History and a Moment” written by Mary Rozell, Global Head UBS Art Collection, which presents a history of the Collection, as well as a view to its future. The central essay by noted art historian and curator Dieter Buchhart entitled “To Art its Freedom: A Collection as Emblem of Post-postmodern Polyphony” which contextualizes the Collection within the framework of art history and makes connections among the various featured works. The title of the publication is a quotation from the famous words above the entrance to the Secession Building in Vienna, “To Every Age its Art, to Art its Freedom,” which, according to Buchhart, reflects the spirit of the UBS Art Collection – one that endures and remains relevant, independent of changing circumstances or frameworks.

UBS And Contemporary Art

UBS’s long and substantial record of patronage in contemporary art enables clients and audiences to participate in the international conversation about art and the global art world through the firm’s global art platform. In addition to the UBS Art Collection, considered one of the world’s largest and most important corporate collections of contemporary art, UBS has an extensive roster of contemporary art programs that include the firm’s long-term support for the premier international Art Basel shows in Basel, Miami Beach and Hong Kong, for which UBS serves as global Lead Partner; the Guggenheim UBS MAP Global Art Initiative with the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum; and a global exhibition tour of WOMEN: New Portraits, an exhibition of newly commissioned photographs by renowned photographer Annie Leibovitz. These activities are complemented by a number of regional partnerships with fine art institutions including the Fondation Beyeler in Switzerland, Galleria d’Arte Moderna in Milan, the Nouveau Musée National de Monaco, the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Denmark, the Deichtorhallen in Hamburg and the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia. UBS also provides its clients with insight into the contemporary art world through the free art news app UBS Planet Art, collaborations with the Swiss Institute, and the online resource Artsy, as well as through the UBS Arts Forum. (For more information about UBS’s commitment to contemporary art, visit www.ubs.com/art.)

Today the UBS Art Collection is considered one of the largest and most important corporate collections of contemporary art in the world. Comprised of various individual art collections with unique attributes that have been integrated over time through a series of mergers and acquisitions – notably between Union Bank of Switzerland, Swiss Bank Corporation and PaineWebber Inc. – the UBS Art Collection currently includes more than 30,000 paintings, works on paper, photography, sculpture, video and installations by artists from 73 countries. The vast majority of these works are displayed in more than 800 UBS offices around the world, serving as an inspiration for employees and a platform for dialogue with clients and the public.

Art News: Ocean of Images: New Photography 2015 at The Museum of Modern Art

November 07, 2015–March 20, 2016

Edward Steichen Photography Galleries, The Agnes Gund Garden Lobby, and the Bauhaus Staircase

Lele Saveri (Italian, born 1980). The Newsstand. 2013-14. Mixed medium installation, approximately 11 ft. 4 7/8″ x 11 ft. 8″ x 9 ft. 9″ (347.7 x 355.6 x 297.2 cm) overall. Courtesy the artist. ©2015 Lele Saveri

New Photography, MoMA’s longstanding exhibition series of recent work in photography and a vital manifestation of the Museum’s contemporary program, will return this fall in an expanded, biannual format. On the occasion of its 30th anniversary, New Photography is expanding to 19 artists and artist collectives from 14 countries, and includes works made specifically for this exhibition. Ocean of Images: New Photography 2015 will be on view throughout the entirety of the Museum’s Edward Steichen Photography Galleries, as well as The Agnes Gund Garden Lobby and the Museum’s Bauhaus Staircase.

Katharina Gaenssler (German, born 1974). Model for Bauhaus Staircase. 2015. Site-specific photo installation (work in progress). Laser prints and wall paper paste, 12′ 5″ × 32″ (378.5 × 975.4 cm). © Katharina Gaenssler and Barbara Gross Gallery, Munich, Germany

Since its inception in 1985, the New Photography series has introduced the work of nearly 100 artists from around the globe early in their careers, including Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Rineke Dijkstra, Rachel Harrison, and Wolfgang Tillmans. This year’s edition explores contemporary photo-based culture, specifically focusing on connectivity, the circulation of images, information networks, and communication models.

John Houck (American, born 1977). Copper Mountain. 2014. Pigmented inkjet print, 22 × 27″ (55.9 × 68.6 cm). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. The Photography Council Fund. ©2015 John Houck

Natalie Czech (German, born 1976). A Poem by Repetition by Allen Ginsberg. 2013. Three chromogenic color prints, three frames, museum glass, overall 55 3/16 × 96″ (140.1 × 243.9 cm). Courtesy Capitain Petzel, Berlin and Kadel Willborn, Düsseldorf. © 2015 Natalie Czech/VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn

Ilit Azoulay (Israeli, born 1972). Shifting Degrees of Certainty (detail). 2014. Installation view Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art. Pigmented inkjet prints, individually framed, 8′ 3″ × 29′ 7″ (251.5 × 901.7 cm) overall. Courtesy the artist, Andrea Meislin Gallery, New York, and Braverman Gallery, Tel Aviv.. ©2015 Ilit Azoulay

Probing the effects of an image-based post-Internet reality, Ocean of Images examines various ways of experiencing the world: through images that are born digitally, made with scanners or lenses in the studio or the real world, presented as still or moving pictures, distributed as zines, morphed into three-dimensional objects, or remixed online. The exhibition’s title refers to the Internet as a vortex of images, a site of piracy, and a system of networks, which is reflected in the work of the 19 included artists and collectives. Ocean of Images presents new and recent bodies of work that critically redefine photography as a field of experimentation and intellectual inquiry, where digital and analog, virtual and real dimensions cross over. Coinciding with the opening of the exhibition, MoMA will also launch an online platform housing the live archive of the New Photography series, featuring documents and images from its history.

Anouk Kruithof (Dutch, b. 1981). Subconscious Travelling (detail). 2013. Installation view Het Nederlands Fotomuseum, Rotterdam, 2013. Installation of 99 photo stickers and 5 pieces of coloured glass, each 9 1/16 × 7 1/16″ (23 × 18 cm). Photo credit: Dennis Guzzo. Art © 2015 Anouk Kruithof

Basim Magdy (Egyptian, born 1977). The Hollow Desire to Populate Imaginary Cities. 2014. Installation view Art in General, New York. 30 chromogenic color prints from chemically altered slides on metallic paper, each 13 3/8 × 20 1/16″ (34 × 51 cm). Photo: Charles Benton. Commissioned by Art in General, New York and HOME, Manchester, U.K. ©2015 Basim Magdy

THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART ACQUIRES COMPLETE SET OF AUGUST SANDER’S LANDMARK ACHIEVEMENT PEOPLE OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY, 1892–1954

The Museum of Modern Art announces the acquisition of a complete set of August Sander’s People of the Twentieth Century (1892–1954), the artist’s comprehensive visual examination of German society that remains among the most ambitious undertakings in the history of photography. Produced over a 60-year period, the 619 photographs are widely celebrated for embracing photography’s unique ability to capture detail, and its potential to evoke meaning through straightforward description. MoMA acquired the set through the generosity of the Sander family, and is the only museum to hold the body of work in its entirety.

All 619 works were printed with extreme sensitivity from the artist’s glass plate negatives by Gerd Sander, the artist’s grandson and a leading authority on his work, and Jean-Luc Differdange between 1990 and 1999 in an edition of seven. The only public exhibition of the complete project was at the 30th São Paulo Biennial, in 2012.

Sander first exhibited a selection of 100 prints in 1927 at the Cologne Art Union. Two
years later, 60 portraits from this body of work were published in the book Antlitz der Zeit (Face
of Our Time), which marked the beginning of its international recognition.

“In the history of photography there are few works that rival August Sander’s People of the Twentieth Century in scope or influence,” said Quentin Bajac, The Joel and Anne Ehrenkranz Chief Curator of Photography at MoMA. “It is exhilarating to bring it into the collection to contextualize not only Eugéne Atget and Walker Evans, but also the Bechers, Diane Arbus, Judith Joy Ross, Rineke Dijkstra, and many others who cite his achievement as essential to the development of their own.”

Sander (German, 1876–1964) began to conceive of the structure for his life’s work in the mid-1920s, dividing the images into seven groups that incorporated at least 45 distinct portfolios. The first of these groups, “The Farmer,” begins with a portfolio of Archetypes (or Stammappe) that establishes the rural community of the Westerwald region in Germany as the foundation for what Sander believed to be “universally human.” Once Sander had identified his broader ambition for the work, he sought out the individuals who could function as both fact and metaphor in his work. Sander titled the subsequent six groups “The Skilled Tradesman,” “The Woman,” “Classes and Professions,” “The Artists,” “The City,” and “The Last People” (depicting old age, sickness, and death). These groups and the portfolios they contain reflect both the employment divisions and social structures of the era. In their clarity they also depict a structural system that can be seen in societies around the world and throughout history.

Winter Films at National Gallery of Art Highlight Georgian Cinema, Contemporary Brazilian Documentary, Recent International Shorts, New Restorations, and More

Film still from Resistfilm by Pablo Marin, 2014, to be shown as part of the series Selections from Oberhausen, New International Shorts, program one, on Saturday, January 3, at 2:00 p.m. National Gallery of Art, West Building Lecture Hall. Image courtesy the artist

This winter, the National Gallery of Art Film Program continues its collaboration with Washington-area institutions during the ongoing renovation of the East Building galleries, which temporarily impacts the availability of the Gallery’s auditorium. The season opens with Selections from Oberhausen (January 3–10), featuring recent work from one of the oldest and most prominent showcases for short cinema in the world. Each event is introduced by artist and programmer Sylvia Schedelbauer. Discovering Georgian Cinema (January 12–March 26), a retrospective survey of filmmaking (in 35 mm archival prints) from this distinctive cultural milieu with roots in antiquity, takes place at several Washington venues. The Georgian project was originally organized by curators from the Museum of Modern Art and the Berkeley Art Museum/Pacific Film Archive. Washington is the only American venue other than New York and Berkeley. (Seating for all events is on a first-come, first-seated basis, unless otherwise noted. Doors open thirty minutes before show time. Whenever possible, works are presented in their original formats. Please note that the West Building Lecture Hall seats only 150 visitors.)

Films will be shown at:

American Film Institute, Silver Theatre (8633 Colesville Road, Silver Spring, MD)

American University, Malsi Doyle and Michael Forman Theater (McKinley Building, 4400 Massachusetts Avenue NW)

Embassy of France (4100 Reservoir Road NW)

Freer Gallery of Art (1050 Independence Avenue SW)

Goethe-Institut Washington (812 7th Street NW)

National Archives, McGowan Theater (7th Street and Constitution Avenue NW)

National Portrait Gallery, McEvoy Auditorium (8th and F Streets NW)

National Gallery of Art, West Building Lecture Hall (7th Street and Constitution Avenue NW)

Film still from The Machine Which Makes Everything Disappear by Tinatin Gurchiani, to be shown as part of the film series Discovering Georgian Cinema on Thursday, January 29 at 6:30 p.m. at the Goethe-Institut. Image courtesy Icarus Films

Film still from Hélio Oiticica by Cesar Oiticica Filho, 2012, to be shown as part of the series Cruzamentos: Contemporary Brazilian Documentary, on Friday, February 13 at 2:30 p.m. at the National Gallery of Art, West Building Lecture Hall. Image courtesy Wide Management

Film still from Housemaids by Gabriel Mascaro, 2013, to be screened as part of the series Cruzamentos: Contemporary Brazilian Documentary, on Sunday, January 25, at 4:30 p.m. at American University, Malsi Doyle and Michael Forman Theater, McKinley Building. Image courtesy Icarus Films

Actress Fa´angase (Fa´angase Su´a-Filo) in a color photograph by Frances Hubbard Flaherty taken in Samoa during production of the silent film classic Moana by Robert Flaherty, 1926. Moana with Sound by Monica and Robert Flaherty, 1926-2014, to be shown on Wednesday, January 17 at 7:00 p.m. at the National Archives, McGowan Theater. Image courtesy 2K Digital Restoration Moana with Sound, The Robert and Frances Flaherty Study Center

Coming Soon: Making Music Modern: Design for Eye and Ear at The Museum of Modern Art, New York

November 15, 2014–November 15, 2015

Philip Johnson Architecture and Design Galleries, third floor

Jonathan Ive, Apple Industrial Design Group. iPod. 2001. Polycarbonate plastic and stainless steel, 4 x 2 1/2 x 7/8″ (10.2 x 6.4 x 2.2 cm). Mfr.: Apple, Inc. The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Gift of the manufacturer

Music and design­—art forms that share aesthetics of rhythm, tonality, harmony, interaction, and improvisation—have long had a close affinity, perhaps never more so than during the 20th century. Radical design and technological innovations, from the LP to the iPod and from the transistor radio to the Stratocaster, have profoundly altered our sense of how music can be performed, heard, distributed, and visualized. Avant-garde designers—among them Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Lilly Reich, Saul Bass, Jørn Utzon, and Daniel Libeskind—have endeavored to push the boundaries of their design work in tandem with the music of their time. Drawn entirely from the Museum’s collection, Making Music Modern gathers designs for auditoriums, instruments, and equipment for listening to music, along with posters, record sleeves, sheet music, and animation.

Panasonic. Toot-A-Loop Radio (model R-72). c. 1972. ABS plastic, h. 2 3/4″ (7 cm), diam. 6″ (15.2 cm). Mfr.: Panasonic Company, Secaucus, NJ. The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Gift of Anne Dixon

 

The exhibition examines alternative music cultures of the early 20th century, the rise of radio during the interwar period, how design shaped the “cool” aesthetic of midcentury jazz and hi-fidelity culture, and its role in countercultural music scenes from pop to punk, and later 20th-century design explorations at the intersection of art, technology, and perception.

THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART ANNOUNCES HENRI MATISSE: THE CUT-OUTS, THE MOST EXTENSIVE EXHIBITION OF THE ARTIST’S LATE WORK EVER MOUNTED

Exhibition to Debut MoMA’s Newly Conserved Monumental Cut-Out The Swimming Pool

The Museum of Modern Art has announced Henri Matisse: The Cut- Outs, the largest and most extensive presentation of Matisse’s cut-outs ever mounted, on view from October 25, 2014, through February 8, 2015. This groundbreaking reassessment of the final chapter of the artist’s career includes approximately 100 cut-outs—drawn from public and private collections around the globe—along with a selection of related drawings, illustrated books, stained glass, and textiles, as well as the post-conservation debut of MoMA’s own The Swimming Pool (1952). Henri Matisse: The Cut-Outs is organized by The Museum of Modern Art in collaboration with Tate Modern, London. It is organized at MoMA by Karl Buchberg, Senior Conservator, Department of Conservation, and Jodi Hauptman, Senior Curator, Department of Drawings and Prints, with Samantha Friedman, Assistant Curator, Department of Drawings and Prints. Prior to its presentation at MoMA the exhibition is on view at Tate Modern from April 17 through September 7, 2014.

Henri Matisse (French, 1869-1954). The Swimming Pool (La Piscine), late summer 1952. Maquette for ceramic (realized 1999 and 2005). Gouache on paper, cut and pasted, on painted paper. Overall 73 x 647” (185.4 x 1653.3 cm). Installed as nine panels in two parts on burlap-covered walls 136” (345.4 cm) high. Frieze installed at a height of 65” (165 cm). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Mrs Bernard F. Gimbel Fund, 1975 © 2014 Succession H. Matisse, Paris / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

In the late 1940s, Henri Matisse (1869–1954) turned increasingly to cut paper as his primary medium and scissors as his chief implement, introducing a radically new kind of work that came to be called a cut-out. Matisse cut painted sheets into forms of varying shapes and sizes— from the vegetal to the abstract—which he then arranged into lively compositions, striking for their play with color and contrast, their exploitation of decorative strategies, and their economy of means. Initially, these compositions were of modest size but, over time, their scale grew along with Matisse’s ambitions for them, expanding into mural- or room-sizeworks. A brilliant final chapter in Matisse’s long career, the cut-outs reflect both a renewed commitment to form and color and an inventiveness freshly directed to the status of the work of art, whether as a unique object, environment, ornament, or a hybrid of all of these.

Henri Matisse (French, 1869-1954). Composition Green Background (Composition fond vert), 1947. Gouache on paper, cut and pasted, and pencil. 41 x 15 7/8” (104.1 x 40.3 cm). The Menil Collection, Houston. © 2014 Succession H. Matisse, Paris / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Henri Matisse (French, 1869-1954). Two Masks (The Tomato) (Deux Masques [La Tomate]), 1947. Gouache on paper, cut and pasted. 18¾ x 20 3/8 (47.7 x 51.8 cm). Mr. and Mrs. Donald B. Marron, New York. © 2014 Succession H. Matisse, Paris / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

The exhibition was sparked by a multiyear initiative to conserve the Museum’s monumental cut-out The Swimming Pool, acquired in 1975. The room-size work has been off view at MoMA for more than 20 years, and will return to view in MoMA’s exhibition following extensive conservation. Matisse’s only cut-out composed for a specific room—the artist’s dining room in his apartment in Nice, France—The Swimming Pool depicts swimmers splashing in water and leaping through air in a reduced palette of blue and white, fulfilling Matisse’s grand ambition to work at the scale of a mural.

Although The Swimming Pool is at the conceptual heart of MoMA’s presentation of Henri Matisse: The Cut-Outs, the exhibition goes well beyond it, encompassing works with a fuller palette, of differing degrees of abstraction and decoration, and in a range of sizes. It is part of the Museum’s long and deep commitment to Matisse’s oeuvre, which comprises an outstanding collection that reflects his activities across mediums, exhibitions that have considered both his entire career and more focused aspects, and new scholarship.

Matisse’s studio, Hôtel Régina, Nice, c. 1953. Photo: Lydia Delectorskaya. © 2014 Succession H. Matisse

The result of in-depth research on two fronts—conservation and curatorial—Henri Matisse: The Cut-Outs offers a reconsideration of the cut-outs by exploring a host of technical and conceptual issues: the artist’s methods and materials and the role and function of the works in his practice; their environmental aspects; their sculptural and temporal presence as their painted surfaces exhibited texture and materiality, curled off the walls, and shifted in position over time; and their double lives, first as contingent and mutable in the studio and, ultimately, as “permanent,” a transformation accomplished via mounting and framing. The exhibition also mines the tensions that lurk in all the cut-outs, between completion and process, fine art and decoration, drawing and color.

Henri Matisse (French, 1869-1954). Composition Green Background (Composition fond vert), 1947. Gouache on paper, cut and pasted, and pencil. 41 x 15 7/8” (104.1 x 40.3 cm). The Menil Collection, Houston. © 2014 Succession H. Matisse, Paris / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Henri Matisse (French, 1869-1954). Zulma, early 1950. Gouache on paper, cut and pasted. 93 11/16 x 52 3/8“ (238 x 133 cm). Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen. © 2014 Succession H. Matisse, Paris / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

The exhibition is accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue edited by Karl Buchberg, Nicholas Cullinan, Jodi Hauptman, and Nicholas Serota, with additional contributions by Samantha Friedman, Flavia Frigeri, Markus Gross, and Stephan Lohrengel.

Bank of America is the Global Sponsor of Henri Matisse: The Cut-Outs. Major support for the MoMA presentation is provided by The Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation. Additional funding is provided by Dian Woodner and by the MoMA Annual Exhibition Fund. Park Hyatt® is the hotel sponsor of Henri Matisse: The Cut-Outs.

Isa Genzken: Retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art

November 23, 2013–March 10, 2014

The Joan and Preston Robert Tisch Exhibition Gallery, sixth floor

This exhibition, the first comprehensive retrospective of Isa Genzken’s (German, b. 1948) epically diverse body of work in an American museum, and the largest to date, encompasses Genzken’s work in all mediums over the past 40 years. Although a New York art audience might be familiar with Genzken’s more recent assemblage sculptures, the breadth of her achievement—which includes not only three-dimensional work but paintings, photographs, collages, drawings, artist’s books, films, and public sculptures—is still largely unknown in this country. Many of the nearly 200 works in the exhibition will be on view in the United States for the first time.

Genzken’s work has been part of the artistic discourse since she began exhibiting in the mid-1970s, but over the last decade a new generation has been inspired by the artist’s radical inventiveness. The past 10 years have been particularly productive for Genzken, who, with a new language of found objects and collage, has created several bodies of work that have redefined assemblage for a new era. These groups of sculptures range from smaller, diorama-like works to room-filling installations.

Isa Genzken Hospital (Ground Zero), 2008 Each: 86 5/8 x 23 5/8 x 17 11/16″ (220 x 60 x 45 cm) Overall: 86 5/8 x 23 5/8 x 70 3/4″ (220 x 60 x 179.7 cm) 122 13/16 x 24 13/16 x 29 15/16″ (312 x 63 x 76 cm) Collection Charles Asprey Courtesy the artist and Galerie Buchholz, Cologne/Berlin © Isa Genzken

Isa Genzken Bild (Painting), 1989 Concrete and steel 103 9/16 x 63 x 30 5/16″ (263 x 160 x 77 cm) The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Gift of Susan and Leonard Feinstein and an anonymous donor. © 2012 The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Photo: Jonathan Muzikar

Although Isa Genzken’s primary focus is sculpture, she uses various media including photography, film, video, works on paper and canvas, collages, and books. Her diverse practice draws on the legacies of Constructivism and Minimalism and often involves a critical, open dialogue with Modernist architecture and contemporary visual and material culture. Using plaster, cement, building samples, photographs, and bric-a-brac, Genzken creates architectonic structures that have been described as contemporary ruins. She further incorporates mirrors and other reflective surfaces to literally draw the viewer into her work. The column is a recurring motif for Genzken, a “pure” architectural trope on which to explore relationships between “high art” and the mass-produced products of popular culture.

Isa Genzken Rot-gelb-schwarzes Doppelellipsoid ‘Zwilling’ (Red-Yellow-Black Double Ellipsoid “Twin”), 1982 Lacquered wood, two parts Overall: 9 7/16 x 8 1/16 x 473 1/4″ (24 x 33.5 x 1202.1 cm) Part one: 5 1/8 x 8 1/16 x 236 1/4″ (13 x 20.5 x 600 cm) Part two: 4 5/16 x 5 1/2 x 237″ (11 x 14 x 602 cm) Collection of the artist Courtesy the artist and Galerie Buchholz, Cologne/Berlin © Isa Genzken

In 1980, Genzken and Gerhard Richter were commissioned to design the König-Heinrich-Platz Underground Station in Duisburg; it was only completed in 1992. Between 1986 and 1992, Genzken conceived her series plaster and concrete sculptures to investigate architecture. In 2000, a series of rather roughly patched together architectural models was inscribed with Fuck the Bauhaus. Later, in the series New Buildings for Berlin, which was shown at DOCUMENTA 11, Genzken designed architectural visions of glass high-rises.

Isa Genzken MLR, 1992 Alkyd resin spray paint on canvas 48 1/16 x 32 5/16″ (122 x 82 cm) Lonti Ebers, New York Courtesy the artist and Galerie Buchholz, Cologne/Berlin © Isa Genzken

The project entitled Der Spiegel 1989-1991 is a series images comprising 121 reproductions of black and white photographs selected and cut from the influential German newsweekly Der Spiegel. Presented in a non-sequential but methodical manner, each image is glued against a piece of white card and individually mounted in a simple frame. Whilst the images themselves remain caption-less, the dates in the series’ titles offer clues about the artist’s intentions. Her paintings of suspended hoops, collectively entitled MLR (More Light Research) (1992), recall gymnastics apparatus caught mid-swing and frozen in time.