Displaying items by tag: Contemporary Art

Great and Mighty Things: Outsider Art from the Jill and Sheldon Bonovitz Collection presents over 200 objects from one of the country’s most remarkable collections of works by American self-taught artists. On view at the Philadelphia Museum of Art through June 9, 2013, Great and Mighty Things includes drawings, paintings, sculptures, and other objects by 27 artists who created their oeuvres outside of the mainstream modern and contemporary art worlds.

Jill and Sheldon Bonovitz, who have spent over 30 years assembling their collection, will donate the works in the exhibition to the museum. The exhibition and gift include works by prominent outsider artists such as Martín Ramírez (1895-1963), Howard Finster (1916-2001), Purvis Young (1943-2010), and Bill Traylor (1854-1949) and spans from the 1930s to 2010. The Bonovitz’s generous donation will greatly enhance the Philadelphia Museum of Art’s collection as well as help to establish the institution as one of the primary centers for the study of American outsider art.

Outsider Art, which is known for its raw and out-of-the-ordinary beauty, has become a global phenomenon in the 20^th and 21^st centuries. Once considered the art of the mentally insane, Outsider Art now holds a prominent place next to modern and contemporary art while maintaining its individual identity.

The Cloisters museum and gardens, a branch of The Metropolitan Museum of Art located in northern Manhattan’s Fort Tryon Park, will celebrate its 75^th anniversary this year. Assembled from architectural elements, both domestic and religious, that date from the 12^th through the 15^th century, the Cloisters houses approximately 3,000 works of art from medieval Europe.

To commemorate its 75^th year, the Cloisters has a number of celebratory exhibitions planned. Search for the Unicorn: An Exhibition in Honor of the Cloisters’ 75^th Anniversary will present the Unicorn Tapestries (1495-1505), a series of seven tapestries, which were a gifted to the museum by John D. Rockefeller, Jr. when the Cloisters opened in 1938. The Tapestries are the museum’s best-known masterpieces, but their history and meaning remain mysterious. The Unicorn Tapestries will be exhibited alongside approximately 40 works from the Metropolitan, sister institutions, and private collections. Search for the Unicorn will be on view from May 15-August 18, 2013.

In September, the Cloisters will mount an installation by Janet Cardiff (b. 1957). The Forty Part Motet (2001) is comprised of 40 speakers, each playing the sound of one singer in a 40-voice choral performing “Spem in alium numquam habui” (circa 1573) by the Tudor composer Thomas Tallis (circa 1505-1585). The installation will play on a loop in the Cloister’s Fuentidueña Chapel through December 8, 2013. The Forty Part Motet is the first piece of contemporary art to be featured at the Cloisters.

The Cloisters will wrap up its anniversary celebrations with the exhibition of six near life-size stained glass windows on loan from England’s historic Canterbury Cathedral. It will be the first time the panels have left the cathedral since their creation in 1178-80. Current repairs to the cathedral’s stonework required the removal of the windows, which have recently been conserved. The stained-glass windows that will be on view at the Cloisters feature six figures from an original cycle of 86 ancestors of Christ, the most comprehensive stained-glass cycle known in art history. The Romanesque masterpieces will be on view from March through May 2014.

On June 5, 2013 the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. will auction 25 rugs from its William A. Clark Collection at Sotheby’s New York. The rugs, which are from the 16^th and 17^th centuries, are estimated to bring as much as $9.6 million.

The rugs were part of a bequest from William Clark (1839-1925), a Montana-based billionaire entrepreneur-turned-senator, to the Corcoran in 1925. The gift was comprised of 200 paintings and drawings and a number of other works, including the rugs.

The Corcoran will use the proceeds from the sale to support future acquisitions that will better fit the institution’s focus on American and contemporary art. While the Corcoran has endured recent financial troubles, the money will not be used for operating expenses in keeping with its deaccession policy.

Highlights from the Corcoran sale include the Clark Sickle-Leaf Carpet, which is expected to garner between $5 million and $7 million. An unknown Persian artist created the rug during the first half of the 17^th century possibly for the shah. The rarely exhibited Sickle-Leaf is one of the most iconic and important carpets to appear at auction. Another rug known as the Lafoes Carpet, which measures 44 feet long, is expected to bring between $800,000 and $1.2 million.  

Looking at the View, a sweeping display of 300 years of British landscape painting, opened at London’s Tate Britain on February 12, 2013. The exhibition coincides with the re-opening of the Tate Britain galleries, which were closed for renovations.

The show is part of the museum’s BP British Art Displays, a series that highlights contemporary and historic British art from its collection. Curated by Tate Britain’s director Penelope Curtis, Looking at the View illustrates the different ways British artists have interpreted and portrayed their surroundings over the past three centuries. The exhibition features works from the Romantic and Pre-Raphaelite periods as well as paintings from the Land Art and other contemporary movements. Artists on view include J.M.W. Turner (1775-1851), John Brett (1831-1902), Henry Lamb (1883-1960), Lucian Freud (1922-2011), and Tracey Emin (b. 1963).

Looking at the View, which presents over 70 works by more than 50 artists, is arranged according to motif and draws connections between artists from vastly different time periods and movements. It is on view at Tate Britain through June 2, 2013.

Christie’s will be holding an online-only auction of works by Andy Warhol (1928-1987) from February 26 through March 5, 2013. The sale, which aims to grant a broader audience the chance to own a Warhol original, will benefit the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts.

125 paintings, drawings, photographs, and prints by Warhol, an art market powerhouse, will be available. The works feature a wide range of pre-sale estimates, spanning from $600 to $70,000. The online format allows interested buyers to browse available works, make bids, and receive notifications by phone or email about the sale and status of their bids.

Although this is Christie’s first online-only Warhol sale, the auction house will be hosting more throughout 2013 as part of an ongoing partnership with the Warhol Foundation. The weeklong digital sale marks the first time Christie’s has ever offered online-only Post War and Contemporary art sales.

Highlights from Christie’s online sale include one of Warhol’s famous Campbell’s soup cans filled with concrete (circa 1964), four gelatin silver prints of Steven Spielberg stitched together (circa 1976-1986), and a graphite on paper drawing titled Madonna and Child (circa 1981).

2nd Annual Naples Art, Antique & Fine Jewelry Show
February 8–11, 2013; Preview: February 7, 2013
Naples Exhibition Center, 100 Goodlette Road
South Naples, Florida 34102

10th Anniversary Palm Beach Jewelry, Art & Antique Show
February 16–19, 2013; Preview: February 15, 2013
Palm Beach Country Convention Center, 650 Okeechobee Blvd.
West Palm Beach, Florida 33401

After its successful debut in 2012, The Palm Beach Show Group (PBSG) is proud to announce that the Naples Art, Antique & Jewelry Show will be held this year from February 8th to the 11th. More than 75 high-caliber dealers will be exhibiting. As an indicator of how strong the inaugural show was, the majority of the 2012 participating dealers signed up again for 2013.

Scott Diament, President and CEO of the PBSG remarked, “The second annual Naples Show will again provide exhibitors with the unique opportunity to not only meet sophisticated and educated clientele from Florida’s Paradise Coast, but also from the Midwest region, an area from which many attendees travel during this peak season.” Show visitors will gain access to major works of art, antique and estate jewelry, furniture, porcelain, Asian antiquities, American and European silver, glass, textiles, sculpture, contemporary art and many more of the world’s most beautiful collections.

The show's location is ideal for collectors and decorators alike, located just steps from Fifth Avenue, Naples’ world-renowned shopping, dining and entertainment district, and its cultural attractions including museums, theaters, and art galleries.

On President’s Day Weekend, following just four days after the Naples Show, the Palm Beach Jewelry, Art & Antique Show is celebrating its 10th anniversary. With the addition of so many top painting dealers this year, it has become the preeminent show for American and European art of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In the art and antiques industry, this is an annual must-attend event and a hallmark in Palm Beach. Many exhibitors, including Peter Finer (the world’s leading specialist in antique arms and armour and new to the show this year) also exhibit at other top-notch shows such as TEFAF Maastricht, The Winter Antiques Show, Masterpiece London and The American Art Fair.

The Palm Beach Show was so successful last year that over 50 dealers were waitlisted for this year's show since the demand to exhibit exceeded capacity, an exceedingly rare situation in this volatile economic climate.

“Our Naples Show is the perfect complement to our Palm Beach Show,” adds Diament. “We are now providing our exhibitors with tremendous back-to-back exposure to the most affluent collectors from the Northeast, who choose to winter in Southeast Florida, and the most affluent collectors from the Midwest, who choose to spend their winters on the West Coast of Florida. Thousands of patrons—from private collectors to museums curators to investors—are anticipated to attend.

When Henry Kravis, the co-chairman of the global investment firm KKR & Co., and prominent art collector Donald L. Bryant Jr. purchased a triptych by Jasper Johns (b. 1930) in 2008, the duo agreed to take turns exhibiting the works in their homes before eventually donating them to the Museum of Modern Art in New York. In a lawsuit recently filed by Kravis and his wife, Marie-Josée, the couple claims that Bryant violated their agreement when he refused to hand the works over to them on January 14, 2013. The Kravises stated that Bryant is essentially holding the works hostage until their agreement is amended, nixing the pledge to donate the paintings.     

Considered one of the most important living American artists, Johns completed the three works titled Tantric Detail I, Tantric Detail II, and Tantric Detail III in 1980 and 1981. A powerful presence in the contemporary art market, Johns’ triptych is said to be worth between $15 million and $25 million. MoMA announced the Johns acquisition in a 2008 press release saying that the works were a “promised gift” from Bryant, who was one of the museum’s trustees at the time, Marie-Josée, the president of MoMA’s board of trustees, and her husband, Henry.

In their lawsuit, the Kravises ask that Bryant relinquish the works to them so that they can fulfill their vow to donate the paintings to MoMA.  

Continuing his family’s tradition as a Boston art dealer, Adam Adelson, son of preeminent New York City art dealer and former Boston gallery founder Warren Adelson, has opened an impressive 2-floor gallery in Boston that specializes in contemporary and modern art. Says Adelson, “My family’s business in art has inspired me to pursue the same profession. We plan to exhibit pieces that in some small way define our generation.” The gallery is currently showing “Modern Masters” through January 30. Opening February 1 and extending through March 17, 2013, the gallery will be hosting an exhibit on Winfred Rembert. Of the show, Adelson says, “I am happy to introduce Winfred Rembert to Boston. His amazing life story, which he tools on leather, is not only an inspiration, but an important part of American history.

Adelson Galleries Boston is located at 520 Harrison Avenue, Boston, MA. For more information call 617-832-0633 or visit www.adelsongalleriesboston.com.

Renowned art collector, Daphne Farago, announced that she will donate 161 works from her stunning collection to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. A longtime supporter of the MFA, Farago’s contribution is the largest gift of contemporary craft the museum has ever received and will greatly improve a once-lacking part of the collection.

Farago’s gift features works from the 20^th and 21^st centuries by artists such as Dale Chihuly (b. 1941), Sam Maloof (1916-2009), and John Cederquist (b. 1946). The pieces range from works of fiber, ceramics, glass, woodcarvings, and metal to furniture, jewelry, basketry, and folk art. The newly acquired works, man of which have remained out of public view until now, will be exhibited in the museum’s Farago Gallery beginning in August 2013.

This is the third major donation from Farago and her late husband, Peter to the MFA; their contributions total $2.5 million to $5 million in art and money, which prompted the museum to open the Farago Gallery in September 2011 as part of the Linde Family Wing for Contemporary Art. Edward Saywell, Chair of the Linde Family Wing, said, “Although the MFA has a distinguished history of collecting and exhibiting contemporary craft, this gift broadens and deepens our holdings in truly significant ways. The gift will be a touchstone for the collection and will be a remarkable legacy.”  

The Metro Show, The New Face of Art & Design, kicks off on January 24, 2013 at the Metropolitan Pavilion in Chelsea and runs through January 27. Produced by the Art Fair Company, which organizes the Sculpture Objects & Functional Art Fairs as well as the Antique Dealers League Spring Show NYC, the Metro Show brings together a striking mix of historic and contemporary art and design.

The second edition of the Metro Show boasts an impressive roster of exhibitors that includes Bernard Goldberg Fine Arts, Carl Hammer Gallery, Gary Sullivan Antiques, Just Folk, Ricco/Maresca Gallery, M. Finkel & Daughter, Hill Gallery, Samuel Herrup Antiques, Stephen Score, and many more. A broad range of objects will be on view including paintings, furniture, drawings, prints, photographs, sculpture, folk art, textiles, and decorative arts.

Caroline Kerrigan Lerch, Director of the Metro Show said, “Our vision is to illustrate the intellect, beauty, and vision in American arts and design, while placing it in a more modern and international context. We want to broaden its appeal and reach out to a new and younger audience while renewing the interest of the loyal attendees who flock each January to the Metropolitan Pavilion.”

The Metro Show will hold an invitation-only preview on January 23 from 6-7PM and a public preview from 7-9PM.