Displaying items by tag: themes

The Museo del Prado presents "Danaë and Venus and Adonis : Titian's Early Poesie for Philip II," an exhibition that will showcase the first two "Poesie" created by Titian following their recent restoration. The artist painted these works in the mid-sixteenth century and they can be seen together for the first time since Ferdinand VII presented Danaë to the Duke of Wellington as a gift. Alongside these masterpieces, visitors will be able to contemplate another of the versions of Danaë belonging to the Museo del Prado, which was created by Titian in around 1565. This work was paired with another work, "Venus and Adonis," in the "Bóvedas de Tiziano" Halls at the Real Alcázar Collection.

Inspired mainly by Ovid's "Metamorphoses," the themes chosen by Titian for these works are portrayed in order to delight the senses and demonstrate the capacity of painting to convey emotions.

"The Last Rainforest.” “Silence = Death.” “Apartheid.”

Though many associate the late artist Keith Haring with his seemingly innocuous images of barking dogs, crawling babies, beating hearts and flying saucers, his work often tackled social justice issues – from nuclear proliferation to AIDS to the environment to racial and income inequality.

“The Political Line,” at the de Young Museum in San Francisco, is the first show to look at Haring’s art from a social justice perspective, grouping it by themes such as racism, capitalism and consumerism, the growing use of technology in everyday life, the treatment of those suffering from HIV/AIDS, the suppression of individual freedoms, and environmental devastation.

Widely considered one of the greatest sculptors of all time, British artist Henry Moore played a pivotal role in translating modernism into three dimensions. A new exhibition at the artist’s former home in Hertfordshire, England, examines the influence that Moore’s soaring, organic sculptures had on contemporary art.

“Body & Void: Echoes of Moore in Contemporary Art” presents works by some of the world’s most celebrated contemporary arts, including Damien Hirst, Rachel Whiteread, Antony Gormley, and Anish Kapoor. Works by a number of post-war artists, such as Joseph Beuys and Bruce Nauman, are also included in the exhibition. Site specific works by leading British artists Richard Deacon and Robert Long have been commissioned as part of the show.

“Body & Void” presents sculptures that examine Moore’s central themes, including the exploration of internal and external space, mother and child, and figures in a landscape, alongside contemporary works that touch on the same topics. For example, Hirst’s “Mother and Child (Divided),” a bisected cow and calf floating in giant tanks of formaldehyde, appears between Moore’s rose marble sculpture “Mother and Child” and “Stringed Mother and Child,” a single plaster cast that features two forms connected by a series of cords. The three works explore the same mother and child relationship in vastly different ways.

“Body and Void” fills the galleries and gardens at Perry Green, where Moore lived and worked for 50 years. The estate is also home to the Henry Moore Foundation, which was established by the artist in 1977. Although Moore amassed considerable wealth during his lifetime, he chose to live frugally and put most of his fortune towards endowing the Foundation, which continues to support education and promotion of the arts.  

“Body & Void: Echoes of Moore in Contemporary Art” will remain on view at Perry Green through October 26.

On Saturday, May 11, 2013, the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art In Bentonville, Arkansas launched two exhibitions dedicated to American genre painting. Genre painting, which became popular during the mid-19^th century, involved the depiction ordinary scenes of everyday life. As religious artworks waned in prevalence, genre painting struck a chord with the public as they could easily relate to the narratives, which spanned various races, regions, and classes.

American Encounters: Genre Painting and Everyday Life presents five paintings by a handful of the most well known artists from the movement including George Caleb Bingham (1811-1879), Eastman Johnson (1824-1906), and Arthur Fitzwilliam Tait (1819-1905). Between Bingham, who painted scenes of life on the American frontier, Johnson, who captured the true spirits of the people of New England, the western frontier, the slavery-ridden south, and prominent Americans, and Tait, whose subject of choice was wildlife, the three artists come together to communicate a varied and comprehensive American experience.

The works in American Encounters are accompanied by two paintings from the Louvre – one is from the Dutch genre painting school and another from the English interpretation of the movement. American Encounters is also complemented b the exhibition Genre Scenes on Paper from Crystal Bridges’ Permanent Collection.

Genre Scenes on Paper provides a sampling of the museum’s 19^th century watercolors and drawings, many of which have never been on public view. The exhibition explores themes of work and leisure in the city and country and features works by Winslow Homer (1836-1910), Thomas Waterman Wood (1823-1903), and John Lewis Krimmel (1786-1821). Just as the paintings in American Encounters, these works come together to show how a variety of artists interpreted daily life in a young country still coming into its own.

American Encounters and Genre Scenes on Paper will be on view at the Crystal Bridges Museum through August 12, 2013. American Encounters, which is the second exhibition in a four-year partnership between Crystal Bridges, the Louvre and the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, Georgia, will then travel to the High where it will be on view from September 14, 2013 through January 14, 2014.

The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) is hosting Modern Women at PAFA: From Cassatt to O’Keeffe through September 1, 2013. The exhibition, which features 40 works by pioneering female artists, is a companion installation to the exhibition The Female Gaze: Women Artists Making Their World, which is on view through April 7, 2013.

Modern Women at PAFA includes both paintings and sculptures and explores themes such as motherhood and beauty, the natural landscape, self-portraiture, women in their community, women illustrators, and modern women in motion. Artists on view include Mary Cassatt (1844-1926), Georgia O’Keeffe (1887-1986), Violet Oakley (1874-1961), and Susan Macdowell Eakins (1851-1938).

PAFA has been a notable supporter of female artists since its inaugural exhibition in 1811, which featured works by Anna Claypoole Peale (1791-1878), Margaretta Angelica Peale (1795-1882), and Sarah Miriam Peale (1800-1885), all members of the Peale family of American painters descended from the miniaturist and still-life painter James Peale (1749-1831). By 1844 PAFA encouraged female students to participate in art classes, distinguishing itself as a leader in arts education for women. A number of important female artists including Cassatt, Cecilia Beaux (1885-1942), and Emily Clayton Bishop (1883-1912) went on to forge important relationships with PAFA as both students and instructors.