Rose Art Museum: Warhol, Whitten, and More

This fall marks the one-year anniversary of Chris Bedford's position as director of the museum, and also marks my first full year at Brandeis. Though I have only witnessed three seasons of exhibitions, I am amazed by how much has changed at this museum haunted by the not-so-long-ago drama of its past. 

On Tuesday, students, faculty, and the public flocked to the Rose Art Museum to celebrate the opening of the fall exhibitions, five in total, including: “Image Machine: Andy Warhol and Photography;” “Light Years: Jack Whitten, 1971-1973;” “Omer Fast: 5000 Feet is the Best;” “Collection in Focus: Al Loving;” and “Minimal and More: 60s and 70s Sculpture 

from the Collection.”

Rose Art Museum Opening Reception, Photo/Mike Lovett

The reception was graced by featured artists Jack Whitten and Omer Fast, the latter holding a talk just before the museum opening. (Check out Omer Fast's work featured at the Rose here!) I have always been tentative to explore the film medium, even in observation. It is such a stigmatized medium, especially in American culture. I was pleasantly surprised by the insightful, often emotional works Fast discussed during his talk. Through the deconstruction of film footage, Fast often recomposes or distorts film in such a way as to make the viewer ponder and question the viewing sensation. While many of his films prove narrational upon first observation, it is the subtle but often overlooked distortion of film and audio that captures the focus of Fast's work.

Opening Reception: so excited to work with Dustin, the other curatorial intern!

I had to stop for photo ops in front of Jack Whitten's incredible painting The Pariah Way (1973) featured in the main gallery space. The work glows with an iridescence and metallic quality that I can't quite figure out. Whitten's exhibit includes paintings that the artist had never seen stretched on canvas before, let alone publicly displayed. It was a joy to watch the artist interact with his own work.

Prints that Pop: Students dressed in mod attire in honor of the Warhol exhibit

The Warhol exhibit brings out several themes that are often left unexplored in Warhol's work. Image Machine explores Warhol's use of photography in his explorations of these themes. Curated by Joe Ketner, former Rose director, the exhibit shows a masterly knowledge of the Warhol works in the collection. 

Saturday Disaster (1964), one of Warhol's most displayed works in the Rose's collection.

The collection's Saturday Disaster is placed in the front entrance room of the Foster wing. I have grappled with this work since I first viewed it. Even in contrast to the nudes on display, I find it a highly controversial statement... Stay tuned for more thoughts on this.

My favorite aspect of the show was one of the prints from one of Warhol's many voyeuristic filmings of his friends, which was counter-imposed on his self-portrait wallpaper. I got a kick out of watching visitors enter the room and dodge the work, their discomfort in facing Warhol's display of candid nudity so humorously apparent (not that I can blame them, it's a surprise as you round the corner). 

At the end of the day, though, I think it was the cow wallpaper and Warhol "silver clouds" that stole the show. I'm a complete sucker for anything interactive, so playing with the balloons as they floated around the back staircase (which was delightfully lined with printed Warhol wallpaper) was my favorite part of the opening. I didn't know much about the balloons before the opening, in fact, I was somehow convinced they were packing materials during installation! Anyway, if you're curious, click here.

The opening was a success! The museum is alive with vibrant displays of color, textures, light, and sound, no doubt due in part to Warhol's colorful display. I am thrilled to be a part of this constantly evolving institution alongside those who are working so diligently to preserve and exhibit the rich culture of decades past. Things have been so crazy leading up to the opening though that I've hardly begun my curatorial work. Let the research begin!

While we're on that note, check out this awesome upcoming symposium at Brandeis University and the Rose Art Museum next month: 

Jack Whitten:  Painting, Politics, Technology

Saturday, October 5, 2:00 pm

Carl and Ruth Shapiro Admissions Center, Presentation Room

Featuring:

Rose Art Museum Curator at Large Katy Siegel

Jack Whitten 

Mark Bradford

Artforum Editor Michelle Kuo 

Mingus Mapps

University of Virginia Associate Professor Howard Singerman

For more information about the Rose Art Museum and current exhibitions, visit http://www.brandeis.edu/rose/

Categories: Al Loving, Andy Warhol, Art Education, Art Museum, Howard Singerman, Intern, Jack Whitten, Katy Siegel, Mark Bradford, Michelle Kuo, Mingus Mapps, Minimal, New Exhibition, Omer Fast, Pop Art, Rose Art Museum

Snapshots of the Zimmerman House

I had the pleasure this summer of spending time at the Zimmerman House in Manchester, New Hampshire, as a part of my internship at the Currier Museum of Art. Working with the incredibly dedicated house docents, we worked on improving improvisational methods during tours. I went on several tours of the house with different docents. Each visit was an entirely different experience. I am finally beginning to understand why Frank Lloyd Wright has such a cult following!   Over the past few months, I watched as the summer blooms came to life in the garden, and the greens became exotic and lush. It is a magical and mysterious place.
I am constantly amazed at the fine detail work that went into the design of the house. Even to an untrained eye, elements of the house that appear effortless prove ruthlessly intricate upon closer inspection. From every angle, the house provides a kaleidoscope of shapes and lines. This is my favorite view of the house, seen from the top stair of the far left end of the carport.
Like my intern supervisor pointed out on my first visit to the house, the open view onto the lawn in the backyard from the carport is like a painting that is constantly in transition. The windows, too, with Wright's signature geometric glass panels, provides frames from which to view the yard and garden. To think that Wright designed this house without ever setting foot on the plot!

Reserve your ticket for a tour of the Zimmerman House here.

Categories: Architecture, Art Education, Currier Museum of Art, Frank Lloyd Wright, Historic House, Manchester, New Hampshire, Organic Architecture, Zimmerman House

Joan Mitchell

Drips, spattering, globs of paint smeared over larger-than-life canvases. Joan Mitchell is a powerhouse.

Mitchell is known for her abstract, streaky works that manage to convey sometimes incredibly powerful, provocative emotions.

Ladybug (1957)
Museum of Modern Art

During the period between 1960 and 1964, Mitchell moved away from the all-over style and bright colors of her earlier compositions to concentrate on sombre hues and dense central masses. The marks on these works were said to be extraordinary: “the paint flung and squeezed on to the canvases, spilling and spluttering across their surfaces and smeared on with the artist’s fingers.”

Cous Cous (1961-62)
Currier Museum of Art

As a contemporary of famous artist Jackson Pollock, her work displays an equal amount of strength and vitality. To be quite honest, I much prefer Mitchell's  slow, deliberate methods to Pollock's haphazard drips, and how could anyone dismiss the varied, unexpected use of color on her canvases?

Leading visitors to Mitchell's work Cous Cous, at the Currier, the response is often "My child could paint better." But I always try to talk about the importance of the process. From this vantage point Mitchell's process becomes laborious, her conscious efforts show in every brush stroke. She said that she wanted her paintings “to convey the feeling of the dying sunflower” and “some of them come out like young girls, very coy … they’re very human.” Perhaps that is what draws me to Mitchell's work over Pollock's. There is something alive, organic, representational. It doesn't matter that you can't pin it on a particular object or figure, but you can relate somehow.

Yves (1991)

 Thus far, my favorite work of Mitchell's is No Birds. An admirer of Vincent van Gogh’s work, Mitchell observed in one of his final paintings, Wheatfield with Crows (1890), the symbology of death, suicide, hopelessness, depression and darkness. With her sense that Wheatfield with Crows was a suicide note she painted a painting called No Birds as a response and homage. 

No Birds (1987)

Want more? Check out Mitchell's work and legacy at the Joan Mitchell Foundation.

Categories: Abstract Expressionism, Art, Automatic, Feminist, Jackson Pollock, Joan Mitchell, Spontaneous, Surrealism, Vincent van Gogh

Woman Power: Louise Nevelson

According to the National Endowment for the Arts, a study completed between 1990 and 2005 showed that the art world remains largely male-dominated. Disheartening news for a young female professional. 

Some interesting numbers:

1990: 50.7% of all visual artists were female, and women held 53.1% of art degrees. Okay.... But 80% of art faculty were males, and male artists received 73% of all art grants or fellowships.

2004:  Of the 415 works on New York’s Museum of Modern Art’s 4th and 5th floors, less than 5% - were by women. Is this a reflection of the past or the present?

2006: Of 297 solo art shows in New York in 2006, only 23% were by women.

Today: Only 4% of museum acquisitions are by women artists. In curated exhibits, museums average about 15% work by women, and .003% minority women. 

As I've been researching works in my museum's collection, I've found only a handful of works produced by female artists. But of the handful, I found some incredibly powerful, and inspiring women.

"I am a woman's liberation." -Louise Nevelson

Louise Nevelson rocked my world.

First Personage (1956)
Brooklyn Museum

Nevelson had some serious attitude about life, undoubtedly influenced by major trials and tribulations she faced throughout her life. Moving from Russia to Maine as a child, I can only imagine how bizarre a transition that must of been. The family experienced hardship upon their arrival (umm, I can only picture Maine in the early 20th century as akin to the Yukon...). Nevelson's father, eventually built his career as a lumbaryard realtor and owner.

Sky Cathedral (1958)
Museum of Modern Art

What strikes me about Nevelson is the way she admired her mother, a seemingly eccentric primadonna who paraded around their hometown, Rockland, Maine, dressed in bright colors, heavy makeup, and laden with jewelry. Looking at pictures of Nevelson in her later years, one can see the effects of her mother's influence. I admire Nevelson for moving out of her small hometown, and her motivation to pursue a career in art, a profession that was embedded in taboo and stigmas. Even more, she not only was she living in a land far far away from the dynamic art world, but she was already ostracized in her town as a Jewish Russian immigrant.

Dream Houses XXXIII (1972)
Currier Museum of Art

Her work is mysterious, sensual, and alluring (as I can imagine Nevelson might have been herself). She was working during a period dominated by powerful male artists, and yet her work departed from the work of the other abstract expressionists, like Alexander Calder, David Smith, or Theodore Roszak, all of whom were weilding metal and steel. Nevelson found her medium in wood--a material so embedded in her personal life and which was in part attractive for an artist trying to make ends meet.

Untitled (c. 1985)

Limiting her palette to mostly black (she also worked with white and gold at times), the color was to her the totality--it contained all colors, yet was poised and aristocratic. Black meant the potential for greatness. A NYT review of a show featuring Nevelson's work back in 2007 at the Jewish Museum,  the geometry of Cubism and the epic scale of Abstract Expressionism with the logic of dreams." 

Categories: Alexander Calder, Art, David Smith, Feminist, Louise, Minority, Museum, Nevelson, Theodore Roszak