Art Knowledge News - Keeping You in Touch with the World of Art...

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• The Neue Pinakothek opens a Major Exhibition of Work by George Stubbs
• The Delaware Art Museum Features Edward Burne-Jones "Flower Book Illustrations"
• The Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum Features Collages by John Stezaker
• Scream Presents its Curated Exhibition of Emerging Artists
• The Tel Aviv Museum of Art Shows Contemporary Paintings From Berlin
• The Brooklyn Museum Exhibits Rachel Kneebone Alongside Auguste Rodin
• The Brunei Gallery Shows Japanese Fans From the Ishizumi Family Colleciton
• The Walker Art Center opens "Frank Gaard: Poison & Candy"
• The Didrichsen Art Museum Shows Hugo Simberg's 'Viipuri Bay' Paintings
• The Hyde Collection to premiere Degas & Music Exhibition
• Sotheby's May Sale of American Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture
• The National Museum of the American Indian in New York to exhibit Andrea Carlson
• Earliest Known Michelangelo Painting Acquired by the Kimbell Art Museum
• Yale University Art Gallery Focuses on the Science of Fine-Arts Conservation
• The Peabody Essex Museum to exhibit "The Golden Age of Dutch Seascapes"
• Two Exhibitions Of Jean-Antoine Watteau Art Compete in London
• Singapore Art Museum Publishes the Book Latiff Mohidin ~ The Journey to Wetlands, and Beyond
• Architectural Firm RVTR Wins Canada Council for the Arts Professional Prix de Rome
• The Portland Art Museum to exhibit Raphael's Renaissance Masterpiece
• This Week in Review in Art Knowledge News

The Neue Pinakothek opens a Major Exhibition of Work by George Stubbs Posted: 26 Jan 2012 01:23 AM PST Munich, Germany.- The Neue Pinakothek is proud to present "George Stubbs (1724-1906, Science Into Art", on view at the museum from January 26th through May 6th. As a museum holding one of most important collections of British painting anywhere on the continent, the Neue Pinakothek casts the spotlight in the upcoming year on English art with this exhibition. This will mark the first ever major showing of the artist's works in a European museum outside of Great Britain. Stubbs achieved his high degree of fame through his realistic portraits of horses and exotic animals, which are based on a precise observation of nature. Like few other artists, he managed to forge empirical research and aesthetics into a new synthesis in his paintings. The exhibition contains some thirty paintings which together outline the full spectrum of George Stubbs's artistic output. The list of lenders for the Munich show includes some of the most important collections and museums in the United Kingdom, such as the Royal Collection, the National Gallery and Tate Britain in London. In addition, numerous works from various country homes and castles in Britain have been sent to Munich. These works have remained in the possession of the descendants of the original commissioners up until today and include the canvases Stubbs painted for Lord Rockingham and the Duke of Rutland. In addition, a selection of exceptional drawings for the anatomical treatise 'The Anatomy of the Horse' will be on view - a group of works that hold a particularly valuable place in the collections of the Royal Academy of Arts in London. As an exceptional printmaker who experimented with various etching techniques, George Stubbs also created a small yet remarkable oeuvre of engravings consisting primarily of depictions of exotic fauna. Prints of these are extremely rare, and will be on loan from the British Museum. Finally, George Stubbs's contemporary popularity and influence - also in Germany - is evidenced by the high-quality reproductions of his paintings by such renowned engravers like Benjamin Green (1739-1798) and William Woollett (1735-1785). Both the Department of prints and drawings of the Veste Coburg Collections and the Aschaffenburg-based holdings of the Staatliche Graphische Sammlung München hold outstanding examples of these prints. This exhibition will provide an opportunity to view key works from these two collections, and highlights the late 18th century collecting tradition of British art in Germany. George Stubbs's career as a painter of horses started when he retreated to Horkstow in Lincolnshire, where he spent the years 1756 to 1758 in an isolated farmhouse and single-handedly dissected and drew dead horses. In 1766 he published his studies in a book of engravings entitled 'The Anatomy of the Horse', which set new standards in the depiction of anatomical subjects. After moving to London, Stubbs quickly rose to fame as the leading equine artist of his day, a position he held from the 1760s until his death. His works were largely commissioned by a circle of young aristocrats enthusiastic about horse-breeding and equestrian sports. After his death, Stubbs soon faded into obscurity. He was gradually rediscovered around the middle of the 20th century, when art historians and US collectors such as Paul Mellon recognized his true artistic quality. By the time a major retrospective exhibition was held at the Tate Gallery in London and the Yale Center for British Art in New Haven in 1984/85, Stubbs had been firmly established in Great Britain and America as one of the greatest artists of his time. This reappraisal of his artistic legacy was also reflected in developments on the art market. Just a few months ago, his painting 'Gimcrack on Newmarket Heath' fetched a price of 22.4 million pounds at a London auction. This set a new record price for the artist at auction, and is one of the highest prices ever paid for an old master painting.  The exhibition of Stubbs's work will be enriched by the Neue Pinakothek's holdings of important 18th and 19th century English paintings, which includes works by Thomas Gainsborough and Joshua Reynolds, Thomas Lawrence and David Wilkie, and John Constable and J M W Turner. The Neue Pinakothek also possesses the only painting by George Stubbs in a German museum, the "Bird Dog", purchased in 1810 by King Maximilian I Joseph of Bavaria. This exhibition thus highlights on one of the key facets of the collection and introduces the work of the unique artist George Stubbs to a wider audience in Germany for the first time. The Neue Pinakothek in Munich, Germany, together with the Alte Pinakothek and the Pinakothek der Moderne it is part of Munich's "Kunstareal" (the "art area"). The focus of the Neue Pinakothek is on European Art of the 18th and 19th century and it is one of the most important museums of nineteenth century art in the world. The museum was founded by the former King Ludwig I of Bavaria in 1853. The original building was constructed by Friedrich von Gärtner and August von Voit, but was destroyed during World War II. The ruin of the Neue Pinakothek was demolished in 1949. Designed by architect Alexander Freiherr von Branca the new postmodern building opened in 1981. Ludwig began to collect contemporary art already as crown prince in 1809 and his collection has been steadily enlarged. When the museum was founded the separtation to the old masters in the Alte Pinakothek was fixed with the period shortly before the turn of the 19th century, which has become a prototype for many galleries. The delimitation to the modern painters displayed in the Pinakothek der Moderne was later fixed by taking the restart of Henri Matisse and the Expressionists into account (ca. 1900). Consequentially a painting of Matisse acquired by the "Tschudi Contribution" is displayed in the Pinakothek der Moderne. The so-called Tschudi Contribution in 1905/1914 led to an extraordinary collection of masterpieces of Impressionism and Post-Impressionism. In 1915, the Neue Pinakothek became the property of the Bavarian state. A self-portrait of Vincent van Gogh was confiscated in 1938 by the Nazi regime as degenerate art and sold one year later. The museum is under the supervision of the Bavarian State Painting Collections which houses an expanded collection of more than 3.000 European paintings from classicism to art nouveau. About 400 paintings and 50 sculptures of these are exhibited in the New Pinakothek. Among others the gallery exhibits works of Francisco de Goya, Jacques-Louis David, Johann Friedrich August Tischbein and Anton Graff. It also has one of the largest collections outside the United Kingdom with masterpieces of Thomas Gainsborough, William Hogarth, John Constable, Joshua Reynolds, David Wilkie, Thomas Lawrence, George Romney, Richard Wilson, Henry Raeburn, George Stubbs and J. M. W. Turner. German artists are well represented, from classicism in Rome (Friedrich Overbeck, Friedrich Wilhelm von Schadow, Heinrich Maria von Hess, Peter von Hess and Peter von Cornelius) to the German Romantics, with paintings by Caspar David Friedrich, Karl Friedrich Schinkel and Carl Blechen among others. The Biedermeier period is represented by Franz Xaver Winterhalter, Carl Spitzweg, Moritz von Schwind and Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller. French Realism and French Romanticism by Eugène Delacroix, Théodore Géricault, Gustave Courbet, Jean-François Millet, Honoré Daumier and others. German and French Impressionists are well covered, weith works by Max Liebermann, Lovis Corinth, Max Slevogt, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Edouard Manet, Claude Monet, Paul Cézanne, Paul Gauguin, Edgar Degas, Camille Pissarro, Alfred Sisley, Georges-Pierre Seurat and Vincent van Gogh. Early 20th century are is represented by, among others, Giovanni Segantini, Gustav Klimt, Paul Signac, Maurice Denis, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, James Ensor, Edouard Vuillard, Ferdinand Hodler, Franz von Stuck, Edvard Munch, Walter Crane, Thomas Austen Brown, Pierre Bonnard and Egon Schiele. Visit the museum's website at ... http://www.pinakothek.de

The Delaware Art Museum Features Edward Burne-Jones "Flower Book Illustrations" Posted: 26 Jan 2012 12:01 AM PST Wilmington, Delaware.- The Delaware Art Museum is proud to present "A Secret Book of Designs: The Burne-Jones Flower Book", on view at the museum from January 28th through April 22nd. Between 1882 and 1898, Pre-Raphaelite artist Edward Burne-Jones (1833-1898) periodically worked on a series of small, circular watercolor images, each inspired by the name of a flower. In 1905, after the artist's death, his wife published these representations in an exquisite, labor-intensive facsimile edition limited to 300. "A Secret Book of Designs" will feature all 38 images from one of these rare un-bound books, recently acquired for the Museum's Helen Farr Sloan Library & Archives. Edward Burne-Jones was profoundly inspired by the landscape surrounding his cottage in Rottingdean on the south coast of England, and he incorporated elements of the sea, the cliffs, and the downs into these images. He periodically retreated to this village to escape the social and professional demands of his life in London, seeking an opportunity to recharge both physically and creatively.

The Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum Features Collages by John Stezaker Posted: 25 Jan 2012 10:21 PM PST St. Louis, Missouri.- The Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum is pleased to present "John Stezaker" on view at the museum from January 27th through April 23rd. Breaking through the onslaught of images in contemporary culture, British artist John Stezaker (b. 1949) subverts the familiar through collage in a way that is at once captivating and unsettling. "John Stezaker" - the first US museum exhibition of this influential artist's work - reveals his lifelong fascination with the potent force of images, showcasing his investigations into the ways visual language can create meanings that vary dramatically according to context. Stezaker transforms classic movie stills and vintage postcards, magazines, and book illustrations by inverting, slicing, and combining them to challenge and complicate the original connotations. With over ninety works on paper from the 1970s to today, John Stezaker offers an in-depth survey of the artist's ability to produce compelling new images by juxtaposing disparate images from found photographs.

Scream Presents its Curated Exhibition of Emerging Artists Posted: 25 Jan 2012 09:00 PM PST London.- Scream is proud to present "Unweave the Rainbow", on view at the gallery from January 27th through March 10th. "Unweave  the  Rainbow" is its second annual curated exhibition of emerging artists, and the sequel to last January's "States  of  Reverie". The exhibition features young artists from the USA, UK, China and Poland, each with a unique style, who have in common a psychedelic, other worldy or surreal sensibility. The exhibition title is inspired by John Keats' 19th Century poem 'Lamia', an allegory for man's attempt to separate emotions and sensuality from reason, this poem inspired the selection of artists in "Unweave the Rainbow". The practice of each artist featured in this exhibition demonstrates tension between dream and reality, imagination and reason. Several of the artists work in 2 or 3 dimensions, for example Caroline Jane Harris who creates otherworldly handcut photographs; Jen Stark whose psychedelic paper sculptures are also handcrafted, and Scott Hove who creates surreal cake sculptures fit for the fairy palace of Keats' Lamia. Ye Hongking uses a collage of multi-coloured stickers to create depictions of Nirvana. Malgosia Stepnik, Andrew McAttee and Cain Caser are all exhibiting paintings with explosive neon palettes that inhabit the entire spectrum of the rainbow.

The Tel Aviv Museum of Art Shows Contemporary Paintings From Berlin Posted: 25 Jan 2012 08:39 PM PST Tel Aviv, Israel.- The Tel Aviv Museum of Art is proud to present "I Am a Berliner", on view at the museum through March 24th. What does it mean to speak of "the persistence of painting"? In Berlin today, this expression represents a remarkable diversity of practices ranging from abstraction and realism to highly expressive, narrative, and post-narrative painting. These distinct painterly positions, which are represented by the 18 artists featured in this exhibitions, all involve a self-reflexive investigation of the painterly process and of the nature of contemporary painting.

The Brooklyn Museum Exhibits Rachel Kneebone Alongside Auguste Rodin Posted: 25 Jan 2012 08:10 PM PST Brooklyn, New York.- The Brooklyn Museum is pleased to present "Rachel Kneebone: Regarding Rodin", on view at the museum from January 27th through August 26th. The exhibition will feature new works by the British artist Rachel Kneebone shown alongside iconic works from the nineteenth-century French master Auguste Rodin. Kneebone's first major museum presentation, the exhibition will include eight intricately wrought, large-scale porcelain sculptures paired with fifteen Rodin sculptures from the Brooklyn Museum's collection."Rachel Kneebone: Regarding Rodin" will focus on Kneebone's and Rodin's shared interest in the examination of gender and sexuality, the nature of sculptural form, and the formal representation of mourning, ecstasy, death, and vitality in figurative sculpture. This pairing will also offer a visual comparison of their sculptural materials and processes.

The Brunei Gallery Shows Japanese Fans From the Ishizumi Family Colleciton Posted: 25 Jan 2012 07:52 PM PST London.- The Brunei Gallery at the School of Oriental and African Studies of the University of London is proud to present "Traditions Revised - Japanese Fans from the Ishizumi Family Collection " on view through March 24th. People usually perceive folding fans as simple implements to cool one-self. Collectors of antique folding fans see them as decorative art. This exhibition explores the history of the folding fan, its traditions and the culture of fans in Japan, from everyday items to cool one-self to communication tools, writing instruments, symbols of status, fine art and even weapons. During 18th and 19th Century Europe, ladies carried a folding fan in their daily life as a decorative and sometimes practical ornament with a variety of uses and secret meanings. Few art forms combine functional, ceremonial and decorative uses as elegantly as the fan.  Fewer still can match such diversity with a history stretching back at least 3,000 years.

The Walker Art Center opens "Frank Gaard: Poison & Candy" Posted: 25 Jan 2012 07:51 PM PST Minneapolis, Minnesota.- The Walker Art center is pleased to present "Frank Gaard: Poison & Candy", on view at the center from January 26th through May 6th. Known for his brash personality and his inimitable art practice, Frank Gaard has made an indelible mark on the local visual arts community. This exhibition, the largest-ever exhibition of Gaard's work, will feature more than 30 works from Gaard's ongoing series of portraits, for which he is arguably best known. His portrait subjects are a who's-who of the local arts community, past and present—they include artists Bruce Tapola, Melba Price, Mary Esch, and Alexa Horochowski; VocalEssence conductor Philip Brunelle; and writers Emily Carter, Julie Hill, and Neal Karlen, among many others. Since the late 1960s, Gaard has forged a deeply personal and idiosyncratic style that borrows from classic Sunday comics such as Dick Tracy and the Katzenjammer Kids and the history of Modernism, as embodied in the work of artists Marcel Duchamp and Piet Mondrian, and philosopher-poets such as Ludwig Wittgenstein, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Charles Baudelaire. Combining his vibrant, highly-saturated palette of deep jewel tones, unsullied pastels, and retinal fluorescents with a profound tendency toward comedic satire on an operatic scale, Gaard's imagery borders on the iconographic. Cartoon-like faces with exaggerated features populate his paintings, as do crowned and spectacled self-portrait busts, devils, swans, panties, and ponies. His fantastical, sometimes ribald fetishistic imagery stems in part from early-childhood traumas and a life lived with bipolar disorder, a diagnosis that he received in the wake of several breakdowns in the 1970s and 80s. This survey of some 75 works features monumental tableaux paintings; portraits of friends, family, and fellow artists from the mid-'80s to the present; a suite of new paintings with a recurring pony motif; an installation of paintings that incorporate DVDs, CDs, and 78-rpm records; and illustrations from Artpolice, the cult zine Gaard published from 1974 to 1994. The exhibition will also feature ephemera including drawings, letters, record album covers, and hand-lettered promotional materials Gaard designed for Twin Cities gallery exhibitions and other events. For more than four decades, Gaard has been an elemental part of the Twin Cities art scene, revered by many as a mentor and simultaneously scorned by others for his salacious artistic style. He arrived in 1969 to take a professorship at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design and later launched his underground zine Artpolice, which he co-published with several other Twin Cities artists and former students, and which developed a cult following worldwide. The illustrations in Artpolice ranged in subject from current events to politics to graphic sex, presented in a licentious comic strip style but also featuring Gaard's signature brand of intellectualism and social critique. Though Artpolice ceased publication in 1994, Gaard's diaristic, no-holds-barred observations and commentary on society and art continue on his must-read blog (see frankgaard.com). For nearly 30 years, Gaard has also undertaken a serious study of Jewish mysticism and the Kabbalah, having converted to Judaism in 1982. His frequent use Hebrew textual references and the Sephiroth or "tree of life" as a formal and conceptual construct in his paintings provided him, in the difficult early years of his mental illness, with a readymade of sorts that he could use as a compositional device so that, in his words, "he didn't have to keep reinventing the universe over and over." The Walker has had a sustained relationship with Gaard since the mid-1970s, when it began collecting his work (some 20 works from the Walker collection are in this exhibition). Three major paintings were purchased in 2010, and the following year, Gaard gifted an important early painting currently on view in the Walker exhibition Midnight Party. The Walker also presented the exhibition Viewpoints—Frank Gaard: Paintings in 1980. Gaard was born in Chicago in 1944. He attended the Art Institute of Chicago and the California College of Arts & Crafts, where he earned a Master of Fine Arts degree. He has received grants from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, the Bush Foundation, and the McKnight Foundation. His work has been shown in local, national, and international exhibitions and is in the permanent collections of the Walker Art Center, the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, the Art Institute of Chicago, and the Museum of Modern Art New York. The museum's focus on modern art began in the 1940s, when a gift from Mrs. Gilbert Walker made possible the acquisition of works by important artists of the day, including sculptures by Pablo Picasso, Henry Moore, Alberto Giacometti, and others. During the 1960s, the Walker organized increasingly ambitious exhibitions that circulated to museums in the United States and abroad. The Walker's collections expanded to reflect crucial examples of contemporary artistic developments; concurrently, performing arts, film, and education programs grew proportionately and gained their own national prominence throughout the next three decades. Today, the Walker is recognized internationally as a singular model of a multidisciplinary arts organization and as a national leader for its innovative approaches to audience engagement. Adjacent to the Walker is the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden, one of the nation's largest urban sculpture parks. When the Garden opened in 1988, it was immediately heralded by the New York Times as "the finest new outdoor space in the country for displaying sculpture." The Garden's centerpiece and most popular work is Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen's Spoonbridge and Cherry (1985–1988), which has become a beloved symbol of the Twin Cities. The Garden has demonstrated extraordinary appeal in the community, and is a vital force for bringing new visitors inside the Walker and building new audiences for contemporary art. More than 15,000 people attended the Walker's Rock the Garden concert and 15th-anniversary celebration in June 2003. The Walker's expansion, which was designed by Herzog & de Meuron, opened in April 2005. The increased indoor and outdoor facilities, including the William and Nadine McGuire Theater, allow the Walker to share more of its resources with its growing audiences—from objects in the collection and books in the library to an inside view of the artist's own creative process. Increasingly, this ability to link ideas from different disciplines and art forms is seen as a model for cultural institutions of the future. A key aspect of the design is a "town square," a sequence of spaces that, like the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden, draws people for informal conversation, interactive learning, and community programs. Today the Walker Art Center ranks among the five most-visited modern/contemporary art museums in the United States and, together with the adjacent Minneapolis Sculpture Garden, attracts more than 600,000 visitors per year. The Walker's permanent collection has its origins in the mid-1870s with acquisitions made by lumber magnate Thomas Barlow Walker, who built an eclectic personal collection ranging from European paintings and sculpture to Asian porcelains, Chinese jade carvings, and Southwest Indian artifacts. In the 1940s, the Walker's focus on contemporary art began with the acquisition of works by important artists of the day, including sculptures by Pablo Picasso, Henry Moore, and Alberto Giacometti and paintings by Edward Hopper, Georgia O'Keeffe, and Franz Marc. During the 1960s, the Walker formalized its commitment to contemporary art, and works by young artists such as Andy Warhol, Chuck Close, George Segal, Donald Judd, Dan Flavin, and Claes Oldenburg were acquired; this commitment to nurturing artists early in their careers continues today. The highlights of these collections are numerous. Within the visual arts holdings of some 11,000 objects, there are Minimalist sculptures and paintings, including seven by Donald Judd, three by Dan Flavin, and two each by Carl Andre, Sol LeWitt, and Agnes Martin; these are augmented by drawings and prints in which the same artists explore their ideas on paper. There is a rich representation of the Italian Arte Povera movement, with works by eight of its major figures, and a concentration of paintings by the mid-century Japanese Gutai group--both unusual choices for an American museum. A large number of artists--including Matthew Barney, Robert Gober, Ellsworth Kelly, Sherrie Levine, Claes Oldenburg, and Andy Warhol--are represented in depth, offering viewers an extended assessment of each career. Editioned works are a strong focus: there are more than 500 objects by the wide-ranging international group known as Fluxus, 500 multiples by influential German artist Joseph Beuys, and concentrations of prints and multiples by Katharina Fritsch, Sigmar Polke, and Rirkrit Tiravanija. The Walker has the only complete archives of graphic works by Jasper Johns and Robert Motherwell, as well as hundreds of prints from the archives of Tyler Graphics Workshop, which collaborated with such masters as Helen Frankenthaler, Joan Mitchell, and Frank Stella. The Visual Arts Study Collection contains models, working drawings, and other preparatory materials related to objects within the larger holdings. Within the Ruben/Bentson Film and Video Study Collection, one finds nearly 800 titles, including an unusually rich group of experimental films from the 1960s and 1970s by Kenneth Anger, Stan Brakhage, Bruce Conner, Paul Sharits, and many others, as well as the complete catalogue of films by William Klein and a clutch of rare early-20th-century films from the Soviet Union. The Walker holds more than 1,200 artists' books and multiples as well as ada'web, an early and historically significant archive of Internet-based art. In the performing arts, choreographers Trisha Brown, Merce Cunningham, and Bill T. Jones together account for 21 residencies and 38 performances over five decades, and have been commissioned to make 11 new works--a significant contribution to the development of contemporary dance and an immeasurable enrichment of this community's cultural life. In recent years, the Walker has tended to collect around the edges of the obvious, distinguishing itself by embracing hybrid or otherwise unclassifiable works that might fall between the cracks in more traditional institutions. Visit the center's website at ... http://www.walkerart.org

The Didrichsen Art Museum Shows Hugo Simberg's 'Viipuri Bay' Paintings Posted: 25 Jan 2012 07:41 PM PST Helsinki.Finland - The Didrichsen Art Museum presents "Hugo Simberg & Niemi Ferry" until the 28th of August. Hugo Simberg spent nearly all the summers of his life at Niemenlautta, the family estate on the north-western coast of Viipuri Bay. So great was its inspiration that he immortalised its landscapes and people in his works. Real places also served as the stage for his symbolist motifs – such as the dance on Niemenlautta jetty ("Winger Dance" 1903) where people are partnered with skeletons. The exhibition is like a conducted tour of the headland, showing you how Simberg experienced this summer paradise and interpreted its surroundings. The artist's brilliant talent for portrayal is revealed in the pictures of people who visited Niemenlautta and also many other familiar themes find their origins in the surrounding landscapes. The exhibition includes works from the Didrich­sen's own collections as well as other art museums, and includes many rarely seen paintings and biographical material from private collections. Hugo Simberg was born at Hamina in Finland, the son of Colonel Nicolai Simberg and Ebba Matilda Simberg. In 1891, at the age of 18, he enrolled at the Drawing School of the Viipuri Friends of Art, and also studied at the Drawing School of the Finnish Art Association (Suomen Taideyhdistys), but in 1895 decided to become the private pupil of Akseli Gallen-Kallela at his wilderness studio Kalela in Ruovesi. Between 1895 and 1897 he studied with Gallen for three periods. In 1896 Simberg went to London, and in 1897 to Paris and Italy. During these years he exhibited several works at the Finnish Artists' autumn exhibitions, including 'Autumn, Frost', 'The Devil Playing Music' and 'Aunt Alexandra' (1898), which were well received. Critical success led to his being made a member of the Finnish Art Association, and to his being appointed to teach at the Drawing School of the Viipuri Friends of Art. In 1904 he was commissioned to decorate the interior of Saint John's church in Tampere (now Tampere cathedral), a project which he carried out with Magnus Enckell between 1904 and 1906. From 1907 to 1917 Simberg taught at the Drawing School of the Finnish Art Association. He died at Ahtari in 1917. The Didrichsen Art Museum is the result of a love of art. All the pieces in the collection were bought by Marie-Louise and Gunnar Didrichsen together. It was important to them that they both liked the artworks. The collection consists of Finnish art from the 20th century including, among others Edelfelt, Cawén, Schjerfbeck, Särestöniemi, Linnovaara, Hiltunen and Pullinen. In the modern international art collection there are works by Picasso, Kandinsky, Miró, Léger, Moore, Giacometti and Arp. Finland's only Pre-Columbian art collection is situated in the basement where you also can find the Oriental art. The Villa Didrichsen, which houses the museum, was designed by architect Viljo Revell in 1958-59. Six year later the art collection was placed in a new annex connected to the villa. In the cosy museum art and architecture meet with the surrounding nature. The garden is not filled with sweet flowers but instead with sculptures such as Henry Moore's Reclining Figure on Pedestal (1960), Atom Piece (1964) and Eila Hiltunen's Crescendo with the dedication words: "In Memoriam Marie-Louise Didrichsen". Visit the museum's website at ... http://www.didrichsenmuseum.fi

The Hyde Collection to premiere Degas & Music Exhibition Posted: 25 Jan 2012 07:40 PM PST Glens Falls , NY – The Hyde Collection's summer 2009 exhibition, Degas & Music, marks the first time The Hyde Collection will host an exhibition of the works of Edgar Degas. The exhibition is also an art-world first as no other display of Degas' work has exclusively focused on the artist's fascination with music.  Approximately thirty-five paintings and other works from major national and international collections, as well as The Hyde's own holdings, will be included in the Degas & Music exhibition. On exhibit 12 July through 18 October, 2009.

Sotheby's May Sale of American Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture Posted: 25 Jan 2012 07:39 PM PST NEW YORK, NY.- Sotheby's spring sale of American Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture will take place on May 21, 2009. The sale will feature a selection of works from private collections by prominent American artists spanning the 19th and 20th centuries, and will be exhibited to the public at Sotheby's New York galleries beginning May 16th, 2009.

The National Museum of the American Indian in New York to exhibit Andrea Carlson Posted: 25 Jan 2012 07:38 PM PST NEW YORK, NY.- Twenty of Andrea Carlson's complex and layered works will be at the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian in New York, the George Gustav Heye Center beginning Saturday, June 13. Carlson (Anishinaabe/European, b. 1979) is a Minnesota-based artist whose works offer a sharp commentary on museums, collections and contemporary storytelling. The exhibition will continue through Jan. 10, 2010. "Andrea Carlson" is guest curated by Joseph D. Horse Capture (A'aninin), associate curator at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts.

Earliest Known Michelangelo Painting Acquired by the Kimbell Art Museum Posted: 25 Jan 2012 07:37 PM PST FORT WORTH, TX.- Michelangelo's painting of The Torment of Saint Anthony, described by his earliest biographers, has been acquired by the Kimbell Art Museum of Fort Worth, Texas. Its purchase was announced today by the Kimbell's newly appointed director, Dr. Eric McCauley Lee. Executed in oil and tempera on a wooden panel, this work is the first painting by Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475–1564) to enter an American collection, and one of only four known easel paintings generally believed to come from his hand. The others are the Doni Tondo in Florence's Uffizi Gallery and two unfinished paintings in London's National Gallery, The Manchester Madonna and The Entombment. Dr. Lee commented, "The acquisition of this rediscovered work from the very beginnings of Michelangelo's artistic career offers an extraordinary opportunity to advance the understanding of European art." Kay Fortson, president of the Kimbell Art Foundation's board of directors, said, "This is an outstanding acquisition for the Kimbell. Michelangelo's rare painting will be a beacon in the Museum's already distinguished collection." According to Michelangelo's biographer and former student, Ascanio Condivi, whose information came directly from the artist, the young Michelangelo was granted access to some of the prints and drawings in the workshop of Domenico Ghirlandaio. Of these, we are told, one particularly attracted his attention: an engraving by the 15th-century German master Martin Schongauer of The Temptation of Saint Anthony. Michelangelo reportedly took this engraving and, in an effort to try his hand at painting, produced a mesmerizing rendition of it on a wooden panel. Condivi also provides the curious detail that while Michelangelo was working on the painting, he visited the local fishmarket in order to learn how to paint fish scales—a feature missing from the engraving. When the painting was finally unveiled, it apparently elicited a good deal of admiration, and even Ghirlandaio is said to have been taken aback. Future writers were equally admiring of the Saint Anthony. It figures prominently in Giorgio Vasari's laudatory accounts of Michelangelo's life (the first from 1550; the second from 1568), and Benedetto Varchi also mentions the story of the painting in his funeral oration for Michelangelo in 1564. The painting, measuring 18½ by 13¼ inches (47 by 35 centimeters), was sold at auction in London in July 2008 and has since undergone conservation and technical research at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, where it will be the subject of a summer focus exhibition. The painting had been known to scholars for many decades, but until its recent cleaning, discolored varnishes and disfiguring overpaints had prevented a full appreciation of its masterful execution, which is rich in colors and lively brushwork. In his analysis of the painting (see attached), Dr. Keith Christiansen, the Jayne Wrightsman Curator of European Paintings at the Metropolitan Museum, concludes: "The case for this panel being the one described by Condivi is exceptionally strong . . . and given what we know, the burden of proof that it is NOT the picture described by Condivi is with those who would deny it." Dr. Everett Fahy, the Sir John Pope-Hennessy Chairman of the Department of European Paintings at the Metropolitan Museum, is also in complete agreement. He has known this work since 1960 and always promoted its attribution to Michelangelo. His views—along with those of Dr. Christiansen—will be published in forthcoming articles on the painting. While being cleaned, the painting also underwent a technical study, which fully supported the attribution. It became evident that Michelangelo had elaborated on the composition, and it is now possible through the aid of infrared reflectography to observe how the artist modified his German source. See the attached technical report by Michael Gallagher, conservator of paintings at the Metropolitan Museum. "The important technical information that has come to light includes revelations of numerous pentimenti, or artist's changes, that show Michelangelo working through his ideas in paint," reports Claire Barry, the Kimbell's chief conservator. According to Dr. Edmund P. Pillsbury, former director of the Kimbell (1980–98), who endorsed the acquisition, "Michelangelo's brush transforms the bizarre shapes and unsettling appearance of the Teutonic monsters and demons into a far more naturalistic and convincing account of the monk's torments. Moreover, Michelangelo's invention of the highly poetic but symbolic landscape of fertile and arid passages joined by a distant riverscape with rolling hills roots the event in a topography resembling the Arno valley of Florence rather than the site of the actual event recorded in faraway Egypt. Michelangelo brought the torment a lot closer to home." The remarkably fresh and well-preserved gem, believed to have been painted in 1487–88, when Michelangelo was 12 or 13 years old, was acquired by the Kimbell Art Museum from Adam Williams Fine Art of New York for an undisclosed sum. Following its inaugural presentation at the Metropolitan Museum, which will showcase the recent technical examination, the panel will go on public view this fall for the first time in its new home; Louis Kahn's award-winning Kimbell Art Museum. Born in 1475 near Florence, Michelangelo is universally acknowledged as one of the towering geniuses of the Renaissance. Already by his teenage years, he had proven himself a superlative sculptor and painter. His contributions to the field of architecture are also renowned. Best known for his mature works such as the ceiling frescoes in the Sistine Chapel, he evolved a forceful, muscular style that gripped the imaginations of artists for decades to come. First and foremost, Michelangelo thought himself a sculptor, and many of his works in marble are icons of Western art: his Vatican Pietà, his vigorous David in Florence, and his tragic and unfinished Rondanini Pietà. As a painter, Michelangelo was equally influential. As The Torment of Saint Anthony proves, he was drawn to painting at an early age, and by the time of his final masterpiece, the Last Judgment, also in the Sistine Chapel, he had presided over a vast revolution in Italian painting. Kimbell Art Museum Owned and operated by the Kimbell Art Foundation, the Kimbell Art Museum opened to the public in 1972.   Its collections range in period from antiquity to the 20th century, including signature examples by European masters from Duccio, Fra Angelico and Caravaggio to Cézanne and Matisse, and selected holdings of Egyptian, Near Eastern, Greek, and Roman antiquities, as well as Asian, Mesoamerican, and African arts.   The Kimbell's building, designed by Louis Kahn, is widely regarded as one of the supreme architectural achievements of the modern era. Kimbell Art Museum hours: Tuesday–Thursday and Saturdays, 10 a.m.–5 p.m.; Fridays, noon–8 p.m.; Sundays, noon–5 p.m.; closed Mondays. For general information, call 817-332-8451. Web site: www.kimbellart.org

Yale University Art Gallery Focuses on the Science of Fine-Arts Conservation Posted: 25 Jan 2012 07:36 PM PST NEW HAVEN, CT.- Time Will Tell: Ethics and Choices in Conservation showcases the important relationship between curators and fine-art conservators as they consider techniques for and approaches to caring for museum objects in their collections. The exhibition, organized by the Yale University Art Gallery, demonstrates that no aspect of conservation is simple or straightforward. Each of the objects chosen for this exhibition highlights a specific conservation choice and the decision-making process that goes into its treatment and display. "The aim of the exhibition is to show the public some of the complex issues that conservators and curators consider when deciding the best course of treatment for an object," says Ian McClure, the Susan Morse Hilles Chief Conservator at the Gallery.

The Peabody Essex Museum to exhibit "The Golden Age of Dutch Seascapes" Posted: 25 Jan 2012 07:35 PM PST SALEM, MA.- The Peabody Essex Museum presents The Golden Age of Dutch Seascapes, 70 works by Dutch masters of maritime art working in the time of Rembrandt and Vermeer. Painted during the peak years of Dutch artistic achievement between 1600 and 1700, these superlative, emotional works are the first in which European artists realistically depicted natural settings, rendering coastal atmospheres with great focus and virtuosic technique. Artists such as Jacob van Ruisdael, Jan Porcellis, Simon De Vlieger and Ludolf Backhuysen were masters of air, light and water, and used their prodigious talent to convey a world of political allegory and mystical allusion on canvas. On view 13 June through 7 September, 2009.

Two Exhibitions Of Jean-Antoine Watteau Art Compete in London Posted: 25 Jan 2012 07:34 PM PST London (Reuters).- Whether by coincidence or design, French 18th century artist Jean-Antoine Watteau has two major London shows dedicated to him, both opening on Saturday 12 March 2011. The Royal Academy's show "Watteau: The Drawings" focuses on the artist as draughtsman, an important element of his work which acquaintances said he preferred to painting. At the nearby Wallace Collection, the museum has re-displayed its extensive Watteau canvases including examples of the "fete galante" (an elegant social gathering in parkland setting) for which the artist is probably best known today. To accompany the re-hanging, the Wallace Collection put on a separate exhibition on Jean de Jullienne, one of the most important art collectors of his time who edited a collection of prints of Watteau's works which appeared after the artist's death. While both galleries stressed that their exhibitions should be seen as complementary rather than in competition, privately sources said they would have preferred to avoid such a clash. The Wallace Collection's exhibition is called "Esprit et Verite: Watteau and His Circle," although the main section is a re-arrangement of the gallery's existing collection of works by Watteau rather than a fresh show. Complimenting the paintings is a small side-show dedicated to Jullienne, including some of the paintings once owned by the famous patron and an illustrated inventory of his collection. That collection concentrated on French art, a break from the prevailing preference for important Italian works, and it also featured drawings and sketches and not just finished objects. The Wallace Collection compared him to leading British art collectors of today like Jay Jopling and Charles Saatchi, who similarly concentrate on contemporary artists. Visit the Wallace Collection's website at ... http://www.wallacecollection.org/ The Royal Academy has gathered more than 80 works on paper which underline why Watteau's works on paper were so admired by contemporaries. Mainly in red or a combination of red, black and white chalk, the drawings capture a host of characters from seated Savoyards to soldiers to a reclining nude. They are often taken from real life and, unlike the idyllic, tranquil and aristocratic fetes galantes, reflect the teeming and filthy streets of Paris in the early 1700s. Watteau's friend Edme-Francois Gersaint once said he was "more satisfied with his drawings than with his paintings ... I have often seen him out of temper with himself because he was unable to convey in painting the truth and brilliance he could express with his pencil." From his extensive drawings, Watteau created the fetes galantes canvases which art critics say took French painting in a new direction and created a fresh idyll for the new century. Visit the Royal Academy's website at ... http://www.royalacademy.org.uk/ Although Watteau has been studied extensively, relatively little is known about his life, and his works are particularly difficult to interpret. He was probably born in 1684 in a Flemish town which had become a part of France six years earlier. He moved to Paris in around 1702 where he worked with a painter of theater scenes before joining successful decorative painter Claude Audran. He was accepted as a candidate for membership of the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture and eventually became a full member in 1717. He presented the Academy with his most famous painting "The Pilgrimage to the Island of Cythera" which hangs in the Louvre, Paris. In 1719-20 he spent nearly a year in London but little is known of his stay. In 1721 he died in France from tuberculosis, probably aged thirty-seven, and Jean de Jullienne was responsible for distributing engravings of Watteau's work after his death, thus ensuring the artist's longevity.

Singapore Art Museum Publishes the Book Latiff Mohidin ~ The Journey to Wetlands, and Beyond Posted: 25 Jan 2012 07:33 PM PST SINGAPORE - The Singapore Art Museum launched the book Latiff Mohidin: Journey to Wetlands and Beyond. The book represents over 4 decades of the artist's works and presents a selection of 120 drawings as a retrospective of Latiff Mohidin's works from 1962 to 2006. Says Latiff Mohidin, "A sketch is not really to catch the floating moment, but the atmosphere. Not only what is there but also what isn't there." His drawings are not about replicating what he sees, but interpreting it. It is about experiencing Nature, experiencing the World completely.

Architectural Firm RVTR Wins Canada Council for the Arts Professional Prix de Rome Posted: 25 Jan 2012 07:31 PM PST OTTAWA.- The Canada Council for the Arts announced today that Toronto architecture firm RVTR is the winner of the Professional Prix de Rome in Architecture for 2009. This award recognizes exceptional talent and achievement in the field of architecture and architectural design. The Professional Prix de Rome in Architecture, valued at $50,000, is awarded to a young architect or practitioner of architecture, an architecture firm or an architectural design firm that has completed its first buildings and demonstrated exceptional artistic potential. The prize, established in 1987, allows the winners to travel to other parts of the world to hone their skills, develop their creative practice and strengthen their presence in international architecture culture. The project can involve multiple trips to a number of destinations, spread over a two-year period.

The Portland Art Museum to exhibit Raphael's Renaissance Masterpiece Posted: 25 Jan 2012 07:30 PM PST PORTLAND, OR.- This October, the Portland Art Museum will present a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to view Raphael's renowned painting The Woman with a Veil. This single-painting exhibition will bring one of the most important paintings of the Renaissance to Oregon for the first time. The Woman with a Veil (la velata or la donna velata) was painted in 1516 and depicts a serene woman looking intently at the viewer. It is believed that the model for the painting is the same woman depicted in other Raphael works including La Fornarina. Scholars have suggested that the woman was Raphael's lover, Margherita Luti. The Woman with the Veil's perfect harmony and balance beautifully capture the fundamental principles of the High Renaissance. Raphael demonstrates his brilliance at sfumato, an Italian term for a painting technique often associated with Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa, whereby lightly applied layers of color are used to capture light and articulate volume and form. To ensure an optimal viewing experience, The Woman with a Veil will be displayed in a gallery with no more than 25 people allowed access at any given time. Text panels, audio and video presentations, and public programs will provide insight into Renaissance art, portraiture, and the artist. Raphael Raphael (1483–1520), also known as Raffaello Sanzio, was born in Urbino, Italy. His father, Giovanni Santi, was a painter and poet. Raphael trained in his father's workshop and later in the workshop of the artist Pietro Perugino. In 1504 he began spending time and perhaps even resided in Florence, where he was influenced by the work of Leonardo da Vinci. Eventually, he moved to Rome where, under the patronage of Pope Julius II, he entered his most productive phase as an artist. He managed a large workshop of pupils and assistants, many of whom became well-known artists in their own right. Raphael's art reached wide-spread influence through collaboration with the engraver Marcantonio Raimondi, who produced prints of Raphael's paintings. Raphael's personal life was complex. He never married but was reputed to have had many relationships. In 1514 he became engaged to Maria Bibbiena, the niece of an influential Cardinal and Raphael's friend. The marriage never took place, and she died in 1520. Raphael lived a grand lifestyle in Rome and attained some status at court. It is believed that he died on his 37th birthday in 1520. He left a significant portion of his estate to Margherita Luti—La Donna Velata—and he was buried in the Pantheon. Visit the Portland Art Museum at : http://portlandartmuseum.org/

This Week in Review in Art Knowledge News Posted: 25 Jan 2012 07:29 PM PST This is a new feature for the subscribers and visitors to Art Knowledge News (AKN), that will enable you to see "thumbnail descriptions" of the last ninety (90) articles and art images that we published. This will allow you to visit any article that you may have missed ; or re-visit any article or image of particular interest. Every day the article "thumbnail images" will change. For you to see the entire last ninety images just click : here . When opened that also will allow you to change the language from English to anyone of 54 other languages, by clicking your language choice on the upper left corner of our Home Page.  You can share any article we publish with the eleven (11) social websites we offer like Twitter, Flicker, Linkedin, Facebook, etc. by one click on the image shown at the end of each opened article.  Last, but not least, you can email or print any entire article by using an icon visible to the right side of an article's headline.

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