The Five Gods of the Five Sciences
Sipe Rignga
Tibet; 18th century; Mineral pigments on cloth; 14 x 55 1/8 in.
Rubin Museum of Art
C2006.66.53
Bon: The Magic Word is the first art exhibit to illuminate the Bon, a religious and cultural group living in the Himalayas and Central Asia and a group almost unknown in the Western world. Bon culture and religion pre-date the northern advance of Buddhism onto the Tibetan Plateau in the 7th century. Despite Buddhism’s growth in popularity since the 11th century, the Bon religion and culture have survived and thrived to this day. This eye-opening exhibition highlights a belief in the spirits of place and natural formations—mountains, sky, rivers, stones, and lakes—springing from Bon that runs through the edifices of religions in the region. It will also begin to train the eye to see distinctive Bon features in the arts of the Himalayas and surrounding regions.
Rubin Museum of Art
150 W. 17th St. (off of Seventh Avenue)
New York, NY
Telephone: (212) 620-5000
Web site: www.rmanyc.org
The Great Tangka at Drepung
Photo by Eveline Yang; courtesy of the Tibetan and Himalayan Digital Library (www.thdl.org)
This exhibition presents the largest objects from the Rubin Museum’s collection and explores the reasons why artists living in the Himalayas produced the even larger tangkas (Tibetan scroll paintings and textiles) that are majestically draped over mountainsides and in valleys. In Himalayan cultures, these large works are the focus of community celebrations and accrue merit for all who participate.
Rubin Museum of Art
150 W. 17th St. (off of Seventh Avenue)
New York, NY
Telephone: (212) 620-5000
Web site: www.rmanyc.org
Charles Burchfield (1893-1967)
Daybreak, circa 1920
Watercolor and pencil on woven paper
26 13/16 x 35 ½ x 1 ¾
Sponsored by Bank of America, Lines of Discovery: American Drawings celebrates the rich history of American drawing and explores how artists have used the medium to define the nation’s evolving character. The featured works were selected by the Asheville Art Museum from the holdings of the Columbus Museum in Columbus, GA, which has one of the most important collections of American drawings in the Southeast. The exhibition represents various styles and techniques through works by major artists from the late 19th century to the present. As an overview of American art, Lines of Discovery highlights the unique properties of drawing and its status as the most intimate, immediate and versatile medium.
The show includes works by such 19th-century American artists as William Merritt Chase, Thomas Cole and Winslow Homer. Also included are a range of works by such diverse 20th-century artists as Charles Burchfield, Isamu Noguchi and Andrew Wyeth. There are drawings by contemporary artists like Thornton Dial, Leslie Dill and Jerome Witkin, as well.
Asheville Art Museum
2 South Pack Square
Asheville, NC
Telephone: (828) 253-3227
Web site: www.ashevilleart.org
Lauren Greenfield. Alli, Annie, Hannah, and Berit, All 13, before the First Big Party of the Seventh Grade, Edina, Minnesota, 1998. Restricted gift of Anstiss and Ronald Krueck in honor of Renée Harrison Drake, with love and admiration.
In recent years, the issues and problems surrounding adolescence—especially the lives of teen and pre-teen girls—have come to the attention of the general public, from those concerned with the formation of future generations of modern women, to artists who have matched that bodily transformation with photography’s particular gift for surface description. Contemporary artists including Rineke Dijkstra, Lauren Greenfield, Sally Mann and Hellen van Meene have explored this topic with empathetic images that capture universal experience. From documentary photographs examining peer groups and body image to posed individual portraits, the pictures in this exhibition are poignant reminders of the complexity and vulnerability of girls in this time of change.
Art Institute of Chicago
111 South Michigan Ave.
Chicago, IL
Telephone: (312) 443-3600
Web site: www.artic.edu/aic/
Caldecott Award-winning children’s-book illustrator Jerry Pinkney is featured in this delightful show at the Brandywine River Museum in Chadds Ford, PA. On view are images that Pinkney created for such timeless and beloved stories as The Tortoise and the Hare, The Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing, The Ugly Duckling, Rikki-Tikki-Tavi and Uncle Remus Tales. A Native of Philadelphia, Pinkney attended the Philadelphia College of Art (now the University of the Arts). Before opening his own studio in 1971, he worked as a designer and illustrator for several companies. His first book, The Adventures of Spider: West African Folktales, was published in 1964. Since then, he has illustrated more than 80 children’s books and won numerous awards, including five Caldecott Honor Medals and five Coretta Scott King Awards.
In conjunction with Jerry Pinkney: Aesop’s Fables and Other Tails, the museum will host “Read-Aloud Tours for Young Children” on Thursday mornings, for children ages 3 to 6 accompanied by an adult, from January 31 through March 6, 2008. Storytime in the gallery will be followed by an art-making activity. Registration is required and families may sign up for one or more programs by contacting the education office at (610) 388-8382 or education@brandywine.org. Read-Aloud Tours are free to Brandywine Conservancy members. For non-members, the tours are included in regular museum admission.
The exhibition is accompanied by an illustrated catalogue, Jerry Pinkney: Aesop’s Fables and Other Tails, which includes the artist’s commentary on his influences, his techniques and some thoughts regarding the books he has illustrated.
Pinkney will speak about his work on February 2 at 1 p.m. in the Museum Lecture Room. Following the talk, until 4 p.m., Pinkney will sign copies of his books and the catalogue.
Brandywine River Musem
US Route 1
Chadds Ford, PA
Telephone: (610) 388-2700
Web site: www.brandwinemuseum.org
Geoffrey Holder as Baron Samedi from the film Live and Let Die
This show represents the first full-scale museum exhibition devoted to the life and work of Tony Award-winning dancer, choreographer, character actor, costume designer, director, painter, photographer and author Holder (best known as 7 Up’s “Uncola Man” and for his appearances in the popular films Annie and Live and Let Die). The exhibit spotlights Holder’s achievements beyond the stage, as a visual artist. His figurative paintings are powerful images that draw on his Caribbean background and African roots. Holder’s works feature scenery and florals, performers and, most especially, dramatic portraits. Also displayed are photographs, costume designs and memorabilia that document Holder’s wide-ranging interests and accomplishments.
Nassau Country Museum
One Museum Drive
Roslyn Harbor, NY
Telephone: (516) 484-9338
Web site: www.nassaumuseum.com
Party in Carreyes, 1989
Enamel on aluminum backed paper
98 x 72 x 24 in.
Courtesy of Marlborough Gallery, New York
©2007 Red Grooms / Artist Rights Society (ARS), New York
The exciting and colorful world of entertainment (the circus, theaters, concerts, nightclubs, vaudeville, street performance and other forms) has attracted the attention of artists in all media. This show surveys 19th- and 20th-century entertainment-related art, created by the likes of Edgar Degas, Henri Toulouse-Lautrec, Walt Kuhn, Reginald Marsh and Romare Bearden and others, with particular emphasis on Red Grooms. In each gallery, a key entertainment-themed work by Grooms will be juxtaposed with work by other artists.
Nassau County Museum
One Museum Drive
Roslyn Harbor, NY
Telephone: (516) 484-9338
Web site: www.nassaumuseum.com
A Spanish-language version of Facing Fascism: New York (Museum of the City of New York, March 23-Aug. 12, 2007) is now on view at the Instituto Cervantes in Alcalá de Henares, Spain. The exhibition lines the walls surrounding the courtyard of a 16th-century building, the Colegio del Rey, in the historic town that is the birthplace of writer Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra and home to one of the oldest universities in Spain.
The Instituto Cervantes also translated and published the companion catalogue, edited by Peter N. Carroll and James D. Fernández, which features fourteen essays of new scholarship on the story of New York City’s interest and involvement in the Spanish Civil War.
Facing Fascism: New York examines the role that New Yorkers played in the conflict, as well as the political and social ideologies that motivated them. The stories of these New Yorkers are remembered through photographs, letters, uniforms, weapons, and an array of personal and historical memorabilia.
Instituto Cervantes
C/ Libreros 23
28801 Alcala De Henares, Spain
Telephone: (34) 918 856 100
Web site: www.cervantes.es
Featuring examples of pottery made by North Carolina craftspeople, this exhibit includes pieces from a surprising variety of folk traditions including Native American earthenware, Moravian lead-glazed earthenware, salt-glazed stoneware from the eastern piedmont and alkaline-glazed stoneware from the Catawba valley. Connections are made between the forms, influences and styles and their relationship to northeast Georgia folk pottery and the museum’s collection.
Visitors will see several pieces by Burlon Craig, a surviving link to the utilitarian pottery production made by the small farmers of the south. North Carolina potters settled where clay deposits and markets took them, and and the stories of these people can be traced through the pottery they made. A resident of Vale, North Carolina, Craig was one of the last North Carolina potters to work in alkaline glaze. A potter since 1928, Craig died in 2002 at the age of 88. In 1984, he received the prestigious National Folk Heritage Award from the National Endowment for the Arts. He is known for digging the clay he used from the banks of the South Fork of the Catawba River, and his examples of his work are part of the permanent collection of the Smithsonian Institution.
Folk Pottery Museum
Sautee Nacoochee Center
Sautee Nacoochee, GA
Telephone: (706) 878-3300
Web site: www.folkpotterymuseum.com
Fifty years after the end of the Civil War, artists in Charleston began to focuse their energies on making art to inspire a sense of unity and appreciation of their city among those living there. Through their art, Alice Ravenel Huger Smith, Elizabeth O’Neill Verner, Anna Heyward Taylor, Alfred Hutty and others shared their love of Charleston’s physical environment and lowcountry character. In the Gibbs Museum’s newly installed Explore Gallery, visitors will see many examples of art works that figure prominently in the Charleston Renaissance, a period of artistic ferment dating from 1915 to 1940. This exhibition combines computer resources, library materials and works of art to offer a multi-dimensional, educational experience.
Gibbs Museum of Art
135 Meeting St.
Charleston, SC
Telephone: (843) 722-2706
Web site: www.gibbesmuseum.org
