Editor's Sketchbook

'MODERN' ART TURNS 100

New York

What do Constantine Brancusi's Muse endormie, Marcel Duchamp's Nude Descending a Staircase (N0.2), François Picabia's Dances at the Spring, and Jacques Villion's Young Girl have in common? These works, then contemporary works, were all part of scores of now 'modern' paintings and sculptures that were displayed in the ground-breaking Armory Show, held in New York 100 years ago and now recreated at the New-York Historical Society Museum &; Library, 170 Central Park West at 77th Street.

 

There's another commonality: These and other sculptures and pictures, more than a dozen in all, are now housed in the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the single best-represented repository of Armory Show submissions, all part of the museum's stellar Louise and Walter Arensberg Collection.

 

'The Armory Show at 100' is one of the best art exhibits I've ever had the privilege of attending. It's a time capsule of what modern art was to become. I was transported to 1913 and 69th Regiment Armory (1906), still functioning at 68 Lexington Avenue, between 25th and 26 streets. Imagine, if you will, being an attendee at that time, seeing, aye savouring, early first works by Picasso, Matisse, and Van Gogh. Add a Renoir or two, a picture by Goya, even an Augustus John, the under-appreciated English portraitist. In all, scores of artists are represented. Still, only a fraction of the total collection in the show itself. 

Holding Hands?

PMA and Barnes Forge Bond

Rub, left; Gilman, right Photos: Writers Clearinghouse

to Roll Out 'Renoir Country'
By Richard Carreno
Junto Senior Staff Writer Bio

Albert Barnes must be rolling over in his grave. Make that 'roiling.'

In what has been a low-profile reconciliation, the Barnes Foundation and the Philadelphia Museum of Art, once arch enemies, thanks to Dr.Barnes animus against the PMA, have been smoking the peace pipe in recent months. No where has this fraternal inter-institutional cooperation --unthinkable during Barnes' lifetime -- been so evident as during the PMA's current Pierre-Auguste Renoir exhibit, which opened last week.

Both museums have been blowing kisses, what with recently rolled out jointly sponsored tours and lectures. And even Timothy Rub, the museum's director, telling the press, in a pre-show viewing of 'Late Renoir,' how Philadelphia is really 'Renoir country,' due in large part to the Barnes Foundation's unique collection, at 181 works, the largest cache of the French Impressionist anywhere.

Well, why not? Rub and Derek Gilman, the Barnes' director, were both in knickers when the wacky good doctor was fulminating at the PMA and the curatorial elite that mocked his own eclectic curatorial style -- or rather, non-style. Barnes' non-traditional presentation methods are famous or infamous, depending on one's viewpoint.

What isn't in dispute, however, is that Barnes' rage against what he perceived as a fuddy-duddy Philadelphia Establishment was never in the best interests of Philly's arts community and the world-wide constituencies of both museums. Barnes was right about the conservative, uptight Philadelphia Establishment. He was wrong though to hate and to cloister the Barnes Foundation in its Lower Merion compound as if it were a Palm Beach gated-community.

As usual with 'main-stage' shows, the PMA is offering, along with 'Late Renoir,' a series of collateral events, most held at the museum itself.

In what might be a first, however, the Museum is also sponsoring a cooperative venture with the Barnes, including a private, guided tour of the foundation's collection. The tours will be for groups of 15 to 50, on Tuesdays, and will also include a private, guided tour of 'Late Renoir' and lunch at the museum. Total per person cost varies at $140, without museum transport to the Barnes, or $164, with transport.

The Barnes itself is also sponsoring its own Tuesday afternoon tours in 'celebration' of the PMA show. (Did I hear 'celebration'? Take that, Al!) Tours are priced at $75 person, or $65 for a member.

Martha Lucy, an associate curator, will also lecture on Barnes 'obsession' with Renoir at 6:30 pm, Thurday, July 29. The lecture is titled 'A Collector's Obsession: Dr. Barnes and Renoir.' (Lucy has been talkative. Last month, she offered another Renoir and PMA-related lecture, 'Barnes, Late Renoir, and the Modernist Canon.'

How far can this hand-holding go? The PMA is also offering Barnes members $2 off the regular $24 'Late Renoir' fee.

This cooperation is good news. And will probably grow stronger once the Barnes moves to its new home next year on Museum Mile.

Museum Round-up

Gross Clinic Gets
Out of Rehab

By Richard Carreno

Junto Staff Writer Bio 
Right, 'Girl with Red Ruff' (1896)
by Pierre-Auguste Renoir
The Gross Clinic, Thomas Eakins' masterwork, will be remounted  in July at the Philadelphia Museum of Art following recent conservation and restoration of the painting, often acclaimed as one of the most significant artworks of the 19th-century.

The painting, completed in 1875 sold by Eakins (1844-1916) to Thomas Jefferson University (then Tomas Jefferson Medical College), is now jointly owned by the Art Museum and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts after a controversial purchase from the university in 2006.

The specialty exhibit, from July 24 to January 9, 2011 in the Perelman Building, will explore the painting's history, itself controversial. Initial reaction to the painting ranged from 'horror and revulsion to awe-struck praise,' according to the museum.

The show will be comprehensive, including x-rays of the picture and documentary film produced by the museum.

The museum noted that preservation was particularly required because of 'an insensitive 1920s cleaning.'

'As a result of research and conservation work, audiences will be able to see this masterpiece looking more as it did in Eakins's day than it has at any time since the early 1920s,' the museum said in e-mailed press notes.

Curating the exhibit are Mark S. Tucker, vice chair of conservation and senior conservator of paintings; and Kathleen A. Foster, senior curator of American art and the director of the Center for American Art. The documentary was filmed by Suzanne Penn, conservator of paintings.

SUMMER WITH RENIOR
Works from the last three decades of Pierre-Auguste Renior's career, drawn from private and public collections from around the the world, will be the PMA's main stage exhibit this summer.

The show, titled 'Late Renoir' and now at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, will run from June 17 to September 6 in the Dorrance Galleries.

About 80 works by the Renoir (1842-1919) will be displayed, including sculpture and drawings. The museum did not mention whether any works from the Barnes Foundation, a rich repository of the artist's output, will be exhibited. A fully-illustrated catalog will be available.

'...Late Renoir examines new directions that the artist explored several decades after he and others such as Claude Monet and Camille Pissaro created the new style of painting known as Impressionism,' the museum said in press notes.

As is the case with most PMA exhibits, the narrative of the artwork will be chronological.

The show's curator is Jennifer Thompson, associate curator, European painting before 1900.

Museums Around Town

At the Institute of Contemporary Art
'Queer Voice,' an exhibit of works by nine artists across three generations, including Philly-based Ryan Trecartin, will run through August 1 at Penn's Institute of Contemporary Art on the university's campus at 36th Street.

Admission to the museum is always free.

Included is Trecartin's video, P.opular S.ky (section ish) (2009) and the script for K-Corea INC. K (Section A) (2009).

Trecartin, a native Texan, was born in 1981 and studied at the Rhode Island School of Design, Providence. In 2009, Trecartin won the Jack Wolgin International Competition in Fine Arts and was named the 'Best New Artist of the Year' in the first Annual Arts Awards at the Guggenheim Museum.

At the Please Touch Museum
Please Touch Museum, the Children's Museum of Philadelphia, located in Memorial Hall, will sponsor the 10th annual ABC Games, a near month-long series of sport and physical activities to encourage youth fitness, sportsmanship, an self-confidence.

The event's kick-off will be Friday, June 4 and run to June 27. Activities will be held at the museum's Rainforest Rhythm Gallery, next to the Woodside Park Dentzel Carousel.