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The Harvard Art Museums

5/20/2018

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I recently had the pleasure of visiting the Harvard Art Museums in Cambridge, MA.  I highly recommend you check it out as they have a wonderful and varied collection of artwork from earliest times to the present.
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The Harvard Art Museums are actually comprised of three art collections; The Fogg, the Busch-Reisinger, and the Arthur M. Sackler Museum.  The three were combined in a beautiful space designed by Renzo Piano Building Workshop.  The Museum's literature stated that it is their hope that their collections and unique spaces inspire new ways of looking and thinking about art for all visitors.  ​

I started out off the main atrium to explore the European Art of the 19th and 20th Century and the Modern and Contemporary Art galleries.  
I came across this painting to the right by Paul Cezanne called, "Study of Trees."  It is oil on canvas and is from the early 20th Century.  When I think of Cezanne, I often think of impressionism, delightful landscapes, or beautiful bowls of fruit!  This painting demonstrated Cezanne's role in connecting 19th Century Impressionism to 20th Century Cubism.  I love how the trees are represented here because he was able to depict depth using diagonal shapes and brushstrokes that hint at movement and depth.  There are dashed lines that define the tree trunks on both sides of a country road.  It's no wonder why Harvard has this painting as part of its collection; Although it's not as well-known as Van Gogh's "Starry Night" or Monet's "Waterlilies," it's one of the most important paintings from this time period and the history of abstract painting.
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Pablo Picasso's "Still Life with Inkwell" Oil on Canvas, c. 1911-1912. Picasso applied cubism to the traditional still life.
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Pablo Picasso's "The Pomegranate" Oil on Canvas, 1911-1912.
Here is Willem de Kooning's 1937-1938 Oil on Masonite painting titled, "Untitled (The Cow Jumps Over The Moon).  I learned that de Kooning was trained as a commercial artist and his artistic styles move back and forth between abstract and figurative methods. This painting below is one of his earlier works, which reminds me of Joan Miro's work to some degree.  His later artwork, for which he is more well-known, is more gestural and epitomizes the abstract expressionism movement.  
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Georgia O'Keefe, "Red and Pink" Oil on Canvas, 1925. Perhaps an abstraction of flower petals.
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Vincent Van Gogh's "The Blind Man" Watercolor on paper mounted on canvas, 1903.
Joan Miro in his painting to the right titled, "Mural" made in 1935 plays with the idea of surrealism.  Animal-like figures are seen here on an oddly shaped background with areas of pure, flat color.

If you haven't seen my blog on Barcelona Art, there is a ton I included on my visit to the Joan Miro Museum.  Click Here to read my blog on Barcelona Art!
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You wouldn't know it based on the type of artwork he became famous for, but the painting below is by the artist, Roy Lichtenstein.  "The Capture of Roanoke Island" was painted in 1953, well before he developed his pop art comic-book style of art.
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I came across several sculptures by the artist David Smith.  For those of you who read my blog about the Downtown Art Scene in Los Angeles, I included a David Smith sculpture.  You can read it HERE!

I learned that due to a generous donor, the Harvard Art Museums have the largest and most complete collection of David Smith's artwork than any other museum in the world.  David Smith lived in Indiana and Vermont and although he began his career as a painter, he created many many sculptures.  In the photo to the right, Smith's sculpture, "Flight" that was created in 1951 and depicts birds in flight.  What's interesting is his use of both welding steel and casting bronze, and his process to paint the former and patina-ting the latter.
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David Smith's "Detroit Queen" Bronze, 1957.
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David Smith's "Doorway on Wheels" Steel with Paint, 1960.
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Three Untitled works of art by David Smith created in 1959.
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David Smith's "Birthday" 1954, "Books and Apple" 1957, and "Bird" 1957. All Sterling Silver.
I stared at this painting below "Grazing Horses IV (The Red Horses), painted in 1911 by Franz Marc for quite a long time.  Not because I love horses, but rather it struck me as fascinating.  Franz Marc painted horses a lot, and was known for his preoccupation with animals.  I learned that this particular painting was actually his first work of art to enter a museum's collection, the same year it was made.  What struck me was his use of unnatural colors in a very natural scene.  It's hard to see in the photo, but I was intrigued with the use of bright red in only one or two spots on the horses.
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Here to the right is one of my favorites...  Piet Mondrian's "Composition with Blue, Black, Yellow, and Red," painted in 1922.  Many people have commented that much of my own artwork reminds them of Mondrian's artwork.  In this blog article from the Museum of Contemporary Art in New York, I discuss this in greater length.  CLICK HERE to read that blog article!
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Claude Monet's "Red Boats, Argenteuil" Oil on Canvas, 1875. This painting is notable because x-rays of this painting show that Monet reworked this painting a few times.
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Georges Pierre Seurat, "Seated Figures, Study for A Sunday Afternoon On The Island of La Grande Jatte" Oil on Panel. 1884-1885. This is one of about 30 oil studies made in preparation for his masterpiece.
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Henri Matisse, "Geraniums" Oil on Canvas, 1910.
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Max Beckman's self-portrait in 1927, "Self-Portrait in Tuxedo" Oil on Canvas.
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Gustav Klimt's "Pear Tree, 1903, later reworked by the artist. Interesting to note that Klimt chose to use a square canvas, which at the time was not typically used for landscapes.
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In the Foreground, Alexander Calder's "Little Blue Under Red" c. 1950 Painted Steel.
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Three Sculptures: "Head of a Woman" by Aristide Maillol; Degas' "Grande Arabesque, Third Time, modeled c 1885-90, cast after 1920; and Charles Despiau's "Seated Man, Statue for the Monument to Emile Mayrisch" c. 1930.
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​Jackson Pollock's "No. 2" mixed Media on Canvas, 1950.

No 2 is an example of Pollock's fully developed paint-pouring/splatter-painting/dripping techniques. 

​He put raw, un-stretched canvas on the floor and worked from above, pouring, dripping, flicking, and spraying paint onto the surface of the canvas.  The movement shown here is a record of his bodily movements as he produced the painting.
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Franz Kline's "High Street" Oil on Canvas, 1950. It's made with House-painters' brushes and inexpensive enamel house-paint.
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Mark Rothko's "Untitled" Oil on Canvas, 1947. A precursor to his well-known, iconic style, of two or three tiers of brightly colored rectangles.
Below is Jasper johns' "The Dutch Wives", encaustic on canvas, created in 1975.  If you haven't read my blog article on the Jasper johns retrospective exhibition at The Broad Museum in Los Angeles, you can find it HERE.
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Josef Albers' work here below shows his thought process of how art is a type of research.  With the same format of squares within squares, he tested a vast array of color combinations; He took all this research and theoretical findings to publish his book in 1963, "Interaction of Color," which is an essential resource for art and design students to this day.
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Josef Albers: "Homage to the Square: Against Deep Blue" 1955 and "Homage to the Square: Four Greens" 1964. Both Oil on Masonite.
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Auguste Rodin's "the Walking Man" Bronze, created around 1899-1900.
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Above is Richard Serra's "Untitled (Corner Prop Piece) created in 1969.  It's a sculpture comprised of a lead plate and pole and an example of minimalism and the use of industrial materials in fine art.  Serra makes use of the room's architecture including the walls and floor, essential to the sculpture.
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Claude Monet's "Red Mullets" Oil on Canvas, painted around 1870. I love this painting as it's so different from a typical Monet landscape, or waterlilies painting.
Here are three painting studies by John Singleton Copley, all painted in 1787.  I learned that the city of London commissioned the artist to create a large painting commemorating Britain's victory over the Spanish and French at the Siege of Gibraltar in 1782.  These portraits are character studies and experiments of his in composition.  Looking at this from a contemporary art perspective, I love how the portraits are "unfinished."
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Below is a wonderful painting from a German artist that I was unfamiliar with named Corinne Wasmuht.  It is titled, "50 U Heinrich-Heine-Str." oil on wood and created in 2009.  The painting is a portrayal of Berlin's Heinrich Heine Street subway station and its surrounding neighborhood.  It's hard to tell scale from photographs, but this is a huge painting and it's scale immerses the viewer, but the paintings various perspective points and different scales of objects also disorient the viewer.  It's really a magnificent painting and I can see why it was gifted to Harvard's Busch-Reisinger Museum. 
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Ai Weiwei's "258 Fake" created in 2011 features 12 monitors that show 7,677 photographs taken between 2003 and 2011
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Below are some fascinating samples taken from the Forbes Pigment Collection.  Edward Forbes was the director of the Harvard Art Museums from 1909 to 1944.  During his tenure, he traveled the world, collecting a large number of pigments for the library.  Today, the Pigment Collection contains more than 2,500 samples that are beautifully displayed in cabinets on the 4th floor and are used to this day to help identify pigments used in historical artworks.
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I came across this wonderful, short video on the Forbes Pigment Collection that was created about 2 years ago. Check it out!

Inventur--Art in Germany, 1943-55
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The special exhibition at the Harvard Art Museums was titled, "Inventur--Art in Germany, 1943-55" and focuses on modern-period artists who remained in Germany during World War II and the Holocaust.  The exhibit runs through June 3, 2018 on the 3rd Floor of the Museum.

​The artwork in the exhibition is in some way, a representation of the individual artist's response to Nazi censure, which prevented artists from exhibiting and/or selling their artwork.  I found it fascinating that the exhibition was called Inventur, meaning inventory,  because it is a collection of the artist experience for over 50 artists.

With Hitler's rise to power, there was a major government-driven effort to align individuals and organizations with the doctrine of the Nazi State.  Many teaching artists lost their jobs.  The well-known art school, The Bauhaus School of Art and Design, was closed under Nazi Rule.  Artwork that was not approved of by the Nazi State was coined "Degenerate Artwork."  If artists chose not to leave Germany or were not permitted to leave Germany, they had no choice but to create art privately.
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Hans Uhlmann's "Male Head" Steel sheet, 1942.
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Ernst Wilhelm Nay's "Embers" Oil on Canvas, 1951.
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Thomas Grochowiak's "Technical District I, Blue" Oil on Canvas, 1951.
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Jeanne Mammen's "Falling Facades (Berlin Ruins), oil on cardboard, 1945-1946.
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Konrad Klapheck's "Typewriter" Oil on Canvas, 1955.
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Fritz Winter's, "Figuration in Front of Blue" Oil on Canvas, 1953.
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Willi Baumeister's "Large Montaru" Oil with synthetic resin on board, 1953.
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Willi Baumeister's "Growth of the Crystals II" Oil with resin and putty on board, 1947/1952.
For more information about The Harvard Art Museums, please visit their website:  www.harvardartmuseums.org.  I definitely recommend visiting the Museum as you're in for a wonderful experience!  
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The Getty Center

4/2/2018

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The Getty Center is comprised of the J. Paul Getty Museum, the Getty Research Institute, the Getty Conservation Institute, and the Getty Foundation.  I visited the Museum, which was a wonderful experience.  The Getty Villa, which I did not visit on this trip, is located in Pacific Palisades, California.  The Getty Museum is set atop a hill bridging Los Angeles and the San Fernando Valley, right off of the 405 Freeway.  After parking, you take a tram from the bottom to the top of the hill.  The Fran and Ray Stark Sculpture Garden is located near the parking area!  While there is a fee to park your car, admission to The Getty is always free.
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Vinvent Van Gogh's "Irises" is one of The Getty's highlights.  Van Gogh painted Irises in 1889 in the garden of the Saint-Remy asylum where he was being treated for his mental illness.  It is oil on canvas.  I learned that Van Gogh never really thought of this painting as a finished painting, but rather more of a study.  It's a great example of his work that demonstrates how he painted en plein air.  I'm fascinated with his brush techniques and how he layers color upon color upon color.  I've included a detailed image of "Irises."  
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Detail of Van Gogh's "Irises"
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Starry Night, Edvard Munch, Oil on Canvas, 1893.
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Jeanne (Spring) by Edouard Manet, Oil on Canvas, 1861.
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Still Life With Apples, Paul Cezanne, Oil on Canvas, About 1893-1894.
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Sunrise, by Claude Monet, Oil on Canvas, 1873.
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Wheatstacks, Snow Effect, Morning, by Claude Monet, Oil on Canvas, 1891. Monet painted 30 variations of these Wheatstacks during different seasons and times of day, demonstrating his masterful ability to capture light in his artwork.
I really loved the special exhibit at The Getty Center called, "Cut! Paper Play in Contemporary Photography."  This exhibit that runs through May 27, 2018 features the work of contemporary photographers who use paper in unique and innovative ways. Some of the artists created paper models with images from current events with the intention of photographing them to create their final piece of artwork. While some artists make folds, cuts, or layers to arrange photographs to create something entirely new and innovative.
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Work by Thomas Demand who photographed architectural models and focused on small details while creating large-scale prints.
The photo below is the artwork of artist, Soo Kim.  To create her artwork, she cuts and layers imagery to create areas of negative space that gives her images a 3-D look.  The shadows cast onto the wall are fascinating.  I included two detailed shots showing some of the imagery seen in this cut photograph.  the other detailed photo shows the beautiful shapes created by the shadows.
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"Midnight Reykjavik #5" by Soo Kim
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Detail of "Midnight Reykjavik #5" by Soo Kim
This next artist, Christiane Feser, bridges the gap between photography and sculpture.  What you are seeing here are photographs of sticks and also the stick(s) itself.  It's hard to know whether you're looking at a photograph of something, or the actual object. The artwork below and the detail to the right is also by Christiane Feser and is titled, "Partitian 31".

Overall, it was fascinating to experience this exhibit which was just adjacent to another exhibit on early American photography. Rare photographs were on view.  The innovation in photography and how these artists push the boundaries that paper plays in the artists creation process is thought-provoking.
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Sticks 2, by Christiane Feser
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The grounds of The Getty are home to wonderful sculptures; there's something wonderful around every corner.  Unlike most paintings, sculptures are typically created to be displayed outdoors.  Outside, a three dimensional sculpture can be viewed from every angle, a variety of distances, and therefore creating an experience or a special moment for the viewer.  The sculpture gardens include artwork from artists such as Joan Miro, Rene Magritte, Alexander Calder, Fernand Leger, Ellsworth Kelly, Roy Lichtenstein, and other artists.  
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Another amazing exhibit was  the "Michelangelo to Degas" exhibit that featured new aquisitions that broke records in the art world.  The Getty Museum purchased 16 major drawings and one painting from a private collector that includes works by Michelangelo, Andrea del Sarto, Goya, Domenico Tiepolo, and Edgar Degas.  Below are three of my favorite pieces from this small but powerful exhibit.  From left to right: Edgar Degas' "After The Bath (Woman Drying Herself)" about 1886; Michelangelo's "Study of a Mourning Woman" about 1500-1505; and Edgar Degas' "Two Studies of Dancers" about 1873.
I encourage you to go visit The Getty when in Los Angeles--You won't be disappointed!  ​I encourage you to take advantage of the wonderful tours and events that the Getty Center offers such as architectural tours, garden tours, exhibition tours, etc.  Also, for families with children, there are Art Detective Cards where kids can find the artworks and solve mysteries while exploring the galleries.  For visitors information, please visit: www.getty.edu.
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The Hammer Museum

4/1/2018

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The Hammer Museum is a small but wonderful treasure of a museum located in Los Angeles near UCLA.  The museum has free admission and hosts lunchtime art talks and other programs on a regular basis.  The Hammer Museum is operated and partially funded by UCLA.  The collection includes historical artworks that reflect the personal interests of Armand Hammer, the founder of the museum. He collected art for most of his life and his collection is one of the best collections of representative artwork from 19th Century French Art, impressionism, pointillism, etc.  
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"Boulevard Montmartre, Mardi Gras," Oil on Canvas, 1897 by Camille Pissarro
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"Grape Pickers at Lunch," 1888, Oil on Canvas, by Pierre-Auguste Renior.
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"Bonjour Monsieur Gaughin" 1889, Oil on Canvas and Panel, by Paul Gaughin.
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"Study for In the Salon on the Rue des Moulins" 1894, Oil on Canvas, by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.
I love this painting below by Vincent Van Gogh, not because I love the imagery, but because it really doesn't look like a typical painting by Vincent Van Gogh!  This painting, "Garden of the Rectory at Nuenen" was painted in 1885 in the Netherlands.  The browns and grays are vastly different from the vivid, bright colors we are used to seeing in his later paintings when he lived in the south of France.
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Below is one of Van Gogh's more typical painting style with all the beautiful colors and brushwork.  The painting, "Hospital at Saint-Remy" is oil on canvas and was painted in 1889.  It depicts the scenery at the institution in the south of France where Van Gogh was being treated for severe mental illness.  
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"The Sower" Oil on Canvas, 1888, by Vincent Van Gogh.
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"Boy Resting" Oil on Canvas, 1887, by Paul Cezanne.
The Hammer Museum also has other galleries dedicated to contemporary artists.  There was a really cool exhibit by the artist, Molly Lowe and another exhibit by the artist, Lawrence Abu Hamdan.  Abu Hamdan uses a series of overhead projectors that cast images that have been created with a visualization tool that architects use to map the leakages of sound throughout a structure.  The visuals are accompanied by audio that helps transform the research on a Syrian torture prison.  I enjoyed looking at the exhibit from a visual perspective, but after reading about the artwork's meaning, it really makes me question my thoughts on conceptual art. Below is a photo of the small room that housed the projectors.  
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Perhaps the most bizarre (in a  good way) exhibit was called "Stories of Almost Everyone" featured in the large exhibit hall .  It's a group exhibition of 40 artists that is about society's willingness to believe the stories that are conveyed by works of contemporary art.  It really hones in on conceptual art and how we look at material objects.  Below is a photo of the exhibit hall showing some of the artworks.   I'm including a YouTube video that was created by the Hammer Museum with Will Ferrell and Joel McHale, which is very funny and addresses the issues related to conceptual art head-on.  Art can be confusing and the fact that the Hammer Museum pokes fun at this, I think, is really bold.  "Stories of Almost Everyone" runs through May 6, 2018.  For more information about The Hammer Museum, check out their website:  https://hammer.ucla.edu/.
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Loving Vincent

10/25/2017

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I’ve been anxiously waiting to see the movie, "Loving Vincent" ever since I first started to hear about its production a few years ago.  It is the world's first fully-painted feature film.  I had the pleasure of seeing this incredible film today.
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Over 65,000 frames of the movie were painted by over a hundred artists on over 1,000 canvases. The movie was shot on film with professional actors, and was produced by later painting over each frame by frame. I learned that it took over 4 years to develop this technique.  Each frame of the movie is painted in the style of Vincent van Gogh and tell the story of Vincent van Gogh‘s life as an artist and his unfortunate death.
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Vincent van Gogh is perhaps one the most famous painters in the world with masterpieces such as Starry Night, his many self-portraits, Sunflowers, Café Terrace at Night, Wheatfield with Crows, and portraits of his friend, the Postman, Joseph Roulin.  Starry Night is one of my favorite paintings to see when in New York City at the Museum of Modern Art.

​From a visual perspective the film is absolutely stunning, spectacular, awe-inspiring, beautiful, and incredible. Almost every adjective that is positive and good could be attributed to this masterpiece of film animation.


We all have heard how Vincent van Gogh cut off his ear, delivered it to a brothel, and later shot himself dying two days later.  This movie explores Vincent van Gogh's life and career as an artist with an incredibly unique approach in this animated historic documentary.
​The famous Postman, Joseph Roulin, played by Chris O’Dowd was Vincent van Gogh's loyal friend. The film's story takes place a year after Vincent van Gogh‘s death and centers around Joseph Roulin's son seeking to deliver an unopened letter from Vincent van Gogh originally sent to his brother Theo that was returned as un-deliverable.  Joseph Roulin's son, Armand Roulin, portrayed by actor Douglas Booth, is sent to deliver the letter by hand to Vincent's brother, Theo, and find out what really happened to Vincent.  

​Through a series of flashbacks, we learn about Vincent‘s life and the mystery surrounding his death. The flashbacks were painted in black and white, and had a different look and feel to them, separate and distinct from the colorful Van Gogh-like paintings which moved as if they have a life of their own.
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The artists and director of the film really captured van Gogh's style, bringing it to life on film. The swirls in the sky and starry night opens the film it’s opening credits. Every detail was taken care of regarding the casting of light and shadow as people moved in front of the light and moved away from the light or moved closer to the light. In some scenes where there were lamps, you really could tell by the painters brushstrokes the glow of the fire that emanated from the lamp. And it was that glow that was also masterfully captured in the characters faces, clothing, etc.

The plot-line of the movie is certainly more of a historical documentary, featuring a variety of different flashbacks and characters re-counting their impressions of van Gogh and their interactions with Vincent van Gogh. From from all of these characters' subjective accounts of Vincent van Gogh‘s life and death, we learn, in aggregate, all about Vincent van Gogh.

At the end of the film, we see the closing credits, which featured photographs of the actors in costume in character beside actual photographs or paintings by Vincent van Gogh of those characters and the images that inspired the scenery, etc. For example, the Vincent van Gogh's paintings of Joseph Roulin, the Postman, of which there are several of them, those images were shown beside the actor's portrayal of that character.

It really is hard to believe that Vincent van Gogh only sold one painting in his lifetime. And it’s really hard to even fathom that he painted over 800 paintings in his eight year career as an artist.  I always wonder what wonderful artwork he would have produced for the world to experience and enjoy had he lived a longer life.

Even describing this film does not do it justice. You really do just have to see it for yourself. The film has already won several nominations and awards at various internationally acclaimed film festivals.  Anyone who appreciates Vincent van Gogh's artwork, or even Modern Art in general, needs to see this movie.  

I can’t recommend this movie more highly. The official trailer is posted below.  For more information about the movie, please visit the official website www.lovingvincent.com

Go see it!  And I welcome your comments below.
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Museum of Modern Art, New York

2/15/2017

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Every time I visit New York City, I always try to make it to the Museum of Modern Art.  Each visit exposes me to exciting new exhibits, while at the same time, I really enjoy seeing art that is regularly on view like Van Gogh's Starry Night and Picasso's guitar sculpture (among many others).  Seeing these familiar works of art is almost like being reunited with an old friend.  So for this blog post, I'll focus on the new as well as the old (at least to me) when I visited the Museum of Modern Art this past December.
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I love this Sol LeWitt "Wall Drawing #1144 Broken Bands of Color in Four Directions." Synthetic polymer paint on wall.
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I was excited to see the Francis Picabia exhibition, "Francis Picabia: Our Heads Are Round So Our Thoughts Can Change Direction," which runs through March 19, 2017.  Picabia lived from 1889 to 1953.  
Just recently, on February 14th, I came across an editorial article on Artsy.net by Isaac Kaplan entitled, "Do Francis Picabia's Anti-Semitic Remarks Tarnish his MoMA Retrospective?" After reading the article I learned about Picabia's anti-Jewish feelings (and womanizing behaviors).  MoMA's exhibit apparently does address this part of Picabia's character; however, I must have missed this as I walked through the gallery.  To answer Kaplan's question personally.  I think it does, in fact, tarnish his reputation.  I really enjoyed his artwork during my visit to the MoMA.  But after learning more about the artist, I can't say that I can admire him.  Famous artists are people that I want to look up to and admire.  They are people that I want the next generation of artists to look up to.  And so, while I can appreciate his artwork at face value and his artistic technique, learning about his anti-Semitic behavior does take him down several notches in my book.  Similarly, just like we want our kids to admire our professional sports players, it's hard to have our kids look up to them if they do drugs, treat women badly, are anti-gay, or are anti-Jewish, or discriminate in any way.  So, I'm kind of let down after my great experience viewing his work in the gallery.  But for this blog article, I will continue to proceed sharing my thoughts on the exhibit as if I hadn't learned of his anti-Semitic feelings and behavior.  

​Here is the link to the article for your information:  
https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-francis-picabias-anti-semitic-remarks-tarnish-moma-retrospective
As I walked though the gallery rooms, the one thing that struck me the most was how his artistic style changed throughout his lifetime.  Picabia was an artist of many genres, and his body of work lacks consistency and categorization. He shifted styles over time.  The exhibit highlights his impressionist landscapes, abstract works, paintings, photo-based nudes, etc. 

​Here are some photos from the exhibit.
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These two Picabia paintings shown below reminded me of one of my own paintings that I painted earlier this past year, "Woof Woof! Gotta Get My Bone."  All three works utilize black lines in a similar fashion. I should note that my painting was created without ever seeing Picabia's work; I am just noting the coincidence in how we both used these lines in the same fashion.
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Woof Woof! Gotta Get My Bone, 10" x 20", Acrylic on Canvas by Eddie Bruckner
"Revolutionary Impulse: the Rise of the Russian Avant-Garde" was another wonderful temporary exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art that runs through March 12, 2017.  The fact that all the artwork on display comes directly from MOMA's permanent collection, demonstrates how wonderful MOMA is and how impressive their permanent collection is.  Of all the artwork on view, there were two artists whose work caught my eye.  

The two photos below are from the Russian artist Alexandra Exter. The oil on canvas painting on the left, called "Theatrical Composition" was very intriguing to me.  I loved the colors, shapes, and overall composition of the painting.  The other smaller works, pictured to the right are six designs from various stage sets like The Merchant of Venice, Othello, and others.
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The second artist, whose work I found very unique was the Russian artist, El Lissitzky. the painting shown below (along with a detailed close-up photo) is of the painting "Proun 19D"  It is painted on plywood and uses a variety of media such as gesso, oil, varnish, crayon, colored papers, graph paper, sandpaper, cardboard, metallic paint, and metal foil.
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To photograph all the well-know paintings from all the famous artists would be a huge undertaking.  So I'm including a small selection of some of my favorite pieces along with some detailed close-up photos from the following artists:  Georges Seurat, Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, Jasper Johns, Henri Matisse, Fernand Leger, Jim Dine, Andy Warhol, Edward Ruscha, Josef Albers, James Rosenquist, Robert Rauschenberg, and Sol LeWitt.  I have the close-up photos to show the brushstrokes, the detailed use of color, and a glimpse into what the artist was focused on while painting their masterpiece.  
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Georges Seurat
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Vincent van Gogh's "The Starry Night"
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Jasper Johns' "Flag"
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Robert Rauschenberg's "Sky Garden" from "Stoned Moon Series"
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Pablo Picasso's Guitar Sculpture (3 views), and below, "Vase of Flowers" & "Les Demoiselles d'Avignon
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Henri Matisse "The Piano Lesson"
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Fernand Leger, "The Mirror"
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Jim Dine
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Edward Ruscha, "OOF"
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Josef Albers, "Day and Night: Homage to the Square"
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Andy Warhol, "Water Heater"
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James Rosenquist, "F-111" Oil on Canvas with aluminum, 23 Sections on 4 walls.
I highly recommend visiting the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.  More information about the museum can be found on their website:  www.moma.org.
PS: If you liked this article, you might like these other articles on my artistic travels:
Kennebunkport, Maine
Los Angeles, California
New York City Street Art
Napa Valley, California
Park City, Utah
Barcelona, Spain
Caribbean Art
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Visiting Two Great Art Institutions in Greater Boston

6/16/2016

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This past week I had the pleasure of visiting two of my favorite Art Museums in the Boston area.  What I love about art museums is the special combination of new temporary exhibitions and spectacular permanent collections. 

The Rose Art Museum
The first museum I’ll write about is the Rose Art Museum, located in Waltham, Massachusetts.  On a personal note, the Rose Art Museum is special to me because it is part of Brandeis University, my alma mater.  As part of my art education at Brandeis university, I had the unique opportunity to tour the Rose’s amazing permanent collection—however, not exhibited on the walls of the museum, but rather in the museum’s storage vault.  In the mid-1990s, I saw incredible works from the collection from Roy Lichtenstein to Andy Warhol to Willem de Kooning to Jasper Johns.  With over 8,000 works of art, mostly from American Artists from the 1960s and 1970s, the Rose Art Museum is one of the leading art museums in the world.  Use the following link to see the digital collection:  http://rosecollection.brandeis.edu/
 
This week the Rose Art Museum was exhibiting a temporary retrospective exhibit on the artist Rosalyn Drexler. The exhibit, “Rosalyn Drexler:  Who does She Think She Is?” recently closed, but I believe it is traveling to other museums in the coming months.
It was very exciting to look at the career of an artist from the 1960s; Drexler’s work was really relevant at that time in history.  She was part of the pop art movement, knew Andy Warhol, and although her work is really relevant, for various reasons, she wasn’t a central figure in the art world at that time. Walking around the museum and looking at her artwork was really fascinating.  The themes of the show explored issues of love and violence and her interest in pop media, film posters, magazines, etc.  There were also depictions of violence towards women, which she picked out from the images in the mass media and used them as her subject matter.  She’s telling us that this is what is in our mass media and we should be thinking about it.  Some of her artwork feels very “Hollywood.” 
 
The one thing that was very exciting to see in her artwork is how you get to understand and experience her creative process.  For example, Andy Warhol literally took images from mass media, made a screen print of it and used it as his own on his canvas.  And pop artist Roy Lichtenstein often took an image, typically from a cartoon or comic book, and projected it on his canvas and then hand painted what it looked like. Rosalyn Drexler would do something in between, where she would find an image from the mass media and she would use a mimeograph machine (an early photocopier) to enlarge it and paste those enlargements directly on the canvas and painting right over it.  On a number of the paintings, if you looked closely, you could see this collage'd element.  She is using found material directly on the works.  The exhibit also featured from the original source material of the mass media materials she used for her artwork. ​​
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Also on permanent view just outside the museum is Chris Burden’s “Light of Reason” sculpture shown here, which was specifically commissioned for the Rose Art Museum and Brandeis University.  I had the pleasure of attending the dedication ceremony in 2014.  A similar work of his also featuring found Los Angeles street lamps can be seen at the entrance of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
http://www.brandeis.edu/rose/
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It was wonderful to see this retrospective exhibit.  Seeing all of an artist’s work together sheds new light on how significant her work was at the time.

​I also enjoyed a new permanent exhibit that was commissioned from the artist Mark Dion.  He turned a small space in the museum into an exhibit called “The Undisciplined Collector” and is staged as if it were a collector’s home office from 1961, the year of the Rose Art Museum’s founding.  The furniture is from that era and a record player was even playing in the background.  Works from the Rose’s permanent collection from 1961 were hanging on the wall.  In the drawers were prints and photographs from early exhibitions at the Rose.  It just opened this past fall and the room will remain on permanent view. 
The Museum of Fine Arts Boston
The following day I had the opportunity to visit the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, which houses one of the world’s best and diverse collections of fine art including contemporary art, art of Asia, Oceana, Africa, Europe the Americas, art of the ancient world, and jewelry, musical instruments, prints, drawings, and photographs.  Although I didn’t get to see everything in the museum, I was able to see some of my favorite works of art again as well as see some new things and very cool new temporary exhibits.
 
And while I’m more of a contemporary and modern art kind of guy, I was particularly impressed with the story behind a 13-foot-tall statue of a classical sculpture of Juno.  The Roman marble lady is the largest Classical sculpture in any museum in the United States.  But perhaps even more fascinating was where the statue was found; It was found in the backyard of a Brookline, Massachusetts home (a suburb of Boston).  The statue that is dated to about the year 1633 was purchased at the end of the 19th Century in Rome and brought to Brookline, Massachusetts to be placed as part of a formal garden.
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I also encountered an amazing Vincent Van Gogh painting, called “Ravine,” painted in 1889, one year before his passing in 1890. The painting, pictured here along with a close up, is amazing!  From afar, the colors blend together to form a visual picture of a spectacular and breathtaking ravine in France, near the town of Saint Remy.  But as you draw closer to the painting, you see individual brushstrokes, globs of paint on top of paint, on top of even more paint.  The texture and thickness is very cool.  And yet, up close, you can’t even tell what the painting’s subject is at all.  Up close, it simply looks like brushstrokes of color in a random, haphazard fashion.  So what I love about this painting, is that the beauty of this painting is its uniqueness, partly because of this magical illusion; that when seeing the painting up close, we’re being tricked to think these brushstrokes don’t have meaning, when in fact they most certainly do.
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Two works that I loved seeing were Frank Stella’s 1966 painting, “Cinema de Pepsi” and Ellsworth Kelly’s 1968 huge, uniquely shaped painting, “Blue Green Yellow Orange Red”.  These two artists used color in fascinating ways, which I really love and admire. ​
Another American artist, named Spencer Finch, exhibited a spectacular work of art using florescent light fixtures and filters to create his 2014 work entitled, “Shield of Achilles (Dawn, Troy, 10/27/02).  Finch’s work observes colors of a given landscape at a precise day and time; This work is arranged in the shape of a shield, inspired by Homer’s Illiad.  
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The Danish artist, Jeppe Hein’s work entitled “PLEASE…” is a neon light installation from 2008.  Hein is fascinated with the relationship between the viewer and his artwork and the art really isn’t complete without the viewer’s participation.  I really can relate with Jeppe Hein and his work because some of my artwork also has a similar element to it.  My paintings entitled “Close Your Eyes” and “You Have To Read This” come to mind when thinking about Hein’s work.  With “Close Your Eyes” I’m trying to convey to viewers a bit of edginess or something to make you think twice about what you are seeing.  I really enjoy the irony of creating art that is visual, and then the message of the painting instructs you not to look at it.  “Close Your Eyes” was selected in the prestigious Connecticut Academy of Fine Arts Annual Juried Art Exhibit a few years ago.  The six works of art are pictured here.  http://www.jeppehein.net/
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Throughout the museum (and around the Museum and even in Faneuil Hall in Boston) is the Megacities Asia exhibit, which runs until July 17, 2016.  Megacities are cities with populations of more than ten million. These megacities are increasing in numbers and changes the lives of so many people.  I was really impressed with the works of the artists Ai Weiwei and Choi Jeong Hwa.  Choi Jeong Hwa’s “Breathing Flower” located just outside the museum was very moving. http://aiweiwei.com/
  http://choijeonghwa.com/
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And lastly, the temporary exhibit called “#techstyle” was really quite amazing to see.  It’s on view through July 10, 2016, so be sure to get to the MFA soon!  The exhibit shows how emerging technologies are shaping fashion design now and in the future.  The exhibit highlighted 3d printed shoes (shown here), electronics, lights, lasers, etc.  Here is a photo of a dress made with a programmable LED display with changing patterns and colors.
 
For more information, go to www.mfa.org
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