The Curated Object

Exhibitions San Diego. All that Glitters: The Splendor & Science of Gems & Minerals. The San Diego Museum of Natural History. The Curated Object

Balboa Park Carousel Egg -Design by Jim Grahl. A red enameled golden egg opens to reveal an exact miniature replica of the life-sized carousel that can be found near the entrance to the San Diego Zoo. A hand-crafted key winds the music box, the carousel goes around, and the animals go up and down, just like the original. Photo by Sylvia Bissonnette.

Emerald and diamond necklace - Designed by Ostertag; set with carved emeralds and diamonds in platinum; circa 1930. The longest dangle on the necklace and the earrings are each about 3 1/2 inches long. Photograph by Tino Hammid.

Pomegranate brooch - Designed by Verdura; set with peridot, ruby cabochons, and yellow diamonds in gold; circa 1945. 2 1/2 inches wide.  Photograph by Tino Hammid.

 

ALL THAT GLITTERS: The Splendor and Science of Gems and Minerals

May 15, 2010-April 2012

The San Diego Natural History Museum is pleased to announce a new exhibition, developed and designed by Museum staff, entitled "ALL THAT GLITTERS: The Splendor and Science of Gems and Minerals." The exhibition will take visitors beyond the “bling” to see gems as very rare and ancient by-products of the forces that have created our landscape, including right here in San Diego County.

In conjunction with highlights from the Museum’s own collection, the exhibition will include a unique assemblage of extraordinary gem specimens and superlative jewelry designed by such renowned jewelry houses as Tiffany & Co., Cartier and Van Cleef & Arpels on loan from private collectors, and such notable institutions as the American Museum of Natural History, Gemological Institute of America (GIA), Harvard University Mineralogical Museum, Newark Museum, and the Smithsonian.

The displays will showcase classic workmanship and signature elements related to specific styles and time periods. Exquisite gem carvings include a Faberge grey chalcedony pig with diamond eyes, a jelly fish opal brooch by Mauboussin, Cartier diamond panthers and tigers, and a never-before-seen collection of 13 butterfly brooches set with rare gems such as alexandrite, flame spinel, sphene, rhodochrosite, Mexican fire opal, pearls from Baja California, topaz, rainbow moonstone (transparent labradorite), and sapphire from Montana.

“In addition to demonstrating the ‘splendor and science of gems and minerals,’ ALL THAT GLITTERS will have a playful side, says Exhibition Curator and Graduate Gemologist Elise B. Misiorowski. “Jewels and carvings incorporating natural-history themes will give children as well as adults delightful surprises to hunt for. How many jeweled butterflies, birds, and flowers can you find? Which case contains the Faberge carved pig with diamond eyes? What gems are set in the little bee brooch? How many jewels represent sea life?”

The core of "ALL THAT GLITTERS" is gems and minerals of California, including tourmaline, spessartite (orange garnet), kunzite, topaz, Morganite, aquamarine, quartz, opal, scheelite, colemanite, covellite, sphene, herderite, and jade. A special case will spotlight benitoite, the California State Gemstone. This dark blue gem is extremely rare, found only in San Benito County, California—nowhere else in the world. “San Diego County is known among collectors throughout the world for its gems and minerals, and yet, few of our residents are aware of our rich mineral legacy,” says Michael W. Hager, Ph.D., Museum President and CEO. “ALL THAT GLITTERS is intended to inspire, educate, and dazzle residents and visitors alike with our local treasure.”

A giant periodic table will teach visitors what elements comprise which gems, and that the diamond— perhaps the most coveted gem of all—is the only one made from a single element (carbon). In addition, gems made from minerals will not be the only stars of the exhibit. Organic beauties, such as pearls, jet, ivory and coral will also be featured, including a piece of amber (fossilized tree sap) containing an ancient cricket suspended in time.

One of the highlights of "ALL THAT GLITTERS" is the expanded Gem Pocket exhibit. Gem pockets are natural occurrences caused when fiery fluid from inside the Earth rises and penetrates the Earth’s crust, melting the rock and reforming as gem crystals and important economic minerals. Installed to look like a rocky outcropping in the local hills, the “Fantasy Gem Pocket” exhibit will be a dramatic cave-like space where visitors will explore the 4′ x 4′ Gem Pocket embedded with gems native to San Diego County, including quartz, tourmaline, blue topaz and pink kunzite, and orange garnet.

Misiorowski says, “During the two years this exhibition will be in place, there will be occasional changes in several of the displays which will keep the exhibition fresh. Visitors will want to return and see the new additions!” Misiorowski, an internationally respected jewelry historian, previously served as the Museum Director at the Gemological Institute of America (GIA) world headquarters in Carlsbad, California before coming to the Museum to curate "ALL THAT GLITTERS." She lectures and publishes extensively to both professional and lay audiences, and has mounted numerous exhibits at GIA and at national trade shows.

The exhibition is funded by the San Diego County Board of Supervisors at the recommendation of Chairwoman Pam Slater-Price, with additional sponsorship by Bank of America Charitable Foundation and Jerome’s Furniture.

The San Diego Natural History Museum is the second oldest scientific institution in California and the third oldest west of the Mississippi. Founded in 1874 by a small group of citizen scientists, the Museum’s mission is to interpret the natural world through research, education and exhibits; to promote understanding of the evolution and diversity of Southern California and the peninsula of Baja California, Mexico; and to inspire in all people respect for the environment.

For more information please visit: The San Diego Museum of Natural HIstory

 

Exhibitions Charlotte. Chanel: Designs for the Modern Woman. The Mint Museum. The Curated Object

Cocktail Ensemble

Artist: House of Chanel 
Date Created: Spring 2000
Photo Credit: 
jacket and skirt: wool with crystal beads
underskirt: silk mousseline
Gift of Mrs. William McCormick Blair. 

 

Cocktail Dress with Overwrap

Artist: Chanel House of
Date Created: circa 1998-2004
Photo Credit: 
wool boucle and silk chiffon
Gift of a Palm Beach Lady. 

Evening Dinner Suit

Artist: House of Chanel 
Photo Credit: 
Silk net lace over wool 
Gift of Mrs. Charles Wrightsman. 

 

Chanel: Designs for the Modern Woman

May 21, 2011 - 1 January 1, 2012

Harold Koda, Curator-in-Charge of the Costume Institute at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, once stated: “In creating a wardrobe for herself, Chanel invented the idea of the modern woman…it is her work, which transcended class barriers and revolutionized the ideals of dress, that is the ultimate testament of her life.” And thus the name of Chanel has long been recognized as one associated with elegance, refinement, and fashionable flair. 

The Mint Museum’s Historic Costume and Fashionable Dress collection has within its holdings more than fifty works by the legendary French designer Gabrielle Bonheur “Coco” Chanel (1883-1971) and whose House of Chanel in Paris, under the design leadership of Karl Lagerfeld, continues to carry her name. Her fashions and accessories – including her famous Chanel No. 5 perfume – earned her a place on Time Magazine’s 100 most influential people of the 20th century. Her tailored two-piece suits for women are icons of her designs and the Museum is proud to have, among its rarities, an early example that dates to circa 1926-1930. A selection of suits, evening wear, and fashion accessories will comprise this presentation of Chanel fashions.

For more information please visit: The Mint Museums

 

Events NYC. PYT: Pretty Young Thing. The New Pop Up. The Curated Object

  Olola Palm, oil, acrylic on canvas, 40 x 40 inches 

PYT: Pretty Young Thing 

reviewed by Natalie Fasano

The pop-up art show is often a subject of mystery, relegated black-card holder status in the minds of young would-be collectors and art aficionados. Recent trends to bring contemporary art to a younger consumer base, and in a less foreboding format, have found success in events less pomp and circumstance and more laissez-faire.  

The Pretty Young Things event, pop-up art show of rather unique proportions, was heralded by the usual crowd of smokers, invitees and curious passersby, all congregated outside of a rather nondescript building on 13th and Broadway. Produced by Anne Huntington, of AMH Industries, LLC and Diana Campbell, PYT didn’t break any new ground on the general concept of the pop-up art show—to sell art—though it did create a unique atmosphere of confrontational art, in a non-confrontational, and fun way.  Those who had already entered appeared ready to go back in, and those like myself who had come a bit late felt rest-assured that this party showed no signs of stopping.  

Entering the second-floor loft, I was bombarded with a disorienting mélange of sound, colored light, and art—everywhere. Cotton candy machines and a live DJ, celebrity clientele a la Keith Richards and crew, interminable bottles of rose splashed into iced-filled trash bins, cached bottles of whiskey near the air conditioning unit—all dumped alongside a atria-length trestle table, filled with empty cups and the slight murmurs of circulating wine openers— set the scene.  

And the art; well, it was simply everywhere.  It was projected on the walls, arranged on the floor, hung from the highest point on the vaulted ceilings.  Price tags placed reflected in low to mid-range, though a diverse selection of styles and artistic mediums provided a one-stop lesson on the New York City contemporary art scene—Anna Coroneo’s oil paintings of vibrant density and controlled enthusiasm, Grant Singer’s colorful and mind-bending collages, Todd Bienvenu’s earthy abstractions, among others, completed the scene of artistic confrontation—perfectly checked by the relaxed audience who came without anything to prove, but a love of art and, perhaps, cotton candy.

Though the atmosphere was carnivalesque the crowd was not—here was an assortment of young business professionals, artists, collectors, journalists and cultural icons. I seldom hear questions about the actual art asked at art previews; attendees generally comprise of individuals who either already know what they are looking for— and are thus sure bets for auctions houses, galleries or studios—or those who simply come for the open bar, hors-d’oeuvres and beautiful people. Organizers Diane Campbell and Anne Huntington obviously pooled their rolodexes for those not only interested in art, but also those looking to buy, and without anything much to prove other than a desire to know more—about investment in art and the art of the investment. Shop-talk echoed throughout the loft-space—guests discussed sales records, bankable contemporary trends and techniques etc.  

Featured artists, rather than loudly decrying their industry as a “business,” circulated the space with alacrity, interacting with and answering questions of attendees who simply wanted to know more.  They provided a favorable portrait of the industry at large—vibrant, accessible and without any signs of stopping.  

Exhibitions Philadelphia. Vanitas: Contemporary Reflections. (The Last Week Folks!) The Philadelphia Art Alliance. The Curated Object

Courtesy of the Philadelphia Art Alliance

Courtesy of the Philadelphia Art Alliance

Courtesy of the Philadelphia Art Alliance

Vanitas

May 27 - Aug. 12,2010

By JoAnn Greco

Feminine grace, wiles, frippery, domesticity, imagination, and, yes, angst, have taken over the serene rooms of the Beaux Arts confines of the Art Alliance. This joint show features five female artists who work in widely diverging media and who tackle a variety of issues. But oh how nicely it all blends together.

Walking up the building's sweeping staircase leads to the galleries that are hosting Vanitas — Latin for life's transitory nature. First, there on the landing: a teaser; one piece laid out on top of the grand piano. It's a copper chafing dish that Myra Mimlitsch Gray has manipulated so it's come to resemble a. . .  grand piano.

The work sets the stage for what proves to be a surprising assemblage of the ordinary writ extraordinary. To begin, the first gallery lies ahead, beckoning with crinkly cellophane, plastic hair accessories, crystal beads and Christmas ornaments alive in candy tones and stacked into towers of fantasy. The point of Gae Savannah's "cakes" isn't hard to grasp — our focus on easy prettiness and the saccharine is shallow and transparent — but that doesn't make them any less compelling.

Gray's work takes over the next room. At first, the elegant silver platters and copper pots displayed in vitrines resemble those arrayed in any fine arts museum. Upon closer inspection, though, they drip and "melt," their classic form's in slight disarray even as their finishes remain perfect.

Continuing the fascination with the workaday stuff of life that captures each artist, Candy Depew's work interweaves paisley-adorned bone china washing bowls and floral-motifed skateboards seemingly coated in porcelain with vinyl cutouts, wall etchings and digitally printed fabrics. Diamonds, flowers, and fish prance across the walls in lively "still lifes" that pay homage to the 17th-century Dutch painting tradition in which the origins of "vanitas" lie.

The last gallery showcases the sugar-coated (literally!) world of Katherine Kaminski, a world where carefully arranged faux flowers are glazed with sugar and recurring deer imagery runs rampant. Once you've eyed the waxen cast at the center of one tableau, you'll never call someone "deer heart" again without recalling this disturbing image.

Finally, Audrey Hasen Russell's unadorned compositions of cheap "souvenir" Depression-era and milk glass bowls and cups impart dignity and beauty onto these inexpensive staples. Steeped in solid Americana — and backed with the European traditions which so many immigrants brought to the Midwest's glass factories — the pieces ask us to think about the fleeting nature of childhood and its memories.

For more information, please visit: The Philadelphia Art Alliance

Exhibitions Vienna. Minimal. Art and Furniture from the MAK Collection. MAK, Vienna. The Curated Object

MAK Table, 2009 Design: Joao Silva 200 x 80 cm Photo © MAK/Georg Mayer, 2010

Wall Étagère (in the “Brettl”-style), ca. 1898 Design: Josef Hoffmann Softwood, previously stained greenH 220 cm, W 37 cm, D 29 cm Photo © MAK/Georg Mayer, 2010

Object: Red and Blue Chair, ca. 1920 Design: Gerrit Rietveld Realization: G. A. v. d. Groenekan Beachwood, painted H 85.5 cm, W 60 cm, D 66 cm Photo © MAK/Nathan Murrell, 2010

  

Minimal: Art & Furniture from the MAK Collection

May 26-October 31, 2010

The exhibition "Minimal. Art and Furniture from the MAK Collection" finds its starting point in American Minimal Art, which was one of the most influential artistic movements of the 20th century’s second half, and goes on to deal with Minimal Art precursors and more recent further developments of minimalism in the field of furniture and “furniture-like” art. Many aspects of the minimalist aesthetic, characterized above all by a simple, clear and for the most part geometric formal language, are already evident in the furniture designed by architects during the early 20th century. Over the past few years, such furniture has been increasingly rediscovered by contemporary artists, some of whom refer explicitly to Minimal Art in their works. Even if minimalist art objects usually require a great deal of space in order to have their effect on the viewer, this exhibition—in keeping with the motto “maximally minimal”— dares to meet the viewers’ gaze with a comparatively large number of pieces of furniture and artworks placed within a small space.

In the strict sense, this exhibition contains only one true work of Minimal Art: an untitled wall object created by Donald Judd in 1989. The artist and architect Judd, who passed away in 1994, was one of the most important representatives of the movement. Now as then, his artistic oeuvre is of central importance to the MAK. Following his most important MAK exhibition, Donald Judd: Architecture (1991), Judd also took charge of the artistic installation of the MAK Permanent Collection’s Baroque Rococo Classicism, which reopened in 1993; he is also present with various minimalist works in the MAK Permanent Collection Contemporary Art, the Study Collection Furniture and the Works on Paper Collection. Accordingly, this artist’s extensively documented oeuvre also represents one of the starting points of Minimal.

Alongside the wall object, the exhibition includes various pieces of furniture by Judd; these are works which demonstrate in an almost exemplary way the idea of returning things to basic geometric and cubic forms, as well as the use of industrially prefabricated materials such as colored aluminum panels and solid wooden boards.

A counterpoint to the artistic personality of Judd is provided by the furniture of Josef Hoffmann, whose oeuvre is also represented in the collection of the MAK. Although ornamentation is one of the things for which the architect and designer Hoffmann is widely known, Hoffmann in fact authored a manifesto-like text for the periodical Das Interieur in 1901 in which he advocated “simple furniture,” and he also created a whole series of furniture which was abstracted to simple basic forms. However one cares to characterize the roles of the two antagonists of Viennese Modernism, Josef Hoffmann (co-founder of the Wiener Werkstätte) and Adolf Loos (who detested ornamentation), the “more minimalist” furniture was certainly designed by Hoffmann: his furniture in the so-called “Brettlstil” [board style], which construction emphasized the fact that they were made from simple, prefabricated wooden boards, could be regarded as precursors to minimalism.

Items on display include a softwood wall étagère from 1898 and a kitchen footstool which was created in 1899 for Paul Wittgenstein's country house (known as “Bergerhöhe”) in Hohenberg, Lower Austria. Some of the elements that would characterize Minimal Art later on can also be found in the furniture created around 1920 by Dutch architect and designer Gerrit Rietveld. He used machine-cut, standard-sized wooden blocks and boards painted in primary colors to construct furniture that seemed to consist only of geometrically arranged lines and color surfaces. Among these is the famous Red and Blue Chair, which he produced in multiple variants beginning in 1918 and which can also be seen in this exhibition; it can be categorized as one of those pieces of architect’s furniture which, during the first half of the 20th century, were viewed as programmatic manifestos of innovative lifestyles, societal utopias and a transformed—modern—conception of space. It is probably for this reason that Donald Judd, as well, was happy to furnish his own living and working spaces with pieces by Rietveld.

The aesthetic of Minimal Art itself likewise had a strong influence on designers, including on interior designers: furniture made in simple, geometric forms from industrially produced materials represents the continuation of a rationalist tradition that advocates reserve in terms of form and décor, strict functionalism and workmanship that is appropriate to the material being used, thus also adhering to modernist dictates of “good form.” Alongside Hubert Matthias Sanktjohanser’s Social Cube, made of variable, easy-to-handle basic elements, the items on display also include a simple chest from the Crate series by Jasper Morrison (which has been in progress since 2006), as well as the MAK Table created by Joao Silvas for the MAK Design Week of 2009.

In keeping with the “furniture-like” aspect of Minimal Art, numerous contemporary artists have taken up forms from furniture in their artworks and oriented themselves on furniture dimensions: Heimo Zobernig and Werner Feiersinger seem to often find a starting point in furniture for their large-scale sculptures: the analogy to utilitarian items means that these objects are anchored in the everyday experience of the viewers, while their simultaneous  lack of functionality also communicates something that is intensely irritating. 

In the same way, Layered Impasse Screen, an installation of rhythmized, colorful, transparent panels akin to a folding screen created by British artist Liam Gillick in 1998, serves viewers as a sort of artistic springboard from which to experience space in a different way; it is intended to encourage the fundamental reevaluation of one’s relationship to things—an intention which already played an important role in the artworks of the Minimalists. And while the Meuble by French artist Guillaume Leblon seems to represent something of a missing link between the “Brettlstil” of a Josef Hoffmann and the minimalist furniture of a Donald Judd, Judd’s oeuvre in turn quite literally represented a concrete starting point for Austrian designer Andreas Feldinger.

In his homage, "Remember Donald", Feldinger reworked a typical piece of Ikea furniture into a functional sculpture, in the process translating a graphic work by Judd into the three-dimensional realm.

For more information please visit: MAK, Vienna

 

Exhibitions Vienna. "Flowers for Kim Il Sung. Art and Architecture from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. MAK. The Curated Object

Stadion 1.Mai stadium 1st May, 1989, Sitzplätze für 150.000 Personen seats for 150.000 persons © Paektusan Academy of Architecture, Pyongyang

Panorama Pyongyang Paektusan Architekturakademie panorama Pyongyang Paektusan Architectural Academy, ohne Jahreszahl without date © Paektusan Academy of Architecture, Pyongyang

Lasst uns in der gesamten Gesellschaft eine Atmosphäre des Lesens und des Studierens errichten! Establish reading atmosphere, studying atmosphere throughout the whole society! 2010 Kim Myung Gon © Korean Art Gallery, Pyongyang

Blauer Himmel The blue sky over my country, 2005, Ri Sok Nam © Korean Art Gallery, Pyongyang

Flowers for Kim Il Sung: Art and Architecture from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea

May 18- September 5, 2010

The exhibition offers for the first time insight into the contemporary art, poster production and architecture of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, which hitherto was mostly not on show in international exhibitions. The show at the MAK was prepared in cooperation with the Korean Art Gallery and the Paektusan Academy of Architecture. In the spotlight is a culture that seems foreign to us, determined by the all-encompassing worship of “Eternal President” Kim Il Sung (deceased in 1994) and his currently reigning son Kim Jong Il, Chairman of the National Defence Commission, and characterized by the Chuch’e Idea, a specific interpretation of socialism. 

Around 100 oil and ink paintings, a representative selection of posters and a model of the “Chuch’e Tower”, the landmark of Pyongyang, will be presented, and is rounded off by architectural drawings and photographs.

For the first time, 16 portraits of the two most senior leaders of the country, Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong II, are exhibited. Generally they depict father and son together with representatives of the people, including factory workers, soldiers and peasants as well as children, and in a variety of settings.

This major exhibition at the MAK will be joined by a supporting program— lectures, films and a symposium—which deal with the art, culture and architecture of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

For more information please visit: MAK, Vienna 

Exhibitions Santa Fe. Sole Matters: Cowboy Boots and Art. The New Mexico Museum of Art. The Curated Object

Playing cards from the 1950s

Teal McKibben's boots, made by Montana Boots, courtesy of the estate of Teal McKibben, photo by Blair Clark.

 Deana McGuffin stitching shaft pieces, 2009, photo by Blair Clark.

Playing card boots from the 1940s, made by Abraham Rios of Mercedes, Texas, courtesy of Larry Jennings and Linné S. Miller, photo by Blair Clark.

Lisa Sorrell, Butterflies and Bluebirds, September 2008, kangaroo and crocodile, courtesy and © of the artist. 

Sole Mates: Cowboy Boots and Art

May 14, 2010 - September 5, 2010 

Sole Mates: Cowboy Boots and Art celebrates the art of the West and views cowboy boots as important symbols of western life.  The exhibition includes paintings, drawings, postcards, advertisements, sculptures, video imagery, and of course boots.  The images define changing aspects of the West, from 1880 to the present.  The exhibition includes more than 130 objects and pairs of boots that investigate freedom, neliness, gender, fashion, allure and contemporary art.

Joseph Traugott, Ph.D., summarized the goal of the exhibition by stating that "Sole Matesbroadens our understanding of the West and western art, and encourages discussions between western artists and the general public."  He is curator of twentieth century art at the New Mexico Museum of Art in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and the organizer of Sole Mates.

Each section of the exhibition is titled with a line from a well known western song. The introduction- I See by your Outfit that You Are a Cowboy-sets the tone for the exhibition which is simultaneously stimulating, educational, and fun.  Western songs will play in the background of the exhibition.

The historic section of the exhibition includes works by Frederic Remington, Charles M. Russell, and Herbert "Buck" Dunton.  These artists defined and then promoted a view of cowboy life that is descriptive, inspiring, and romantic.  This section also describes the construction of boots through the work of Deana McGuffin, a third generation bootmaker from Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Conceptual sections of the exhibition allude to western attitudes that are infused into boots and art. These sections incorporate popular culture images that help to expand the notion of western art beyond the restrictive stereotype of ranch workers as men on horseback riding with a herd of cattle.  For example, David Politzer's video self portrait, Rio Macho, shows the artist dressed as a middle-aged dude-ranch cowboy bemoaning his lost youth and his failure to become a working cowboy.

The contemporary art in the exhibition presents the West in a complex, provocative manner.  The nationally known contemporary western artists in this section include James Drake, Betty Hahn, Martin Cary Horowitz, Luis Jiménez, Bruce Nauman, Patrick Oliphant, Bill Schenck, Lisa Sorrell, and Donald Woodman.  The contemporary artists' point of view can be summarized by Horowitz's sculpture Baby Bomb that references Coyote and Roadrunner cartoons, but also presents a powerful antiwar commentary.

Oklahoma artist Lisa Sorrell's leather sculptures, such as Butterflies and Bluebirds, are included in the exhibition.  In addition, this sculpture just happens to be a pair of cowboy boots.  Butterflies and Bluebirds captures the essence and irony of the West- while the sculpture can worn, it may never hit a dance floor. 

James Drake's waterless lithograph Valley of the World relates to his Tony Lama boots with inserts of red snake skin that are also in the exhibition.  The print shows a bridge over the Rio Grande  connecting Juarez, Mexico, and  El Paso, Texas.  A rectangle of snake skin attached to the print can be understood as both a symbol of the economic ties bridging the two countries, as well as a reference to El Paso-the cowboy boot center of the universe.

Of course, these categories often overlap.  Carol Sarkisian's Maurice's Boots, Galisteo, NM . Sarkisian transformed tin-artist Maurice Dixon's worn out boots into jewel-like sculptures, encrusted with glass beads.  This work combines sculpture, popular culture, jewelry, and western philosophy into a seductive form.

The content of the exhibition is further explained in Sole Mates: Cowboy Boots and Art, published by the Museum of New Mexico Press:  http://www.mnmpress.org/    The publication includes 130 full-color illustrations with narratives by Traugott that further explain the concepts underpinning the exhibition.  The book is designed by David Skolkin, the press's award-winning designer.

Sole Mates: Cowboy Boots and Art was organized by the New Mexico Museum of Art, Department of Cultural Affairs, Santa Fe, New Mexico. 

Exhibitions NYC. American Woman: Fashioning a National Identity. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Curated Object

 

Eugene Robert Richee (American, 1895– 1972)

Louise Brooks, ca. 1928

Courtesy of John Kobal Foundation / Getty Images

 

 
Costume by Travis Banton (American, 1894–1958)

Anna May Wong in Limehouse Blues (directed by Alexander Hall), 1934

Courtesy of John Kobal Foundation / Getty Images

 
 Costume by Robert Kalloch (American, 1893–1947)

Katharine Hepburn in Holiday (directed by George Cukor), 1938

Courtesy Everett Collection

 


 
Ball Gown, 1898

Blue silk, sequins, rhinestones, beads, metallic

Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift

of the Brooklyn Museum, 2009; Gift of Mrs. Paul Pennoyer, 1965

  

Jeanne Lanvin (French, 1867–1946Evening Ensemble, 1923

Gold silk, sequins, metallic, rhinestones

Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift

of the Brooklyn Museum, 2009; Designated Purchase Fund

 
 

Attributed to Callot Soeurs (French, 1895–1937)

Evening Jumpsuit, ca. 1910

Yellow and beige silk, metallic

Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift

of the Brooklyn Museum, 2009; Gift of Mercedes de Acosta, 1954

“American Woman: Fashioning a National Identity” for Spring 2010; First Costume Institute Exhibition Based on Renowned Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection

May 5–August 15, 2010

The spring 2010 exhibition organized by The Costume Institute of The Metropolitan Museum of Art will be American Woman: Fashioning a National Identity, the first drawn exclusively from the newly established Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection at the Met. The exhibition, on view from May 5 through August 15, 2010 (preceded on May 3 by The Costume Institute Gala Benefit), will explore developing perceptions of the modern American woman from 1890 to 1940, and how they have affected the way American women are seen today. Focusing on archetypes of American femininity through dress, the exhibition will reveal how the American woman initiated style revolutions that mirrored her social, political, and sexual emancipation. “Gibson Girls” and “Screen Sirens” laid the foundation for today’s American woman – a theme that will be explored in a video installation.

To celebrate the opening of the exhibition, the Museum's Costume Institute Gala Benefit will take place on Monday, May 3, 2010. The evening’s Co-Chairs will be Oprah Winfrey; Patrick Robinson, designer for Gap; and Anna Wintour, Editor-in-Chief of Vogue. This fundraising event is The Costume Institute’s main source of annual funding for exhibitions, operations, and capital improvements. “The ideal of the American woman evolved from a dependence on European, Old World ideas of elegance into an independent New World sensibility that reflected freedoms still associated with American women today,” said Andrew Bolton, Curator of The Costume Institute. “The show will look at fashion’s role in defining how American women have been represented historically, and how fashion costumes women into archetypes that still persist in varying degrees of relevance.”

The exhibition will feature approximately 75 examples of haute couture and high fashion from the Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, which was transferred to the Met from the Brooklyn Museum in January 2009. Many of the pieces have not been seen by the public in more than 30 years. Visitors will walk through time as they enter circular galleries that reflect the milieu of each feminine archetype. Period clothing will be brought to life with panoramas animated by music, video, and lighting. The first gallery will evoke the ballroom of the “Heiress” (1890s), filled with ball gowns by Charles Frederick Worth. Scenes of the great outdoors will showcase the athleticism and physical independence of the “Gibson Girl” (1890s) as characterized by bathing costumes, riding ensembles, and cycling suits.

Picture galleries in connecting corridors will put faces to the archetypes and demonstrate how the gradual emancipation of the American woman was reflected in the media of the day. The “Heiress,” embodied by Consuelo Vanderbilt and others, will be seen in oil paintings; the “Gibson Girl” in fashion illustrations; the art-collecting “Bohemian” (early 1900s) in photographs of Rita Lydig; and the “Suffragist” (1910s) in poster art showing Alice Paul, Lucy Burns, and others. Photographs of “Flappers” (1920s) such as Clara Bow and Louise Brooks will precede galleries showing beaded chemise dresses by Lanvin and Molyneux, among others. Filmic representations of the “Screen Siren” (1930s) will herald a nightclub scene that will include body-cleaving, second-skin bias-cut gowns, including the Siren dress designed by Charles James and worn by Gypsy Rose Lee. In the final gallery, a video installation will demonstrate the significance of contemporary archetypes and the media’s role in sustaining them despite the multi-dimensionality of the modern American woman.

Designers in the exhibition will include Travis Banton, Gabrielle Chanel, Callot Soeurs, Madame Eta, Elizabeth Hawes, Madame Grès, Charles James, Jeanne Lanvin, Liberty & Company, Edward Molyneux, Paul Poiret, Elsa Schiaparelli, Jessie Franklin Turner, Valentina, Madeleine Vionnet, Weeks, Charles Frederick Worth, and Jean-Philippe Worth, among others.

A simultaneous exhibition of masterworks from the Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection will be presented at the Brooklyn Museum from May 7 – August 1, 2010. American Style: Fashioning a National Collection will take a look at historic designs of the 19th and 20th century by designers including Charles James, Norman Norell, Jeanne Paquin, and Elsa Schiaparelli collected by prominent women including Dominique de Menil, Millicent Rogers, and Lauren Bacall. Many of the objects have never been previously exhibited. This exhibition will be organized by Jan Glier Reeder, Consulting Curator of the Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Credits: The Metropolitan Museum exhibition is organized by Andrew Bolton, Curator, with the support of Harold Koda, Curator in Charge, both of the Met’s Costume Institute. Nathan Crowley, a production designer of films including The Prestige, The Dark Knight, and Public Enemies will serve as the exhibition’s creative consultant, as he did for the 2008 exhibition Superheroes: Fashion and Fantasy. The design for the 2010 Costume Institute Gala Benefit will be created by Nathan Crowley with Raul Avila.

For More Information please visit: The Metropolitan Museum of Art