Exhibitions Archived in: 1997

Then and Now

6 February–16 March 1997

This exhibition offered the University community a comprehensive look at the work of Midway Studios faculty members Judith Brotman, Lynne Brown, Herbert George, Robert Hooper, Vera Klement, Laura Letinsky and Tom Mapp. Recent works by each artist were contrasted with earlier pieces–some from the artists’ graduate school days–to provide a... more »

African Affinities/Expressionist Essences: Vincent Smith's Eight Etchings, 1965-1966

7–28 February 1997

Mounted in honor of African-American Heritage Month, this exhibition featured eight etchings made by African-American artist Vincent Smith in 1965–1966 at the height of the civil-rights movement. Mounted alongside African masks and prints by Otto Dix and Max Beckmann, German printmakers who were great influences, Smith’s prints exhibited the stylistic... more »

Excavating the Smart Museum: (Re)viewing the Classical Greek and Roman Collection

1 April–8 June 1997

The exhibition focused on eighty artifacts from theSmart Museum’s classical Greek and Roman holdings. Students in Professor Pinney’s seminar researched objects ranging from sculpture to coins and then catalogued them according to the themes of death, gender, public space, entertainment, and religion. By examining these objects in light of current... more »

From Blast to Pop: Aspects of Modern British Art 1915-1965

17 April–15 June 1997

Organized from the Smart Museum’s little-known collection of British paintings, sculptures, and works on paper, Blast to Pop explored the complex chronology and diverse artistic traditions of British Modernism. Featuring over one hundred works by important British avant-garde artists such as Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth and William Turnbull, the show... more »

In the Presence of the Gods: Art from Ancient Sumer in the Collection of the Oriental Institute Museum

July 1, 1997– March 8, 1998

This exhibition displayed over forty artifacts from ancient Sumer, one of the most important city-states of ancient Mesopotamia, located in present-day Iraq. Dating from the third millennium, B.C.E., these objects ranted from stone and metal statuettes of praying priests and worshippers to ritual vessels and ceremonial inlaid plaques. Once adorning... more »

EXIT 7: Seven Artists from Midway Studios

July 10 - August 5, 1997

The work of Constance Bacon, Nicole Been, Mark Clarson, Katie Dowling, Michael Dreeben, Scott Marshall, and Jung Rhee Shim constituted the fourteenth annual Midway Studios graduate exhibition. Through the media of sculpture, painting and photography, these artists explored such issues as fetishism, revising modernism, the social construction of identity and... more »

Post-Pop, Post-Pictures

August 22 – September 21, 1997

Highlighting the work of eleven young abstract painters from Chicago, New York and Texas, this exhibition illustrated the current shift in abstraction away from the heroic brushwork and emotional concerns first expressed in the 1950s to painting that is more mundane and mediated because it is more self-consciously culturally informed.... more »

Still More Distant Journeys: The Artistic Emigrations of Lasar Segall

October 16, 1997 - January 4, 1998

Born in Vilna, Lithuania, Lasar Segall lived in Berlin and Dresden, where he was associated with the German Expressionist movement. He later emigrated to Brazil, where he lived and worked until his death. Celebrated in South America, his work is still little known in the U. S. Documenting the Diaspora... more »

The University of Chicago smARTKids