Past Exhibitions: 2005
January 18 – April 24, 2005 | Art Before 1900 Gallery
Shepherds and Plowhands: Work and Leisure in the Nineteenth Century
The vast economic and social changes of the Industrial Revolution dramatically transformed the long-held ways of country and village life: centralizing resources in city environments, changing people's occupations, and ultimately refacing the bucolic landscape. Whether documenting true habits of rural life or nostalgically returning to pastoral themes of an earlier age, many nineteenth-century artists were drawn to rustic subject matter that appeared to be fading from view. The collection-based exhibition gathered scenes of rural labor and leisure by various nineteenth-century French artists: Charles Daubigny, Charles Jacque, Jean-Fransçois Millet, Féix Buhot, Alphonse Legros, Camille Pissarro, Maximilien Luce and others. Consisting mainly of works on paper, the exhibition considered the Etching Revival artists' renewed interest in the craft of printmaking in relation to nineteenth-century notions of the nobility of work and the individual laborer. It also featured a bronze sculpture by Constantin Meunier and a recently acquired painting by Léon Lhermitte.
Curator: Anne Leonard, Smart Museum Mellon Projects Curator.
February 3 – May 15, 2005 | Richard and Mary L. Gray Special Exhibition Gallery
Paper Museums: The Reproductive Print in Europe, 1500 – 1800
As relatively inexpensive, transportable, and storable objects, prints had an important place in the culture of Renaissance and Baroque Europe. Well before the era of photography and digital images, a variety of print techniques revolutionized the ways in which images could be reproduced and circulated. Reproductive prints – prints that reproduce other works of art – allowed a much broader public to become familiar with paintings, sculptures, and other works that had previously been available only to wealthy travelers or collectors. This exhibition looked at the impact of this expanding visual culture in helping printmakers earn reputations for truthfulness, promoting certain artists and collectors, and increasing familiarity with original works of art. Including prints by or after Dürer, Claude Lorrain, Raphael, Watteau, and J.M.W. Turner, among many other artists, the exhibition also highlighted recent Smart acquisitions, such as an engraving of Michelangelo's Last Judgment and two versions of Rubens' Supper at Emmaus. Far from being "merely" reproductive, these prints are themselves objects of exquisite beauty.
Curators: Rebecca Zorach, University of Chicago Assistant Professor of Art History, and Elizabeth Rodini, Johns Hopkins University Lecturer in the History of Art and former Smart Museum Mellon Projects Curator. The Smart Museum installation was overseen by Anne Leonard, Smart Museum Mellon Projects Curator.
Tour Dates: Grey Art Gallery, New York University, New York, September 13 – December 3, 2005.
Exhibition Catalogue is available from the Smart Museum Shop.
This exhibition and related programs were generously supported in part by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, the Rhoades Foundation, and the Adelyn Russell Bogert Endowment Fund of the Franke Institute for the Humanities, University of Chicago.
February 8 – April 3, 2005 | Joel and Carole Bernstein Gallery
Jacques Callot and the Etched Series
The endlessly inventive etchings of Jacques Callot (1592-1635) make him one of the most important printmakers of the early seventeenth century, or indeed of any period. Whether turning his eye and hand to the devastating wars that plagued his era or to more picturesque and fanciful subjects, he produced a distinctive vision of the world: theatrically staged, sharply detailed, and at times vigorously sardonic. Though Callot's prints can be appreciated individually, they are best understood as integral sets, of which the Smart Museum possesses several. In this exhibition, we presented the following series in their entirety: the Large Miseries of War (18 sheets), the Views of Florence (10), and the Combat at the Barrier (10).
Curator: Anne Leonard, Smart Museum Mellon Projects Curator.
April 9 – June 12, 2005 | Joel and Carole Bernstein Gallery
Objects of History: The Boone Collection of Japanese Art
Often in exhibitions of cultural and historical materials some objects are designated as "art" (e.g. paintings and prints) and others as "material culture" (e.g. textiles and shoes). This intimate exhibition drew from more than 3,500 Japanese objects in the Boone Collection of the Field Museum in Chicago – traditionally a place for "material culture" – and brought scroll paintings, woodblock prints, and decorative arts objects from the later Edo to Taisho periods (18th-20th centuries) to an art museum context. Scrutinizing these terms for their aesthetic, cultural, and historical issues, this exhibition examined what this nomenclature tells us about the Boone Collection and museum and collection studies in general.
Curators: Hans Thomsen, University of Chicago Instructor of Japanese Art History, and James Ketelaar, University of Chicago Center for East Asian Studies Director, in consultation with Richard A. Born, Smart Museum Senior Curator.
May 10 – November 6, 2005 | Art Before 1900 Gallery
Quiet Revolutions: Modernizing Traditional Art in East Asia
The twentieth century was a period of extraordinary social and political transformation throughout East Asia. In the wake of an intense period of foreign domination and Western influence in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, many artists throughout East Asia struggled to reconcile the mounting tension between time honored historical art traditions and newer, more modern, even foreign concepts and techniques. Drawn primarily from paintings, prints, and ceramics in the Smart Museum East Asian Collection, this exhibition explored the quiet revolution within the region: one that sought to reshape traditional arts as part of a larger effort to form an East Asian modernity.
Curator: Kris Imants Ercums, University of Chicago advanced graduate student of Chinese art history and Smart Museum Curatorial Intern.
June 2 – September 18, 2005 | Richard and Mary L. Gray Special Exhibition Gallery
Centers and Edges: Modern Ceramic Design and Sculpture, 1880-1980
Humble in origin, clay is one of the oldest and most enduring of all artistic mediums. Starting in the late 19th century, American and European artists—inspired by non-Western traditions and framed by the context of social reform—reimagined the potential of this simple material. Over the next 100 years studio potters, industrial designers, and fine-arts sculptors mirrored and advanced vanguard artistic theories and design philosophies. Centers and Edges: Modern Ceramic Design and Sculpture, 1880-1980, organized mainly from the Smart Museum's collection, focused on five key moments of influence, invention, and impact that are marked by shifting geographical centers of creative energy: late 19th-century British and American Arts-and-Crafts pottery; functionalist designs from 1920s and 30s Germany and Austria; the modernist figuration of Aristide Maillol, Henry Moore, and other European sculptors; a widespread embrace of studio and folk pottery traditions in America, Europe, and Japan after World War II; and an expressive reworking of vessel and sculptural forms from 1950s California to 1970s London featuring pieces by such leaders in the field as the West Coast master Peter Voulkos and Chicago-based Ruth Duckworth.
Curator: Richard A. Born, Smart Museum Senior Curator.
June 18 – September 11, 2005 | Joel and Carole Bernstein Gallery
Syncopation: André Lhote, Louis Marcoussis, and the Cubist Print
Following the innovative years before World War I when Pablo Picasso and George Braque introduced the Cubist pictorial language into graphic media, Cubist prints became less experimental and more elaborate in design and execution. Frequently, these later prints emphasize sophisticated techniques and subtleties of printing. Less studied than the pre-war graphic works, this second florescence of the Cubist print begins around 1915 and continues through the 1930s. It includes many striking compositions realized in woodcut, a medium normally associated with French Fauvism and German Expressionism.
This exhibition featured two cycles of prints in the Smart Museum collection. The earlier, from 1925, was a unique, deluxe edition of five woodcuts accompanied by the original pen-and-ink studies made by André Lhote. This series is devoted to marine themes, including mythic mermaids, sailors at work and rest, and the racy world of bars, prostitutes and other port-of-call pleasures. The other featured print cycle, appearing five years later, was a suite of ten mixed intaglio prints by the Polish-born Louis Marcoussis, whose masterful etchings made during this period create a mysterious visual poetry from a subtle fusion of Cubist and Surrealist motifs.
Curator: Richard A. Born, Smart Museum Senior Curator.
September 17 – December 11, 2005 | Joel and Carole Bernstein Gallery
The Poetry of Shijo Surimono
Celebrating the sophisticated literary and artistic culture of nineteenth-century Japan, the social elite of the day commissioned artists and publishers to create costly and intricate prints called /surimono/. While the Shijo surimono made in Kyoto and Osaka have not received nearly the attention and examination of their Edo (modern Tokyo) counterparts, these works shed light on the print culture of nineteenth-century Japan. Shijo prints are characterized by naturalistic images that form a frame for the surrounding elegant poems by literary societies of the time. Poets and artists celebrated the cultural stars of the day—the masters of the poem, the song, and the stage—and portrayed the complex relationships between the star and his fans. As the examples in this exhibition amply displayed, these prints were distinguished by their imaginative patterns, striking color contrasts, and visually exciting designs. This exhibition consisted of recent additions to the Smart Museum collection.
Curator: Hans Thomsen, University of Chicago Assistant Professor of Japanese Art, in consultation with Richard A. Born, Smart Museum Senior Curator.
October 6, 2005 – January 15, 2006 | Richard and Mary L. Gray Special Exhibition Gallery
Beyond Green: Toward a Sustainable Art
Sustainable design attempts to meet the needs of the present without compromising those of future generations. Balancing environmental, social, economic, and aesthetic concerns, sustainable design has the potential to transform everyday life and is being enacted around the world in large and small ways not only by architects and designers but also by growing numbers of activists, corporations, policymakers, and possibly even your next-door neighbors. Beyond Green: Toward a Sustainable Art explored how this design philosophy resonates with an emerging generation of international artists who combine a fresh aesthetic sensibility with a constructively critical approach to the production, dissemination, and display of art. Contributing artists and artists' groups from the United States and Europe included Allora & Calzadilla; Free Soil; JAM; Learning Group; Brennan McGaffey in collaboration with Temporary Services; Nils Norman; People Powered; Dan Peterman; Marjetica Potrč Michael Rakowitz; Frances Whitehead, WochenKlausur; and Andrea Zittel. The exhibition included existing works, commissions, and previously presented work that had been "recycled," spotlighting ways in which artists are building paths to new forms of practice.
Curator: This exhibition was co-organized by the Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, and iCI (Independent Curators International), New York, and circulated by iCI. This exhibition was curated by Stephanie Smith, Smart Museum Curator of Contemporary Art.
Tour Dates: Museum of Arts & Design, New York, New York,
February 2 – May 7, 2006; University Art Museum, California State University
Long Beach, November 1 – December 17, 2006; Smith College Museum of Art,
Northampton, Massachusetts, February 2 – April 15, 2007; Contemporary
Arts Center, Cincinnati, Ohio, May 5 – July 15, 2007; Richard E. Peeler
Art Center, DePauw University, Greencastle, Indiana, September 14 – December
2, 2007; Museum London, London, Ontario, Canada,
January 4 – March 14, 2008; Joseloff Gallery, Hartford Art School, University of Hartford, Hartford, Connecticut,
April 2 – June 10, 2008; The Ronna and Eric Hoffman Gallery of Contemporary Art, Lewis & Clark College, Portland, Oregon,
September 11, 2008 – December 7, 2008; The DeVos Art Museum, Northern Michigan University, Marquette, Michigan
January 19 – March 30, 2009.
Exhibition Catalogue is available for download and for purchase from the Smart Museum Shop.
This exhibition and accompanying catalogue were made possible in part by the Smart Family Foundation; the Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation; the Richard H. Driehaus Foundation; and iCI Exhibition Partners Kenneth S. Kuchin and F. Bruce Anderson, and Gerrit and Sydie Lansing. Additional support was provided by the Arts Planning Council, the Environmental Studies Program, and the Green Campus Initiative, University of Chicago. Related programs in Chicago were made possible with additional support from the Chicago Architecture Foundation.
November 22, 2005 – April 23, 2006 | Art Before 1900 Gallery
Whose Land?: European and American Landscapes, 1600-1900
Nothing could be more fundamental to a country's identity than the territory it occupies. Accordingly, artists' renderings of landscape highlight recognizable sites, distinctive topography, or natural beauty. However, landscape styles have never stayed within geographic boundaries. For example, Rome, as the unrivaled center for artistic training over several centuries, exerted enormous influence, and even artists from northern Europe learned to bathe their landscapes in the light of Italy's classical tradition. Seventeenth-century Dutch landscapes, with their low horizons and expansive skies, came into vogue a century later in France and England, and artists there did not hesitate to fill the demand with landscapes in the desired style. Featuring European and American masters from the Smart Museum collection, this exhibition focused on exchange among landscape traditions, while questioning the usefulness and limitations of conventional geographic classifications.
Curator: Anne Leonard, Smart Museum Mellon Curator.
December 17, 2005 – March 12, 2006 | Joel and Carole Bernstein Gallery
Collecting for the Cause: Activist Art in the 1960s and '70s
In the 1960s and early '70s, many American artists actively questioned the artist's role and responsibility in the public sphere. As they sought political relevance for their work, the relatively easy duplication and dissemination of works on paper made printmaking a choice medium. Selections from two portfolios of prints – one created as a protest to the Vietnam War and one as a philanthropic endeavor for the Museet Moderna in Stockholm – revealed how individual artists such as Louise Nevelson, Robert Rauschenberg, and Mark di Suvero came together for common causes. Each print collected for these portfolios has its own aesthetic integrity, but collectively these images represent the will and agency of artists who sought to influence the artworld and the socio-political spheres that lay beyond it.
Curator: Dawna Schuld, Smart Museum curatorial intern and University of Chicago Ph.D. candidate in art history, in consultation with Stephanie Smith, Smart Museum Curator of Contemporary Art.