Events

In 2019, Germany will mark the 100th anniversary of the Bauhaus, the legendary school of art design originally founded in Weimar. On this occasion, the Klassik Stiftung Weimar will open the new Bauhaus Museum Weimar and a new exhibition on modernism at the turn of the 20th century at the Neues Museum Weimar on 6 April. Both museums are located at the heart of a new cultural quarter which will highlight the eventful history of modernism in Weimar’s urban infrastructure. Featuring contemporary architecture and innovative exhibition design, the Bauhaus Museum Weimar will present numerous treasures from the world’s oldest Bauhaus collection for the first time. All further information can be found under: www.bauhausmuseumweimar.de

The former Grand Ducal Museum was built in 1869 – one of the first museums in Germany. In 2019, the Neues Museum Weimar will become an integral part of the Quarter of Weimar Modernism centred around the bauhaus museum. In 2020, it will be joined by a Buchenwald Memorial exhibition on the subject of “forced labour” in the south wing of the “Gauforum”, and the House of the Weimar Republic on Theaterplatz. The new permanent exhibition “Van de Velde, Nietzsche and Modernism around 1900” features outstanding international works of Realism, Impressionism and Jugendstil which exemplify a radiant, but ambivalent chapter of art history with numerous references to contemporary trends. Based on the philosopher and cult figure Friedrich Nietzsche, the exhibition will present important works of early modernism in Weimar, including pieces by the Weimar Art School and prominent avant-gardists, e.g. Claude Monet and Max Beckmann, who enjoyed the support of Harry Graf Kessler. The exhibition will also present numerous functional and elegant works designed by Henry van de Velde. A large museum workshop will offer regular and special programmes that invite visitors to actively explore exhibition themes related to handicrafts, such as bookbinding and woodworking. Both the exhibition “Van de Velde, Nietzsche and Modernism around 1900” and the museum-pedagogical workshops in the Neues Museum Weimar are financed by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the Free State of Thuringia, represented by the Thuringian State Chancellery, Department of Culture and Art

The Haus Am Horn is widely regarded as one of the pioneering examples of modern living. This is where the revolutionary ideas of the Bauhaus materialised for the first time in their own unique architectural style. The model house, designed by Georg Muche and presented at the first Bauhaus Exhibition in 1923, is only a stone’s throw away from the Goethe Gartenhaus. Every piece of furniture was handcrafted in the Bauhaus workshops by such renowned Bauhäusler as Marcel Breuer, Theodor Bogler and Alma Siedhoff-Buscher. As the only original Bauhaus construction in Weimar, the Haus Am Horn belongs to the UNESCO World Heritage Site »Bauhaus and its Sites in Weimar, Dessau and Bernau«. Due to various alterations carried out over the past century, the Haus Am Horn is now undergoing extensive renovation to return it to its original appearance. The Klassik Stiftung Weimar will reopen the Haus Am Horn to visitors in time for the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Bauhaus in April 2019.

At a time when extreme climatic phenomena, air quality, and industrial impact are among the most pressing issues on the public agenda, the dramatic change in the climate has led to the realization that capitalism has a destructive effect on the environment. Our lifestyle must be reevaluated in order to positively impact both present and future.

The Albertina Museum is marking what would have been the hundredth birthday of Maria Lassnig (1919–2014) with a comprehensive look back upon her career, thus showing impressive key works and masterpieces by one of the most important woman artists of the 20th century. Among the multitude of themes to which Maria Lassnig devoted herself over the course of her life (including self-portraits, science fiction, relationships with people, animals, and technology, and how we relate to violence and war), a dominant golden thread running throughout her oeuvre’s content is the act of rendering her body-consciousness visible. As early as the late 1940s, Lassnig placed her own body at the center of her work—long before physical feeling, body language, and gender relations became central themes of the international avant-garde. She thus marked an important turning point in the history of modern art whose echoes can still be heard today. It was humorously and seriously, wistfully and mercilessly that the artist placed her perceptions of her own self on the painting surface. In this, it was not what she saw, but what she felt became the image.

Modernisms: Iranian, Turkish, and Indian Highlights from NYU’s Abby Weed Grey Collection explores art from the 1960s and early ’70s from Iran, Turkey, and India via selections from the unparalleled Abby Weed Grey Collection of Modern Asian and Middle Eastern Art at New York University. Featuring approximately 25 to 35 paintings, sculpture, drawings, and prints from each country, the exhibition will shed light on how Iranian, Turkish, and Indian artists created works that drew on their specific heritages while also engaging in global discourses around key issues of modernity. Illuminating our understanding of art made outside the long-dominant North American–West European axis, the exhibition also features historic exhibition brochures, invitations, photographs, correspondence, journals, and invoices from the Abby Weed Grey Papers housed in the NYU Archives.

The Davis Museum at Wellesley College presents Fatimah Tuggar: Home’s Horizons, a major solo exhibition that investigates history, technology, and the home. A multimedia artist born in Nigeria in 1967 and currently based in Kansas City, Missouri, Tuggar has taught and exhibited around the world. Curated by Assistant Curator Amanda Gilvin, this exhibition featuring sculpture, photo-montage, video, and augmented reality (AR) highlights Tuggar’s interrogation of the systems underlying human interactions with both high-tech gadgets and handmade crafts. She seeks to promote social justice by implicating everyone in these systems, while playfully proposing new ways of seeing and making.

For close to fifty years, Senga Nengudi (b. 1943) has shaped an oeuvre that inhabits a specific and unique place between sculpture, dance and performance. Before moving to Colorado Springs at the end of the 1980s where she lives until today, Nengudi was mostly based in Los Angeles. In the 1960s and 1970s, L.A. was the capital of an African-American artistic avant-garde with Nengudi as one of its pivotal figures. Her iconic R.S.V.P sculptures, exhibited for the first time in 1976, are made from pantyhose combined with natural materials such as sand and stone. While ostensibly abstract, their biomorphic forms suggest a body under tension, both physical and social. The artist herself describes the works as “stationary performances.” As the title of the growing series—R.S.V.P., short for “Répondez, s’il vous plait” or “Please respond”—implies, these works formulate an invitation and are occasionally activated during choreographed performances. Performance is at the core of Nengudi's practice—a fact that will be reflected by the exhibition. An illustrated catalog in English and German will be published. Curated by Stephanie Weber and Anna Straetmans.

Hosting the Victor Keen collection at the Arts Center is an outstanding opportunity to share with our visitors and community a collection that pushes the boundaries of art and facilitates a native son to share his treasures with Pueblo. "Still, for convenience, I refer to “outsider” art and “outsider” artists, as a shorthand with the understanding that others may favor other descriptives. Outsider art is not a “school” of art; what sets it apart is the circumstances and characteristics of the artist. The biographical narrative of every outsider artist is unique, but most share one or more of the following: no or only limited art training; living with mental or physical infirmities; poverty; educational deficit; being held back by racial discrimination. Most did not create their art for others, and any made no effort to share the work with anyone; some even affirmatively withheld it from the view of others." -Victor Keen “When it comes to self-taught and outsider art, there is a special barrier to a full embrace by head and heart. In the face of this supposedly raw art, we are often exhorted with evangelical force to renounce analysis and lay aside what we carry of knowledge and experience—what the artist Jean Dubuffet called asphyxiating culture—in favor of genuine response.” –Lyle Rexer Special events: Saturday, October 6, 2019 | Coffee with the Curator Friday, November 1, 2019 | Free First Friday ArtWalk Friday, December 6, 2019 | Free First Friday ArtWalk

Organized by Phoenix Art Museum, Agnes Pelton: Desert Transcendentalist is the first survey of the obscure American modernist painter in more than 23 years. Although she painted conventional landscapes and portraits, Pelton (1881–1961) is most celebrated for her abstract compositions that reflect her interest in esoteric subjects, including numerology and Agni Yoga with its principal focus on fire as a guiding force. The exhibition of more than 40 works from various private and museum collections sheds light on Pelton’s artistic contributions to American Modernism, a movement more commonly associated with artists such as Georgia O’Keeffe (1887–1986) in the Southwest and Marsden Hartley (1877–1943) in New England. Furthermore, Pelton’s interest in spirituality and abstraction links her to a larger international movement that is only now being properly studied and contextualized. Desert Transcendentalist represents a fascinating reexamination of an overlooked female artist and her rightful place within the canon of modern and contemporary art history.

Marking the 500th anniversary of the Spanish conqueror Hernán Cortés' landfall in the Gulf of Mexico, this major exhibition offers a fascinating insight into Aztec culture. At the centre of the exhibition are two unique feather shields and a nephrite jade figurine from the Württemberg State Museum, objects that have never been presented in the context of Aztec culture. These exquisite treasures will be complemented by high-quality objects loaned from Mexican and European institutions. Another focal point of this exhibition will be the presentation of the latest research results; for example, previously undisclosed findings regarding the great temple, the Templo Mayor, first discovered in 1978, will be on display. Impressive stone sculptures, ceramics, mosaics and gold works will provide a glimpse into Aztec art and culture, with vivid illustrations from colourful illuminated manuscripts bringing the visitor deeper into the subject. The dramaturgy of the exhibition follows the journey of Cortés from the peripheral provinces all the way to the sacred ceremonial precinct of the capital, Tenochtitlán.

With this spectacular exhibition the Kunsthalle Bremen is celebrating a premiere: For the first time, an exhibition will take over the entire museum. The show will present a single masterpiece in each of the museum’s galleries – from the Russian icon to Andy Warhol. With 60 stars in 60 galleries, the exhibiton will examine how the concept of the icon unites aspects of the sacred, worship and the idea of transcendence. Focussing on a single work of art, the presentation examines various aspects of spirituality, devotion and adoration. It invites visitors to experience iconic art works from ten centuries in a new and intense way. Works by Caspar David Friedrich, Wassily Kandinsky, Kazimir Malevich, Mark Rothko, Yves Klein, Niki de Saint Phalle, Isa Genzken, Andreas Gursky and Kehinde Wiley will be complemented by everyday icons – from consumer brands to icons of popular culture such as Marilyn Monroe, Beyoncé and YouTube stars. An interpretation of the traditional notion of the icon in art will be juxtaposed with the proliferation of icons in everyday life. A once-in-a-lifetime experience in which the museum itself is transformed into a place of contemplation and reflection!