Last Call - Francis Naumann Fine Art closing on February 28 with Marcel Duchamp Portraits

"Depicting Marcel Duchamp," Francis Naumann Fine Art

Francis Naumann Fine Art will close its gallery space at the end of the day on Friday, February 28, 2020.  The absence of FNFA will be greatly felt among his fans and the art history community which has relished the exceptional curation of historically important figures in art and their appropriators.  In this spirit, the current exhibition Depicting Marcel Duchamp: Portraits of Marcel Duchamp and/or Rrose Sélavy is pitch perfect for our fond farewell.

"Depicting Marcel Duchamp," Francis Naumann Fine Art

In the gallery's own words:

“Depicting Duchamp: Portraits of Marcel Duchamp and/or Rrose Sélavy opens at Francis M. Naumann Fine Art on January 10, 2020. As the title suggests, the show will consist of portraits of Marcel Duchamp and/or the artist in the guise of his female alter-ego, Rrose Sélavy. Many were made in Duchamp’s lifetime, but countless portraits have been made of the artist in the years since his death.  Indeed, a number were made by contemporary artists specially for inclusion in this show.

"Depicting Marcel Duchamp," Francis Naumann Fine Art

Marcel Duchamp’s reputation as an artistic iconoclast—combined with his legendary good

looks, genial character and accessibility—have made him the subject of countless portraits.

Indeed, if we combine the number of portraits made by his contemporaries with those made posthumously, Duchamp has been depicted more often than any other major artist of the modern era. Works of art are generally comprehended only visually (“retinal” in Duchamp’s terminology), and are, therefore, subject to evolving changes in taste.  The ideas Duchamp introduced avoid fluctuations of style by inhabiting the mind, thereby forcing an intense and rigorous engagement with the process of thought. As a result, artists render him as a physical presence, for to this day, his ideas continue to affect the way we think about art and the art-making process.

"Depicting Marcel Duchamp," Francis Naumann Fine Art

The first formal painted portrait of Marcel Duchamp was made in 1915 by Walter Pach (1883-1959), an artist best remembered today for having helped to organize the Armory Show of 1913. It was Pach who had selected many of the modernist works in that landmark exhibition, including Duchamp’s infamous Nude Descending a Staircase. Consequently, he had done more to establish the artist’s reputation in the United States than any other single individual. In the painting, the artist wears a green shirt with a white collar and blue tie, and he is set against a modulated green backdrop that closely matches the color and texture of his shirt (green was Duchamp’s favorite color). Pach not only captured his sitter’s penetrating intelligence, but the delicate and attenuated features suggest an effeminate quality that the artist himself probably would not have denied, for with his invention of a female alter ego some years later, he would openly explore this aspect of his complex but ever-engaging personality.

"Depicting Marcel Duchamp," Francis Naumann Fine Art

The Pach portrait is the earliest dated work in the show, but it was followed by countless others made in the artist’s lifetime. Many photographs of Duchamp were taken over the years; see those by Denise Bellon (1938), Irving Penn (1948), Naomi Savage (1949), Victor Obsatz (1953), and Arnold Rosenberg (1958).  He was depicted countless times by various painters, sculptors and printmakers, beginning with an early torso by his brother Raymond Duchamp-Villon (1910), plaster and bronze life casts by Ettore Salvatore (ca. 1945), sculptures by Reuben Nakian (1943), Isabelle Waldberg (1958), as well as to prints made by Man Ray (1971), Marcel Gromaire (1952), an etching by his sister Suzanne Duchamp (1953) and another by his eldest brother Jacques Villon (1956). 

"Depicting Marcel Duchamp," Francis Naumann Fine Art

By and far the most ambitious series to depict the life of Marcel Duchamp was undertaken by the Musée National d’Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris when they opened their inaugural exhibition in 1977—eleven years after the artist’s death—with a Duchamp retrospective.  To introduce this exhibition, they displayed a series of pictures illustrating the life of Marcel Duchamp painted by André Raffray (1925-2010), an artist who had earlier worked as an illustrator for the French cinema. Over a period of two years, he completed La Vie illustrée, twelve gouache panels that reconstruct major events in Duchamp’s life not otherwise recorded: from painting his first picture at age fifteen, to standing next to his Etant donnés in the last year of his life.

"Depicting Marcel Duchamp," Francis Naumann Fine Art

Curiously, the twelve panels in the series do not account for the eight years that Duchamp spent in New York from 1915 through 1923, arguably the most important and productive period of his life. The omission (likely a consequence of the Francophile nature of the enterprise), was rectified when Raffray was later commissioned by Francis M. Naumann to add a thirteenth panel to the series called Chez Arensberg (1984), depicting a typical soirée at the apartment of Louise and Walter Arensberg, Duchamp’s steadfast patrons during his years in New York.

"Depicting Marcel Duchamp," Francis Naumann Fine Art

Among the most engaging portraits of Duchamp are those done after his death, some by artists who are themselves today no longer living; see the works by Sarah Austin, Tom Chimes, Ray Johnson, Richard Hamilton.  Yet it is the younger contemporary artists who give us the sense that Duchamp is still living, his ideas as prescient today as they were when first introduced over 100 years ago, forever altering the very definition of art; see Michael Vannoy Adams, Stefan Banz, Carl Bates, Larissa Bates, Ray Beldner, Nancy Becker, Mike Bidlo, Brice Brown, Rob Brinker, Pablo Echaurren, TR Ericsson, Robert Forman, Kathleen Gilje, Elise Graham, Tom Hackney, Rudolf Herz, Jasper Johns, Don Joint, Pamela Joseph, Larry Kagan, Jane Kaplowitz, L. Brandon Krall, Cary Leibowitz, Christa Maiwald, Carlo Maria Mariani, Sophie Matisse, Jacques Moitoret, Yasumasa Morimura, Richard Pettibone, Jonathan Santlofer, Donald Shambroom, Tom Shannon, Mark Tansey, Douglas Vogel, Ai Weiwei, CK Wilde, Rob Wynne and Tetsuya Yamada."

So, run, flight or "beam up" to this landmark show. 

Thank you, Francis Naumann and Dana Martin, for 18 1/2 years of extraordinary exhibitions.

We will miss your presence at 24 West 57th Street.

Best wishes to you both-

Beth and your loyal fans from the New York Arts Exchange

Beth S. Gersh-Nesic, Ph.D.

Director and owner

New York Arts Exchange

on Twitter @bethnewyork

Remembering artist Michael Richards at Francis Naumann Fine Art on September 11th

Michael Richards, Tar Baby vs. St. Sebastian, 1999

at Francis M. Naumann Fine Art, through November 17th

A tribute to Michael Richards, the artist who perished in the World Trade Center attack on September 11, 2001, opened on Friday, September 8th at Francis M. Naumann Fine Art, 24 West 57th Street, NYC.  The gallery will be open on Monday, September 11th from 11 am to 6 pm, in honor of Michael  Richards' and all the victims of the 9/11/2001 attacks.   

The New York Arts Exchange joins with Francis Naumann Fine Art in honoring Michael Richards and all the lives cut short because of those heinous acts of terrorism. Our hearts go out to the first responders and those who worked on Ground Zero, who still suffer from the health-hazards posed by this toxic environment.  We remember you. We salute you. We still mourn you who perished on that day or because you stayed to help in the aftermath.

Michael Richards, Are You Down?, 2000

2' 10" x 22' 6" x 22' 6" 

Fiberglass, Bronze Bonded Resin, Concrete & Black Beauty Sand

Michael Richards FSP/Jerome Grant Recipient 2000

Franconia Sculpture Park, St. Croix Trail, Shafer, MN

Michael Richards' biography and legacy are available here, on the Francis M. Naumann Fine Art website and also at the Franconia Sculpture Park website, where an installation of Michael's Are You Down? is on permanent display.

Uncannily prescient, this Tar Baby pierced with planes, like St. Sebastian's tortured body pierced with arrows, "... was about death," Michael's art dealer, Genaro Ambrosino explained in the press, and: “ . . . about liberation, freedom, being able to escape. It was a sad message because of what it meant historically … It was like redemption from all that.”  

The relevance of Michael Richards' work continues to resonate in ways beyond his experience of America's inability to deal honestly with racism. Take note that he felt optimistic and empowered to make a difference, to right a wrong, to enlighten where there was ignorance or denial.  We hope his work will eventually become known for its excellence above all else.

Michael, your light shines on.

Last Call: Duchamp's Fountain, Sasha Meret @ Shchukin, Esmeralda Kosmatopoulos @ 2 Rivington

  

Marcel Duchamp Fountain: An Homage

Marcel Duchamp, Fountain, 2017/1964

On April 10, 2017, Francis Naumann Fine Art celebrated the centenary of Marcel Duchamp's famous/infamous Fountain with an exhibition of artworks that pay homage to this revolutionary artist's gesture: a urinal turned up on its side, signed by a mysterious unknown called "R. Mutt." It was submitted to the supposedly open, unjuried first exhibition of the Society of Independent Artists in New York City, in the Grand Central Palace (since destroyed to make way for a taller, more lucrative real estate investment). The Society of Independent Artists included Marcel Duchamp, Katherine Dreier, Walter Arensburg, Albert Gleizes, William Glackens, and Man Ray.  From a position of power, Duchamp dared to submit a "ready-made" (already a concept in his repertoire, begun with Bottle Rack of 1914).  In this case, it was a decidedly male bathroom fixture with a sort of vaginal orientation on its pedestal.  This mass-produced ceramic site for depositing urine was sold by the J.L. Mott Iron Works Company. Nothing could be more antithetical for art.  It was a total Dada gesture: not unique, not handmade, not meant to be enjoyed for its aesthetic invention, and not made by the artist himself in any way, even as a commission from the foundry.  The supposedly "open" committee immediately rejected Duchamp's conceptual piece before the opening on April 10, and Duchamp immediately resigned from the SIA.  The urinal was photographed in Alfred Stieglitz's studio, published in The Blind Man magazine, and somehow lost. Reproductions are in various collections, most notably at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, which has curated its own homage to Marcel Duchamp's "scandalous" gesture (on view through December 3, 2017).

 Kathleen Gilje, Sant'Orinale, 2017

gesso, goldleaf, gouache, oil paint on panel

16 3/4 x 13 inches

My favorite is Kathleen Gilje's Sant'Orinale (Saint Urinal) which says in its concise visual vocabulary how this subversive gesture has been transformed into a icon of art historical veneration, becoming as sanctified as a devotional image from the early Renaissance. Moreover, Gilje's painting amplifies the irony of this particular show by intimating that these appropriations may enrich many an artist due to the sales of their creations in response to Duchamp's anti-art work. In Gilje's work we see a masterfully rendered image of Fountain (Duchamp's rejection of "retinal art") surrounded by gold leaf in the manner reserved for Christian saints, Christ and the Virgin Mary. The sheer opulence, precious materials, uniqueness of the hand, and artistic fame of both artists (Duchamp and Gilje) flies in the face of Duchamp's original intentions, enacting a rebellion on its own terms and insisting on the glorified permanent art object that Duchamp decided to militate against and do without (by misplacing the first Fountain).  

Mike Bidlo, Fractured Fountain, Series of 8, 2015

Bronze, 14 3/4 x 16 x 11 inches

Mike Bidlo, Sherry Levine and Ray Beldner (Peelavie) transgress the original transgressive object by casting a urinal in bronze or sewing a urinal out of dollar bills, respectively.

Sophie Matisse, Fountain Cake, 2017 

Meringue, frosting, chocolate chips

16 x 16 x 12 inches

More in keeping with the original may be Sofie Matisse's white frosted meringue cake, fashioned into the fabled Fountain, embedded with chocolate chips to depict the urinal's holes.  Saul Melman's Johnny on the Spot, a concert hall in the shape of Duchamp's urinal that was burned during the Burning Man Festival in 2003, also plays into the Duchamp's anti-fetishizing of art through longevity, collectability and enshrinement as scholars anoint the object with masterpiece status.  Their works are ephemeral, in keeping with Duchamp's original iteration.

The Francis Naumann Fine Art website announced that May 24th would be the last day of the show. However, you can still see the exhibition through today, Friday, June 2nd. Gallery hours are 11 am - 6 pm and online at Francis Naumann Fine Art, 24 West 57th Street, NYC.

Sasha Meret at his opening, Shchukin Gallery, 110 East 31st. Street, NYC

through June 6th

Sasha Meret: Incendiary Artifacts of Past Digressions, opened on May 4th at Shchukin Gallery amidst a flurry of fans eager to partake in the magical journey of Meret's surrealist mind. The evening felt electrified with excitement.  Fortunately, the show will continue past the closing day announced on the invitation.  At this moment, June 6th is the closing date.  Hopefully, it will be extended further.

Mythological in origin, each work resonates with Meret's profound insights into the humor and darkness of human existence. Above, we find beauty in  Meret's reordering of existential chaos, for here are material castoffs recontextualized into magnificent creatures/creations and prints replete with phantasmagorical figures writhing inside fascinating compositions.  We see connections and disruptions, Dantesque heads spilling pipes from one mouth to another.  It's a scene reminiscent of Purgatory or Hell or both. For Meret disturbs our minds into a state of morbid curiosity. There is humor and their is demonic discourse presented in deliciously intricate detail and excellent drawing. 

Sasha Meret, Emperor Duck, 2017

As always, entering Sasha Meret's exhibitions feels like a trip into another realm of existence, an exploration into an extraordinary consciousness of reorientations.  Meret is indeed a response to Marcel Duchamp's Fountain in our time: the ready-made loses its identity.  It's fluid, undefined and yet part of an ensemble that functions as an artwork. Thus, it is postmodern and Dadaesque without being Dada at all. For Meret creates an aesthetic environment that retains the appearance of each object while he subordinates the individual identities of the ingredients to the whole vision.  Sasha Meret: Incendiary Artifacts of Past Digressions was curated by CATM  NYC.

Esmeralda Kosmatopoulos, "What I always wanted to tell you but never dared," 2 Rivington, NYC

May 31 - June 5

Curator Clémence Mailly explains that the artist Esmerald Kosmatopoulos discovered the uncanny abilities of predictive digital programs in text and email applications.  "The virtual machine had been learning from the artist’s everyday written communications and was now trying to mimic at its best her writing style, appropriating her most used vocabulary and style, in an attempt to predict her next words. This parapraxis was shedding light in a somehow disturbing way the complex - man versus machine - dialectic as the phone had been anticipating the artist’s next words without her consent." To that end, the artist decided to use these written artifacts to help digital "ready-mades" become artworks by virtue of the artist's intervention. "And the rest is history . . . .," as she quotes in one of her audio pieces.  What I always wanted to tell you but never dared, is a pop-up exhibition at Parasol Projects 2 Rivington Street gallery, just around the corner from the New Museum and on the way to Morgenstern's ice cream.  Another heir to Duchamp's Fountain, Kosmatopoulos dares to re-contextualize the algorithmic accidents that occasion our co-dependent  relationship on our smartphones and other mobile devices, teasing out the humor in accidents of communication. detecting significant in this banal quotidian territory.   This pop-up show will last until Sunday, June 4th.  So try to catch it before it disappears or visit Kosmatopoulos' website to see more images of the installation.

Happy Birthday, Fountain, and thank you, Marcel.  Let's us also celebrate rejection and the victories that finally ensue.

Best wishes for the weekend,
Beth New York

aka Beth S. Gersh-Nesic, Ph.D.
Director and owner
New York Arts Exchange, LLC
www.nyarts-exchange.com 

Last Call: Man Ray at Francis Naumann Fine Art, through November 18th

Man Ray, Self-Portrait with Half-Beard, 1943

Francis Naumann is a national treasure and one of the smartest art historians I can think of - particularly when it comes to Dada artists.  So any Man Ray exhibition deserves our attention, for it is indeed a reason to celebrate as we head into the holidays. Alas, today and tomorrow mark the end of Man Ray: Continued and Noticed - a most excellent show that should be noticed by everyone.  

Naumann explained that he has mounted an homage to Man Ray's 1948 show at Copley Gallery in Beverly Hills entitled Man Ray: Continued and Unnoticed.  "Man Ray must have wanted these words to let his audience know that he was still working ('continued'), but that he worked with virtually no recognition ('unnoticed').  The present exhibition - held 68 years after his show at the Copley Galleries - is intended to demonstrate that Man Ray's work not only continues to be of interest, but that it is still noticed and, with the passage of time, better understood and appreciated (although the latter may never have been his intent)." 

May I add that the same goes for Francis Naumann's endeavors.  They continue to enlighten us and are always noticed for their insightful analyses.

Man Ray, Self-Portrait (on Plexiglas), 1916/70

Man Ray was born Emmanuel Radnitzsky on August 27, 1890 - about 10 years after Picasso (whose photograph is included in the show) and closer in age to Marcel Duchamp (born July 28, 1887), who befriended him while he lived in New York in 1915 - 1920.  Man Ray moved to Paris in 1921.

In Man Ray's self-portrait on plexiglas, we see evidence of the artist's grasp of French as he attempts to visually pun his name with his handprint (main - pronounced "meh") and beams of lights or stripes (rayons or rayures).  This images also demonstrates Man Ray's fertile mind for invention. Naumann attributes this "defiance of artistic convention" and "commitment to absolute freedom in the arts"  to "his association with the anarchist movement in New York."  Moreover, this portrait speaks to the artist's infusion of humor in his work, which Naumann points out several times in his essay, particularly at the end in Marcel Duchamp's definition, 1959: "Man Ray, n.m. la joie, jouer, jouir  [Man Ray, noun, masculine, joy, to play, to enjoy]."

Man Ray, L'Heure de l'observatoire les amoreaux, 1932-36

And for those of you who cultivate a love of Man Ray's work, this exhibition will not disappoint. One of his best known works (among so many) entitled Observatoire Time: The Lovers is on view.  Based on Lee Miller's lips, which he kissed so often and missed intensely after their breakup, it wistfully conjures up this photographer in her own right, who was Man Ray's assistant and lover from 1919 to 1932.

Would love to add more to this blog post, but the "heure" is late and I must post asap.

Man Ray: Continued and Noticed closes at 6 pm on Friday, November 18.

Francis Naumann Fine Art, 24 West 57th Street, 3rd floor.

The exhibition will be featured in the Francis Naumann booth at Art Miami Basel, December 1st through 4th.   Please inquire at the gallery for details.

N. B. - I highly recommend the catalog for this show, even if you are not able to see the works in person - a must-read for any serious art historian and all Man Ray fans. 

Le Beaujolais nouveau est arrivée -

Beth New York

aka Beth S. Gersh-Nesic

Director

New York Arts Exchange

www.nyarts-exchange.com 

Last Call: William Kentridge at Marian Goodman and Jacqueline de Ribes at the Met, Closing this Weekend

William Kentridge, More Sweetly Play the Dance, 2015

Courtesy of Marian Goodman Gallery, NYC

The sun has come out today!  And, hopefully, we will have a comfortable week through Sunday.   Let's get to some art exhibitions, shall we?

Closing on Saturday, February 20th - William Kentridge: More Sweetly Play the Dance at Marian Goodman Gallery, 24 West 57th St.   Two videos and props from the videos on view: More Sweetly Play the Dance (2015) and Notes Toward a Model Opera (2015).  As always, this South African artist delivers one of the best shows this season, because he is one of the best artists of our time. Please do not miss this excellent show.

Paula Modersohn-Becker, Self-Portrait, 1903

And while you are in the building, please visit Paula Modersohn-Becker at Galerie St. Etienne (8th floor), through March 12th.  Museum quality - not to be missed!

Mike Bidlo, Not Duchamp Fountain, 2015

And Mike Bidlo: Not Duchamp Fountains and Bottlerack at Francis Naumann Fine Art (3rd floor), through February 26th. Trust Mike Bidlo to reinvent these Dada landmarks with gusto. Simply Smashing!

Richard Avedon, Jacqueline de Ribes in Yves Saint-Laurent, 1962

French aristocrat Jacqueline de Ribes (born Jacqueline Bonnin de La Bonninière de Beaumont on Bastille Day, July 14, 1929 and married to Vicomte Edouard de Ribes in 1948) became one of the most important fashion icons of her time, as well as a successful designer, businesswoman and philanthropist.   The Metropolitan Museum's exhibition of her dreamy clothes warms our hearts come rain, snow or bitter cold.  Closing on Sunday, February 21.  So hurry!

Save the day: Artist's Talk with Clarity Haynes and Beth Gersh-Nesic on Sunday, February 28 at Stout Projects, Bushwick Brooklyn, 3 pm.  More on this again.

Happy President's Week - 

Beth New York

aka Beth S. Gersh-Nesic, Ph.D.

Director, New York Arts Exchange

www.nyarts-exchange.com 

Last Call: Suzanne Duchamp Drawings at Francis Naumann Fine Art through March 6th

Suzanne Duchamp, Untitled (Red Flowers), ca. 1933

Watercolor and gouache on paper, 16 3/8 x 24 3/8 inches

Hark, Feministas and Feministos - We forgot to include Suzanne Duchamp in the women artists canon of modern art!   How did this happen?

I checked through Linda Nochlin and Anne Sutherland Harris' catalog for Women Artists, 1550-1950 (LA County Museum, 1976); Wendy Slatkin's Women Artists in History: From Antiquity to the Present (most recent edition 2000); Nancy Heller's Women Artists: An Illustrated History (most recent edition 2000) and  Whitney Chadwick's Women, Art and Society (most recent edition 2012). Only Gill Perry in her Women Artists and the Parisian Avant-Garde : Modernism and "Feminine" Art, from 1900 to the 1920s (1996) lists Suzanne Duchamp among other Cubist women artists, but adds in a footnote; "Although Suzanne Duchamp was associated with the Section d'Or exhibition [1912], she went on to work with the Dada group, hence her exclusion from the group of 'femmes peintres" featured in this book." (p. 80).  Hmmm - not "femme" enough, eh?   Well, I disagree.  Based on the current mini-retrospective at Francis Naumann Fine Art, we see plenty of "feminine" delicacy in her still life and landscape drawings and paintings - rather School of Paris-esque following her eccentric Dada and Tabu Dada periods.  

Feminist art historians take note: we must redress this egregious omission.

          

Suzanne Duchamp, Self-Portrait, ca. 1920    

 ink on paper, 14 x 9 7/8 inches     

Man Ray, Suzanne Duchamp, 1920

Centre Pompidou, Man Ray Trust

   Artists Right Society (ARS)/ADAGP. Paris 2014

To that end, may I introduce to you: Suzanne Marie Germaine Duchamp (1889-1963) the fourth sibling among the very talented six Duchamp-Villon children.  She was born on October 20, 1889, the first daughter after three sons Jacques Villon [Guston Ducamp], 1875-1963; Raymond Duchamp-Villon, 1876-1918; and Marcel Duchamp, 1887-1968,  and the oldest among the sisters, Suzanne, Marie Madeleine Yvonne,1895-1969, and Marie-Thérèse Magdeleine, 1898-1979 (the latter two were not professional artists). 

Suzanne Duchamp, Untitled (Landscape with Cubist Tree), ca. 1945

Watercolor and pencil on paper 23 1/8 x 30 7/8 inches

Academically trained at the École des Beaux-Arts in Rouen (beginning in 1905), Suzanne lived among the most avant-garde groups as a teenager.  Her much-older brothers Jacques Villon and Raymond Duchamp-Villon actively participated in the burgeoning Cubist movement.  The third, and much younger, brother Marcel Duchamp shocked New York with his famous Nude Descending Stairs (1912) in the legendary Armory Show of 1913, before he became part of the Dada movement. These familial connections brought her membership in the Société  Normande de Peinture Moderne in Rouen.

Suzanne Duchamp, Untitled (Flowers), 1946

Crayon and ink on paper, 15 1/2 x 19 inches

In 1911 she married pharmacist Charles Victor Rene Demares in Rouen and divorced him in 1914. Suzanne moved to Paris and into her brother Marcel's flat on the rue de Condamine.  During World War I she worked as a nurse in the Hôtel des Invalides (while Marcel was in New York). Through the Dada network, she met Jean Crotti (1878-1958), a Swiss Dada artist, in 1916 and married him in 1919.  The two artists created their own movement, Tabu (based on the word "tabou") Dada, which expressed a life-giving force with mystery and spirituality - contrasting with Dada's nihilism.  Its first exhibition took place in April 1921, at Galerie Montaigne in Paris 

Suzanne Duchamp, Untitled (Interior au Gueridon), 1948

Watercolor and ink on paper, 24 1/2 x 19 1/4 inches

In the 1930s through the late 1950s, Suzanne embraced the popular charm of the School of Paris, concentrating on landscapes and still lifes radiant with color.  In his memoirs, Souvenir sans fin, André Salmon mentioned that she was very ill and could drink only pure milk, which Jean Crotti purchased in a specific dairy in Neuilly. Perhaps this period restricted her production, requiring only modest undertakings as an artist.

In 1958, Jean Crotti passed away and shortly afterward Suzanne turned to abstraction, expressing an energy and innovation that lasted to the very end of her life, September 11, 1963.  Her late work is a revelation.

Suzanne Duchamp Works on Paper seems to augur the return of spring.  These lively paintings and drawings will warm the cockles of your heart.   

Three more weeks of winter!

Beth New York

aka Beth S. Gersh-Nesic, Ph.D.

Director, New York Arts Exchange

www.nyarts-exchange.com 

"Kathleen Gilje: Revised and Restored," Bruce Museum in Greenwich, CT through Sept. 8

Kathleen Gilje, Lady with an Ermine, Restored, 1997, 

oil on panel, 15 ¾ x 21 7/8 inches,  
Courtesy of the Artist, © Kathleen Gilje 2013 

Leonardo da Vinci, Lady with an Ermine (Portrait of Cecilia Gallerani) 1490
oil on wood panel, 15.0 x 21.6 inches, Czartoryski Museum, Wawel Castle, Krakow

Kathleen Gilje is an art historian's artist: a brilliant scholar and detective who can deftly copy masterpieces from different eras and then, with just an addition or subtraction of elements, transform the imagery into a highly charged, contemporary topic.

Known for her “restorations” (the artist’s term), Gilje’s appropriations grow out of a long and careful study of the each work of art.  She physically masters the artist’s style, material, and execution. Then she scrupulously researches the iconography, artist’s life and the socio-political context of the work in order to deepen her understanding of the artist’s decisions. Often her academic investigations uncover background stories or encoded narratives embedded in the art or swirling around the artist’s milieu that may inform her analysis. 

Gilje’s sly additions or adjustments in the works derive from her considerable research. Then, in an effort to break new ground, she paints revised art historical readings. Gilje calls this practice “restoration,” because she fantasizes a restoration of the meaning of the work which may not be visible in the original work itself.

Kathleen Gilje, Woman with a Parrot (Restored), 2001, 

Courtesy of the artist., © Kathleen Gilje 2013 

For example, in her 2001 “restored” version of Courbet’s Woman with a Parrot (1866) she replaced the bird’s perch with a nude male figure to emphasize the phallic symbolism of the original painting. The parrot in the Courbet may represent the petit ami who is privileged to gaze upon the female model [i] or the Kamasutra.   

Gilje painted her “restoration” of the artist standing over the frisky model and then painted an exact copy of the Courbet painting on top of her “restored” version. She had her exact copy x-rayed in order to show her faux “original” underneath the copy. Viewed as an installation, the 2001 copy of the Courbet painting placed next to the x-ray film of the “restored” version sparks a variety of associations. The perch clearly becomes the proxy for Courbet himself, who has eroticized his model for his own delectation.

Gilje’s installation also comments on scopophilia: pleasure derived from the act of looking, an aspect of the male gaze.[ii] In Gilje’s “restoration” of Courbet’s Woman with a Parrot, the artist enters into his own picture and experiences the pleasure of viewing the model directly. (The grainy texture of the x-ray also suggests that we are witnessing the artist’s dream or fantasy as he paints the nude with ardent desire.)

Gilje’s ability to alter the original iconography to serve her interpretation of the work elucidates what she believes lies beyond the physical evidence. In this way, she embarks on dialogues with art history’s masters that seamlessly integrate her feminist readings and sometimes incorporate the very history of the work itself.

Kathleen Gilje, Danaë, 2001, 

oil on canvas, 72 1/2 x 80 1/2

Courtesy of the artist, © Kathleen Gilje 2013 

Rembrandt van rijn, Danaë, 1643, 

Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg

In her Danaë, Restored (2001), Gilje alludes to the vicious slashing and sulfuric acid attack on Rembrandt’s painting Danaë (1636), which occurred at The Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, on June 15, 1985.[iii]  Here, a puddle of acid flies through the air toward the nude heroine, instead of the supernatural golden shower of rain (Zeus’ transmogrification in the myth) which Rembrandt painted in the original. Gilje explained in a conversation that the golden shower in the myth is the Greek deity’s semen which impregnates Danaë with Perseus. Gilje views this sneaky sexual encounter as a romanticized act of non-consensual sex: a form of rape.

Rape, the violation of another’s body, is a perfect metaphor for the attack on the Rembrandt painting in 1985. Gilje noted that Danaë’s gesture in the original painting was meant to welcome Zeus as the golden shower into her bower. In Gilje’s “restoration,” Danaë’s raises an arm in a feeble attempt at self-defense, warding off the approaching acid. In the Gilje appropriation, Danaë’s gesture emphasizes the vulnerability of the woman in the painting and the artwork itself during the violent attack at The Hermitage. The title of Gilje’s work reminds us that Rembrandt’s Danaë is now literally a restored work of art.

Gilje came by her ability to reenact the masters’ touch as an apprentice in Antonio DeMata’s studio for restoration from 1966 to 1968. Then, she went to Naples with DeMata and his other assistants to restore masterpieces in the Museum of Capodimonte from 1968 to 1972. In 1973, she returned to New York City, her hometown,[iv] to work for Marco Grassi, where she restored paintings for various collections, including the Thyssen Bornemizsa Collection in Lugano and Madrid and the Norton Simon Collection in Pasadena. In 1976, she opened her own studio, restoring works for numerous public and private clients, such as Stanley Moss, Eugene V. Thaw, and Robert Dance.[v]

Kathleen Gilje, Bacchus (Restored), 1992

oil on linen, 37 1/2 x 33 1/2 inches

Courtesy of the artist, © Kathleen Gilje 2013 

Caravaggio (Michaelangelo de Merisi da Caravaggio), Bacchus, c. 1595

Uffizi Gallery, Florence

Gilje’s concept of the “restored” painting (her Postmodern Appropriations) dates back to the early 1990s. Her Bacchus, Restored of 1992 (after Caravaggio’s Bacchus, c. 1595) features plastic wrapped over the bowl of fruit with condoms strewn alongside the succulent choices Caravaggio depicted in his original. Gilje’s “restoration” suggests that the beautiful young man in the seductively draped toga was indeed “forbidden fruit” for the patron Cardinal Francesco Maria Del Monte, who commissioned Caravaggio’s work and delighted in beautiful young men.[vi]

 Gilje’s Bacchus, Restored belongs to the horrific first wave of the AIDs epidemic and historically marks the overwhelming concern that gripped the arts community. Simultaneously, Gilje explored the iconography of homoeroticism in art, which had recently gained recognition as “queer” theory among academic art historians and critics.

Today, a wonderful selection of Gilje's oeuvre has been beautifully installed in the Bruce Museum, on view through September 8, 2013.   This venue, which has welcomed numerous exhibitions of Old Master art, perfectly complements Gilje's paintings and drawings with its warm colors and informative text panels. 

The exhibition catalog deserves high praise too.  It features essays by the executive director Peter Sutton, critic John Yau, art historian (and subject in two Gilje portraits) Linda Nochlin, art historian (and subject in one portrait)  the late Robert Rosenblum, and an interview between the artist and art historian Francis Naumann (who exhibits Gilje's work in his gallery Francis Naumann Fine Art).  It is an elegant book, packed with valuable information about Gilje's work and the original pieces she copied - a delicious art history textbook in its own right.

Nevertheless, the catalog is not the real thing.  Seeing is believing.  This rare opportunity to see a large portion of Gilje's formidable body of work in public ends one week after Labor Day and then heads out to other parts of the US.  Catch it while you can!

(The New York Arts Exchange features two tours of Kathleen Gilje's exhibition this summer: Tuesday, June 25 and Tuesday, July 9.  Please visit our website for details and to make a reservation www.nyarts-exchange.com)

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[i] Mona Hadler introduced the notion that the parrot represents the privileged position of the male gazing upon the courtesan in her reading of her article “Manet’s Woman with a Parrot of 1866,” Metropolitan Museum Journal, v. 7 (1973): 115-122. Kam or Kamadeva, the god of love in Indian mythology, is best known for the Kamasutra. He flies through the air on his parrot. Therefore, the parrot can be associated with sensual love.

[ii] Laura Mulvey, “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,” Screen 16, no. 13 (1975): 6-18, was very much on the minds of feminist artists and art historians during the late twentieth century, as well as the feud between Linda Nochlin and Michael Fried on gender bias and artistic intentionality in Courbet Reconsidered (Brooklyn: Brooklyn Museum, 1988). Kathleen Gilje directed my attention to the two articles in this exhibition catalogue.

[iii] The assailant slit the female figure across the stomach and thigh with a knife and then threw acid against the canvas. It took twelve years to repair. Danaë was put back on view in the Hermitage in 1997. (John Russell, New York Times, August 31, 1997.)

[iv] Kathleen Gilje was born in Brooklyn.

[v] Information culled from the artist’s website www.kathleengilje.com and interviews with the artist. Her own work belongs to collections all over the world, including the Musée Ingres, Montaubon; the Weatherspoon Museum, North Carolina; and the National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, DC.

[vi] Donald Posner, “Caravaggio’s Homo-erotic Early Works,” Art Quarterly 34 (1971), 301-24.

(The essay is an excerpt from "Portrait as Performance: The Theater of the Self in Kathleen Gilje’s Series of Curators, Critics and Connoisseur," written to honor Dr. Alicia Faxon, professor emeritus, Simmons College, whose scholarship has always been a source of inspiration.  The complete version will be published in a forthcoming festschrift dedicated to Professor Faxon, organized by Simmons College, where I taught from 1989-1991.)

Best regards,

Beth New York

aka Beth Gersh-Nesic

Director

New York Arts Exchange

www.nyarts-exchange.com 

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