Best Wishes for Labor Day 2023

Jean-François Millet, Noonday Rest, 1866

Boston Museum of Fine Arts

Vincent van Gogh, Noon, Rest After Work (After Millet), St. Rémy, 1890-91

Best wishes for Labor Day 2023

to you and your family.

With hugs and love,

Beth  and the New York Arts Exchange

 

Last Call: Van Gogh's Cypresses, MAD's Paper Dresses and Funky Art, MCNY "Home" - closing August 27

 

Vincent van Gogh, Cypresses, late June 1889

Metropolitan Museum of Art

Dear Friends,

Summer is coming to an end  - at least our sense of "summer" when schools are closed and the days are long. Although Labor Day is over a week away, many museums will close their spectacular Summer Season exhibitions this Sunday, August 27th.

Here are 5 shows you don't want to miss:

Vincent Van Gogh, The Starry Night,  June 1889

Museum of Modern Art

    Vincent van Gogh, The Little Stream, October 1889

Star Insurance Companies

Van Gogh's Cypresses at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, closing Sunday. Hours on Friday and Saturday from 10-9; Sunday 10-5. You must sign up for the virtual wait line when you arrive. So, don't forget to scan the QR code on the sign next to the Admission Desk. You will use your cell phone. Then you fill in the form online and check your texts for notification. If all this sounds confusing and complication, don't worry.  Ask the Admissions cashier or a MMA guard for help. Also, please brush up on your VVG using Smarthistory and read this wonderful article "The Dark Side of van Gogh's Cypress Trees," on the meaning of cypresses, which Daniel Larkin noted was missing on the text panels - great catch, Mr. Larkin.

(Photos taken by BGN.)

Generation Paper: A Fashion Phenom of the 1960s, Museum of Art and Design, Columbus Circle, NYC. closing on Sunday. A welcome trip down Memory Lane of the 1960s, when clothes designer Mary Quant, hair stylist Vidal Sassoon, and models Jean Shrimpton and Twiggy were all the rage in the fashion world. An absolutely fab exhibition that should have received more publicity. You'll escape into your recollection of Beatles songs, while Swifties groove on Taylor Swift music playing throughout an exhibition of her clothes on the second floor (closing March 24, 2024). Learn about the history of the paper dress and its demise with this video.

Gallery Installations of Funk You Too!  (Photos taken by BGN)

Also at MAD - Funk You Too!  Humor and Irreverence in Ceramic Sculpture, closing on Sunday. Not as exciting as Generation Paper or Craft Front and Center, but worth a giggle or two when you walk through the show. Let me know what you think of it, if you decide to visit.

Gallery Installation of Craft Front and Center  (Photo courtesy of MAD)

Craft Front and Center: Exploring the Permanent Collection, continues through January 14, 2024, and I am so glad it does. I can't wait to return for a longer, more intensely focused visit with these extraordinary artworks. You will find enormous imagination here. I could not select my favorite - I loved each and every piece. A must!

New York Now: Home, The Photography Triennial at the Museum of the City of New York, Fifth Avenue between 103rd and 104th Streets, NYC.  Great photos of our great city that celebrate our diversity and particular aesthetics.

Best wishes for the Labor Day Weekend Holiday,

Beth

Beth S. Gersh-Nesic, PhD

Director and owner, New York Arts Exchange, LLC

Mother's Day 2016

Grant Wood, Hattie Weaver Grant, 1929

Happy Mother's Day to you and yours.  This blog post is dedicated to my mother, Mildred Gersh, who gave me a love for art through our many visits to museums.  Thank you, Mom.

Please make visits to museums a frequent and pleasant experience for your family.  Take your children and grandchildren to a museum for a short time - an hour or so.  Not too long.  Just enough time to whet the appetite for more, another day. 

Also, have the children select a reproduction in the bookstore as a souvenir of the trip to the museum. The purchase not only supports the museum, it also extends the experience past the doors of the museum and into one's personal space, one's comfort zone.

I urge you to frame these museum reproductions so that they hang in the child's bedroom, creating a personal connection that will last a lifetime.

Rembrandt van Rijn, Neeltgen Willemsdochter van Zuytgbrouch. van Rijn, 1629

Rembrandt's mother's face is familiar to us through other works wherein she served as his model.

Vincent van Gogh, Anna Cornelia Carbentus van Gogh, 1888

Almost smiling, Anna van Gogh seems to listen intently.  She provided solace for her son when he was at odds with his father. An artist in her own right, she too studied art and drew plants and flowers in notebooks. 

Andy Warhol, Julia Justine Zavacka Warhola, 1974

Julia Warhola is truly the Mother of Pop Art.  Her charming European script graces most of Andy Warhol's early works, such as the greeting cards and clever books. Examples of her work are currently on view at the Morgan Library in the exhibition Warhol by the Book, closing on May 15th. 

For other artists' mothers place click on this link.  

And please check out our Mother's Day Special: private tours for $250 per group, if you book by June 1st. Tours will be conducted this summer.  Reservations at nyarts.exchange@verizon.net

Happy Mother's Day to you and yours - 

Beth New York

Beth S. Gersh-Nesic, Ph.D.

Director

New York Arts Exchange.