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Coming to NCMA in March
FERNANDO BOTERO
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GALLERY
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and larger view |
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March 13, 2010 through May 24, 2010
Sponsored by David Benrimon Fine Art LLC
"Art is deformation" Fernando Botero
A major exhibition that showcases work by one of the most honored
Latin American artists working today, Fernando Botero includes a
range of paintings, drawings and monumental sculpture that exemplify
Botero's most familiar themes: commonplace scenes of everyday life,
life in the bedroom, life of the streets and people rapt in the
excitement of music or family activities. Throughout, Botero's
characters are seen in their "Botero-esque" girth and grandeur. Work
by this famed artist of Colombia were previously seen at the museum
in a major 2005 exhibition. Fernando Botero, opening on March 13,
2010 and remaining on view through May 24, 2010, is sponsored by
David Benrimon Fine Art LLC.
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DUBUFFET/MIRO/BASQUIAT
March 13, 2010 through May 24, 2010
For the first time, works by Dubuffet, Miró and Basquiat are
shown together, giving voice to the primal symbols that characterize
their works in personalized types of graffiti that exist in a
timeless, unidentifiable space. In the work of these artists, signs
and color erupt in a free association of structure and rhythm; the
mysterious act of painting is shown as wild and free, yet also very
exacting. The artists do not share generation nor culture, but they
do share a confrontational antagonism to the traditional and
academic, resulting in art that is raw, bold, forthright and
terribly exciting!
Jean Dubuffet (1901-1985) lived in
Montparnasse, where, in addition to painting, he read widely in
ethnology, paleography, and ancient and modern literature. After
seven years, he abandoned painting and became a wine merchant.
During the thirties, he painted again for a short time, but it
was not until 1942 that he began the work which has
distinguished him as an outstanding innovator in postwar
European painting. His interest in art brut, the art of the
insane, and that of the untrained person, whether a caveman or
the originator of contemporary graffiti, led him to emulate this
directly expressive and untutored style in his own work. His
paintings from the early forties in brightly colored oils were
soon followed by works in which he employed such unorthodox
materials as cement, plaster, tar, and asphalt-scraped, carved
and cut and drawn upon with a rudimentary, spontaneous line.
Variations of this method of working preoccupied him until 1962,
when he wrote and illustrated a book, L'Hourloupe, in which he
evolved a new stylistic and ideological concept for his later
work, both paintings and plastic sculpture.
Joan Miró (1893-1983) Miró was born
in Barcelona. He studied art at the Barcelona School of Fine
Arts and at the Academia Gali. In the beginning of his career he
dabbled in different painting styles that were fashionable at
the time, among them Fauvism and Cubism. In 1920 he made the
first of a series of trips to Paris, settling there in 1921. He
met Pablo Picasso and many of the other great painters and
artists living in the center of arts in the late 19th and early
20th centuries. From 1924 on, Miró joined the circle of the
Surrealist theorist, André Breton, increasingly painting in that
style. But he never integrated himself completely and remained
somewhat of an outsider. By the 1930s, Miró's fame and
recognition had become international. From 1940 to 1948 he was
back in Spain and visiting the U.S. where he had several solo
exhibitions including a retrospective at MoMA.
Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988) was
born in Brooklyn. His father was from Haiti, his mother of Puerto
Rican descent. He displayed artistic talent from his earliest years
and was encouraged by his mother. In 1977 he began to spray paint
cryptic aphorisms on subway trains and around lower Manhattan and
signing them with the name SAMO© (Same Old Sh_t). He left home,
supporting himself by selling hand-painted postcards and T-shirts.
The first public viewing of his art was in 1980, in a group
exhibition sponsored by Colab (Collaborative Projects Incorporated).
Basquiat continued to exhibit his work around New York City and in
Europe, participating in group shows with other emerging
contemporary artists. He met Andy Warhol in 1983; the two
collaborated on several paintings. Although Basquiat's work was
becoming increasingly valued, even featured in a 1985 New York Times
magazine cover story, his drug use concerned many; in addition he
was often unkempt and in a state of paranoia. He continued to
experience artistic success and personal failure. Basquiat died at
the age of 27 as the result of a drug overdose.
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