A Day at Queens College, Queens, NY

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On Monday, December 15, under the Professionals Campus program of Queens College I spent an afternoon with beginning art history students in Dr. Deborah Vischak's class. (The Manhattan skyline is a change since my graduate school days.)

 The day was organized by Lauren Cooper who visited the gallery back in July. She works with

Laurie Dorf, AVP for Institutional Advancement. Ms. Dorf introduced the program; Dr. Vischak moderated; colleague Rona Schneider also participated.

The event was held in Klapper Hall. It was great to be back there -- the scene of all those art history classes in the 1970s. At the Godwin-Ternbach Museum I visited the Daghlian Collection of Chinese Art with director Amy Winter. Ranging from hundreds of years before the Christian era through to the nineteenth century, the show focused on ceramics; included were pieces older than the county of China itself. In addition to plates and bowls, there were small models of yurts and chicken coops, perhaps for funerary purposes. In particular, pieces from the Song Dynasty (960-1279) reflected it’s “golden age” brilliance.

At Red Dot Miami

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Red Dot is in full swing. The traffic has been great; the visitors have been friendly and interesting and interested, looking especially at the William Baziotes paintings, the Angelo Pinto reverse painting on glass, Red Beach Flag, 1970, and the Peggy Bacon embroidery collage, Valentine Concoction, 1959.

 

Peggy Bacon, Valentine Concoction, 1959

There have been showers every day since we’ve been in Miami, all starting suddenly, coming down in buckets, and ending just as quickly.  It’s fine if you are snug and dry in the tent and it sounds wonderful. And then the sun comes out again and it’s beautiful!

RED DOT FAIR, MIAMI

Tonight is the opening of the Red Dot Fair, Miami.  Mostly we're ready and the fair looks great.  There was a brief shower this afternoon (sounded nice in the tent), but the day is really fine.  The "Recent Acquisitions" group is a little crowded, but I like it that way.  How else can we show the Peggy Bacons, Alexander Brooks, AND the Isabel Bishops!  

Brook's Bordello Nude, about 1935, relates to a bed headboard and footboard (both sides) that he painted with several boudoir scenes.

THE ABSTRACT PRINT

 

THE ABSTRACT PRINT

ON VIEW THROUGH THIS SATURDAY, 
November 22, 2014

 

Ansei Uchima,

Forest Byobu 
(Shrub Oak), 1979

Prints by JOSEF ALBERS, FRED BECKER, 
EDMOND CASARELLA, MINNA CITRON,
WORDEN DAY, DOROTHY DEHNER, 
SUE FULLER, PETER GRIPPE,FANNIE HILLSMITH, 
DOROTHY BROWDY KUSHNER, 
ALICE TRUMBULL MASON, 

HUGH MESIBOV, ANNE RYAN, 
LOUIS SCHANKER, and ANSEI UCHIMA.    

   

These works may be viewed at WWW.SUSANTELLERGALLERY.COM, under EXHIBITIONS.

ANSEI UCHIMA SHOW IN OKINAWA NOW ON VIEW

Colors and Wind: The World of ANSEI UCHIMA is on view from September 12 through November 9, 2014.

This extensive retrospective of work by UCHIMA is part of the series Artists with Okinawan Roots at the Okinawa Prefectural Museum & Art Museum, Naha City, Okinawa, Japan.

Ansei Uchima was born in Stockton, California. At the age of nineteen he traveled to Japan to study architecture and was stranded there by World War II. He studied painting in the early 1950s, and in 1954 he began to study historical Japanese prints. In 1957 he began to make his own prints, working in the tradition of the sosaku-hanga movement, begun in Japan in 1918. In 1960 Uchima moved to New York City. In 1962 he began teaching at Sarah Lawrence College. He taught there until 1982, and was named a Professor Emeritus in 1985. Uchima was married to the artist Toshiko Uchima. The artists Isamu Noguchi and Shiko Munakata were among their friends.

Ansei Uchima, After Redon, 1972, watercolor.  This drawing is on loan from the Gallery to the Exhibition.

PAFA: Kelley Collection of African American Art Now On View

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The Harmon & Harriet Kelley Collection of African American Art: Works on Paper

Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Samuel M.V. Hamilton Building

Now on view through October 12

William E. Smith,
 A Friendly Game, 1944

Curator Anna O. Marley’s striking installation of the Kelley Collection is in one enormous room without dividers or vitrines. Directly across the entrance is a William E. Smith ink study of World War II-era musicians with their instruments. It’s a small work with fine detail but still an arresting first sight upon entering the room. (A Smith drawing from the Gallery's collection is at right.)

The exhibition is arranged thematically in groups such as dance scenes or political protest. In personal notes from the collectors Mrs. Kelley commented that she was drawn to the works of the depression era through the dignity with which artists drew the figures at work and to the portrayal of everyday farm life that she herself experienced as a child.

The main focus is on the 1930s and 40s, a period when many African American artists entered the field, in part through the efforts New Deal programs such as the Works Progress Administration (WPA).

The Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Broad Street, Philadelphia.

JODY PINTO’S Land Buoy unveiled in Philadelphia.

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It was a BEAUTIFUL DAY. Friday, August 15 was the ribbon-cutting of Washington Avenue Park with JODY PINTO’S Land Buoy referencing both ecology and the history of the site.

Jody Pinto, Land Buoy, August 15, 2014, at the
eastern end of the Washington Avenue Park.
The artist is at the top, in turquoise.

       The park was developed by the Delaware River Waterfront Corporation and is part of a series of projects renewing Philadelphia’s waterfront. It is the original location of Pier 53, an immigration entry point and home to an early Navy shipyard. A path leads the visitor through established trees and a newly planted local habitat, and past spots where one can actually touch the river water. At the furthest end of the walkway, and a clear destination point, is Land Buoy.

       The Washington Avenue Park is in South Philadelphia, at Washington Avenue and Columbus Boulevard, directly behind the Sheet Metal Workers Union Hall. Across the river are the city of Camden and the Battleship New Jersey. It feels like midway between the Benjamin Franklin and Walt Whitman Bridges.

       Philadelphia has made enormous progress in reclaiming its waterfront. Adjacent to the park is a walking and bike path -- turn a corner and there are quiet and greenery and stunning river views. There were unconfirmed rumors of bizarre turtle activity and one very handsome cormorant. There’s no question that fish and birds are returning to this stretch of the Delaware.

      Pier 53 was an immigration point from the 1870s until 1915. Remnants of the old foundations that are still in the water extend beyond the new walkway – these grid-patterned wood pilings delineate the scale and shape of the original pier. The more than one million arrivals were mostly eastern and southern European families; some of their descendants still live nearby in the Italian Market neighborhood. Jody Pinto’s father, the artist Angelo Pinto, and this family came to American through Pier 53.

       Land Buoy is fifty-five feet tall, with a rope-inspired spiral staircase that leads up sixteen feet. There’s a solar-powered blue top that will glow at night. The act of walking up the stairs lowers anxiety as it raises expectations: the 360-degree view at the top is breathtaking. If there’s enough wind the spire will move and seem to adjust itself – to be on the stairs when that happens is amazingly invigorating.

       On Friday, when the crowd had gathered, Philadelphia’s Mayor Michael Nutter was clearly enjoying himself. It was such a pleasant occasion and everyone was having a good time. He did express concern about that afternoon’s Little League game.  He needn’t have worried: Mo’ne Davis carried the Taney Dragons to victory. It was a wonderful day all around.

Useful links:

http://www.delawareriverwaterfront.com/search?q=pier+53

http://washingtonavenuegreen.com/index.html

An extensive discussion of the Pinto family’s Philadelphia history:

http://hiddencityphila.org/2014/08/the-pintos-a-philadelphia-immigration-story-told-through-art-at-pier-53/

Historical photographs of the Pier:

www.delawareriverwaterfront.com/hi-res-photos/2013/10/30/pier-532

Summertime show on view through August 14.

The Summertime show is on view through August 14.

Today is the 31st of July!  Here's Betty Waldo Parish's woodcut, The 31st of July, 1935.

SUMMERTIME Now on View

 

JULY 8 THROUGH AUGUST 14, 2014

American paintings and works on paper and 

glass from the 1930s to the 1950s.

Will Banret, Summer, 1952

Artists love the summer as much as the rest of us. 

On the Gallery’s South Wall there’s a stream of 

identical blue flowing from an Angelo Pinto 

drawing to a Fred Shane painting to a William 

Baziotes watercolor.

Peggy Bacon, The Beauties of Nature, 1942

Long days at the beach (Wellfleet, Long Beach 

Island, NYC, Kennebunk, the Aleutians, LaJolla), 

in the water (ocean waves, lakes, bays, rivers), 

boardwalks, amusement parks, picnics, bikinis, trees

bursting with greens from chartreuse to teal, 

fishermen who’ve forgotten to go home, soldiers on 

V-J Day, and, of course, baseball – this show has 

them all.

 
Works by:

PEGGY BACON

WILL BARNET 
WILLIAM BAZIOTES
BERNARDA BRYSON SHAHN
HOWARD DAUM 
RIVA HELFOND 
CHARLES KELLER
DOROTHY BROWDY KUSHNER
EDWARD LANING 
BETTY WALDO PARISH 
ANGELO PINTO
ALBERT POTTER
ANNE RYAN
BEN SHAHN 
JUDITH SHAHN 
FRED SHANE
MARY SINCLAIR 
LYND WARD 
 

The entire show may be seen under Exhibitions 
at WWW.SUSANTELLERGALLERY.COM

TUESDAY THROUGH FRIDAY, 11 AM TO 5 PM

SATURDAYS BY APPOINTMENT OR BY CHANCE

AMERICAN MINING Now on View in Gallery

AMERICAN MINING

PAINTINGS AND WORKS ON PAPER, 1932 TO 1947

JUNE 4 -- 28, 2014

Fred Shane, Climax, Colorado, 1943-44 (A molybdenum mine)

The paintings and works on paper in this exhibition largely feature coalmines and miners of Pennsylvania and West Virginia, as well as feldspar mining in North Carolina and a molybdenum mine in Climax, Colorado.

         The earliest works in the show are by Riva Helfond. Her future husband, Bill Barrett, was from the anthracite region of northeastern Pennsylvania and her works of that area date from 1932.

         In 1936 Harry Sternberg was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship to record American industry; the coalmines of Pennsylvania were a focus of that project. Sternberg was an instructor at the Art Students League in New York City. Helfond was in one of his classes and she had entrée into the homes of miners. In the 1936-37 season Sternberg and a few students would leave New York on Friday afternoons, drive to Pennsylvania, and stay with a mining family. They would draw on Saturday and then head back to the city on Sunday.

         Will Barnet, Blanche Grambs, Mary Sinclair (whose work in the show dates to 1934), and Charles Keller (represented here by the Deer Park Mine, a source of feldspar in North Carolina), all worked at the League. There are also pieces by Georges Schreiber and Ben Shahn.

         A number of the works in show are by Michael J. Gallagher. From a mining family, Gallagher was the director of the Philadelphia WPA Printmaking Project; Hugh Mesibov also worked at that shop. Recently the Gallagher estate released a significant number of early prints, including the iconic carborundum print Anthracite, 1939-40, that have not been on the market in decades. 

         The Fred Shane painting Climax, Colorado, 1943-44, refers to the site of an enormous molybdenum mine still in operation. Molybdenum, a metal with an extremely high melting point, is used in the production of steel.

         The entire show may be seen under Exhibitions at WWW.SUSANTELLERGALLERY.COM

HOURS: TUESDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, 11 AM TO 5 PM

Artists of Roosevelt

On view through tomorrow, May 25:

Artists of Roosevelt

New Jersey State Museum, Trenton

Bernarda Bryson Shahn, Little Winter Sky, 1990

Works by BERNARDA BRYSON SHAHN, BEN SHAHN, and JONATHAN SHAHN, on included. The museum’s permanent collection is showing paintings by BEN SHAHN and ALICE TRUMBULL MASON.

Medium at Muse: Woodcuts and the Modern Book

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On view through May 11, 2014

Medium at Muse: Woodcuts and the 
Modern Book

The Morgan Library & Museum, NYC

Lynd Ward, Wild Pilgrimage, 1932

Lynd Ward is featured with woodcuts from Wild Pilgrimage, 1932, and the U.S. Pipeline company’s advertisements and calendars (although the Morgan didn’t go into those), 1946. Also in the show is the short film by Elias Katz. It documents Ward working on a print for Vertigo, 1937. 

Edward Burne-Jones and William Morris are also well represented.

NOW ON VIEW: MARY SINCLAIR, A Centennial Retrospective, through Saturday, April 5

May 24, 2014 is the Centennial of the birth of Mary Sinclair. This exhibition covers sixty-five years of paintings, prints, and drawings, from 1933 to 1997.

Mary Sinclair, Judith Practicing, 1978

A Detroit native, Mary Sinclair (1914-2004) grew up in Connecticut. She lost her father, Samuel Eastwick Sinclair, at the Second Battle of the Marne in 1918. Her mother, Grace Elizabeth Williams, was a commercial artist. She married again, to colleague George Annand. Mary Sinclair was Annand’s model for the now iconic National Biscuit Company’s child in a yellow raincoat. Sinclair started to make art seriously as a child; she was nine years old when New York’s Macy’s Department Store incorporated her drawing The Queen into one of their advertisements.

After graduating from Darien High School, Connecticut, Sinclair attended the Art Students League, New York City, from 1931 to 1933.  There she met fellow student Will Barnet (1911-2012); they were married from 1933 to 1952. In the 1930s and 40s Sinclair taught art at the Birch Wathen School, NY (now the Birch Wathen Lenox School). Her second marriage, in the early 1950s was to the doctor and artist Joshua Epstein.

Sinclair had six children: Peter, Richard, Todd, Mary Elizabeth (Betsy), Margaret (Peggy), and Judith. Peter Barnet and Richard Barnet both became artists. Her children, her home, and her Union City, New Jersey, neighborhood, were Sinclair’s most important subjects. She considered herself an impressionist. Richard Barnet noted, “The skill and beauty of Mary Sinclair’s drawing-in-color does not stand alone. Rather, central to her work are the compositions. She always builds powerful designs from these elements: people and the places they inhabit.”

Throughout her life Sinclair was an active member of the artists’ community and she participated in group shows across the country. At the National Arts Club, NY, a work received the Best Oil Painting Award, 1975, and two pieces were included in American Modernist Drawings, at the Susan Teller Gallery, September 3--28, 2013. Sinclair had one-person shows at the New School for Social Research, the Van Diemen Lilienfeld Galleries (with Joshua Epstein), 1950, the Hilda Carmel Gallery, the Education Alliance of New York, the Carl Ashby Gallery, NY; the College of Mount Saint Vincent, 1992, Riverdale, NY (which also has a work by Sinclair in their permanent collection); and the Robert Hutchins Gallery, Maplewood, NJ, 1996.

Report from Los Angeles

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Fred Shane, Nether World, 1968-69

LA was as beautiful as ever – one lovely day after another.

The LA Art Show that ended Sunday was well attended with as lively and interesting visitors as ever. Fred Shane’s Nether World, 1968-69, joined Hugh Mesibov’s Mechanical Dancers, 1944, and William Baziotes’ Young Clown, 1943, as the major crowd pleasers.

Hugh Mesibov, Mechanical Dancers, 1944

At LACMA the Calder and Abstraction: From Avant-Garde to Iconic show was a knockout. We could still see the Hollywood sign from our window at the Hotel Figueroa, and Musso and Franks was wonderfully unchanged.

William Baziotes, Young Clown, 1943