The Art of Blogging

Curator’s Corner has been up and running since June 1, 2006, and today marks our 1000th post!

Primarily powered by public relations and publications interns, past and present, this blog has offered museum patrons and visitors an online report of the goings on of the art world, both at home and internationally. Curator’s Corner is meant to be informative, concise and current, and as interns we try to live up to these expectations with every blog post.

The blogging process begins with visits to such sites as the New York Times, the High Museum, the Huffington Post and ArtDaily.org. We turn blog-worthy topics, from events and exhibitions to breaking arts news, into published snapshots. Curator’s Corner also features regular GMOA updates and also our Phase II expansion.

We would like to take this time to introduce ourselves, the current PR and publications interns. We are all students at the University of Georgia and thoroughly enjoy interning at GMOA during this exciting time in the museum’s history. It’s time to meet the bloggers!

My name is Yamanucci Molin and I am an intern in the publications department. I am a senior majoring in English with areas of emphasis in multicultural literature and creative writing and minors in Spanish and philosophy. I joined the GMOA intern staff a month ago, bringing with me two years of writing, editing and managing experience as the managing editor of InfUSion Magazine. Curator’s Corner has provided me with a platform to write about topics in art that pique my interest while reaching out to the GMOA audience. After graduating, I hope to put the skills I've acquired into practice and pursue a career in publishing. Thanks for reading!

My name is Jennifer Mayer, and I’ve been a public relations intern at GMOA since September 2009. I am a senior majoring in public relations and minoring in Spanish. My PR internship at GMOA has been an incredible experience, as I get to combine my love of the arts with my interest in PR practice. I was honored to receive the GMOA Student of the Year award this past spring. This internship has been extremely rewarding and I know that my experience at GMOA will help me excel in the PR field after I graduate.

My name is Molly Hoffmeister and I just began my internship with GMOA’s public relations department in June. I am a double major in public relations and studio art, with an emphasis in drawing and painting. As a fifth year, I recently graduated with my degree in public relations and an Environmental Ethics certificate, and I am returning this fall to continue working on my art major and a minor in art history-- and of course to continue my internship with GMOA. As I hope to one day make a career out of promoting an art museum, I couldn’t ask for a more perfect internship and I have sincerely enjoyed researching articles and writing for Curator’s Corner.

My name is Margaret George and I will graduate this December with a BFA in printmaking. I began my internship with the publications department in May and am enjoying every minute of it. I combine the knowledge I gained from art history classes with an appreciation for contemporary art to write blogs about events in the art world. I enjoy the process of creating things, which stems from my background in art, and blogging is a practical and fun application of my skills. After graduation, I plan on pursuing a career in either publications or new media at a museum or gallery. This internship has been, and will continue to be, one of the most rewarding and enlightening experiences I’ve had. I will be able to confidently look for a job at a museum or gallery based on the things I have learned through this internship.

As interns we are also responsible for maintaining all outlets of social media, so be sure to check out GMOA on Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, YouTube and Second Life.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank you for following Curator’s Corner. We appreciate your time and we hope that you have enjoyed reading our blogs as much as we have enjoyed writing them!

ATHICA gallery talk tonight

Athens Institute for Contemporary Art (ATHICA) will host "Uncertainly Walk n' Talk: An Informal Discussion with Curators and Artists" this evening from 7-8 p.m., featuring, among others, Katherine McQueen, curator of the "ATHICA Emerges IV" show currently on view (incidentally, Katherine is also my wife). You can read more about the exhibition and tonight's program here.

Countdown: The next post will be our 1000th. Thanks for reading!

Digging Daura: letters from Émile Bernard

This installment of the “Digging Daura” blog series comes from Joanna Reising, an art history major and summer intern in the Daura Center. I’ve asked her to discuss two letters from Émile Bernard to Pierre Daura in the Daura archive. (Lynn Boland)

Émile Bernard (1868-1941) was a French painter and writer who, with the help of the artist Louis Anquetin (1861-1932), devised a new manner of painting using black contours and flat planes of color.(1) The critic Edouard Dujardin named the new style Cloisonnism after seeing Anquetin’s work at the Salon des Indépendants in 1888. Dujardin chose the name of Cloisonnism because the dark outlines between the colors resembled the metal divisions in cloisonné enamel. The style shows the influence of Cézanne, Japanese woodcuts, images d’Épinal (prints on popular subjects shown in bright colors; these prints were made in the printing house Imagerie d’Épinal, which was founded by Jean-Charles Pellerin in the 19th century), enamels, and stained glass. Bernard’s style was a source for Paul Gauguin, and the two became fast friends, exhibiting together at the Exposition Universelle in 1889. The friendship was broken after 1891 when Gauguin was named the leader of the Symbolist movement and the inventor of the so-called Synthetist style. The Synthetist style, according to G.-Albert Aurier, “consists in containing all possible forms within the small number of forms which we are capable of conceiving: straight lines, the several angles, arcs of circles, and ellipses.”(2) Bernard felt that this honor of being named the inventor of Synthetism belonged to him. Bernard then spent time traveling abroad, first to Italy, then to Egypt, and then back to Italy to spend time in Venice. During this time abroad, Bernard moved away from the Cloisonnist manner to a more naturalistic way of representing forms. In 1904, he returned to France and began corresponding with Cézanne. Their exchange of letters gives a detailed account of Cézanne’s views on art and theory. In 1905, Bernard founded his own periodical, La Rénovation Esthétique, in which he redefined the Symbolist doctrines of his youth.

Pierre Daura met Émile Bernard in 1914, when Pierre came to Paris and began work in Émile’s studio. Pierre may have chosen Émile’s studio to work in because of his connection with Cézanne. Pierre was a devotee of Cézanne and was already working in a Cézannesque style. The first task Émile gave Pierre was to sort through and catalogue letters sent from Vincent van Gogh to Émile. During Pierre’s time in Émile’s studio, the two became close friends. Two letters sent from Émile to Pierre provide a small window into the relationship between the two.(3) Deciphering Émile’s messy handwriting was a task. Accents were missing, I’s were not dotted, T’s were not crossed, and some of the words were completely illegible. But after several hours of poring over the letters, with French-English dictionary and book of French verbs at hand, I was able to understand the main ideas. The first letter, undated but written around 1914, is a short message letting Pierre know that Émile stopped by to see him but no one was there. Émile says that he wants Pierre to come by his studio, and that he will send five francs for the cost of travel. The letter also mentions that Émile owes Pierre five hundred francs, but it is uncertain why. The five hundred francs could possibly be back payment that Émile owes Pierre (five hundred francs in 1914 France equals roughly 98 U.S. dollars today). On the back of the letter, Émile included two sketches of a nude woman. One sketch is done in graphite and is smaller and seems to be a preparatory study for the second sketch. The second sketch appears to be done in ink and ink wash and shows a light and airy representation of the female form. The sketch employs the dark contour lines that Émile was famous for, and suggests Émile’s emphasis on the generality of nature, which Émile mentions in his second letter to Pierre.

The second letter, undated but written in early 1919, is a response to an earlier letter written by Pierre. For Christmas 1918, Émile sent Pierre two of his books: Souvenirs sur Paul Cézanne et Lettres and L’Esthétique Fondamentale et Traditionnelle. At this time, Pierre was doing his compulsory Spanish military service on the Catalan island of Minorca. It is presumable that Pierre had had time to reflect upon the books and had written Émile to give his thoughts, because in this second letter, Émile thanks Pierre for reading his books. In the letter, Émile elaborates briefly upon the themes addressed in the books and advises Pierre to continue following his dreams and to continue in his art. By reading the letter, you get the sense that Émile views Pierre as his student, and he is encouraging his student to study and work hard in order to realize his dreams. Émile ends the letter with an endearing plea: he wants Pierre to come visit if he’s ever passing through Paris.

These letters show how Pierre Daura went from working in the studio of a prominent artist to becoming that artist’s friend, they provide insights into studio practice of the period, and they further elucidate the theories Émile presented in his publications.

-Joanna Reising, Daura Center intern

1) The following information comes from George Heard Hamilton’s Painting and Sculpture in Europe 1880-1940 and the Oxford Art Online article for Émile Bernard.

2) Herschel B. Chipp, Theories of Modern Art (Berkeley, University of California Press, 1968), 105.

3) Émile Bernard to Pierre Daura, letters ca. 1914 and 1919, Friends and Colleagues series, Pierre Daura Archive, Georgia Museum of Art, University of Georgia.

Countdown to the 1000th blog post: 1 to go!

Caravaggio's remains

Enzo Russo / AP

The presumed remains (above) of Italian baroque painter Caravaggio are on display in a clear case in Tuscany at the Forte Stella.

The bones were stored in a church after being exhumed from a grave in 1956. A team of microbiologists, art historians and anthropologists examined the bones for a year. Although Caravaggio had no children, the team compared the artist's bones with descendants of his family and carbon dated the remains.

Based on the team's evidence, Caravaggio presumably died in about 1610 in Port Ercole (on the Tuscan coast) at the age of 39, possibly from malaria, sunstroke or lead poisoning.

Caravaggio's famous works include "Bacchus," "David with the Head of Goliath," and "Supper at Emmaus."

Click here for a detailed article.

Countdown to the 1000th blog post: 2 to go!

Haiti: Art and Remembrance

Following the 7.0 magnitude earthquake that brought much of Haiti to shambles, several thousand died and approximately 3 million are still displaced. As efforts to remove the rubble, administer necessary medical aid and distribute basic necessities such as food and water continue, in terms of future historic preservation for a country so deeply rooted in unique cultural traditions, one question remains: What about the art?

Art plays a significant role in the culture and economy of Haiti, where the majority of people live in abject poverty, in part due to an 85% unemployment rate. With few functioning institutions and outlets for self-expression, when artists paint they paint their lives. Art serves as a primary source of cultural preservation depicting spiritual practices, the connections Haitians share with their environment and their history as a people who went from the first black country to gain independence in 1808 to increased suffering under dictatorships and failed governments. Haiti is now the poorest country in the Americas.

The Centre d’Art, which launched Haiti’s Art movement in the 1940s, is severely damaged. The Musee d’Art Nader, which housed over 12,000 works from Haiti’s largest private art collection, collapsed. Murals in the Trinity Cathedral, painted by some of Haiti’s best-known artists, have crumbled.

Gerald Alexis, leading Haitian art historian and curator, notes that because of the consistent political turmoil and instability, Haiti has always had difficulty preserving its art. However, he believes its preservation is of utmost importance because art “will tell future generations who they are and where they come from. It's our heritage. And although people think that in poor countries such concepts are unnecessary, they are indeed the only thing we have. Our cultural heritage is our pride."

Collectively, several countries have pledged millions of dollars in aid over the next few years. However, amidst so much despair and chaos, the restoration and rescue of damaged art remains the responsibility of individual artists and gallery owners. Ultimately, there is no telling how much art remains irreparable. Artist Levoy Exil, whose technique includes using beets and beans to create paint, reflects on this unfortunate reality and says, “It’s a great loss for all of us. But life continues and we will continue to create.”

Countdown to the 1000th blog post: 3 to go!

Construction Updates from Holder

Here are the Phase II construction updates from the week of July 9.

Current week - Activities/Issues:

New Gallery / Connector

• Mud tape and finish walls and ceiling

• Complete grout of tile

Existing Building Renovations

• Installed glass panels behind reception desk

• Installed 1st floor lobby ceiling tiles

• MEP trim out catering kitchen

Storage Bar

• Completed HVAC duct work adjustments to raise light fixtures

Site / Sculpture Garden

• Complete all misc. handrails

• Completed final grading of site

• Reinstalling pavers at east entry

• Completing planting of plants

Next week - Activities/Issues:

New Gallery / Connector

• Finish rails

• Begin punchlist

Existing Building Renovations

• Final cleaning

Storage Bar

• Seal concrete floor

Site / Sculpture Garden

• Complete lattice fence

• Continue landscaping south gallery

Grouting of Tile in Main Lobby

Glass Inserts along Connector Stair Railings

Catering Kitchen Progress

Countdown to the 1000th blog post: 5 to go!

GMOA's Summer Film Series Continues

This July, GMOA presents “Summer Film Series: Avant-Garde Short Films of the 20th Century.” The series features an Avant-Garde short film every Wednesday night in room S151 of the Lamar Dodd School of Art.

The film series began on Wednesday, June 30 with “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari,” directed by Robert Weine, and continued on July 7 with seven short films: "Manhatta" by Paul Strand and Charles Sheeler "Symphonie Diagonale" by Viking Eggeling "H2O" by Ralph Steiner; "Emak Bakia" by Man Ray "Ghosts Before Breakfast" by Hans Richter "The Life and Death of 9413, a Hollywood Extra" by Slavko Vorkapich and Robert Florey and "Lot in Sodom" by James Sibley Watson and Melville Webber.

The rest of the schedule follows:

Wednesday, July 14

“The Man with a Movie Camera” Directed by Dziga Vertov and presented by Dr. Janice Simon, Josiah Meigs Distinguished Associate Professor in Art, Lamar Dodd School of Art. (Russia, 1929; 80 minutes)

Wednesday, July 21

"The Seventh Seal"/"Det sjunde inseglet" Directed by Ingmar Bergman and presented by Dr. Janice Simon, Josiah Meigs Distinguished Associate Professor in Art. Swedish and Latin with English subtitles. (1957, 96 minutes)

Don’t miss out and be sure to join us Wednesdays at 7 p.m. in room S151 to finish up the Summer Film Series!

Countdown to the 1000th blog post: 6 to go!

Gulf Aid Art

"Oops" by Cynthia Scott. Woodcut, 14 x 11 in.

Gulf Aid Art: Artists in Action, a fundraising exhibition in response to the oil spill, took place in June at the Jonathan Ferrara Gallery in New Orleans. The exhibition, organized by gallery owner Jonathan Ferrara and artist Dan Tague, showcased works by well-known Louisiana artists. Online sales will continue through July 28. All proceeds will be donated to Gulf Aid, a non-profit corporation that was created in response to the oil spill.

For the exhibition, artists created limited edition, 10-series prints. The only requirement for the prints was that they had to “respond / react to the current crisis affecting their home, health, happiness and economic futures.” The prices of the works range from $100 to $500 and could raise as much as $80,000.

Gulf Aid Art: Artists in Action was inspired by the recent Gulf Aid concert headlined by Lenny Kravitz and Preservation Hall Jazz Band, and now visual artists are helping in the effort. Artists must “speak up, comment criticize and make [their] voices heard,” Ferrara said.

This isn’t the first time Ferrara and Tague have stepped up during a time of natural disaster. After Hurricane Katrina, Ferrara organized New Orleans Artists In Exile, a traveling exhibition with works by artists affected by Katrina. Tague created a limited edition print called “United For Haiti” after the earthquake and raised over $7,500 for the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund.

Countdown to the 1000th blog post: 7 to go!

George Lucas and Steven Spielberg Present: Norman Rockwell

Norman Rockwell, Shadow Artist

What do George Lucas and Steven Spielberg have in common? Suspenseful movies, multiple prestigious awards and apparently, a taste for Norman Rockwell paintings.

Last week, the Smithsonian American Art Museum opened an exhibition featuring 57 major works by Rockwell from the private collections of Lucas and Spielberg. “Telling Stories: Norman Rockwell from the Collections of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg” is set to run until Jan. 2, 2011.

The mutual interest in Rockwell’s art shared by Lucas and Spielberg may be more than just coincidence. Perhaps the two famous filmmakers closely identify with Rockwell’s work because of the artist’s own interest in the industry that made Lucas and Spielberg household names. The exhibition is the first to explore in depth the connections between the artist’s depictions of American life and the movie-making industry.

Throughout his life, Rockwell took notice of the glamour of Hollywood and its effects on the American lifestyle. During the 1930s and 1940s, Rockwell became further immersed in the culture of the filmmaking industry through his frequent trips to Los Angeles and even designed movie posters for several studios.

This exposure to the movie-making process may have influenced the way he created his paintings: Rockwell truly “staged” his images. He held auditions for his “cast,” and paid particular attention to costumes, props and lighted sets. He even once commented, “If I hadn’t become a painter, I would have liked to have been a movie director.”

But the connections between Rockwell’s art and the movies extend beyond the artist’s staging process. Rockwell’s paintings are also narratives describing American culture and small-town values.

“Norman Rockwell is an artist and a storyteller who captured universal truths about Americans that tell us a lot about who we are as a people,” said Elizabeth Broun, The Margaret and Terry Stent Director of the Smithsonian American Art Museum. “Like Rockwell, both George Lucas and Steven Spielberg embrace the idea that ordinary people can become unlikely heroes,” she continued.

The exhibition will also include a 12-minute film, coproduced by the museum and filmmaker Laurent Bouzereau and featuring interviews with George Lucas and Steven Spielberg. For more information, click here.

Countdown to the 1000th blog post: 8 to go!

Photos from "The Art of the Steal"

Photos from The Collectors Present: "The Art of the Steal" have been posted to Flickr! The event was held last Thursday, July 1, and was a success! Guests arrived at Ciné and had dinner catered by The National. Bill Eiland spoke about the context of "The Art of the Steal" and discussed what it means to the museum world. Attendees then moved into the theatre to watch the film.

Countdown to the 1000th blog post: 9 to go!

Countdown to the 1000th Blog Post

Hey, blog readers! We’d like to take this chance to thank you for keeping up with the GMOA blog and wanted to let you know that, with only 10 posts to go, we are steadily approaching our 1000th blog post.

In honor of the 1000th blog post, GMOA will tweet about the countdown. If you retweet the countdown each day, you will be entered into a drawing to win a free, award-winning GMOA exhibition catalog: “The American Scene on Paper: Prints and Drawings from the Schoen Collection.” Make sure to check Twitter regularly, as we post to the blog often.

The countdown begins now: 10 posts to go!