This catalogue accompanies the exhibition of the same name, on view at the Georgia Museum of Art Sept. 17 – Dec. 11, 2016. It includes essays by curator of American art Sarah Kate Gillespie on the history of the Brooklyn Bridge as a symbol of modernity and on photography of the bridge, by Janice Simon on images of the bridge in the popular press, by Meredith Ward on John Marin's renderings of the bridge and by Kimberly Orcutt on Joseph Stella's paintings of the structure. All images in the exhibition are reproduced full page in full-color and many supplementary images flesh out the discussions.
Watch the video below for a 3-minute reading from the catalogue and to preview the interior pages of the publication.
Full-color images; slipcase; two ribbon markers. Hardcover; 126 pp.; $55.00. ISBN 978-0-915977-95-6. Order through the Museum Shop at 706.542.0450 or online at (Museum Shop via UGA Marketplace) and Amazon.com. Copyright disclaimer under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976: Allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing.
Our current exhibitions "Icon of Modernism: Representing the Brooklyn Bridge 1883–1950" and "Man's Canyons: New York City on Paper" show visual representations of the bridge and New York during a period of changing social attitudes and perceptions; music was another creative discipline that reflected those times.
Of course, you wouldn't think times had changed all that much based on this studio take of "The Brooklyn Bridge" from 1947. Performed by Frank Sinatra, this song was featured in the film "It Happened in Brooklyn," which is screening for free tonight as part of our Brooklyn Bridge film series at 7 p.m. in the M. Smith Griffith Auditorium.
The writers and producers of this light-hearted musical comedy were aware of the growing generational gap between those who remembered how things were and those who saw only modern life, and they used music to contrast the old and the new. Check out two versions of the same song, also featured in "It Happened in Brooklyn."
Outside the film, New York City's contributions to musical history in America has been incredibly rich and diverse. The city is the birthplace of hip hop, doo woo, new wave and salsa, and two of America's most celebrated composers, George Gershwin and Aaron Copland, were born in Brooklyn. For those interested in hearing more of the music created contemporaneously with the paintings featured in "Icon of Modernism," here are a few select playlists of music from Tin Pan Alley, which was the name given to the row of music publishing houses in New York on West 28th Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenue, where popular music flourished from about 1885 through the 1950s.
This first playlist features 80 tracks, some of them the same songs with different arrangements, for a broader view of songwriting during this period.
Gershwin got his musical career started in Tin Pan Alley, eventually moving on to writing Broadway theatre tunes, classical music, and Hollywood movie scores. Some of his most recognizable works include "An American in Paris," "Rhapsody in Blue" and "Porgy and Bess." This particular playlist features his early songs from Broadway and Tin Pan Alley.
Have a favorite song from the early 20th century? Be sure to share with us in the comments!
William Louis Sonntag Jr., Brooklyn Bridge, ca. 1895
Opening this Saturday and on view through December 11, “Icon of Modernism: Representing the Brooklyn Bridge, 1883–1950” is a rich survey of paintings, watercolors, works on paper and photographs that all take the Brooklyn Bridge as a subject and were created between the completion of the bridge (1883) and the mid-20th century. “Icon of Modernism” aims to show how artistic representations of the structure evolved over time even as it symbolized modernity for different generations. From American impressionism to abstract expressionism, the details of how artists presented the bridge may have changed, but its ability to stand for the modern era remained.
“Icon of Modernism” features 42 works of art, including from painters Joseph Stella, John Marin, Yun Gee, Georgia O’Keeffe and Reginald Marsh and photographers Edward Steichen, Walker Evans, Weegee and Consuelo Kanaga. Four works in the exhibition come from the museum’s own collection, but the remainder are on loan from museums, corporate collections and private collections across the country.
Glenn O. Coleman, Bridge Tower, 1929
“When it opened, the Brooklyn Bridge was a phenomenon, and many commemorative objects featuring the bridge were produced. Other museums have shown the wide variety of these objects, but we decided to focus on the aesthetic portion alone,” explains Sarah Kate Gillespie, the museum’s curator of American art, chose Gillespie, who was tasked with organizing the exhibition when the museum hired her in 2014.
Many of our visitors and readers will be surprised to hear of the connection between a structure so tied to New York City and Athens, Georgia. As it turns out, direct descendants of John A. Roebling, who designed the bridge, lived in Athens for many years, and portraits of Roebling's son and daughter-in-law, Ferdinand William and Margaret Allison Roebling, have been on view in the museum’s permanent collection galleries.
In addition, the museum’s collection overlaps strongly with the span of time the exhibition covers; an exhibition of related works that shows the city in the same time period from that collection, titled “Man’s Canyons: New York City on Paper,” will be on view through December 31 in the adjoining Boone and George-Ann Knox Gallery I. An illustrated catalogue, published by the museum and available at the Museum Shop, accompanies “Icon of Modernism,” with scholarly essays by Gillespie, Janice Simon (Josiah Meigs Distinguished Teaching Associate Professor of Art History in the Lamar Dodd School of Art, UGA), Meredith Ward and Kimberly Orcutt, Andrew W. Mellon Curator of American Art of the Brooklyn Museum.
