Cultural web portal Europeana to begin offering online exhibitions

Europeana, an online service that brings together images, texts, sounds and videos from Europe’s museums, galleries, libraries, archives and collections will soon offer a groundbreaking multilingual online exhibition.

The exhibition, entitled, “A Roma Journey,” will feature a collection of full-text books, rare manuscripts, photographs, paintings, sound recordings and videos from the world of the Roma, or gypsies as they are also referred to, an ethnic group primarily located in Central and Eastern Europe. Users of the portal can use “My Europeana” to search, save and bookmark objects.

The exhibition has been organized by the European Library, one of Europeana’s first content providers, which also include the British Library in London and the Louvre Museum in Paris. The European Library has been working on channeling information from Europe’s national and research libraries into Europeana.

“A Roma Journey” also provides a preview of the type of virtual exhibitions that Europeana will offer in the future. Europeana will continue to work with the European Library to develop future virtual exhibitions for the Europeana portal.

The Europeana project began in 2007, after the European Commission decided to create a virtual European Library that would make Europe’s cultural and scientific resources accessible for all. Europeana.eu went live in November 2008, and the updated Europeana 1.0 will launch in 2010 with links to more than 10 million digital objects.

Art Handling Olympics

Ramiken Crucible hosted the first-ever Art Handling Olympics this past weekend in New York (and if you click here, you'll see the full version of the image above, which we cropped to avoid offending delicate sensibilities and is rather more plumber-esque). This article in the Daily News has more details and a very entertaining video, although the headline ("Turning two-bit art jobs into gold") isn't particularly tactful and the packing jobs demonstrated for "unpackable objects" wouldn't pass muster with our registrars and preps. That said, we were impressed with a lot of the teams' uniforms.

GMOA in the News

Hey, we were in Art Daily over the weekend for the exhibition "University of Georgia Turns 225." The press release was also picked up by Fine Art News and Aria.

Art Around Athens (and Beyond)

The biggest art deal going on in Athens this weekend is the annual MFA opening at the Lamar Dodd School of Art, which takes place tonight at 6 p.m. in the Dodd. The MFA students have their own site, where you can see some of what they have to offer, but the reception is always loads of fun. The 2010 MFA Candidates include Catherine A. Bell, Stephanie Blair, Matt Boland, Amanda Bray, David Calton, Kim Deakins, Jennifer Desormeaux, Tate Foley, Emily Hadland, Brian Hitselberger, Robert August Peterson, Alison A. Smith, Stephanie Voegele, and Jessica Wohl (above). The exhibition runs through April 7.

Tomorrow (Saturday, March 20) at 8 p.m. at The Globe downtown is a launch party for the spring issue of Young, Foxy & Free, Michael Lachowski's fun, arty magazine.

As you can read from the above invitation, Happy Valley Pottery, in Watkinsville, is having a sale both Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., complete with studio demo and raku firing. And, of course, don't forget our Family Day.

On Sunday, March 21, from 2 to 3:30 p.m., the Art Education Gallery in the Lamar Dodd School of Art, will celebrate Youth Art Month with an opening reception for an exhibition of work from all schools in the Clarke County School District that runs through March 31.

Sunday is also the Bottlecap Truck's 10th Birthday Bash, from noon to 7 p.m. Our buddy artist Jimmy Straehla has been motoring around town in this art car for 10 years now! Celebrate with an art show featuring the work of several local artists, live music and perhaps some surprise guests. You can email Jimmy at jimmy@bottlecapman.net to get the location.

Have a great weekend getting out in some sunshine and spring weather!

Family Day: Spring Festival sneak preview

Want to see the art project for this week's Family Day (tomorrow from 10 a.m. to noon in the art education classrooms of the Lamar Dodd School of Art)? Check out the slideshow below.

Installation

The exhibition "University of Georgia Turns 225" has been going up in the locked galleries of the Visual Arts Building for the past few days, with preps doing last-minute tweaks, making sure everything is level, adding "Please do not touch" labels and the like. Here are some photos we took to show you what's going on:

Note that this set may well be updated later today, when the pumpkin orange wall right across from our offices (in the same building) gets updated with some artwork.

Art Around Athens

Today at 5:15 p.m., in room S150 of the Lamar Dodd School of Art, Jed Rasula, Helen S. Lanier Distinguished Professor in the department of English at UGA, will give the next Visual Culture Colloquium (VCC) lecture, one he also gave last fall at the Nasher Art Museum at Duke University in conjunction with the exhibition "Picasso and the Allure of Language."

From 5 to 7 p.m., over at the gallery in the Odum School of Ecology on campus is an opening reception for the exhibition "San Luis de Monteverde: Luminosity in life and decay," which consists of digitally layered photographs by Richard Siegesmund, 2009 Willson Center Artist in Residence, University of Georgia, Costa Rica, and associate professor of art education, Lamar Dodd School of Art. The exhibition will be up through April 8.

And from 7 to 9 p.m., in Unit 4 for of the Chase Street Warehouses (160 Tracy St.), there's an opening reception for "Two Bros," an exhibition featuring paintings, drawings, sculpture and conceptual art by Charles Westfall and Layet Johnson (above).

Family Day: Spring Festival

Carissa DiCindio, associate curator of education, just told us that this Saturday's Family Day (to be held from 10 a.m. to noon in the art education classrooms of the Lamar Dodd School of Art) will feature some live animals, courtesy of Memorial Park's Bear Hollow, which is co-sponsoring the event. Expect to see the fellow above possibly (a barred tiger salamander), plus an owl, a snake and maybe some frogs and turtles. Woo-hoo!

Pictures from "The Art of: Brew"

Check out the pictures from last night's event, "The Art of: Brew."

Bracketology

Sure, we admit it. We've been filling out our brackets over the past few days. But now Tyler Green has to come along and make us feel like a bunch of mouth-breathing jocks with his own bracketed tournament to decide the Greatest Living American Abstract Painter. It's even seeded and, as you might guess, Cy Twombly (above) is one of the #1 seeds. Check out the post and start voting/lobbying.

GMOA in the News

It's not an in-depth examination, but Flagpole has an article about LEED certification in Athens that mentions GMOA's addition in passing. There's a nice photo with the article, too.

And Southern Seasons has added our new exhibition, which is going up at present in the Visual Arts Building (we'll have images for you soon), to its calendar.

Foreword Awards

We got great news earlier today. The "Corpus of Early Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections: The South," our three-volume undertaking that has been more than 15 years in the making and was finally, finally published recently, is a finalist in Foreword magazine's Book of the Year Awards, in the art category. Other finalists include books published by the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Hudson Hills Press. The gold, silver and bronze awards won't be announced until May 25, but it's true that, in this case, it really is an honor just to make the finals, especially when more than 1400 books were submitted for the prizes, but it's a testament to the work of many, not least author Perri Lee Roberts, designer Carol Haralson and project editor Cynthia Payne, all of whom spent countless hours poring over its pages. To purchase a copy of the "Corpus" from the Museum Shop, click here, and cross your fingers that we win!

Re:Construction

We’ve all had awful experiences with construction sites­. They cause traffic, never seem to end, and are dangerous and not so pretty, but the Alliance for Downtown New York has introduced a public art program called Re:Construction that turns construction sites into works of art.

Construction projects are everywhere in Lower Manhattan, and the poor economy delays completion, causing the sites to become seemingly permanent. The goal of Re:Construction is to make these sites into “canvases for innovative public art and architecture.” The project’s curator is BravinLee Programs, run by Karin Bravin and John Lee.

Photo credit: BravinLee Programs

All of the projects in Re:Construction “bring color, movement and scenic beauty” to the construction sites. Botanizing on the Asphalt (above) by Nina Bovasso covers 400 feet of jersey barriers at Hudson River Park. Fence Embroidery with Embellishment (below) by Katherine Daniels consists of such materials as spools, jar lids and wire mesh. The installation runs 600 feet along a construction fence.

Photo credit: Nina Bovasso

Re:Construction has been ongoing since 2007 when the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation (LMDC) awarded the Downtown Alliance $1.5 million for the project. Check out the Re:Construction Web site for more photos and information.

Don't Forget: The Art of: Brew

The Banner-Herald is spotlighting our wonderful event tonight, The Art of: Brew, in its Best Bets section, and indeed it is. While we love it when you RSVP (it lets us know how much food to buy), it's not strictly necessary in a case like this, and if you haven't called the Friends to let us know you're coming tonight, please don't let that deter you from attending. The event may seem a little pricey, but it can serve as a renewal of your membership, and every bit you contribute helps us maintain our educational programming, especially in a time of ever-deeper budget cuts. We hope we'll see all of you tonight!

New Media

Yes, sometimes it seems like we're obsessed with making art out of nontraditional materials, but don't they tend to get your neurons firing with a little more excitement? In that vein, check out this slideshow of five artists who use drinking straws to create art (via Flavorpill).

And then there's Garth Johnson's blog post about Bryan Dettmer's memento morii made from cassette tapes.

And if you enjoyed Paul's photographs from the National Museum of the American Indian of Brian Jungen's astonishing work, check out the museum's page devoted to the exhibition.

Empty Bowl luncheon

The Empty Bowl Luncheon, hosted by the Food Bank of Northeast Georgia is this Wednesday at noon. The benefit is held to raise awareness of hunger on a local and national level. Tickets include soup, a sandwich and a bowl handcrafted by Good Dirt potters.

There will also be an auction at the Empty Bowl Luncheon featuring 11 pieces from Good Dirt. The Food Bank is asking for local artists to donate bowls in any media, from ceramic to paintings of bowls, for the auction. All submissions should be themed around the Empty Bowl Concept. Good Dirt will also have donated bowls available for purchase at the luncheon for $15.

The luncheon will take place at the Classic Center. Doors open at 11:30 a.m., lunch starts at noon. Call the Food Bank at 706.354.8191 for more information.

DC / Richmond / Chapel Hill

It was Spring Break at the University of Georgia last week, yet I got the opportunity to travel for work. The itinerary? The Federal District of Columbia, including the monuments and museums; Richmond, Virginia; and Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

The reason? To view two private collections in DC, to conduct some (last minute collection catalogue) research at the Archives of American Art and the Library of Congress, to see the works in an artist's estate in Richmond, and to view another private collection in Chapel Hill.


Below are some images from the trip to DC with a focus on the National Museum of the American Indian (with a private tour by Jennifer Miller, exhibition manager, and Rebecca Troutman, curatorial research assistant), Smithsonian American Art Museum, the Library of Congress, and our National Gallery of Art:



The boss and I also stopped at the Gari Melchers Home and Studio, and got a wonderful, quick tour from Joanna Catron, curator, but I was camera-less at the time.

Construction Updates from Holder

Here's your update from Holder for the week ending today (March 12).

Current week - Activities/Issues:
New Gallery / Connector
• Framing connector walls/soffit
• Coordinating MEP overhead trim out
• Installing glass at the connector curtainwall
• Backfill sculpture garden walls
• Start layout/digging bio-retention pond

Existing Building Renovations
• Tape and finish walls and ceilings
• MEP rough-in hard ceilings
• MEP rough-in acoustical ceilings

Storage Bar
• Framing interior walls
• Hang interior walls
• Continue exterior brick façade

Next week - Activities/Issues:
New Gallery / Connector
• Complete curtain wall glass
• Continue framing walls and soffits
• Complete connector roof
• Start MEP wall rough-in

Existing Building Renovations
• Tape & finish walls and ceilings
• Start priming interior walls

Storage Bar
• Complete exterior CMU and brick walls.
• Finish MEP overhead rough-in.
• Continue framing interior walls

Storage bar exterior

Sculpture garden progress

Sculpture garden curtain wall

Art Around Athens (and Beyond)

The Oconee Cultural Arts Foundation (OCAF) annual thrift sale begins tonight (Friday, March 12), with a preview night from 7 to 9 p.m. Admission is $5, and prices are double what they will be tomorrow (Saturday, March 13, from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m.), but you get first crack at all the good stuff folks have donated to benefit OCAF, an opportunity to bid in the silent auction and wine and appetizers. More than 10,000 items will be available, meaning this is no mere church yard sale, and the cause is a great one.

Also Saturday, from 9:30 a.m. to noon, Blue Tin Art Studio is teaching a class in encaustic painting with beeswax for $40 (that cost includes materials). "Learn how to melt and mix colors, create a variety of surface techniques and incorporate collage and more." You can find a registration form on Blue Tin's site here.

Saturday and Sunday (March 13 and 14), from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., the Carlton Art Group will hold a free open house at 65 Lexington Rd., in Carlton. Stone and wood sculpture, monoprints, Ukrainian eggs, hand-made furniture, fused glass, metal sculpture and jewelry constitute some of the media of the many works on display. A portion of proceeds will benefit Georgia for Haiti.



Finally, Sunday from noon to 5 p.m., renowned local artist Lou Kregel is having an open house and rummage sale at 95 Carter St., here in Athens. She lists an astonishing amount of stuff on the Facebook page she's created for the event, as well as directions, and her latest update suggests there will be cupcakes in addition.

Hello Wall

The Hello Wall from wasted spaces on Vimeo.

Flavorpill linked yesterday to this very cool art project that shows good use to be made of social media. Not that determining whether circles are larger or smaller or faster or slower moving is a huge decision, but it at least shows the potential for public interaction with art, which is something we're always trying to promote. It also, tangentially, makes us think about this early Willie Nelson song that made use of advanced technology in its own way.

GMOA in the News

The Athens Banner-Herald has a lovely article this morning on our upcoming "The Art of: Brew" that we hope will encourage some more folks to show up.

Hungry?

Dan Kenneally's been interpreting various sandwiches (breakfast, lunch, dessert) in these extremely simplified paintings that, nonetheless, convey the essence of each. He also, handily enough, has a section on his site in which he explains what he's on about in both "normal" and "art critic" versions.

Contemplating the Void

Taylor Green has been musing on the Guggenheim's exhibition "Contemplating the Void," in which the curators asked 200 contemporary artists to propose something to go in that big space in the middle of the museum. First he focused on environmentally themed responses, then on responses that had to do with torture, and there's more yet to come this week. The exhibition has its own Web site, too, so you can poke through interpretations of the space on your own, although they're a bit scattered. Make sure you have some time, in other words, and aren't easily frustrated by the weird, Flash-based navigation system or by artists' tendency to believe their work already clearly explained by a quick drawing. We find ourselves drawn to the more colorful options, like Ball Nogues Studio's proposal that appears to have something to do with a giant candy-making machine (above) or Fritz Haeg's idea to paint the ramps as a rainbow, but Green's analysis has been bringing out some interesting themes.

A Reminder

If you haven't yet RSVPed for The Art of: Brew, please remember that it's less than a week from today. The weather even seems to be warming up of late, just like last year, so with luck it'll be a lovely evening, with much appreciation of Terrapin's unique product and perhaps even some dancing. We'll have T-shirts for sale, and you can rehearse for St. Patrick's Day.

GMOA in the News

GMOA gets mentioned in passing in Kevan Williams's Flagpole column "Athens Rising," which is devoted to construction and development in and around Athens. If you'd like to see a gallery of all our construction photos, our Flickr page has a whole section of them, from week 1, when this shovel was about all there was to see:

To the most recent set, when not only is the new wing up, but the connector between old and new areas is starting to look like it's really part of a unified building, with glass and all.

It's easy to forget how far we've come when the updates posted week by week seem incremental, but there is one big, beautiful building taking shape, and you get to see what it looks like inside in person in less than a year.

New Photos Up

Not only have we added more photos to the "Soulful Celebration" set on Flickr, but we've just gotten up pictures from the farewell party for Deirdre Conneely, who just left us to move back up north and will be sorely missed, and the Collectors' last outing.

The History of Western Art in Music Video Form

70 Million by Hold Your Horses ! from L'Ogre on Vimeo.

Hat tip to Amy Miller, who suggested this great mix of fine art and indie rock for the blog. It's Spring Break for the students around here, but that doesn't mean we're slowing down a bit. Things have been very busy today, so blogging has been light.

Construction Updates from Holder

It's the end of the week and we don't want to make you wait until Tuesday (Monday is a furlough day for UGA employees, so expect no updates on this blog), so here's the construction update from Holder on Phase II for the week ending today, March 5.

Current week - Activities/Issues:
New Gallery / Connector
· Framing connector walls
· Hanging and finishing walls and ceilings in gallery
· Coordinating MEP overhead trim out
· Completed the overlook pop out roof
· Installing glass at the overlook and the connector curtainwall
· Framing soffits in connector
· Relaying brick and thru-wall flash at connector parapet walls

Existing Building Renovations
· Continue MEP overhead rough-in
· Hanging hard ceilings
· Prime and paint walls

Storage Bar
· Framing interior walls
· Started exterior brick façade
· Spray foam insulation in walls

Next week - Activities/Issues:
New Gallery / Connector
· Install curtain wall glass
· Start connector exterior brick and roofing
· Backfill sculpture garden walls
· Start layout/digging bio-retention pond

Existing Building Renovations
· Tape & finish walls and ceilings
· Install the 3rd floor punch windows

Storage Bar
· Continue exterior CMU and brick walls.
· Finish MEP overhead rough-in.
· Hanging drywall

East gallery elevation--overlook glass

2nd-floor gallery interior finishes

Connector exterior progress

International Leaders Find Some Time to Enjoy The Arts

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and his wife, Svetlana, visited Paris earlier this week to discuss a possible major military deal between Russia and France. Medvedev spent the week with French president Nicolas Sarkozy, and the two found some time during their visit to put state issues aside and indulge in some of the many cultural pursuits Paris has to offer.

Medvedev and Sarkozy were given special access to the Louvre Museum, which is closed to the public on Tuesdays, for a look at one of the museum’s top exhibits this year.

The exhibition “Holy Russia,” a fitting one for the special guest, features 900 years of Russian art drawn from monasteries and museums around the country and showcases icons from the early years of Russian Orthodox Christianity to the masterpieces of Andrei Rublev in the 15th century up to canvases from the early reign of Peter the Great.

Svetlana Medvedev was joined by Russian Culture Minister François Mitterrand and his Russian counterpart, Alexander Avdeev, on a tour of an exhibition of oil paintings and watercolors by young Russian artists that reflect a romantic view of Russia, with Impressionist-inspired views of the Volga River Valley.

Paris welcomed the Russian visitors with flair. Medvedev arrived at the French capital by helicopter and golden-helmeted guards on horseback led his limousine across the Alexandre III Bridge, named for the second-to-last czar of Russia.

UGA alums

This morning's Art Daily brought news of an exhibition in New York by talented UGA alum of the Lamar Dodd School of Art Ian Ingram, who has continued working on the large-scale self-portrait drawings he has been doing since the age of 16 and did while in school here. We remember going to a reception of his work in the large gallery just down the hall from our current offices. The exhibition is at Barry Friedman Gallery and is accompanied by a catalogue. Congrats, Ian!

Art Around Athens (and Beyond)

The Railroad Arts District blog has already rounded up a good bit of what's going on this weekend in the arts, including an opening of work by the kids at Chase Street Elementary that will be going on display at White Tiger and the opening of Trace Gallery, which is pretty exciting!



Out in Watkinsville, at the Oconee Cultural Arts Foundation, there's an opening reception tonight (Friday, March 5) from 6 to 9 p.m. for the exhibition "Cattywampus," which features the printmaking art of UGA faculty and graduate students Andy Burkitt, Helen Farmer, Melissa Harshman, An Pham, Jon Swindler and Grace Zuniga. The exhibition runs through March 26, and while you're there, you can check out the exhibition for Youth Art Month drawn from Oconee County schools (also up through March 26).

This week's Flagpole lists the following event, about which we know no more than appears here, but it sounds interesting: Mar. 6: Call for location 9 a.m. 706-255-8528, mechanted757@gmail.com. Rose Creeks Clean-Up (Antioch Church Road): Artist Melissa Steele will document the clean-up of Rose Creek and Little Rose Creek as part of her art exhibit "Me'chanted." Breakfast and shuttle from Antioch Church provided. RSVP if you want your biscuits and coffee.

Saturday evening, from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Morton Theatre in downtown Athens, there will be an opening reception for "Refusés," a salon of works not included in the Lyndon House Arts Center's 35th Juried exhibition. The exhibition runs through April 19.



Finally, Sunday afternoon, from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m., is an opening reception for an exhibition of Claire Clements' paintings at the State Botanical Garden of Georgia. Claire's process, cut paintings, involves cutting mixed media painting on paper, and the Athens Banner-Herald ran a great story on her this past week.

Spring 2010 Newsletter

As always, tech-savvy Friends and patrons can get the GMOA newsletter here before printing is completed and physical copies are mailed. The Spring 2010 newsletter should arrive in your mailboxes relatively soon, but in the meantime, here's the digital version, which has great photos, some information on new acquisitions, construction updates and more, including a Save the Date on the back cover for Elegant Salute XII!

In-Room Entertainment

Should you happen to be staying at one of the four locations of the Standard Hotel (New York, Hollywood, L.A. and Miami), the New York Times' culture blog The Moment/T Magazine has a post up about a new option on the TVs in their rooms. The arts organization Creative Time has selected an array of art videos that will be available for your viewing pleasure, including Marilyn Minter's "Green Pink Caviar," which supplied the image above and (intentionally or un-) kind of can't help but remind us of this Internet phenomenon. Video art is one of the easiest media to get out and about in the world, and we think this idea is marvelous.

Athens' Next Top Model?

The all-knowing Brenda Wade, our receptionist and mistress of information, passed along that the newest issue of Blvd. magazine features one of our own former interns, Meg Winthrop, on the cover. To browse through the rest of the issue, click here. Now, we certainly don't go out of our way to find good-looking interns, but they keep finding us! Meg also contributed a couple of entries to one of our upcoming catalogues, on drawings from the permanent collection, so she's far more than just a pretty face.

Willson Center/GMOA Lecture Photos

Our wonderful interns took some photos at the lecture yesterday afternoon, and while slideshows aren't quite as exciting as pictures of people dressed up fancy (to some of us), we think it's wonderful to see the crowd that turned out for Nina Hellerstein's talk on Jean Charlot's murals.

The Pinacothèque Stirs Up Parisian Culture

Marc Restellini, from the Independent

Though still quite young, Marc Restellini’s Parisian exhibition hall, the Pinacothèque, has upset many of the French cultural establishments. Founded in 2007, the Pinacothèque is a privately run, unsubsidized exhibition space whose art shows have attracted more visitors in the last 12 months than the other Parisian exhibition halls.

Many well-known cultural institutions—the Louvre, Musée d’Orsay, and the Centre Pompidou to name a few—are less than happy with the Pinacothèque and its director. Restellini has put on a number of high-profile exhibitions with subjects including Roy Lichtenstein, Man Ray and the Chinese warriors of Xi’an (a show the Louvre is supposed to have been bidding for).

Entrance to the Pinacothèque costs about the same as other exhibition halls and yet Restellini has been able to earn a profit on every show except his first. This creates an uncomfortable comparison for the state institutions that need large public subsidies and private sponsors.

Restellini himself is another source of complaint. He is an art historian but has never taken the official French examination for museum curators. His exhibition methods are also under scrutiny. The paintings are individually illuminated and are hung (when possible) at the angle that the painter would have seen while he was creating it.

Restellini has also made significant effort to improve upon the information panels that accompany works of art in the gallery. He says,“What people want is intelligent information on the history of the artist and the work, something not too complex, but not oversimplified.”

Ultimately Restellini’s goal is not to, as he puts it, “spend hundreds of millions of euros on a building with marble and columns,” but to “show paintings and help people to understand them.”

Currently on view at the Pinacothèque until July 18 is the largest ever exhibition of Edvard Munch paintings from private collections.

For more information, check out this article in the Independent.

Art Around Athens

At 6 p.m. today, Dr. Scott Richardson, associate dean of curriculum at the MCG/UGA Initiative Medical School, will speak on the benefits and relationship of art and medicine, as well as advances in medical school education, in Gallery 307 of the Lamar Dodd School of Art, in conjunction with the exhibition of work by scientific and medical illustration students on display there (through March 8).



Then, from 7 to 8 p.m. at Ciné, Michael Lachowski presents the first 6x6 event, focusing on fashion. Lachowski selected six new media-arts productions, each no longer than six minutes, to be screened, the format that all six of these events (there are five more upcoming, for which entries are still being accepted; next up is "Play" on April 7, with Didi Dunphy as curator) will follow.

Don't forget!

The Seventh Annual Willson Center/GMOA Lecture is taking place this afternoon (Wednesday, March 3) at 4 p.m. in room 314 of Sanford Hall on the UGA Campus.

Nina Hellerstein, professor of French and head of the department of Romance languages at the University of Georgia, will present “Franco-Mexican Artist Jean Charlot (1898-1979), His French Connections and His Mexican-Inspired Murals on the UGA Campus.”

Jean Charlot was born in Paris of French, Spanish and Mexican Indian descent. He studied informally at the École des Beaux Arts in Paris and eventually moved to Mexico, where he became one of Diego Rivera’s assistants. Rivera and the other members of the Syndicate of Revolutionary Painters, Sculptors and Engravers of Mexico dedicated themselves to producing public art for the lower or popular class of society.

In the early 1920s, Charlot was among the artists who assisted Rivera in painting frescos on the walls of the Ministry of Public Education in Mexico City. His contributions to the project included nine decorative shields and three murals of Mexican folk scenes: “Cargadores” (Burden Bearers), “Lavanderas” (Washerwomen), and “Danza de los Listones” (Dance of the Ribbons).

Other influences on Charlot’s work include Indian folk-religious activities he observed during a trip to Chalma and Mayan artifacts he came in contact with while he was staff artist of the Carnegie Institution expedition to Chichén-Itzá on the Yucatán peninsula.

The years from 1941 to 1944, when Charlot was invited by Lamar Dodd to be the artist-in-residence at the University of Georgia, are of particular relevance to Hellerstein’s lecture. Charlot instructed art students at the university while working on murals in the area. The murals painted by Charlot on campus can be seen beneath the portico on the front of the Fine Arts Building and in Brooks Hall, next door to where the lecture will take place.

The lecture is 100% free and open to the public, and you can either park downtown and walk across North Campus or in the North Campus or Tate Center parking decks. We hope to see lots of you at this wonderful lecture organized by our department of education alongside the Willson Center for Humanities and Arts.

Art Phone

At first glance, the iPhone's new app "Is This Art?" seems like another art-assessment mechanism meant yet again to trap questions of art in useless little categories, not to mention merely a gimmick; however, after reading Mattress Factory and Deeplocal's explanation of their new program, the venture seems a little more interesting. Although the question it proposes might seem trite, the resulting conversation could reignite passionate discourse about art, especially with regard to technology. Essentially, "users can then send the image to isthisart.org, where everyone can debate an object's art-worthiness." At the very least, we can chuckle at the sheer absurdity of the devices with which the iPhone presents its users. "Oh yeah? Well MY phone can tell me if this art. What does YOUR phone do?"

Photo comes from the WNYC page above

The National Galleries of Scotland and The High

The High Museum in Atlanta has garnered a sizable amount of press in the past couple of years, mostly due to its collaboration with the Louvre, an enterprise meant to generate income for the Louvre and bring attention to the High with the Louvre’s powerful name. The High is engaging in a similar 4-year project with the National Galleries of Scotland (NGS). The exhibition opens October 16 and will include Titian’s two Dianas.

According to theartnewspaper.com, “the two Titians have never left the UK since their arrival in 1798. They will form the centrepiece of an exhibition on ‘Venetian Masterpieces from the National Galleries of Scotland’. After its presentation in Atlanta, the show will go to the Minneapolis Institute of Arts (opening 5 February 2011) and the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston (21 May 2011).”

Although the NGS director-general, John Leighton, admitted that this campaign was mostly about raising money for the galleries’ pricey renovation, the High and Atlanta dwellers will definitely benefit from this rare tour.

The Future of Art

In an article in the Guardian, artist Antony Gormley discusses the need to rethink the purpose of art. One of his main concerns is the fate of art in the face of a possible climate crisis. He asks, in reference to artists, “what do we do when faced with the global climate crisis in a culture that encourages us to do more, produce more, be seen more?”

He asserts that human evolution has been driven by cultural rather than biological changes and that we need to re-evaluate our values and material culture. The idea of “more is better” can no longer persist nor can we ignore problems created by technology.

Gormley is also concerned with the focus of art. He says, “art, certainly western art, has been an expression of confidence: confidence in a culture's lifestyle and in its continuity into the future. Now art undermines and investigates systems of power and, rather than projecting stable, traditional values into the future, questions the viability of any kind of future at all.”

To Gormley, too much focus has shifted from art’s central subject of the human being to its monetary worth. He cites the Guggenheim and Tate “franchises” as examples of the art world’s expansion and ties to capitalism. He does, however, differentiate galleries as containing “forms and experiences that inspire, question and extend human experience,” as opposed to shops that provide commodities. He wants artists to alter the function of art so that it can fit within a sustainable lifestyle, such as those of earlier societies like the Tahitians.

Gormley has made efforts at his studio to reduce his carbon footprint but wonders if his actions have produced any true benefit or if they are only serving to ease his conscience. Ultimately, he believes that his “greatest responsibility is to make work in the most direct way, and interpret his time and place in a way that makes people more aware of themselves and it.”

This article raises many important issues and questions, and we at the Georgia Museum of Art would be interested in hearing your comments or opinions.

GMOA in the News

Sunday's Art Daily included a story about GMOA's publication of the "Corpus of Early Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections: The South" that we hope will lead to more press for the three big volumes and has already picked up some, as in this post from The History Blog that says it's worth every penny! All Art News picked it up, too. (Update: Here are two more iterations of the story, from Georgia Art Exchange and Daily Fashion News.)

The Columbus Ledger-Enquirer is publicizing the upcoming Nash Boney lecture March 31, and our Gregory Gillespie exhibition from 1999, for which the catalogue is out of print, garners a mention on Forum Gallery's Web site. GMOA is also mentioned in a story in the Athens Banner-Herald on artist Claire Clements, who has several pieces in our Sea Grant collection.

Construction Updates from Holder

Here's the construction update from Holder for the week ending February 26:

Current week - Activities/Issues:
New Gallery / Connector
· Frame connector walls
· Hanging drywall walls and ceilings in gallery
· Starting to tape and finish gallery walls
· Framing / hanging main Gallery space ceilings
· Coordinating MEP overhead trim out

Existing Building Renovations
· Continue MEP overhead rough-in
· Hang hard ceiling
· Prime and paint walls

Storage Bar
· Framing interior walls
· Started exterior brick façade
· Spray foam insulation in walls

Next week - Activities/Issues:
New Gallery / Connector
· Install curtain wall glass
· Start connector exterior brick
· Backfill sculpture garden walls
· Start layout/digging bio-retention pond

Existing Building Renovations
· Tape & finish walls.
· Prime paint walls.
· Demo walls and install structural steel frames for new windows

Storage Bar
· Continue exterior CMU and brick walls.
· Finish MEP overhead rough-in.

Sculpture garden progress

Connector interior progress

Connector exterior progress