The
term “magical realism” was coined by art critic Franz Roh in 1925 to describe
German post-expressionist painting. It was independently applied to literature
for the first time, with a diverging meaning, by Italian novelist Massimo
Bontempelli in 1927 to characterize modernist fiction. While soon the concept
was virtually forgotten in Europe, it was resurrected in Latin American
literature, again with varying meanings, starting in 1940. By the mid 1970s it
had become very popular in the context of the so-called “Boom” of the Latin
American novel (1967-1984). Thereafter, as magical realism declined in Latin
American fiction, it was picked up by many different national traditions of
world literature, and continues to enjoy a successful afterlife. This has
further expanded the already varied conceptions of the term, making its
definition one of the most challenging and interesting theoretical problems in
contemporary literature.
Franz
Roh published his 1925 book Nach-Expressionismus, Magischer Realismus: Probleme
der neuesten Europäischen Malerei (“Post-Expressionism, Magical Realism:
Problems of the latest European Painting”) at the height of the modernist
avantgarde movement in Europe and the beginning of a new tendency in German
art, marked by a post-WWI return to a rather blunt realism (Arnason 317-23).
Roh coined the oxymoron “magical realism” to describe this new style. Two years
earlier, another German art critic, Gustav Hartlaub, had proposed a competing
term: “new objectivity” (Neue Sachlichkeit). Roh sought to define
post-expressionism as a synthesis of two opposing tendencies: impressionism and
expressionism. On the one hand, the impressionism of Van Gogh and his
contemporaries emphasized external objects and the effect (or impression) they
have on our senses. For instance, an impressionist painting up close may look
like a conglomerate of dotted brush strokes, but as we retreat, realistic
figures begin to take shape. On the other hand, the expressionism of Emil
Nolde, Ernst Kirchner, and the followers of Edvard Munch established the
predominance of the subject, or inner self, over the object. The expressionists
sought to project their emotions and existential angst onto the objects they
depicted, thereby deforming them. They considered such distorted figures to be
more “real” and humanly relevant than our proportionate everyday perceptions,
because they embodied the emotions that the subject expressed upon the
world. Franz Roh believed that this tension between subject and
object was a universal dichotomy in art. Today, postmodern critics shun such
broad “universalist” or “essentialist” generalizations. Yet for Roh, this
subject-object dialectics was finally resolved in the synthesis of the new
post-expressionist “verism” of his contemporaries, such as painters Max
Beckmann, Otto Dix, and George Grosz.
Roh’s
rationale for calling this new type of realism “magical,” as opposed to
“mystical,” was scarcely convincing, given the spiritual connotation of a
“primitive” belief in the supernatural, which the word “magic” had acquired
with the rise of ethnology and anthropology. In contrast, Roh meant the
“wonder” that the constant movement of atoms and molecules should generate the
sensation of concrete objects. He was drawing from Husserl’s phenomenology,
introduced in 1913. Edmund Husserl suspended in brackets the old impasse of
whether the world is fundamentally matter or spirit, noting that our perception
of phenomena is the only given fact from which to approach reality. This became
the philosophical foundation for Roh’s theory of post-expressionism. But the
critic did not persist in the use of the term magical realism; he occasionally
employed “ideal realism” instead, and later opted for Hartlaub’s competing
term, “new objectivity.” Meanwhile in European painting, as post-expressionism
intersected French surrealism as well as Russian and Italian futurism, leftist
artists became associated with “new objectivity,” while right-wing fascist
sympathizers were more closely identified with Bontempelli’s “magical realism.”
The increasingly negative overtone that fascism and fascist art accrued during
the 1930s contributed to the term’s waning popularity in Europe (Guenther
33-73).
In
1927, Roh’s work on magical realism was translated into Spanish and published
by the influential Revista de Occidente, directed by José Ortega y Gasset.
Given the diffusion of Spain’s premiere cultural journal among the literary
circles of Buenos Aires, Mexico City, Havana, and other centers of culture in
Latin America, it is presumed that his concept of magical realism may have
enjoyed a certain currency across the Atlantic. Nevertheless, the first Latin
American literati to use the term in writing (Usigli 1940; Lins 1944; Uslar
1948; Portuondo 1955) make no mention of Roh and use the term with totally
different meanings, to include poetic-lyrical-symbolic realism and
psycho-existential realism. With this first acceptation of the term in Latin
America, writers sought to transcend traditional realism, naturalism, and
regionalism by internalizing the narrative point of view through techniques
such as the interior monologue and the then popular “stream of consciousness.”
They narrated from inside the protagonist’s mind in order to express, either a
poetic view of the world and the self, or else a psychological and existential
search for authenticity in a lurid world, viewed through the distorting prism
of an alienated individual, who nevertheless succeeded in exposing disquieting
existential truths.
Notwithstanding
this literature’s vague affinity with post-expressionism, Enrique Anderson-Imbert
(1956) and Luis Leal (1967) would be the first to point out Roh’s forgotten
paternity, at a time when the term “realismo mágico” had already become, in its
own right, a commonplace of Latin American letters. With few exceptions (e.g.,
Seymour Menton), the prevailing view among critics is that Roh’s concept, and
German post-expressionism for that matter, have very little to do with Latin
American literature (González Echevarría 25-27).
A
more direct connection, however, may be found with Bontempelli’s original
literary version of realismo magico. In 1926, Massimo Bontempelli founded the
literary journal 900 (novecento), which circulated in Italy and France,
bringing together modernist figures like James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, Rilke,
Max Jacob, and Blaise Cendrars. Purportedly without any knowledge of Roh,
Bontempelli proposed his own avant-garde literary formula: “precisione
realistica e atmosfera magica.” This formula—normalizing a supernatural
atmosphere by describing it or narrating it in precise realistic detail—remains
to this day a core technique of magical realism. In addition, Bontempelli urged
his fellow writers to become primitives with a past. “Adam and Eve had no
past”—he contended, alluding to the surrealist ideal of a return to the primal.
“We cannot be Adams again: Siamo dei primitivi con un passato” (188). Being
“primitives with a past” meant returning to one’s national traditions,
archetypes, and foundational myths—a very meaningful proposal for the young
Latin American writers who were flocking to Europe at the time, and who would
launch a few years later their own magic-realist proposals. Venezuelan essayist
Arturo Uslar-Pietri, who had met Bontempelli in Paris and joined the debates of
900 in Italy, was a key contact. He would soon befriend Guatemalan Miguel Ángel
Asturias and Cuban Alejo Carpentier in Paris, where all three contributed to
Asturias’s journal Ensayo and Carpentier’s journal Imán.
Significantly, Bontempelli’s proposals
had very different cultural and political implications in Europe as opposed to
Latin America. In a European hegemonic context, the idea of evoking a pure
national archetype, so dear to fascism, was eventually hijacked by the Third
Reich. By the end of the 1920s, Bontempelli, like other Italian futurists, had
become an active fascist, leading to a rupture with many of his former literary
friends. Yet in 1938, as political conditions deteriorated and it became
evident that fascism was going too far, Bontempelli was expelled from the
fascist party for refusing to take over a university post that had belonged to
a Jewish professor. In a Latin American post-colonial context, on the contrary,
that same search for national archetypes led to reclaiming indigenous
traditions (in the case of Asturias’s Latin American highlands) and neo-African
culture (in the case of Carpentier’s Caribbean basin). After their European
experience, both Asturias and Carpentier became active Marxists. By 1949,
Asturias had become the first Latin American novelist to describe his own work
as magic-realist, based on his surrealist interpretation of the “primitive”
Mayan psyche; whereas Carpentier had launched his own concept of lo real
maravilloso americano (“the American marvelous real”), inspired by Cuban
santería and Haitian vodou. Henceforth magical realism has remained primarily a
countercultural and counter-hegemonic literary style.
According to Carpentier (1949),
the marvelous resides in the cultural reality of Latin America itself, by
virtue of the continuous clashes of disparate belief systems (European,
indigenous, African) over five centuries of tumultuous history, and the hidden
syncretism generated by such clashes. The task of the artist is not to create
the marvelous through any technical means, but rather to perceive and bring
forth the hidden cultural and historical marvels that have long been waiting to
be discovered. Due to this radical negation of artificiality, Carpentier
refuses to recognize any “-ism” or literary style other than the (neo-)
Baroque, precisely because of the Baroque’s capacity for accepting and
incorporating onto itself the most varied cultural elements. Following
Carpentier, and yet admitting the role of technique, Haitian novelist Jacques
Stephen Alexis (1956) opted instead for the term “réalisme merveilleux.”
A second moment in the
development of the term in Latin American literature came with the early
attempts at a more precise critical definition. Initially, this took the form
of a debate between critics Ángel Flores and Luis Leal. Flores (1955) took a
formalist approach, describing the term as an “amalgamation of realism and
fantasy” distinguished by its preoccupation with style, precision and
succinctness, a tight and logical plot, the transformation of everyday life
into the awesome and unreal, the intemporal fluidity of the narrative, the
rejection of sentimentality and lyrical effusions, and the predilection for the
new and the surprising (112). These traits, however, characterized modernist
fiction as a whole, and therefore were lacking in specificity. Flores cited as
early precursors a wide array of authors of non-realist fiction, such as Gogol,
Dostoyevsky, Hoffman, the Grimm brothers, the dramatist Strindberg, Poe,
Melville, and even Proust. But he held Kafka to be the purest literary exemplar
and Giorgio de Chirico to be his counterpart in painting, arguing that their
“cold and cerebral” style is what distinguished magical realism from the
earlier, more romantic flights of fantasy that were based on atmosphere rather
than technique (113). Indeed, with his reference to de Chirico and to
“atmosphere” Flores appears to be alluding to, and revising, Bontempelli’s
“precisione realistica e atmosfera magica.” In regard to Latin American
literature, Flores points to Borges as the initiator of magical realism,
followed by the Argentines Bioy Casares, Silvina Ocampo, Mallea, Sábato, and
Cortázar, the Uruguayan Onetti, the Chilean María Luisa Bombal, the Mexicans
Arreola and Rulfo, and the Cubans Novás Calvo and Labrador Ruiz. Meanwhile,
Borges, Bioy Casares, and Ocampo had famously edited their influential
collection Antología de la literatura fantástica (1940), including a sampling
of world literature since ancient times. Significantly, they defined their own
work, not as magical realism, but as “fantastic literature.”
Luis Leal (1967) credits Flores
with producing the first critical study of magical realism in literature, but
disagrees with his definition and with his catalogue of magic-realist authors.
He also recognizes Roh’s first use of the term, but notes that in Latin America
it is Carpentier who presents a more systematic and coherent view based on his
concept of lo real maravilloso. Leal concludes that “magical realism cannot be
identified either with fantastic literature or with psychological literature .
. . neither does it distort reality or create imagined worlds. . . . The
existence of the marvelous real is what started magical realist literature,
which some critics claim is the truly American literature” (121-22). Thus, he
sides with Carpentier’s thematic approach, and not with Borges’s formalism. He
agrees with some of the authors cited by Flores and adds a few of his own,
notably the Venezuelan Rómulo Gallegos and the Cuban Félix Pita Rodríguez. The
core difference between Flores and Leal, as well as between Borges and
Carpentier, ultimately hinges on their emphasis on form (technique) versus
content (the theme of the marvelous real).
A third moment in the development
of the term, relevant not only to Latin America, but now also to world
literature, arises in 1970 with the publication of Todorov’s systematic study,
The Fantastic. Todorov defined the fantastic as the tension between the
possibility of a rational explanation and the disquieting acceptance of the
supernatural—the unsettling prospect that the “laws of nature” have been
violated, thereby compromising the reader’s sense of certainty and
understanding of the world. To promote this tension it is best if the narrator
has a skeptical scientific mind, such as that of a detective, who is constantly
engaging in deductive reasoning, and looking for clues that may lead to a
rational explanation. Therefore, the fantastic is structurally related to
detective fiction, as can be seen in the works of authors like Borges and
Cortázar, whom critic Jaime Alazraki fittingly classified as “neo-fantastic”—as
opposed to magic-realist (1990, 21-33). As long as this tension or doubt
persists, the effect of the fantastic is maintained. On the other hand, if the
characters and narrator do not care to look for a rational explanation but
instead accept the events as normal, then the story belongs to the genre of the
merveilleux (the marvelous), such as in the case of the fairy tale, which
requires from the reader a suspension of disbelief. Todorov emphasizes that any
poetical or allegorical meaning would serve to naturalize or normalize the
story, eliminate the doubt, and therefore destroy the tension of the fantastic,
which requires a strictly literal reading. Finally, if a rational explanation
prevails in the end, then the story is neither fantastic nor marvelous, but
simply strange or uncanny (unheimlich, to use the psychological term developed
by Sigmund Freud for that which is taboo or uncomfortably strange).
Todorov’s systematic definition
of the fantastic was supposed to lead, by elimination, to a more specific
definition of magical realism, but that would not turn out to be such a
straightforward result. By the mid 1970s, the popularity of the term had grown
so much as to lead to numerous studies and almost as many competing
definitions. At the landmark 1973 magical realism conference in Michigan, Yale
critic Emir Rodríguez Monegal called the debate “a dialogue among the deaf” and
suggested that the term be discarded altogether (Yates 1975). To begin with,
one of the problems with Todorov’s theory is that it reduces fiction to only
three types of narrated events: the natural, the supernatural, and the strange
or preternatural. Following this simplification, Anderson-Imbert suggested that
Franz Roh’s original dialectics (impressionism + expressionism = magical
realism) could be transposed to literature as “a thesis: the category of the
veridical, which produces ‘realism’; an antithesis: the category of the
supernatural, which produces the literature of ‘the fantastic’; and a
synthesis: the category of the strange, which produces ‘magical realism’”
(1975, 9). This failed to resolve the problem because the delineation of the fantastic,
while helping to narrow down the possibilities, ultimately could not establish
what magical realism is, but only what it is not.
In
a different take on Todorov, Amaryll Chanady (1985) proposes three criteria for
defining magical realism in contrast to the fantastic. She notes that the
fantastic establishes an antinomy between the natural and the supernatural; it
affirms the natural as valid, such that the irruption of the supernatural
creates an ilogical situation; and it presents a narrator who is reluctant to
explain matters and resolve the antinomy. In contrast, magical realism presents
as an antinomy two coherent perspectives in conflict, one based on a rational
view of reality, and the other one on an acceptance of the supernatural as a
normal everyday occurrence. However, according to Chanady, this second,
coherent (but non-rational) perspective should not be unnecessarily restricted
to that of a marginalized ethnic culture, but could also be that of an individual
psyche (dreams, hallucinations, psychopathology, a child’s perspective, etc.).
The main difference vis-à-vis the fantastic would reside in the natural
attitude with which the narrator accepts the irrational, thereby “resolving”
the antinomy. Nevertheless, it may be objected that the narrator’s natural
attitude may be recognized as a necessary but not as a sufficient condition for
an accurate definition of magical realism. Accepting both a collective
(culturally bound) and an individual (sui generis) point of view as equally
conforming to magical realism, results in grouping together works of very
different styles, traditions, and periods under a single, all-inclusive rubric.
For instance, García Márquez admired Kafka’s penchant for narrating the absurd (as
opposed to the supernatural) “with a straight face” and even recognized this as
a major influence; yet both authors ultimately have very different styles (30,
52). In consequence, despite some important advances, Chanady’s definition
remains vague in as much as it reduces magical realism to a “mode” or technique
that may be employed in very different types of fiction.
Notwithstanding
the limited results of such contrastive method, Todorov’s delineation of the
fantastic did lead most critics to associate modernist authors like Borges and
Cortázar with the (neo-) fantastic, while more regionalist authors like
Carpentier, Asturias, Rulfo, and García Márquez became the most often cited as
representatives of Latin American magical realism. This ushered a fourth moment
in the development of the term, marked by an ethnological approach. From such
anthropological perspective, the reader’s modern-Western-industrial culture is
confronted with the collective worldview of a pre-industrial-ethnic-rural
society of believers, for whom the natural and the supernatural coexist within
a single, culturally-bound belief system. Fernando Alegría (1960) was the first
critic to point out this contextual dependence of magical realism on the Latin
American hinterland, particularly what he called the “Afro-Indian” zone. Along
these lines, I contended that, contrary to Carpentier’s myth of the marvelous
real, subsequent magic-realist authors produced instead a sort of “narrative
primitivism” where Latin American authochthonous culture was technically and
therefore artificially constructed as a conventionalized pastiche or simulacrum
based on classical anthropology’s creation of a generic “primitive society”—a
composite of early ethnographic depictions of traditional non-Western cultures
across the globe, as popularized in twentieth-century ethnology, literature,
and film (2000, 112-31). These “primitive” conventions for what constitutes
habitual everyday reality (perceived as “magical thinking” by the modern
reader) came to replace the rational causality of traditional realism, and
became a given, an unquestionable norm in the magic-realist text. According to
this theory, Latin American magical realism is not a “mode” but a historically
specific style shared by particular works of contemporary authors who exhibit a
definite relation of literary influence, including: Carpentier’s El reino de
este mundo (The Kingdom of This World, 1949), Asturias’s Hombres de maíz (Men
of Maize,1949), Rulfo’s Pedro Páramo (Pedro Paramo, 1955), García Márquez’s
Cien años de soledad (One Hundred Years of Solitude, 1967), Isabel Allende’s La
casa de los espíritus (The House of the Spirits, 1982), Laura Esquivel’s Como
agua para chocolate (Like Water for Chocolate, 1990), and Vargas Llosa’s El
hablador (The Storyteller, 1992). Their style is defined by three common
denominators: The adoption of a “primitive” or provincial narrative viewpoint
(production); the transculturation of reality norms from modern to archaic
(text); and the virtual reader’s dual role as believer and skeptic (reception),
resulting in an alternate, allegorical interpretation of Latin American
history, as opposed to the “official” version of history perpetuated by the
structures of power.
In
the 1990s, as magical realism declined in Latin American literature after
having attained international acclaim, it began to be applied globally to
numerous authors in the rest of the world (Moreiras 84). Formerly competing
terms, such as “marvelous realism,” “the marvelous real,” “fantastic realism,”
and others became eclipsed by magical realism’s sheer popularity. But also, as
a term of international literature, its earlier Latin American definition
became too narrow and had to be complemented by a broader, more inclusive
scope. Meanwhile, the fantastic was also experiencing an expansion of scope.
Todorov’s delineation of the traditional fantastic, applicable mostly to
nineteenth-century literature, and even the notion of a neo-fantastic modernist
literature in the twentieth century, developed into what Brian McHale defined
as a postmodern fantastic. Thus, in the actual practice of contemporary
literature, even in Latin America, as Morales and Sardiñas have shown,
previously separate elements of the fantastic and of magical realism have begun
to coallesce within the same literary works, requiring new and more flexible
theoretical formulations of both terms. This has led to a fifth moment in the
development of the term: magical realism as a global poetics.
A
leading theorist of international magical realism, Wendy Faris, has returned to
Chanady’s broader concept of magical realism as a literary “mode,” and has
identified five primary characteristics: an irreducible element of magic; a
strong presence of the phenomenal world; some unsettling doubts on the part of
the reader in the effort to reconcile two contradictory understandings of
events; the narrative’s merging of different realms; and the predilection for
disturbing received ideas about time, space, and identity (7). Faris observes
that “magical realism often originates in the peripheral and colonized regions
of the West: Latin America and the Caribbean, India, Eastern Europe, Africa.
But the mode is becoming less and less marginal” (29). She then adds, “Magical
realism is currently moving out of that primitivist phase” (36). Among the many
contemporary authors associated with this tendency are Günter Grass, Wilson
Harris, Milan Kundera, Kenzaburō Ōe, Salman Rushdie, D. M. Thomas, Toni
Morrison, Thomas Pynchon, José Saramago, Ben Okri, and Tahar Ben Jelloun. “The
danger of studying magical realism globally, from a broad, comparative
perspective,’ warns Faris, “is to colonize diverse cultural traditions by
considering them under a general rubric” (40).
In
conclusion, there is a tradeoff in theorizing magical realism: the more precise
and rigorous the definition, the fewer the works that meet such strict
criteria; conversely, the more inclusive the term, the more vague the
definition.
In
order to arrive at a suitable compromise, it is important to note that the
single characteristic on which critics agree is that magical realism makes the
extraordinary seem commonplace and vice versa. This is dependent on the
non-conventional point of view of the (“naïve” or “unreliable”) narrator, and
on naturalizing devices such as the extremely detailed and matter-of-fact
description and narration of a rationally implausible event. In any case, the
narrative point of view is key. In this regard, a further distinction may be
drawn as to whether the point of view should be collective and culturally bound
(that is, tied to a set of traditional beliefs shared by a particular cultural
group) or individual and psychologically bound (that is, relative to an
individual as a universal representative of the species, or of the human condition).
Aside
from these primary traits, a host of secondary characteristics may be found in
some works but not in others. Epistemologically, therefore, primary
characteristics should be considered common denominators, while secondary
characteristics would be best conceptualized in terms of Wittgenstein’s family
resemblance—where a wide number of works are linked together as sharing some,
though not all, of a set of overlapping traits, much like members of an
extended family. By the same token, a group of works within the same national
or linguistic tradition may be linked together by strict common denominators,
forming a core or nucleus of magical realism, while other works that share a
family resemblance may be placed in closer or farther proximity to this
relational nucleus. Such is, for example, the general relationship between the
Latin American and the international brands of magical realism.
HEAD OF
MELEAGER, 50 B.C.–A.D. 100
PERIOD: LATE REPUBLICAN –
EARLY IMPERIAL
(1st cent. B.C.–2nd
cent. A.D.)
Marble
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 29.8 x
20.3 x 24.1 cm
This head is from a Roman
copy of a full-length statue by the famed fourth-century-B.C. Greek sculptor
Skopas. It showed the mythological hero Meleager with a hunting dog and the
head of the Kalydonian boar.
Along with Praxiteles and
Lysippos, Skopas was one of the great sculptors of his age, renowned especially
for his depictions of gods. His style was notable for its introduction of an
intense depiction of human emotion into the previously more reserved psychology
of Greek classicism. Typical of Skopas’s innovations are the slightly parted
lips, the low forehead that protrudes over the bridge of the nose and eyes, and
the heavy roll of flesh swelling over the outer corners of the eyes. These
elements—all of which would be further exaggerated in Hellenistic
sculpture—contribute to the quality of barely suppressed agitation.
According to Homer, the
Kalydonian boar was sent by Artemis to ravage the countryside after Oeneus,
king of Kalydon and Meleager’s father, failed to sacrifice to the goddess.
Meleager then led the hunt to kill the boar, but in its aftermath quarreled
with his mother’s two brothers and killed them. Learning of this, his mother,
Althaea, set in motion the dire prophecy that the Fates had decreed soon after
Meleager’s birth—that he would die when a brand, then on the fire, had burned
out. Althaea now took out the brand, which she had hidden for years in a chest,
and brought about her son’s death. Fourth-century-B.C. artists favored
narratives such as this, which humanized the gods and involved mythic heroes in
the sufferings and imperfections of man.
NICOLAS POUSSIN (1594 – 1665)
VENUS & ADONIS C. 1628–29
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 98.5 x 134.6 cm
Framed: 136.2 x 172.1 x 12.7 cm
Early in his career Poussin traveled to Italy and was introduced
to a circle of important Roman patrons including the antiquarian Cassiano dal
Pozzo. Poussin’s classicism, nurtured by his knowledge of antique literature
and art, was warmed by his study of Venetian painting. Venus and Adonis reveals
the influence of Titian in composition, coloration, and mood. The composition
is built in a series of opposing diagonals, highlighting Venus’s shapely limbs
and soft belly and casting the lovers into shadow, foreboding Adonis’s imminent
doom.
According to Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Venus and her mortal lover Adonis
sought the shade of a poplar tree during an interlude from the hunt. The
goddess mingled kisses and words, telling Adonis why she forbade him to pursue
dangerous, wild animals—her mortal enemies. The lovers are attended by a host
of putti who prepare Venus’s golden chariot. A pair of reclining putti, along with
a couple of billing doves, mimic the lovers’ postures. Lance in hand and
helical horn and dog nearby, Adonis is ready to disobey Venus and heed the call
of the hunt. The tragic outcome––for Adonis is killed by a wild boar––is
foreshadowed in the sleeping putto, unattended torch, and menacing clouds.
Adonis wears a wreath of anemones, the flower that Venus would create in his
memory by sprinkling his blood with nectar.
PORTRAIT OF JACOB OBRECHT, 1496
PERIOD: 15th CENTURY
Tempera, Oil, and Gold on Panel
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 51.4 x 36.2 cm
The gilt Gothic inscription on this masterpiece of Renaissance
portraiture identifies the sitter as Jacob Obrecht (1457/58-1505), a renowned
choirmaster and one of the greatest composers of his age. On the original
attached frame is inscribed both the date of the painting, 1496, and the
sitter's age, 38. Born in Ghent, Obrecht led a peripatetic career, taking posts
in Bergen op Zoom, Cambrai, Bruges, and Antwerp. Such was his international
standing, he was invited to the court of Ferrara by Duke Ercole I d'Este. He
died from the plague, eulogized as "a most learned musician, second in the
art to no one, in respect to either voice or cleverness of invention." The
painting, possibly the left-hand side of a diptych, would have faced a
complementary panel of a religious subject. Preserved in exceptional condition,
it is remarkable for the virtuosity of details such as the folds of Obrecht's
lace-trimmed surplice and the soft gray fur of the almuce (the badge of office
of a canon, including the choral clergy) draped over his arm.
The identity of the artist has long remained a mystery. Recent
study of the portrait in the Museum's department of conservation has led to a
new attribution: the painting is the earliest dated work by the Netherlandish
master Quinten Metsys. Just thirty years old when the painting was completed,
Metsys went on to become one of the most successful painters residing in the
city of Antwerp. The technical refinement of the paint layers, from the finely
hatched brushstrokes in the hands to the smoothly blended flesh tones, suggests
that the artist used a mixed medium of egg tempera and oil. Metsys was skilled
at the representation of telling details of his sitters' appearance: the gentle
textures of skin on Obrecht's fingers or on his neck; his carefully delineated
fingernails or the shape of his mouth; the discreet stubble of his beard or his
clear, bright eye.
JOSHUA
REYNOLDS (1723 – 1792)
Framed: 268 x 177.2 x 13.3 cm
GUSTAVE COURBET (1819 – 1877)
PORTRAIT OF J. VAN WISSELINGH, 1846
Medium
Oil on Panel
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 57.2 x 46 cm
Framed: 79.7 x 69.9 x 10.2 cm
Courbet was born at Ornans, near the Swiss border of France.
After he went to Paris in 1840, he evolved a vigorous Realism with profound and
influential philosophical and political implications. Already in the Salon of
1846, Courbet’s work was noticed by the Dutch art dealer H. J. van Wisselingh,
who bought two paintings and presumably commissioned this portrait. Van
Wisselingh also invited Courbet to visit Holland the following year so that he
could study Rembrandt.
Rembrandt’s art was a touchstone for Courbet—as is evident in
this portrait, in which deep shadows obscure physical fact and at the same time
suggest poetic insights into the melancholy of the sitter and his world.
Courbet’s emulation of Rembrandt and other seventeenth-century Dutch masters
put him at odds with his most powerful contemporaries in the French Academy,
for whom the idealizing art of the Italian Renaissance was paradigmatic.
Courbet’s relentless and outspoken disregard for academic
principles, and the example of paintings like this Rembrandtesque portrait of a
Dutch tradesman, quickly set the stage for a sweeping revolution in
mid-nineteenth-century art. In concert with his extraordinary friend the poet
Charles Baudelaire, Courbet advocated a popular art based on modern life, its
dark sides included, inspiring the Impressionists and Post-Impressionists to
find poetry in the prose of everyday activities and locales—as Rembrandt had
done before them.
EL GRECO (DOMENIKOS THEOTOKOPOULOS) (1541 – 1614)
PORTRAIT OF DR. FRANCISCO DE PISA, C. 1610–14
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 107 x 90 cm
Framed: 149.5 x 132.1 x 8.3 cm
The painter known as El Greco (“the Greek”) was born Domenikos
Theotokopoulos in Crete, then a territory of the Venetian Republic, where he
trained as an icon painter. Talented and ambitious, he left Crete around 1568
for Venice, and later Rome. In Italy he studied the coloring and light of the
Venetian masters, the figures of Michelangelo, as well as the grace and dynamism
of the Emilian artists, all of which informed his own highly original style. In
1577, El Greco departed for Spain and settled in the city of Toledo. He was
patronized there by members of the city’s wealthy and educated elite. This
portrait, which dates from the last period of El Greco’s career, attests to the
artist’s profound gifts as a portraitist, which were praised since his years in
Italy and remained undiminished in old age.
The sitter is Dr. Francisco de Pisa (1534–1616), an important
Toledan cleric and official historian of the city, who in 1610 expressed the
intention to endow the Convent of the Purísima Concepción de Nuestra Señora,
also known as the Convent of the Benitas. A portrait of Pisa probably
identifiable as the Kimbell painting was bequeathed by him to the convent and
recorded there in 1616 and 1623, along with other paintings by El Greco.
THOMAS LAWRENCE (1769 – 1830)
PORTRAIT OF FREDERICK H. HEMMING, C. 1824–25
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 76.2 x 64.5 cm
Framed: 104.1 x 91.4 x 12.7 cm
After the death of Sir Joshua Reynolds in 1792, Thomas Lawrence
was appointed Painter in Ordinary to King George III. Drawing inspiration from
Reynolds’s style, with its allusions to the old masters, Lawrence dominated
society portraiture in England. He was knighted in 1815 and elected president
of the Royal Academy in 1820. His accession to this office no doubt prompted
his desire to own the original design by Giovanni Cipriani for the diploma
awarded to new Royal Academicians. Cipriani’s drawing belonged to Richard
Baker, who offered to give it to Lawrence. In return Lawrence volunteered to
paint a portrait of Baker’s great-nephew, Frederick Hemming. Sittings for the
portrait were underway when Baker died and Hemming inherited his collection.
Lawrence also coveted Baker’s drawings by Raphael and offered Hemming a
companion portrait of his fiancée, Mary Anne Bloxam, in exchange for them.
Bloxam was reputedly an accomplished porcelain painter, and in her portrait
holds a brush as if busy at work; she is depicted in a modish white Grecian
dress.
CARAVAGGIO (MICHELANGELO MERISI) (1571 – 1610)
THE CARDSHARPS, C. 1595
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 94.2 x 130.9 cm
Caravaggio was one of the pivotal figures in the history of
Western art. In his short lifetime, he created a theatrical style that was as
shocking to some as it was new, inspiring others to probe their subject matter
for the drama of psychological relationships.
Apprenticed in Milan, Caravaggio came to Rome in the early
1590s. There his early masterpiece The Cardsharps came to the attention of the
influential Cardinal Francesco Maria del Monte, who not only purchased it but
also offered the artist quarters in his palace. Caravaggio was thus introduced
to the elite stratum of Roman ecclesiastical society, which soon gave him his
first significant opportunity to work on a large scale and for a public forum.
In The Cardsharps, the players are engaged in a game of
primero, a forerunner of poker. Engrossed in his cards at left is the dupe,
unaware that the older cardsharp signals his accomplice with a raised, gloved
hand (the fingertips exposed, better to feel marked cards). At right, the young
cheat looks expectantly toward the boy and reaches behind his back to pull a
hidden card from his breeches. Caravaggio has treated this subject not as a
caricature of vice but in a novelistic way, in which the interaction of gesture
and glance evokes the drama of deception and lost innocence in the most human
of terms.
The Cardsharps spawned
countless paintings on related themes by artists throughout Europe—not the
least of which was Georges de La Tour’s Cheat with the Ace of Clubs in the Kimbell.
The Cardsharps was stamped on
the back with the seal of Cardinal del Monte and inventoried among his
possessions after his death in 1627. Its location had been unknown for some
ninety years when it was rediscovered in 1987 in a European private collection.
JACQUES LOUIS DAVID (1748 – 1825)
THE ANGER OF ACHILLES, 1819
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 105.3 x
145 cm
Framed: 132.7 x 172.7 x 10.2 cm
Jacques-Louis David, the leading Neoclassical painter in Europe
during the French Revolution and under Napoleon, took exile in Brussels after
the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. There he painted and exhibited The Anger of Achilles,
which he prized highly as the culmination of his career-long efforts to
recapture the perfection of ancient Greek art.
The complex episode, which
challenged David to render a spectrum of interacting emotions from stoic
courage and calm, heroic resolve to grief and anger, is drawn from Euripides’
tragedy Iphigenia
in Aulis and Racine’s seventeenth-century dramatic version of
the same story. Agamemnon, king of the Greeks, has just revealed to the
youthful Achilles that his daughter Iphigenia is not to be married to him but
sacrificed in order to appease the goddess Diana and so allow the Greek fleet
to set sail for Troy. As Iphigenia’s mother, Clytemnestra, looks on tearfully,
Achilles angrily reaches for his sword. In David’s treatment of the subject,
Agamemnon’s magnetic gaze and authoritative gesture appear to freeze Achilles’
outburst. Apparently dressed as a bride, the angelic-looking Iphigenia clutches
her heart, oblivious to the display of male confrontation. Her mother’s
reaction, composed of disappointment at Achilles’ inability to act as well as
grief for her daughter, is apparently intended to mirror the mixed reactions
that any spectator must feel as filial, spousal, and civic duties compete with
one another.
CROUCHING APHRODITE, C. 50 B.C.–A.D. 140
According to the primal Greek myth recounted in Hesiod’s Theogony (genealogy
of the gods), Aphrodite, the goddess of love, was born of the aphros, the foam
created when Kronos threw the genitals of his father, Uranos (Heaven), into the
sea. The impregnated foam floated first to Kythera, then across the Mediterranean
to Cyprus, where the goddess was born as she stepped ashore fully grown.
Reflecting this aqueous origin, Aphrodite is frequently depicted in relation to
water—bathing, or drying herself after her bath, sometimes accompanied by a
seashell or dolphin.
PRIESTESS OF THE IMPERIAL CULT, A.D. 170–180
PERIOD: 2 ND CENTURY A.D.
Marble
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 33.6 x 27 x 24.5 cm
This head of a young woman was originally part of a full-length,
draped statue. It was formerly identified as a portrait of Faustina the
Younger, wife of the emperor Marcus Aurelius and daughter of Antoninus Pius.
But it does not conform closely to any of Faustina’s accepted numismatic or
sculptural likenesses, and is more plausibly identified as a priestess of the
imperial cult. The work is datable on stylistic grounds to the period A.D.
170–80, and the three now-headless busts emerging from the headband represented
Marcus Aurelius (reigned A.D. 161–80) and other members of the Antonine
line—perhaps Hadrian and Antoninus Pius.
FRANCOIS BOUCHER (1703 – 1770)
JUNO ASKING AEOLUS TO RELEASE THE WINDS, 1769
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 278.2 x 203.2 cm
Framed: 284.5 x 210.8 x 7.6 cm
As told by the Roman author Virgil in the first book of The Aeneid, the
goddess Juno, consumed by jealousy toward Venus, schemed to prevent the fleet
of her rival’s son, Aeneas, from reaching shore and founding a Trojan colony in
Italy. In Boucher’s faithful depiction of this myth, Juno visits Aeolus, keeper
of the winds, and urges him to unleash their fury, thus provoking a violent
storm that would destroy Aeneas’s fleet. As enticement, Juno offers Aeolus her
most beautiful nymph, Deiopea, in marriage. She aims the torch directly at his
heart as love-struck Aeolus releases the winds, while a cupid unsheathes an arrow
to target the compliant nymph, her wrists bound with pearls. The presence of an
alluring sea nymph reclining in the foreground signals the outcome: mighty
Neptune, god of the sea, will prevail over the winds, and calm the insurgent
waters.
FRANCOIS BOUCHER (1703 – 1770)
VENUS AT VULCAN’S FORGE, 1769
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 273.5 x 204.7 cm
Framed: 281.3 x 212.7 x 6.4 cm
In this canvas, Boucher goes to the heart of Virgil’s narrative
in the eighth book of The Aeneid, in which Venus induces Vulcan to forge
arms for her mortal son Aeneas, champion of the Trojans against the Greeks.
Vulcan strains forward, presenting the sword toward Venus with a sense of
urgency and yearning clearly visible on his face. Seized by passion, he is
totally under the sway of Venus, a fact Boucher stresses by the doves and putto
reclining on his lap and by the putto at Venus’s side, who aims his arrow
directly at Vulcan’s heart. Vulcan has succumbed to love, a fire more subtle
and more powerful than that with which he forges steel.
FRANCOIS BOUCHER (1703 – 1770)
MERCURY CONFIDING THE INFANT BACCHUS TO
THE NYMPHS OF NYSA, 1769
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 272.5 x 201.6 cm
Framed: 280.7 x 209.6 x 6.4 cm
At the center of this painting is the infant god Bacchus. Born
of Jupiter’s illicit union with the princess Semele, Bacchus was transported by
Mercury to Nysa for safekeeping from Juno’s jealous rage. Nestled in the clouds
beside Mercury, the eagle bearing a lightning shaft alludes to the circumstances
of Bacchus’s fiery birth. As recounted in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Zeus
had fallen in love with Semele, daughter of Cadmus and Harmonia. To punish her
wayward consort, Juno tricked Semele into asking the god to appear to her in
all his majesty. Powerless to deny her wish, Jupiter came to Semele, who was
consumed by fire. However, the baby gestating in her womb was stitched into his
father’s thigh and spirited away to Nysa as soon as he was born. In Boucher’s
painting, the nymphs marvel at the miraculous infant, whose intoxicating powers
as god of the vine are displayed by putti bearing grapes and the leaf-entwined
thyrsos with which he will lead his band of followers.
FRANCISCO DE GOYA (1746 – 1828)
PORTRAIT OF THE MATADOR PEDRO ROMERO, C. 1795–98
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: Unframed: 84.1 x 65 cm
Framed: 105.41 × 87 × 6.35 cm
Francisco de Goya, the most important Spanish painter after
Velázquez, was, like his predecessor, a master portraitist. This portrait
depicts Pedro Romero (1754–1839), one of the greatest toreadors of all time,
idolized for his courage and control as well as his handsome appearance. He was
the foremost exponent of the classical school of bullfighting established by
his family in Ronda, Andalusia. Romero posed for Goya shortly before he retired
from the bullring in 1799, at age forty-five, and several years after the
artist had become completely deaf as a result of a serious illness.
The finery of Romero’s costume does not upstage his charismatic
good looks. Goya’s study of Velázquez is apparent in the deft brushwork
defining the rich fabric of his black jacket and the silver and pearl tones of
his waistcoat, painted wet-in-wet, against the bright white of his shirt. The
composure of the figure is in keeping with Romero’s style of bullfighting; in
contrast to the recklessness of his Sevillian rivals, Romero—who was said to
have killed over five thousand bulls without suffering injury to himself—relied
on the skill and agility of his maneuvers and his elegant use of the cape,
killing the animal with a single sword-thrust. He asserted that “the
bullfighter should rely not on his feet but on his hands, and in the ring when
confronting the bulls he must kill or be killed before running or showing fear.”
ELISABETH LOUISE VIGÉE LE BRUN (1755 – 1842)
SELF PORTRAIT, C. 1781
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 64.8 x 54 cm
Framed: 86.4 x 73.7 x 12.7 cm
This youthful self-portrait depicts Elisabeth Louise Vigée Le
Brun at the age of about twenty-six, several years after she painted the first
of her many portraits of Queen Marie-Antoinette. Here she presents herself not
as an artist, with palette and brushes, but as a charming and attractive lady
of society––indistinguishable from her own patrons, including the queen and
aristocratic ladies, whom she sometimes painted in similar informal attire.
Largely self-taught, Vigée Le Brun was recommended by the queen for membership
in the Royal Academy in 1783 and soon acquired considerable fame and renown.
When shown at the Salon her paintings were “the most highly praised . . . the
topics of conversation at court and in Paris, in suppers, in literary circles."
Her radiant self-portrait highlights Vigée Le Brun’s healthy
good looks and creamy complexion, a sparkling light catching her eyes and
crystal earrings. Attentive to the latest fashions, she outfitted her sitters
in comfortable Grecian gowns and scarves. Here her simple muslin gown and
elegant scheme of white, black, and cherry, along with her loose curls of hair,
convey an appealingly glamorous persona.
THOMAS LAWRENCE (1769 – 1830)
PORTRAIT OF MARY ANNE BLOXAM
(LATER MRS. FREDERICK H. HEMMING), C. 1824–25
Oil on Panel
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 76.2 x 62.2 cm
Framed: 104.1 x 91.4 x 12.7 cm
After the death of Sir Joshua Reynolds in 1792, Thomas Lawrence
was appointed Painter in Ordinary to King George III. Drawing inspiration from
Reynolds’s style, with its allusions to the old masters, Lawrence dominated
society portraiture in England. He was knighted in 1815 and elected president
of the Royal Academy in 1820. His accession to this office no doubt prompted
his desire to own the original design by Giovanni Cipriani for the diploma
awarded to new Royal Academicians. Cipriani’s drawing belonged to Richard
Baker, who offered to give it to Lawrence. In return Lawrence volunteered to
paint a portrait of Baker’s great-nephew, Frederick Hemming. Sittings for the
portrait were underway when Baker died and Hemming inherited his collection.
Lawrence also coveted Baker’s drawings by Raphael and offered Hemming a
companion portrait of his fiancée, Mary Anne Bloxam, in exchange for them.
Bloxam was reputedly an accomplished porcelain painter, and in her portrait
holds a brush as if busy at work; she is depicted in a modish white Grecian
dress.
JACOPO BASSANO (JACOPO DAL PONTE) (1510 – 1592)
PORTRAIR OF A FRANCISCAN FRIAR, C. 1540 - 1542
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 80.5 x 69 cm
Framed: 123.8 x 113.7 x 9.2 cm
In this imposing portrait, Jacopo Bassano applies a vigorous and
sharply focused naturalism to portray the distinctive features as well as the
spiritual temperament and preoccupations of an unidentified Franciscan friar.
The skull, a reminder of the vanity of earthly life, supports
the contemplative aspect of the friar’s piety, and the pen holder that hangs
from the rope at his waist attests to his learning. A sensitive colorist,
Jacopo creates a rich tonal range, contrasting the cool gray of the wool habit
with the warm flesh areas, which derive luminosity from the reflection of the
white ground through the glazes.
Portraits of Franciscans, who avow humility in a life devoted to
prayer and penance, are not common. This early work is datable to around the
time that Jacopo painted the Saint Anne altarpiece (1541, Gallerie
dell’Accademia, Venice, on deposit in the Museo Civico, Bassano del Grappa) for
the church of the reformed Franciscans in Asolo; possibly the sitter was one of
its members.
Portrait of a Franciscan Friar,
which once belonged to the Marquess of Lansdowne, is one of three works in the
Kimbell from the Earl of Shelburne’s historic collection in Bowood House,
Wiltshire. The others are Domenichino’s Abraham Leading Isaac to Sacrifice and Jacob van
Ruisdael’s Rough
Sea at a Jetty.
CANALETTO (GIOVANNI ANTONIO CANALE) (1697 – 1768)
THE MOLO VENICE, C. 1735
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 62.3 x 101.3 cm
Framed: 85.7 x 124.8 x 7 cm
Trained by his father as a painter of theatrical scenery,
Canaletto gained international renown painting scenes of his native Venice.
These vivid and compelling cityscapes were much sought after by British
aristocrats who traveled to Italy on the Grand Tour. In this painting from the
collection of the Earl of Rosebery, Mentmore, Canaletto depicts one of his most
popular views of Venice––the Molo, a wharf just west of the Doge’s Palace. At
the far right is the column of Saint Theodore, set before the ornate library,
which is next to the Zecca (the mint where the Republic’s gold ducats, or zecchini,
were coined) and the terracotta-colored public granaries. Across the water at
the far left, marking the opening of the Grand Canal, is the church of Santa
Maria della Salute. Canaletto imposes order and balance on the busy scene,
observed from an ideally high viewpoint, omitting or adjusting architectural
motifs and bringing them into alignment.
KIMBELL ART MUSEUM
KAHN BUILDING IN DETAIL
KAHN BUILDING
IN DETAIL
EDGAR DEGAS (1834 – 1917)
DANCER STRETCHING, C. 1882–85
Pastel on Pale Blue Gray Paper
Classification: Drawing
Dimensions: Unframed: 46.7 x 29.7 cm
Framed: 67.95 × 51.75 × 6.35 cm
By 1872 Degas had begun to specialize in genre scenes of women
at work, especially music-hall performers and ballet dancers. In his paintings
of these subjects he often included background figures pausing from tedious
labors to stretch or yawn, as if to underline his goal of capturing unedited
glimpses of daily life. It has been suggested that the Kimbell drawing might
have originated as a study for a never-realized detail in one of these
multifigured paintings.
Degas, who signed works only when he sold or exhibited them (and
rarely did either), never signed this particular drawing. But the executors of
his estate stamped imitation signatures in red ink on all the works left in his
studio, and Dancer Stretching was among them. The status of
its signature aside, the drawing features many of the hallmarks of Degas’s
influential style. As if by oversight, he miscalculated the size of the figure
to that of the sheet of paper, with the result that there is no room in the
composition for her feet and the fingers of her left hand. Nor did he choose to
erase the first lines with which he searched to capture the figure’s form, even
after he had finalized his observations. The visibility of the preliminary
drawings underneath the final one seems intended to suggest how Degas needed to
rush in order to capture such a split-second subject. The smudges and leftover
lines also serve as “background” to the final figure, who inhabits not a
recognizable space, such as a ballet rehearsal room, but the sheet of drawing
paper, evolving from the marks on it as the result of an artistic process.
Degas’s decision to leave traces of this process visible—to represent not
simply a dancer but the act of drawing her—gives this work an expressly modern
character.
JOHN MIRÓ
WOMAN ADDRESSING THE PUBLIC:
PROJECT FOR A MONUMENT 1980 - 1981
Bronze
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 372.1 x 243.8 cm
Kahn Building, East Entrance
With its peculiar proportions and anatomy, Miró’s huge fantasy
monument Woman
Addressing the Public is indebted to the artist’s lifelong
study of the imaginative and expressive powers of the art of children. He first
realized its design in 1971 as a twenty-inch plaster maquette painted white,
with color accents for the eyes, arms, and sexual organs. He then made a
collage with a photograph of the maquette pasted onto a photograph of the
entrance to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, intending the work as a
monument of welcome and maternity. Unable to realize the project in Los
Angeles, Miró submitted it as a proposal for Central Park, dedicated to the
children of New York City, which did not materialize. In 1978, the Hirshhorn Museum
and Sculpture Garden, in Washington, expressed interest in commissioning the
still unrealized Woman Addressing the Public, but the project was once
again abandoned. It would be nearly a quarter of a century before his playful
“monster” would finally have a place of honor outside an important museum, the
Kimbell. The final work, cast in an edition of four when the artist was
eighty-seven, weighs roughly three tons.
The art of children was indeed a major source of inspiration for
Miró, and whimsical creatures related in appearance to Woman Addressing the Public began
to appear in his paintings and drawings in the 1920s. It was only after World
War II, however, that he began to fashion little statuettes of similar figures,
perhaps inspired by the surreal sculptures of his fellow countryman Picasso.
Miró began to develop his ideas as sculpture at full scale in the 1950s and
1960s, in effect embarking on a second career as a sculptor expressly
interested in art for public spaces. The female creature with arms outspread
was his favorite sculptural subject, and Woman Addressing the Public is
his grandest and ultimate statement of the theme.
AMEDEO MODIGLIANI (1884 – 1920)
HEAD C. 1913
Limestone
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 52.4 × 24.8 × 37.5 cm, 51 kg
Credit: Given in Honor of Ted and Lucile Weiner
by Their Daughter Gwendolyn, 2017
The Kimbell Art Museum is honored to receive the gift of a
masterpiece of modern sculpture, a carved limestone Head by the Italian artist
Amedeo Modigliani. This rare work is one of about twenty-seven surviving
sculptures by the artist. The Weiner Head is distinguished from others by its
complex balance of brutality and refinement, as the delicate head emerges from
the roughly hewn mass of the stone block. The lively and varied surface
celebrates the process of its creation: blunt gouges and sensual striations of
the sculptor’s chisels mark the tapered neck and head, countered by the sharp
incisions of the hair and more refined finish of the oval face and cheeks. Its
expressive sophistication reveals a sculptor at the height of his talents.
Although renowned today for his more numerous paintings,
Modigliani considered himself foremost a sculptor. Having left his hometown of
Livorno in 1906 to join the Parisian avant-garde and stimulated by the example
of Constantin Brancusi, who became his neighbor when he moved to a studio in
the community of Montparnasse in 1909, Modigliani championed direct carving in
stone, seeking to revitalize sculpture by returning to its ancient methods.
Scavenging limestone from construction sites including the Paris subway, he
created a series of elegantly stylized, mostly elongated heads, with slender
necks and geometric features such as almond-shaped eyes and small round or
smiling mouths.
Modigliani’s distinctive aesthetic—born from the tension between
figuration and abstraction—was inspired by a range of works that he admired in
Paris, including African, Egyptian, ancient Greek, and Cambodian statuary. His
powerful—even mystical—sculptures invoke deities or timeless beings. Seven of
the heads were displayed as a “decorative ensemble” in the 1912 Salon d’Automne
in a room with Cubist paintings. Paul Guillaume, Modigliani’s dealer, later
wrote that the artist envisioned his heads as “columns of tenderness” in a
“temple of beauty.” Around 1914, ill health and poverty forced Modigliani to
abandon sculpture and return to painting portraits and nude figures. He died at
age thirty-five of tubercular meningitis.
Oilman Ted Weiner, with his wife Lucile and their daughter
Gwendolyn, acquired important modern artworks, particularly sculpture, in the
1950s and 1960s. This major pioneering private collection was displayed in
their modernist home and garden in Fort Worth.
PIET MONDRIAN (1872 – 1944)
COMPOSITION, 1914
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 120.6 x 101.3 cm
Framed: 122.2 x 102.4 x 2.1 cm
Credit: Gift of The Burnett Foundation of Fort Worth
in Memory of Anne Burnett Tandy, 1983
From the age of fourteen, when Mondrian decided to become a
painter, he specialized in calm landscapes, often with isolated buildings and
shadowy twilight effects of dull gold and silver. Starting around 1908, he was
deeply influenced by the bright colors of Fauvism, applied in rows of
rectangular brushstrokes to indicate such textures as stonework. But his
exposure to the Cubism of Braque and Picasso in 1911 quickly converted him to
ever deeper abstraction, and brought him back to the coloration of the poetic
works of his early career. The scumbled atmospheric tones of ocher, blue gray,
and pink in Composition are typical of this development.
Mondrian moved to Paris in 1912 and developed his own luminous
style of Cubism with paintings of trees and clusters of buildings. He based a
series of compositions, including the Kimbell painting, on the complicated
geometry of the streetscape near his studio in Montparnasse. He may have been
inspired in part by Monet’s close-up images of Rouen Cathedral from the early 1890s,
each recording delicate golden, pink, and blue tones of reflected daylight. In
these Cubist-inspired works, Mondrian “drew” his subject with a scaffold of
black lines within, across, and around which he delicately added color as if
orchestrating atmospheric effects.“The masses generally find my work rather
vague,” he wrote in January 1914, around the time he painted Composition. “I
construct lines and color combinations on a flat surface, in order to express general beauty with
the utmost awareness.”
JOAN MIRÓ (1893 – 1983)
CONSTELLATION: AWAKENING IN THE EARLY MORNING, 1941
Gouache and Oil Wash on Paper
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 46 x 38 cm
Framed: 66 x 57.5 cm
Credit: Acquired With the Generous Assistance of
a Grant From Mr. and Mrs. Perry R. Bass
© 2005 Successió Miró / Artists Rights Society
(ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris
This is one of a series of twenty-three small gouache and oil
wash paintings known as the Constellations. The series evolved, surprisingly
enough, from Miró’s aspirations in the late 1930s to work on a mural scale. As
he wrote to his dealer, Pierre Matisse early in 1940: “I feel that it is one of
the most important things I have done, and even though the formats are small,
they give the impression of large frescoes.” By July 1940 Miró and his family
had fled Nazi-occupied France, where he began the series, and were living in
Majorca. It was there that the Kimbell Constellation was finished. At this time, Miró
later explained, “The night, music, and stars began to play a major role in
suggesting my paintings.”
The Constellations series was smuggled to New York,
where part of it was exhibited at the Pierre Matisse Gallery in January 1945.
Symbolic of the survival of great art in the face of the ongoing war, these
small works had important implications for American painters such as Jackson
Pollock as they created abstract compositions permeated with free-floating
lines and forms.
PABLO PICASSO (1881 – 1973)
MAN WITH A PIPE, 1911
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 90.7 x 71 cm
Framed: 113 x 95.3 x 6.4 cm
© 2019 Estate of Pablo Picasso / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New
York
In early July 1911, Picasso left Paris for Céret, a small town
in southwestern France, near the Spanish border. Braque joined him there in
August and the two painted their ultimate “Analytical Cubist” works in intense
dialogue. Analytical Cubist painting is characterized by complex linear
scaffolds—in this case long vertical lines at roughly equal intervals and sets
of isosceles triangles—and by scores of small brush marks, interlocking and
overlapping like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle in progress. While most of the marks
in Man
with a Pipe are baffling in terms of representation and serve
primarily to establish visual rhythms, a few fragments of graphic information
are legible. Easily spotted just above the middle of the painting, the white
clay pipe helps locate the man’s head, with its half-lightened, half-darkened
mustache, suggesting how one side of his face is turned toward some source of
light. The eye and nose can be discerned by extrapolating from the placement of
the mustache. A white rectangular shape at the bottom, a piece of paper,
indicates where to look for the man’s hands. Man with a Pipe presumably
represents the interior of a dimly lit, smoke-filled café—hence the letters est
detached from the word Restaurant and the letters AL to suggest JOURNAL (“newspaper”
in French).
PAUL GAUGUIN (1848 – 1903)
SELF PORTRAIT, 1885
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 65.2 x 54.3 cm
Framed: 95.3 x 84.5 x 7 cm
Gauguin assumed his role as renegade artist in 1885. Rather than
remain jobless in Copenhagen with his Danish wife and their five children, the
former stockbroker decided now to return to Paris to follow his restless
artistic conscience. Painted in Denmark just before reaching this momentous
decision in his life, this painting is both somber and defiant in mood and is
the first of the many self-portraits in which Gauguin sought to explore his
dark inner psyche.
Examination of the Kimbell painting under infrared light and
with radiographs has revealed that Gauguin made important changes in his
self-image as he developed it ever more starkly. At first he portrayed himself
in profile and included reproductions of his own paintings on the background
wall. Turned to confront the viewer in the final work, he shows himself
left-handed, like his image in a mirror, crowded in an attic space with a
slanted beam, and cold, with the lapels of his heavy jacket wrapped together.
Only his piercing eye escapes the bleak atmosphere. When he made a
self-portrait for his new friend Vincent van Gogh, in 1888, he compared himself
to Jean Valjean, the criminal hero of Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables: “It
is the face of an outlaw, ill-clad and powerful like Jean Valjean—with an inner
nobility and gentleness . . . . As for this Jean Valjean, whom society has
oppressed, cast out—for all his love and vigor—is he not equally a symbol of
the contemporary Impressionist painter? In endowing him with my own features, I
offer you—as well as an image of myself—a portrait of all wretched victims of
society who avenge us by doing good.”
GEORGES BRAQUE (1882 – 1963)
GIRL WITH A CROSS, 1911
Oil on canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 55 x 43 cm
Framed: 76.2 × 63.82 × 5.08 cm
© 2019 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris
Beginning in late 1907, Braque and his new acquaintance Pablo
Picasso began to paint objects as highly simplified geometric forms, expressing
solidarity with the most idiosyncratic tendencies in the art of
Cézanne—especially that of putting together unaligned observations of adjacent
parts. Matisse, whose own works at this time emphasized rich color, is
generally credited with coining the term “Cubism”—and he used it to describe
Braque’s overcast landscapes and shadowy still lifes. By late 1909, however, Braque
and Picasso had extended the Cubist premise to such a degree of analysis by
fragmentation that their somber gray and ocher paintings appeared mostly
abstract, except for scattered, geometric-shaped vestiges of recognizable
imagery—an eye, the bridge of a nose, a cascade of hair in curls, or a necklace
with a cross. The implication was that solid matter and the space surrounding
it had interpenetrated one another, resulting in a new visual order.
In Girl with a Cross, the head (or rather its disembodied
details) emerges like an apparition amid a rich interplay of highlighted and
shaded facets, thinly scumbled and atmospheric in mood. What appears to be a
round white ceramic pot at the right, more solidly painted than the woman,
mysteriously occupies the space where her shoulder should be. Orchestrating
details in this way, Braque creates an unprecedented visual impression of
presence, absence, and movement, all dissolved together into a single
space-time diagram.
PIET MONDRIAN (1872 – 1944)
ABSTRACTION
1939- 1942
Oil
on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 74.9
x 67.9 cm
Framed: 90.2 x 82.9 x 3.8 cm
The austerely abstract style of Mondrian’s grid paintings
restricts itself to straight horizontal and vertical lines, and the rectangular
shapes resulting from their crossing; their palette is simply black, white, and
the primaries: red, yellow, and blue. The artist’s intuitive arrangement of
these elementary pictorial means in balance and harmony expressed his concept
of “dynamic equilibrium.” He wrote: “Observing sea, sky, and stars, I sought to
indicate their plastic function through a multiplicity of crossing verticals
and horizontals. . . . The clarification of equilibrium through plastic art is
of great importance for humanity. It reveals that although human life in time
is doomed to disequilibrium, notwithstanding this, it is based on equilibrium.
It demonstrates that equilibrium can become more and more living in us.”
Begun in 1939 in London, where Mondrian had fled from Paris the
year before, Abstraction was completed in New York, where he
arrived in 1940 to escape the quickly spreading dangers of World War II. The
Axis attack on Pearl Harbor, in December 1941, took place just as he put the
finishing touches to the work for a January 1942 exhibition. In most respects Abstraction is
one of the culminating paintings in a stark, hallmark mode that Mondrian had
developed by 1921 in dialogue with his fellow Dutch artists of the De Stijl
movement. But a new sense of adventure, characteristic of Mondrian’s final New
York works, is expressed in such details as the absence of black bordering
lines for the red rectangles located along the right and bottom edges.
Abstraction retains its
vibrant, unvarnished surface and also its original frame. Mondrian himself
claimed, as far as he knew, to be the first artist to bring the painting
forward from the frame rather than setting it within; in so doing, he
eliminated the tendency of the traditional frame to lend an illusionistic depth
to the painting. The wide, recessed borders enhance the ease and safety of
handling his works and also harmonize with their spare aesthetic.
FERNARD LÉGER (1881 – 1955)
COMPOSITION C. 1920
Oil on canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 60.3 x 73.4 cm
Framed: 91.4 x 106 x 12.7 cm
Credit: ©2019 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris
Léger commonly painted several different variations on each of
his pictorial ideas, and many of the same elements in this painting appear in
four others, arranged in similar interrelationships. Aside from what appear to
be rods, wires, and the stenciled letters P, U, and V (presumably taken from
some poster or sign observed on the street), it is impossible to identify
specific objects. Judging from Léger’s more explicitly representational works
of the immediate post–World War I era, however, the colorful fragmented and
segmented forms, all geometrical in outline, are most likely related to
elements of modern machinery and architecture. Already before the war, in a
lecture presented in Paris, Léger stressed that condensation, variety, and
fragmentation were the essential visual qualities of motorized, commercialized,
twentieth-century experience and hence of modern painting.
Léger gave the Kimbell painting to his lifelong friend the poet
and art critic Blaise Cendrars, who favored the rhythms of just such fractured
and fragmentary observations in his influential writings. After the war, in
which they both saw combat, Léger provided illustrations for Cendrars’s book I Have Killed (1918).
Their close relationship is apparent in a poem entitled Construction, which
Cendrars wrote in 1919: “Color, color, and more colors . . . / Here’s Léger who
grows like the sun in the tertiary epoch. . . . Painting becomes this great
thing that moves / The wheel / Life / The machine / The human soul / A 75 mm
breech / My portrait.”
The work remained in Cendrars’s collection until acquired by the
Kimbell in 1985. As a result, its condition remains pristine; never varnished
nor relined, it provides a benchmark for understanding the delicate textures
and matte surfaces essential to Léger’s aesthetic.
EDGAR DEGAS (1834 – 1917)
AFTER THE BATH, WOMAN DRYING HER HAIR, C. 1895
Charcoal on Yellow Tracing Paper
Classification: Drawing
Dimensions: 62 x 69.3 cm
In 1855, the twenty-year-old Degas visited the acclaimed
Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, who was seventy-four at the time, to report that
a family friend had agreed to lend a painting of a nude by Ingres to an
exhibition. At this meeting the elder artist encouraged his young admirer to
draw constantly, from memory as well as from direct observation. Taking the
advice to heart, Degas throughout his career championed drawings on a par with
paintings.
Although Degas seldom dated or exhibited works after the last
Impressionist group show of 1886, this drawing of a nude’s back is among many
closely related works generally dated to the mid-1890s, when the artist’s
longtime colleagues, including Renoir, Cézanne, and Monet, were all producing
variations on single pictorial themes. Degas’s procedure was to make a drawing
of the model in charcoal, then to lay a sheet of tracing paper over this in
order to make duplicates. In the case of some images, such as After the Bath, Woman Drying
Her Hair, he repeated the process many times, creating a sequence
of sheets with identical-size figures on them, the sheets themselves varying in
size, format, and setting details.
HENRY MOORE (1898 – 1986)
FIGURE IN A SHALTER, CAST 1983
Bronze, Edition of 6
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 182.9 x 203.2 x 228.6 cm
Credit: Gift of The Burnett Foundation
© 2019 The Henry Moore Foundation
Henry Moore is one of the most important sculptors of the twentieth
century. Beginning as a carver in wood and stone, Moore moved to modeling
sculpture to be cast in bronze, taking the human form as his constant theme. A
major figure in British art, he achieved greatest fame with large-scale
commissions for public sculpture in civic spaces and in gardens across the
world.
Figure in a Shelter is a work from
the artist’s last creative phase, produced just three years before his death.
Its forms, however, go back to sculptural ideas Moore first explored in the
1930s. The “shelter” that surrounds the figure within has its origins in a
helmet-like head that Moore conceived about 1939–40, a shape in turn based on
ancient armor. Greatly expanded, the two halves of the “helmet” become an
enfolding architectural protection for the small, upright form, whose expanding
and contracting columnar shape suggests a human body.
Shelter and protection are abiding themes in Moore’s art. Many
of his best-known early sculptures show mothers and fathers holding their
children. During the air attacks on London during the Second World War, Moore
created hundreds of moving sketches and finished drawings of figures sleeping
and waiting in underground shelters. Figure in a Shelter, a large-scale bronze that is both
ominous and comforting, takes the theme to its most abstract end.
GUSTAVE CAILLEBOTTE (1848 – 1894)
ON THE PONT DE L’EUROPE, 1876 - 1877
Oil on Canvas
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 105.7 x 130.8 cm
Framed: 141.5 x 167 x 12.5 cm
Although his closest artist friends were Monet and Renoir, the
key advocates for loose brushwork and bright color, Caillebotte preferred the
sort of conventional draftsmanship and unaffected urban subjects dear to their
fellow Impressionist Degas. Like Degas, he limited himself to strictly subdued
visual means, and On the Pont de l’Europe is virtually
monochromatic, the pervasive blue tones corresponding in visual terms to the
chilling cold in which the figures stand. The man on the left with his collar
turned up and the principal figure, their backs turned toward each other, are
dressed in identical fashion. The implication, perhaps, is that modern urban
society appears no less regularized than modern engineering, with its
mass-produced prefabricated parapets, girders, and rivets. For his composition,
Caillebotte has adopted the geometric structure of the bridge, one pier of
which bisects his picture vertically into two arched bays, these each
subdivided by diagonal cross-bracing struts. The humanity of the figures
resides in their freedom to escape the rigid symmetry.
The Pont de l’Europe overlooks the Saint-Lazare train station,
which was famously portrayed by Monet in a dozen paintings made early in 1877
and included at the third Impressionist exhibition that year. It is at least
possible that Caillebotte (who soon purchased three of Monet’s variations on
the station theme) refrained from showing his masterful On the Pont de l’Europe at
the same exhibition in order not to compete.
As well as being a painter himsef, Caillebotte was the most
important early patron of the Impressionists. They invited him to be in their
second group exhibition in 1876, and later that year he wrote a will promising
his controversial collection of works by the artists he championed to the
French state. Today these works form the nucleus of the collection at the Musée
d’Orsay, Paris.
RENZO PIANO PAVILION
Surrounded
by elms and red oaks, Renzo Piano’s colonnaded pavilion stands as an expression
of simplicity and lightness—glass, concrete, and wood—some sixty-five yards to
the west of Louis I. Kahn’s signature cycloid-vaulted museum of 1972.
Piano’s low-slung,
colonnaded pavilion with overhanging eaves graciously acknowledges Kahn’s
museum building by way of its kindred height, emphasis on natural light, and
use of concrete as a primary material. The positioning of the pavilion on
the site focuses attention on the west facade of the Kahn Building, which Kahn
considered to be the main entrance.
The pavilion is made up of two sections connected by a glass passageway. The
front, or easternmost, section conveys an impression of weightlessness: a glass
roof system seems to float high above wooden beams and concrete posts. Sleek,
square concrete columns flank the central, recessed glass entrance and wrap
around three sides of the building. The tripartite facade articulates the
interior, with a spacious entrance lobby and large galleries to the north and
south.
Tucked under a green roof, the Piano Pavilion’s western section contains a
gallery for light-sensitive works of art, three education studios, a large
library with reading areas, and an auditorium with superior acoustics for
music. The latter, located below ground level, is a design centerpiece: its
raked seating faces the stage and the dramatic backdrop of a light well
animated by shifting patterns of natural light.
https://www.kimbellart.org/art-architecture/architecture/renzo-piano-pavilion
PIANO PAVILION IN DETAIL
MATERIALS
Walls made of soft,
light gray concrete unlike any concrete ever produced in the United States
appear throughout the Piano Pavilion’s exterior and interior. Tie holes appear
in the concrete walls at only 30-foot intervals, which is unusual for
architectural concrete. The resulting uninterrupted wall surfaces are ideal for
the display of works of art.
Twenty-nine pairs of
wood roof beams, weighing a total of 435 tons, span the interior and extend to
the exterior beneath the overhanging canopy. In addition to providing support
for the roof system, the 100-foot-long beams of laminated Douglas fir add
visual weight and warmth within largely continuous, changeable, and airy
interiors.
Glass lends
transparency and lightness to the pavilion. In addition to the glass roof,
natural light fills the north and south galleries through glazed walls,
offering passersby a glimpse into the art-filled areas. From the pavilion’s
entrance, five layers of glass provide a view through the lobby and garden
separating the two sections of the pavilion, into the pavilion’s rear section
with the auditorium, and out onto the light well that spans the length of the
west section of the building.
ROOF:
A defining feature
of the pavilion is one of Piano’s most elaborately engineered roof systems,
which appears to float above the massive, coupled wood beams. The roof includes
a layer of high-efficiency fritted glass supporting mechanical aluminum louvers
with built-in photovoltaic cells. The ceiling glows as sunlight filters through
the glass roof down through soft, silk-like scrims. Energy-efficient lighting
with incorporated LED technology enhances the natural light provided by the
roof.
LIGHT:
As always in his
museum designs, Piano continues to experiment with ways to animate and direct
natural light, here primarily with the complex roof system. He also channels
light and provides unexpected sight lines by slanting some of the building’s
walls, including the wall of the deep concrete light well that provides a
spectacular backdrop to the stage in the 289-seat auditorium. Canted walls also
channel light in two sets of stairwells connecting the upper and lower levels:
one leading from the pavilion’s entrance to the underground garage, and the
other descending from the upper level to the lower auditorium entrance.
GALLERY FEATURES:
In the galleries,
Piano has developed what is referred to as a “breathing floor,” in which the
entire floor functions as a vent. The floorboards, made of white oak, have been
laid with small gaps, allowing low-velocity air to flow freely through the
floor. A subtle pattern in the arrangement of the floorboards echoes the wooden
beams of the roof above, and the floor’s warm color complements the cool
concrete walls.
The moveable gallery
walls are specially designed to maintain the tranquility of the space and a
feeling of weightlessness. They are unusually thin—10 ½ inches thick—and
secured only to the floor, yet they can carry a weight of up to 1200 pounds.
Light spills beneath them, making the innovative structures appear to float.
SUSTAINABILITY:
Using only half the
amount of energy per square foot required by the Kahn Building, the new Piano
Pavilion is highly energy efficient. Much of the structure is below ground
level; only a third is above ground and requires full cooling and heating
power. Even these spaces—comprised largely of the lobby and the north and south
galleries—will benefit from the overhanging glass roof, which supports a system
of photovoltaic panels that shade direct sun and generate enough power to
offset up to twenty percent of the carbon produced by the building’s
annual operations. In addition, 450-foot-deep geothermal
wells—thirty-six in all—help to air condition the building by taking
advantage of the natural heating and cooling provided by the earth. Other
features, including lighting, air-conditioning systems, and fixtures, also
contribute to the building’s energy efficiency.
FURNISHING:
Contemporary
furniture in neutral tones of tan and white are accompanied by cherry-red
accents, all designed by the Herman Miller Company, Geiger International, and
Knoll. The auditorium is outfitted with rich red seats by the Italian design
firm Poltrona Frau.
LANDSCAPE:
RENZO PIANO BIOGRAPHY
Renowned architect
Renzo Piano has won many architecture awards, most notably the Pritzker Prize,
the AIA Gold Medal, and the Sonning Prize. The Renzo Piano Building Workshop
(RPBW), based in Genoa, Paris, and New York, employs more than a hundred
architects, engineers, and building specialists. Working with this exceptional
team, Piano has executed designs as city-defining as The Shard in
London—Europe’s tallest building—and as varied as department stores, churches,
factories, housing, university buildings, stadia, a winery, a bridge—and even a
Swatch watch.
Born into a family
of builders in the Italian port city of Genoa in 1937, Piano brings
extraordinary credentials and experience to the Kimbell. As a young man, he
worked briefly in the office of Louis I. Kahn before establishing the firm
Piano & Rogers with the dynamic young Anglo-Italian architect Richard
Rogers. Soon afterward, a brilliant young engineer, Peter Rice, invited the
partners to join him in entering an open competition to design the Centre
Georges Pompidou in Paris. The Beaubourg, as it came to be known, was a new
kind of cultural institution, conceived for a dawning era of freewheeling
multimedia aesthetics. Piano and Rogers saw an opportunity to explore bold new
architectural ideas, which Piano described as “a rebellion against the
mystification of culture.” There were 700 other entries in the competition, but
they did win it—and built it.
In 1980, Piano, now
a principal of Atelier Piano & Rice, was approached by the Schlumberger
oil-equipment heiress Dominique de Menil to design a museum in Houston to house
her impressive collection of art. She and her husband John had previously
commissioned Louis I. Kahn, but after Mr. de Menil died in 1973, Dominique de
Menil abandoned the project. When she was ready to begin again, Kahn was no
longer alive: she turned to Piano for the assignment. The result is an exposed
steel and wood pavilion, minimalist in form, which was immediately hailed as a
new milestone in museum architecture.
Since then, the
Renzo Piano Building Workshop, established in 1981, has received a steady
stream of museum commissions, including two other much-loved spaces in Texas:
the Cy Twombly Gallery, also commissioned by the Menil Collection and located
on its campus, and the Nasher Sculpture Center in Dallas. Piano also designed
what is often credited as being one of the most perfect small museums in the
world, the Fondation Beyeler outside Basel, Switzerland.
The California
Academy of Sciences in San Francisco (2008), the Modern Wing of the Art
Institute of Chicago (2009), and a new entrance to the Isabella Stewart Gardner
Museum in Boston (2012), are among other major American museum projects
realized by Renzo Piano and RPBW.
RENZO
PIANO BIOGRAPHY ….
Renzo
Piano 1998 Laureate Biography Renzo Piano is a man whose work is reinventing
architecture in projects scattered around the world—from a Mixed Use Tower in
Sydney, Australia to the mile-long Kansai Air Terminal on a man-made island in
Osaka Bay, Japan to the master plan for the reconstruction of Potsdamer Platz
in Berlin or the Beyeler Foundation Museum in Basel, Switzerland. Even this
skip around the globe does not indicate the full range or enormous output of
this prodigious architect. Renzo Piano’s projects include not only buildings
that range from homes to apartments, offices to shopping centers, museums,
factories, workshops and studios, airline and railway terminals, expositions,
theatres and churches; but also bridges, ships, boats, and cars, as well as
city planning projects, major renovations and reconstructions, and even
television star of a program on architecture.
He
was born into a family of builders in Genoa, Italy in 1937. His grandfather,
his father, four uncles and a brother were all contractors, and he admits, he
should have been one too, but instead chose architecture. Piano declares his
architecture has an important legacy—a passion for construction, or more
pointedly, a culture of doing, resulting from growing up in a family of
builders.
He
was seventeen when he approached his father with the idea of going to
architecture school. “Why do you want to be just an architect? You can be a
builder,” was his father’s response that has never been forgotten. Perhaps that
is the reason for the name Renzo Piano Building Workshop, rather than Piano
Architects & Associates. Explains Piano, “We not only design things there,
but we also make things, and test them. Keeping some of the action together with
the conception makes me feel a little less like a traitor to my family. The
name is also a deliberate expression of the sense of collaboration and teamwork
that permeates our work.” It was in 1980 that the Building Workshop was formed,
and now has offices in Paris, Genoa and Berlin employing approximately a
hundred people in the three locations.
Following
his graduation from Milan Polytechnic Architecture School in 1964, he worked in
his father’s construction company, designing under the guidance of Franco
Albini. In addition to his 15th century idol, Brunelleschi, Piano pays homage
to Jean Prouvé‚ of France with whom he formed a friendship during the time
(1965-70) that he worked in the offices of Louis Kahn in Philadelphia and Z. S.
Makowsky in London. Two other important influences he acknowledges were
Buckminster Fuller and Pier Luigi Nervi, albeit from afar.
While
still studying in Milan, he married a girl he had known from school days in
Genoa, Magda Arduino. Their first child, Carlo, was born in 1965. He is now a
journalist. Another son followed three years later, Matteo, who is an
independent industrial designer; and a third child, daughter Lia, now 25, is
pursuing a career in architecture.
His
first important commission was in 1969 to design the Italian Industry Pavilion
at Expo ‘70 in Osaka. His late brother, Ermanno, built and installed the
pavilion and a number of other projects before his premature death in 1993.
The
Expo project attracted much favorable attention, including that of another
young architect named Richard Rogers, who although born in Florence was
English. The two architects found that they had a great deal in common and when
an engineering firm suggested that they work together and enter the
international competition for the Georges Pompidou Center (also known as
Beaubourg) in Paris; they did and won.
The
result was a hundred thousand square meters (over a million square feet) in the
heart of Paris, devoted to the figurative arts, music, industrial design, and
literature. In the two decades since it opened, over a 150,000,000 people have
visited it, averaging more than 25,000 people per day—an overwhelming
success—both with the people of Paris and the international media. Both Rogers
and Piano became recognizable names throughout the world.
Described
often as “high tech,” Piano prefers other modifiers. In his own words,
“Beaubourg was intended to be a joyful urban machine, a creature that might
have come from a Jules Verne book, or an unlikely Renzo Piano, 1998 Laureate
(continued) 2 looking ship in dry dock. Beaubourg is a provocation, an apt
description of my feelings, but has no negative connotations as far as the
quality of the design and the reasons behind it are concerned. Beaubourg is a
double provocation: a challenge to academicism, but also a parody of the
technological imagery of our time. To see it as high-tech is a
misunderstanding.”
In
the introduction to the book, Renzo Piano, Buildings and Projects 1971-1989,
Pulitzer Prize winning architecture critic Paul Goldberger wrote, “Like any
artist who produces a celebrated work early in his career, Renzo Piano has in
many ways been more confined than liberated by the Centre Beaubourg, known
primarily as the architect who installed this high-tech spoof at monumental scale
into the heart of Paris.” And then referring to more recent projects such as
the Menil Collection museum in Houston, Texas; the 60,000 seat football stadium
in Bari, Italy; and the multi-functional complex of the giant Fiat factory at
Lingotto near Turin, Italy, Goldberger continues: “(there is) the presence in
all of these projects of a light, tensile quality and an obvious love of
technology. But where the expression of technology at Beaubourg was broad and
more than a little satirical, in the buildings since Beaubourg, it has been
straighter, quieter, and vastly more inventive.”
One
of the casualties of the Beaubourg project, which required years of living in
Paris, however, was Piano’s marriage. His wife preferred to live in Genoa, and
so they separated. In 1989, he met Emilia (Milly) Rossato when she came to work
for his Renzo Piano Building Workshop. They were married in 1992 by Jacques
Chirac, then the Mayor of Paris who supported the construction of Beaubourg
through many crises. They live in Paris next door to their office there, just a
few blocks from Pompidou in the Marais district. In actual fact, they divide
their time between Paris and Genoa, with frequent trips to his many projects
around the world.
In
1995, Piano was called upon to renovate the Centre Georges Pompidou. The
popularity of the place has taken its toll. The library and exhibition spaces
are being expanded, and the public spaces reorganized. Plans call for a
reopening on the eve of the new millennium, December 31, 1999, as Grand Beaubourg.
Two
other projects closely related to the Beaubourg are the IRCAM Extension and the
Reconstruction of the Atelier Brancusi, both on the same Centre Pompidou
square. The former’s initials in French stand for Pierre Boulez’s Institute of
Musical Research which is actually attached to the Pompidou. The need for the
greatest possible soundproofing originally led IRCAM to excavate a space
underneath the square for its various sound labs and studios. The only visible
evidence that it was there was a glass ceiling and a few elements of the
ventilation system. The need for more space, a desire to emphasize the
institute’s role and image, prompted the extension which consists of a tower
six stories above ground and three below. It fills an angle left between two
existing buildings at the edge of the square.
When
Constantin Brancusi died, his will left all his work - sculptures, drawing,
paintings, photographs—to the French state on the condition that they remain in
his studio. In the 1950’s the area occupied by his studio was demolished to
make way for other things. Piano was given the task of rebuilding Atelier
Brancusi on the square of Centre Pompidou. “What we did,” says Piano, “was
reproduce the sensation of being surrounded by an explosion of art made up of
many pieces in different stages of development.”
It
was in 1982, that the now late Dominique Schlumberger de Menil, widow of John,
contacted Piano to design a museum in Houston to house the 10,000 works of
primitive and modern art in the Menil Collection. Completed in1986, it has
achieved universal high praise, and is often cited as Piano’s finest work.
Embodying the idea of a “museum village,” i.e. it is made up of several
buildings, the construction is large, but not monumental, and rises no higher
than its neighboring small houses. The walls are built of planks of wood
attached to a metal framework.
Perhaps
the most distinguishing aspect of the Menil Collection is the roof of the
exhibition spaces, made up of repeating modular elements described as “leaves.”
Each leaf is a very thin section of reinforced concrete integrated with a steel
lattice girder. They function as roof, ventilation and light Renzo Piano, 1998
Laureate (continued) 3 control efficiently. In his book titled Logbook, Piano
states, “Paradoxically, the Menil Collection with its great serenity, its calm,
and its understatement, is far more ‘modern,’ scientifically speaking, than
Beaubourg. The technological appearance of Beaubourg is parody. The technology
used for the Menil Collection is even more advanced (in its structures,
materials, systems of climate control), but it is not flaunted.”
Some
five years later, Piano was called upon to make an addition to this museum
village—a small (approximately 11,000 square feet) gallery to house a permanent
exhibition of the pictures and sculptures of Cy Twombly. Built of modest
materials, the Cy Twombly Gallery has an outer facing of ochre-toned concrete,
the building is devoted entirely to exhibition space with floors of natural
American oak. All the galleries in the building are illuminated by natural
light (except the one in the center). The roof takes the form of a series of
superimposed layers that filter the light. The top layer is a metal grating,
then comes a layer of solar deflectors and a layer of fixed skylights.
Immediately above the exhibition space is a fabric layer. All the systems for
controlling the deflectors are electronic.
The
year before he began work on the Houston de Menil Collection, he was hired to
transform the Schlumberger industrial plant on the outskirts of Paris. The
company made measurement systems for fluids, and including a device to detect
the presence of oil underground. What were mechanical devices were being
replaced by electronic ones. Piano’s plan called for the demolition of part of
the old workshop, where a park was laid out over a parking facility with space
for a thousand cars. Some of the original buildings were retained but
restructured as offices and laboratories. Although the electronic plant in Paris
and the Houston museum were totally unrelated, it is interesting to note that
Mrs. Dominique de Menil was a member of the Schlumberger family of France
before marrying and moving to Texas.
“While
working on the Menil Collection in Texas,” Piano recalls, “we made a little
machine—which we called a bit pompously, ‘the solar machine’—that would allow
us in Genoa to find out the position of the sun in Houston. We also built
one-to-ten scale models, which we put in the garden to study the diffusion of
light. All the projects that come out of the Building Workshop have stories of
similar experiments.”
Piano
went on to relate that Brunelleschi, who is Piano’s favorite architect from
history, studied the mechanism of the clock so that he could apply it to a
system of great counterweights which in turn was used to raise the beams for
the dome of the Florence Cathedral.
“Knowing
how to do things not just with the head,” says Piano, “but with the hands as
well: this might seem a programmatic and ideological goal. It is not. It is a
way of safeguarding creative freedom. If you intend to use a material, a
construction technique, or an architectural element in an unusual way, there is
always a time when you hear yourself saying, ‘It can’t be done,’ simply because
no one has ever tried before. But if you have actually tried, then you can keep
going - and so you gain a degree of independence in design that you would not
have otherwise.”
Reflecting
on the building of the Centre Pompidou, Piano elaborated the point, “We had to
make a structure out of pieces of cast metal. The entire French steel industry
rose up in arms: it refused point-blank, saying that a structure like that
wouldn’t stay up. But we were sure of our facts, and passed the order on to the
German company Krupp. And so it was that the main structure of the Centre
Pompidou was made in Germany, even if the girders had to be delivered at night,
almost in secret. This was one case in which technique protected art. Our
understanding of structures set free our capacity for expression.”
In
1979, Habitat, an educational television program was produced by RAI, the
Italian government television network, starring Piano, who says, “We set out to
explain to the non-specialist audience the principles of construction, a few
simple experiments on structures and materials. I tried to get Renzo Piano,
1998 Laureate (continued) 4 the message across not to be overawed by
architecture, explaining that this century has produced impressive structures
because it has developed fantastic machinery for building. But innovation in
process does not necessarily entail high technology in construction. There is
very little today that can bear comparison to the structural and formal
research that went into a 15th century church.”
……………………………………..
…………..………………………….
You
may read whole biography from to click below link to reach pdf version of file
…….
https://www.pritzkerprize.com/laureates/1998
http://www.rpbw.com/story/philosophy-of-rpbw
MALE FIGURE, C. 195 B.C.–A.D. 205
PERIOD: C. 500 B.C.–A.D. 500
Terracotta
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 49.5 x 22.2 x 16.8 cm
Nok terracottas are the earliest known sculptures from ancient
Nigeria. Sculptures of this kind were first discovered in 1943 by Bernard Fagg
near the northern Nigerian village of Nok, after which the culture that
produced them was named.
The highly skilled Nok artisans created images of great power,
beauty, and sophistication. This commanding male figure represents the fully
developed Nok style, characterized here by the expressively modeled head with
finely detailed features—especially the lips, mouth, beard, and coiffure—and
carefully defined costume. The complex hairstyle, characteristic of Nok pieces,
is composed of three rows of seven conical buns, with larger hemispherical caps
over the ears. The importance of jewelry in Nok culture is illustrated by the
elaborate costume, here meticulously detailed and lavishly adorned with
necklaces, jewelry, and beaded chains. The appearance of a horn, slung around
the back of the shoulders, may identify the figure as a spiritual specialist
(shaman). The figure is broken at the waistline, but may have originally been
kneeling. Animated and compelling, this is one of the masterpieces of Nok
sculptural art.
CENSER STAND WITH HEAD OF A SUPERNATURAL
BEING WITH A KAN CROSS, C. A.D. 690-720
PERIOD: LATE CLASSIC (A.D. 600-900)
Ceramic With Traces of Pigments
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 114 × 54.6 × 29.2 cm
Monumental ceramic censer stands are some of the finest and
largest freestanding sculptures created by Maya artists. The sophistication and
craftsmanship demonstrated in this stand are indicative of Palenque, an
important Maya city-state located in current-day Chiapas, Mexico, that
flourished in the seventh century. Ceramic censers (incensarios) were an
important component of ritual paraphernalia and ceremonial life at Palenque.
They were used to represent and venerate divine beings, primarily the deities of
the Palenque triad (called GI, GII, and GIII). Censers were composed of a stand
and a brazier-bowl (now missing), which was placed on top and used for burning
copal incense. The stands were elaborately embellished with a variety of
iconographic elements, most often featuring the Jaguar God of the Underworld
(GIII). For the Maya, the center of the universe was the Axis Mundi, or World
Tree, which had roots growing deep in the sea under the earth and branches that
rose to support the heavens. Symbolically, the tubular bodies of the censers
formed cosmic trees that made the movement of deities through the cosmos
possible during ritual acts.
This censer stand is sculpted with a vertical tier of five
heads. The lowest head is an unidentified reptilian, surmounted by a head that
may be a human in the guise of a deity, probably the Jaguar God of the
Underworld. This head has an open mouth with a cut-off jaw. The inside of the
mouth is marked with a Kan Cross (X) and resembles the entrance of a temple.
This principal head is topped by Itzamye, the serpent-bird, indicating a
symbolic shift to the branches of the World Tree (Axis Mundi) in the celestial
realm. The two upper reptilian heads are versions of the Jester God, who
resided in the upper heavens. The side flanges of this censer stand are
decorated with a variety of motifs that include (from top to bottom) jewels
with bird-shaped heads and ribbons, stylized crocodile ears, crossed and
knotted bands, and ornamented ear spools. Traces of the original blue, red, and
white pigments are still present on the surface.
KNEELING MOTHER AND CHILD, LATE 19 TH CENTURY
Among the few East African peoples who make sculptures in any
quantity, the Makonde produce unusually naturalistic figures. A strong
sensuality in the representation of the body is complemented by the attention
given to intricate detailing, which often centers on an elaborate coiffure or
tribal markings. These designs are viewed by the Makonde people as indications
of rank, status, and identity, as well as decoration—Makonde females are
scarified as they pass to adulthood.
HEAD, POSSIBLY A KING, 12th–14th CENTURY
Terracotta With Residue of Red Pigment and Traces of Mica
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 26.7 x 14.5 x 18.7 cm
The art of Ife, which flourished from the twelfth to the
fifteenth century in southwestern Nigeria, in the area occupied by the Yoruba
people, is unique in Africa in representing human beings with extraordinary
naturalism. The subject matter of most Ife art is centered around royal figures
and their attendants, reflecting the political structure of a city-state ruled
over by a divine king, the Oni of Ife. Sculpted heads were buried in the ground
at the foot of giant trees and resurrected when they were used ritually as
offerings or sacrifices, sometimes on an annual basis. Ife bronzes and
terra-cottas have been recovered from groves containing sacred shrines, from
crossroads, and from older sections of the Ife palace compound.
The physiognomy of this head has been modeled with extraordinary
subtlety, and the striations, which may represent scarification patterns, are
incised with great delicacy. The square crown, formed of four rectangular
aprons overlying a conical form and embellished with a network of intersecting
beads, is unparalleled in any other known examples of Ife art. Like the vast
majority of Ife heads in terra-cotta, the Kimbell example seems to have been
broken from a full-length figure. The serene and dignified countenance, as well
as the elaborate crown, suggests that this head represents an Ife king (Oni).
DIVINER’S MASK, EARLY 20th CENTURY
Wood, organic materials
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 22.8 x 16.8 x 10.7 cm
Among the Yombe people, masks were used in divination
ceremonies, through which past or future events were revealed. This example was
worn by a nganga diphomba, a divination specialist devoted
primarily to the detection of members of the community responsible for various
crimes, accidents, and other disasters. The diphomba prosecuted
anti-social acts, and during a ritual trial functioned as the vehicle for the
verdict of the ancestral spirit. Yombe masks are generally regarded as
idealized representations of the diviners who wore them, but the closed eyes,
parted lips, and overall expression of intense concentration on the Kimbell
mask lend it a sense of heightened realism.
The mask’s crusted, black surface is the result of its having
been stored in the rafters of a building where it was exposed to the oils and
smokes of cooking. The black color of the mask is also associated with judgment
and divination. Had it been reused, it would almost certainly have been cleaned
and repainted as a part of its preparation for receiving the spirit. Some masks
have relatively blank countenances and depend upon costume and context—dance,
chant, and even speech—to create personality. Others, such as this Yombe mask,
seem aglow with character.
MALE FACE, C. A.D. 700–900
PERIOD: LATE CLASSIC PERIOD (A.D. 600–900)
Stucco With Traces of Paint
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 26 x 22.7 x 16.5 cm
Modeled in high relief, this stucco head was originally an
architectural ornament for a state ceremonial building. Probably the portrait
of an important official, the face has the high-bridged nose characteristic of
the Maya, as well as shallow eye sockets and irregular features. Traces of
brown and red pigment indicate that the rough stone was covered originally with
a smooth plaster finish before being painted.
HACHIMAN IN THE GUISE OF A BUDDHIST PRIEST, 11th
CENTURY
PERIOD: HEIAN PERIOD (794–1185)
Polychromed Wood
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 48.9 x 41 x 32 cm
The Shinto god Hachiman has enjoyed special prominence
throughout Japanese history. He was originally a local military guardian,
protecting an agricultural and mining community in Usa. Since his legendary
birthplace in Japan was near south China, a possible source of military
threats, Japanese rulers came to rely upon him for protection against that
danger. In this role, Hachiman became known as the Shinto god of war.
The Kimbell’s figure of Hachiman reflects a complex theological
transformation that occurred when the Japanese sought to reconcile Buddhism, a
foreign religion, with native Shinto beliefs. Shinto gods could symbolically
enter the Buddhist priesthood, thereby acquiring a dual identity. In this
image, Hachiman is dressed as a Buddhist priest. Seated in a meditative
position, wearing a monk’s robe, his head shaven, and carrying a jewel in his
left hand, he resembles representations of the bodhisattva Kshitigarbha (in
Japanese, Jizo), reflecting the fact that Shinto images shared the same
stylistic features as Buddhist sculpture of the period. Carved from a solid
block of wood, the figure’s generously proportioned chest, shoulders, and legs
impart a monumentality that belies the sculpture’s relatively small size, while
the slight tilt of the head imparts a touch of naturalism.
HEAD OF JINA, 11th CENTURY
PERIOD: MEDIEVAL PERIOD (C. 600–1200)
Gray Pink Sandstone
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 77.1 x 66.7 x 53.3 cm
Credit: Gift of Ben Heller, New York
Jainism,the
most passionately nonviolent of all religions,has been continuously practiced
in India for more than 2,500 years. Its name comes from the word jina, which means
“liberator” or “victor.” The twenty-four jinas of the Jain
pantheon provide spiritual role models for devout Jains, who aspire to achieve
nirvana, or moksha—a state of liberation from the karmic cycle of
rebirth—through a combination of meditation, devotional ritual, and religious
austerities.The historical founder of Jainism is Mahavira, the most recent of
the twenty-four jinas and a contemporary of the Buddha
Shakyamuni.
This
massive head, originally part of a colossal sculpture, represents one of the
twenty-four jinas. It was produced during the medieval period, when followers
of the Jain faith had grown into a large and f lourishing community, especially
in Rajasthan and Gujarat, where they built numerous mountaintop shrines and
temples.The petal- shaped eyes, curving brows, and full lips are typical of the
medieval sculptural tradition of northern India, which adhered to proportions
prescribed in iconographic texts.The snail-shell curls and elongated, pierced
earlobes are conventions shared by images of the Buddha, but the absence of a
cranial protuberance (ushnisha) and dot between the eyes (urna)
confirms that this is an image of a jina.
https://www.kimbellart.org/collection/ag-196801
SEATED NYOIRIN KANNON, C. 1230 - 1250
PERIOD: KAMAKURA PERIOD (1185–1333)
Wood With Traces of Gilt and Pigment
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 48.3 x 45.7 x 25.4 cm
Kannon is the Japanese name for the Indian Buddhist deity
Avalokiteshvara, the bodhisattva of compassion. Because of the boundless love
he offered to all beings, this was the most popular of all the Buddhist deities
throughout Asia. The Nyoirin Kannon, a prominent deity in the Japanese Esoteric
Buddhist pantheon, is one of the six “changed forms” of the bodhisattva Kannon
especially associated with the granting of desires. The word nyo-i refers
to the cintamani, the wish-granting jewel; the term rin,
which means “wheel,” refers to the turning of the wheel of the law. The Nyoirin
Kannon was widely worshiped by those who hoped to gain riches and see their
requests fulfilled.
This gracious image shows the deity seated in a pose of royal
ease. Although drawings frequently depict this god as a bodhisattva with two
arms, the six-armed form was also popular in Japan. As in this sculpture, one
hand is often shown touching the cheek, with a left arm braced against the
lotus pedestal (now missing). Of the other four arms, one of the right hands
holds the jewel, and one of the left hands holds a lotus. The raised left arm
would originally have had a wheel balanced on the upright finger, and the
lowered right arm would have held a rosary.
FOUR ARMED GANESHA, 5th–6th CENTURY A.D.
PERIOD: GUPTA (320–600)
Terracotta Relief
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 49.1 x 67.9 x 20.6 cm
Ganesha is the elephant-headed son of Shiva, one of the three
most important deities of the Hindu pantheon, and his consort, the goddess
Parvati. He is widely worshiped as the remover of obstacles and the bestower of
good fortune, prosperity, and health. The origin of his hybrid body—consisting
of an elephant’s head with one tusk and an infant’s torso with distended
belly—is related in Hindu legends. Parvati is said to have created Ganesha in
human form to act as her door guardian. When he refused to admit Shiva to
Parvati’s chamber, the god cut off the child’s head. In order to placate the
distressed Parvati, Shiva replaced the head with that of the first living thing
he could find—an elephant. Hindu deities are often depicted with multiple heads
and arms, a physical expression of the multiplicity of their superhuman powers.
Due to the damaged condition of this superb terra-cotta relief, it is no longer
possible to identify the deity’s usual attributes—an axe, a rosary, and a bowl
of sweetmeats—which would have been held in his hands. The serpent hanging
across his torso signifies his relationship to Shiva, who also bears this
attribute.
Many Hindu brick temples were decorated with terracotta plaques
such as this one. The plaques are distinguished by their naturalistic modeling,
well illustrated in the sensuous and powerful sculpting of this image, which is
unusually expressive, and notable also for its large size and early date.
EDO PERIOD (1615–1868)
COURTESAN PLAYING THE SAMISEN, C.1785
Hanging Scroll; Ink and Gold on Silk
Classification: Hanging scroll
Dimensions: 39.4 x 49.5 cm
This painting is a late masterwork by Isoda Koryusai, who was an
important and prolific ukiyo-e painter and printmaker in the
last quarter of the eighteenth century, a time when Koryusai and other artists
showed a keen fascination with the natural world. In the Kimbell’s painting,
the intimate scene of a courtesan and her attendant in a teahouse overlooking a
river subtly suggests the elegance and entertainment of the pleasure quarters.
The bamboo shade that is being rolled up by the young attendant indicates that
the weather is warm, while the chrysanthemums decorating the kimono of the
courtesan signal the end of summer and the approach of autumn. The wind gently
blows ripples across the water. Reflecting the most current modes, the two
women wear a popular hairstyle of the period, in which the side locks billowed
out, taking on the abstract form of a lantern top or open fan. The richly
patterned textiles and the strong diagonal formed by the railing of the
verandah make this monochromatic painting a work of unusual sophistication and
visual appeal.
URN IN THE FORM OF COCIYO, GOD OF LIGHTNING AND
RAIN, C. A.D. 400–500
PERIOD: EARLY CLASSIC (A.D. 250–600)
Ceramic
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 72.4 x 53.3 x 45.7 cm
The primary capital of Zapotec culture was the ceremonial site
of Monte Albán (in the modern state of Oaxaca), where the Zapotecs worshipped a
complex pantheon of nature gods. Zapotec culture is divided into four stages,
each associated with the style of gray-ware effigy urns they placed with their
honored dead.
This urn represents Cociyo, the Zapotec god of lightning and
rain, identified by an amalgam of facial elements forming a powerfully
sculptural mask. The stepped, two-part forms enclosing the eyes represent
clouds and, by extension, the precious water needed to grow crops. The doubly
plugged nasal extension is a development from earlier snouted deity elements
that combine jaguar and snake allusions—the roar of the jaguar with the
reverberation of thunder. The three fangs that protrude from this snout cover a
bifurcated tongue, like the almost invisibly flashing tongue of a snake; the
snake’s tongue symbolizes the lightning bolt. The broad mouth with drawn-back
lips is derived from Olmec prototypes, among which would have been images of
the baby rain god. The rest of the dress is as much that of a priest as of a
deity, with the large disk-shaped earplugs and the knotted collar of high rank.
The striations of the cape may be intended to represent feathers. The kilt is
decorated with a wavelike pattern, with three attached tassels at the bottom.
The ensemble thus echoes the various natural phenomena of a tropical mountain
thunderstorm.
STELA A RULER, A.D. 692
PERIOD: LATE CLASSIC (A.D. 600–900)
Limestone
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 272.7 x 173.7 cm
The Maya were prolific makers of carved stone-slab monuments, or
stelae, which were normally set up within architectural complexes and most
often portray specific, named individuals who were members of the hereditary
dynasties that ruled Maya city-states. This imposing figure is identified by
the accompanying inscriptions as K’inich B’alam (Sun-Faced Jaguar), ruler of El
Perú. The Kimbell stela was once part of a sculptural ensemble of three stelae
displayed in a plaza at El Perú. The central monument, now in the Cleveland
Museum of Art, represents on the same scale an equally intimidating woman, who
may represent K’inich B’alam’s wife. The third stela still in situ portrays an
unidentified male figure. The principal event commemorated by the Kimbell and
Cleveland stelae is the ending in A.D. 692 of a k’atun, or twenty-year
period, a date of special importance in the structure of Maya rulership.
The primary elements of K’inich B’alam’s costume were intended
to situate the Maya ruler not just locally and in his historic role but, more
importantly, in his relation to the gods and the cosmos. The main headdress
element, repeated in the ruler’s anklets, is the head of the Water-lily Snake,
a deity symbolizing standing bodies of water and the earth’s abundance, and
patron god of the number thirteen. The several representations of fish leaping
toward water-lily blossoms—at the top of the headdress and, less recognizably,
at the back of the headdress and at either knee––reinforce this symbolism.
Through these devices the ruler is shown as guarantor of agricultural success. The
mosaic mask represents a jeweled serpent, and the round shield he grasps in his
left hand emphasizes the war role of Maya rulers. Partly hidden by his left
thigh is a deified perforator, used by the ruler at important period endings,
like this one, to shed blood from his penis as an offering to the gods.
SEATED ARHAT, C. 1300–1450
PERIOD: LATE YUAN TO EARLY MING DTNASTY
(1279–1368/1368–1644)
Cast Iron, Traces of Pigment
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 78 x 50.5 x 40.7 cm
This engaging portrait of a monk represents an arhat (in
Chinese, lohan), one of a group of “perfected beings” who, in the
Buddhist faith, were the original disciples of Shakyamuni Buddha. Like
bodhisattvas, arhats have attained perfection but have delayed entering nirvana
and becoming buddhas so that they may aid others in seeking enlightenment.
Arhats were regarded as having achieved extraordinary spiritual levels that
endowed them with superhuman capabilities. Usually appearing in groups of four,
sixteen, eighteen, or even as many as five hundred or a thousand, the arhats were
depicted as monks and ascetics, sometimes with exaggerated features such as
long eyebrows or domed heads, and some were associated with particular
attributes. Although lists identifying each arhat exist, the descriptions are
generally vague, and precise identifications of individual figures are
difficult.
The realism and humanity in the Kimbell arhat’s face contrast
with the simplified but rhythmical form of the body to produce a portrait of
great character and presence. An inscription on the back of the statue names a
large group of donors who commissioned and paid for the work, and gives the
name of the temple, Yuhua, in Shanxi province, to which it was donated, and
where it may have been installed as part of a larger group of arhat portraits.
BODHISATTVA KHASARPANA LOKSHVARA, C. 11th–12th
CENTURY
PERIOD: PALA PERIOD (750–1174)
Gray schist
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 124.9 x 80.3 x 35.9 cm
The increasing complexity of imagery and iconographic detail in
late Pala art paralleled the growing popularity of Esoteric Buddhism in eastern
India. Khasarpana Lokeshvara, the Esoteric form of the immensely popular
bodhisattva of compassion, Avalokiteshvara, was created by the absorption of
Hindu elements into Buddhism and appears frequently in Pala art. In this stela,
the youthful, bejeweled figure is seated on a double-lotus throne, surrounded
by lotus blossoms and the deity’s four standard attendants: the goddesses Tara
and Bhrikuti to the left and right of the bodhisattva’s knees; and, on the
base, the needle-nosed Sucimukha, who imbibes the nectar of grace, at the left
rear, and the plump, fearsome Hayagriva at the right front. In addition, the
princely Sudhanakumara, who carries a book under his left arm, is shown at the
front left of the base, while two tiny figures of the donor couple are shown
kneeling behind Hayagriva. Due to damage to the upper part of the stela, only
one remains from the figures of the five jina Buddhas, the rulers of the
Buddhist universe. The elegant proportions, attenuated waistline, richly carved
surface decoration, complex iconography, and almost feminine poise of the
bodhisattva are hallmarks of the mature Pala style.
XIPE TOTEC, C. 900–1200
PERIOD: POSTCLASSIC PERIOD (900–1521)
Ceramic
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 40 x 16.8 x 9.8 cm
Xipe Totec, the Aztec god of spring and regeneration, appears in
many Mesoamerican cults. A fertility deity, Xipe Totec vividly conveys the
concept of death and rebirth by wearing the flayed skin of a sacrificial
victim. Meaning literally “our lord, the flayed one,” Xipe Totec is also
associated with the arrival of spring, when the earth covers itself with a new
coat of vegetation and exchanges its dead skin for a new one. During the
corn-planting festival, Xipe Totec was worshipped by a priest who, dressed in
the skin of a flayed victim, ritually enacted the death-and-renewal cycle of
the earth. Xipe Totec was the divine embodiment of life emerging from the dead
land and of the new plant sprouting from the seed.
In this sculpture, the face of a living being is seen behind the
mouth and eye openings of the sacrificial victim, whose skin is laced together
by cords at the back of the wearer’s skull. Similar lacing is also seen on the
chest, amid the vigorously articulated body covering. This clay sculpture of
Xipe closely resembles Aztec stone figures in the smooth modeling, sturdy body,
and rounded lips and eyes.
WREATHED MALE HEAD, C. 500–475 B.C.
PERIOD: ARCHAIC (700–475 B.C.)
Sandstone
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 16 x 12.5 cm
Crowned with a laurel wreath symbolic of victory, this small head was carved during the most creative period of Cypriot art, when the island of Cyprus was a mercantile crossroads between East and West. The sculpture reflects this confluence: the idealized facial structure and enigmatic smile resemble contemporary Greek sculpture, while the wide, almond-shaped eyes and tightly knotted curls bespeak a Near Eastern influence.
STANDING BUDDHA SHAKYAMUNI, 7th CENTURY
PERIOD: LICCHAVI (400-750)
Gilded Copper
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 50.2 x 20.3 x 8.6 cm
This slim, richly gilded figure represents the historical
Buddha, Shakyamuni, Sage of the Shakya clan. He displays a number of the
physical signs that had come to represent the Buddha’s divinity—the cranial
protuberance (ushnisha), elongated earlobes, three parallel folds in the
neck, webbed fingers and toes, and palms marked by a wheel. He stands in a
graceful pose with the weight on the right leg and the hip thrust gently out.
The smooth, fleshy contours of the body are revealed by a thin, clinging
garment with cascading pleats delineated into a threadlike surface design. The
upper end of the robe is gathered in the left hand, the right bestowing the
gesture of charity (varadamudra).
Lichchhavi Buddha images were directly inspired by Indian
Gupta-period (A.D. 320–600) images. This sculpture reveals the mannered
elegance, introspective expression, and taut but smooth modeling characteristic
of Gupta Buddhas. The “snail-shell” pattern of curled hair, the half-closed
eyes, and the lack of an urna between the eyebrows are also
typical Gupta features. The Nepalese origin of the sculpture is most evident in
the expression of the face. The important inscription on the base is in a
script derived from Gupta India that was in use in Nepal during the Lichchhavi
period.
PRESENTATION OF CAPTIVES TO A MAYA RULER, C. A.D. 785
PERIOD: LATE CLASSIC PERIOD (A.D. 600–900)
Limestone With Traces of Paint
Classification: Sculpture
Dimensions: 115.3 x 88.9 cm
This carved relief probably served as a wall panel inside a Maya
building or as a lintel over an entrance. It depicts the presentation of
captives in a palace throne room, indicated by swag curtains at the top of the
panel. The five figures are the Yaxchilan king, seated at top left, his sahal (a
military chief) on the right, and three bound captives in the lower left. The
glyphic text, which gives a date of 23 August 783, records the capture of a
lord and a sacrificial bloodletting three days later under the auspices of the
king. The three prisoners may be scribes; the one in front holds a
“stick-bundle” associated with Maya scribes, and all three wear headdresses
with hun (book) knots. All figures but the leftmost captive
are identified by name. The inscription on the throne front, of special
interest, is carved with the king’s name and titles; the glyphs are inscribed
in reverse order, from right to left.
The name of the artist responsible for sculpting the relief
appears on the vertical panel of four glyphs under the sahal’s outstretched
arm. Signed works of Maya art are rare, and the signature on this relief
suggests that it was considered of great value in its time.
MINIATURE CASKET, C. 1250–1300
PERIOD: 13th CENTURY
Champlevé Enamel on Copper
Classification: Metalwork
Dimensions: 9 x 7.7 x 4.2 cm
The enameled decoration of this fine casket, produced in
Limoges, features scrolling vines with fleurons on all four sides and lozenge
patterns on the pitched roof. The enameled copper plaques of reliquaries are
normally nailed to a wooden core; the absence of such a wooden carcass, along
with the miniature scale of this casket, makes it difficult to ascertain its
original function.
RELIQUARY CASKET, C. 1200–1220
PERIOD: 13th CENTURY
Champlevé Enamel on Copper, Wood Core
Classification: Metalwork
Dimensions: 22.6 x 24.2 x 10.5 cm
A major center of the manufacture and export of exquisitely
crafted reliquaries in the Middle Ages was Limoges, located in southwestern
France along several ecclesiastical and pilgrimage routes. Limoges workshops
producing liturgical objects employed the technique of champlevé enamel,
whereby brilliantly colored, powdered glass was placed in cavities gouged into
a copper plaque that was then fired at high temperatures.
This Reliquary Casket (châsse), which
probably contained the relics of several saints, features eight half-length,
raised, and gilded figures of saints against a richly enameled ground decorated
with halos, scrolling floral motifs, and wavy cloudbanks. These figures are
portrayed with various liturgical gestures, such as upraised palms. The full-length
saints holding books on the gabled end panels are engraved in reserve on the
enamel ground. The casket, with its gabled roof and cresting, recalls not only
a tomb enshrining the relics, but also a cathedral representing the church and
hence the Heavenly Jerusalem, where the saints eternally abide.
SINGING PRIEST OR GOD, C. A.D. 400–600
PERIOD: EARLY CLASSIC (A.D. 250–600)
Fresco
Classification: Painting
Dimensions: 60.2 x 110.5 cm
The city of Teotihuacán, located about thirty miles northeast of
Mexico City,was the capital of the first classical civilization of Mesoamerica,
dating from around the first to the seventh century A.D. Teotihuacán was an
urban and ritual complex eight miles long with a number of buildings on the
main avenue, including the second largest pyramid in Mesoamerica. Both the
residential and ceremonial structures were characterized by “slope-and-panel”
profiles on their platforms and terraces, and were decorated with elaborate
polychrome wall frescoes. The frescoes were arranged in orderly sequences
depicting ritual images that appear to represent ceremonies in which specific
favors were sought from the gods.
In this richly symbolic mural fragment from Teotihuacán, a
priest or god costumed in an elaborately plumed headdress performs a ceremony
involving the scattering of incense while singing. The object of the ceremony
seems to center on the glyphlike symbol to the left, depicting five maguey
spines thrust into a stack of reeds. In all likelihood this is a place name.
The officiating figure holds an incense bag in his left hand, while
flower-decorated water streams from his right. Proceeding from his mouth is a
large speech scroll edged with vegetation (probably meaning “flowery song”);
the hearts, jade, and other symbols in the scroll may stand for the song’s
content.
THE VISION OF THE
FOUNDERS
The Kimbell Art
Museum officially opened on October 4, 1972. The Kimbell Art Foundation, which
owns and operates the Museum, had been established in 1936 by Kay and Velma
Kimbell, together with Kay’s sister and her husband, Dr. and Mrs. Coleman
Carter. Early on, the Foundation collected mostly British and French portraits
of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. By the time Mr. Kimbell died in
April 1964, the collection had grown to 260 paintings and 86 other works of
art, including such singular paintings as Hals’s Rommel-Pot Player,
Gainsborough’s Portrait of a Woman, Vigée Le Brun’s Self-Portrait,
and Leighton’s Portrait of May Sartoris. Motivated by his wish “to
encourage art in Fort Worth and Texas,” Mr. Kimbell left his estate to the
Foundation, charging it with the creation of a museum. Mr. Kimbell had made
clear his desire that the future museum be “of the first class,” and to further
that aim, within a week of his death, his widow, Velma, contributed her share
of the community property to the Foundation.
With the
appointment in 1965 of Richard F. Brown, then director of the Los Angeles
County Museum of Art, as the Museum’s first director, the Foundation began
planning for the future museum and development of the collection, both of which
would fulfill the aspirations of Mr. Kimbell. To that end, under the leadership
of its President, Mr. A. L. Scott, and in consultation with Ric Brown, the
nine-member Board of Directors of the Foundation—consisting of Mrs. Kimbell;
Dr. Carter; his daughter and her husband, Mr. and Mrs. Ben J. Fortson; Mr. C.
Binkley Smith; Mr. P. A. Norris, Jr.; Mr. J. C. Pace, Jr.; and attorney Mr.
Benjamin L. Bird—adopted a policy statement for the future museum in June 1966,
outlining its purpose, scope, and program, among other things. That statement
remains to this day the operative guide for the Museum. In accordance with that
policy, the Foundation acquires and retains works of so-called “definitive
excellence”—works that may be said to define an artist or type regardless of
medium, period, or school of origin. The aim of the Kimbell is not historical
completeness but the acquisition of individual objects of “the highest possible
aesthetic quality” as determined by condition, rarity, importance, suitability,
and communicative powers. The rationale is that a single work of outstanding
merit and significance is more effective as an educational tool than a larger
number of representative example
Two aspects of the
1966 policy in particular would have the greatest impact on changing the
Kimbell collection: an expansion of vision to encompass world history and a new
focus on building through acquisition and refinement a small collection of key
objects of surpassing quality. The Kimbell collection today consists of about
350 works that not only epitomize their periods and movements but also touch
individual high points of aesthetic beauty and historical importance.
