1900s

“Art Exhibit Blends Video Games with Religious Iconography”

“Art Exhibit Blends Video Games with Religious Iconography”

by Owen S. Good via “Polygon“

“An art exhibit currently showing in New York imagines video game scenes as if they were religious frescoes from the late Middle Ages.

The one shown here is “Defenders of Ataros,” by Dan Hernandez, plainly referencing Atari’s Missile Command. It’s part of “Genesis 2014,” showing now at the Kim Foster Gallery in Chelsea.

Hernandez, notes the Gallery, mixes religion, mythology and pop culture in his work. “Hernandez blurs boundaries, rearranges hierarchies, and calls into question our notions of iconography, collectibles, violence and devotion,” the gallery says.

The show is running until next Saturday. Other paintings in the collection referenceStreet Fighter 2 and Space Invaders. See them at this link. . . . . “

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“Matisse ‘Cut-Outs’ Go On Show At Tate Modern”

“Matisse ‘Cut-Outs’ Go On Show At Tate Modern”

via “KLFM”

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“The most comprehensive exhibition ever devoted to Henri Matisse’s famous “cut-outs” will go on display at Tate Modern.

Around 120 of the French artist’s pieces will be shown together for the first time, including celebrated works such as the seated Blue Nudes and the original models for his illustrated book Jazz.

Matisse was widely regarded as one of the most significant artists of the last century, and his technique of cutting out painted pieces of paper to create works of art was considered ground-breaking.

He called the practice “drawing with scissors”.

Tate director Sir Nicholas Serota has co-curated the exhibition personally, and described hosting the collection as the “most extraordinary and exciting moment” for the gallery.

The artist began the process of cut-outs in 1943 while in his 70s, following a bitter divorce and amid the Nazi occupation of France.

Sir Nicholas told Sky News: “Many people regarded them slightly as the meanderings of an old man rather than a great artist, but gradually they began to understand how important they were.

“Artists began to use the cut-outs as ingredients for their own work, so from the 50s onwards you see artists picking up . . . .”

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“First Look Inside Expanded Harvard Art Museums”

“First Look Inside Expanded Harvard Art Museums”

by Greg Cook via “The Artery“

“Light is one of the most important materials of architecture,” Renzo Piano said at a talk at Harvard University in 2009. Light and transparency—one of the ways he makes light part of his architecture—are primary themes for the suave, celebrated Italian architect.

“Transparency is still a very important quality of urban life,” he said at that Harvard talk. “Urbanity comes because the buildings talk to the street.”

These notions are evident in his designs for the newly renovated and expanded Harvard Art Museums between Quincy and Prescott streets in Cambridge. On Tuesday the university announced plans to reopen the complex on Nov. 16.

Since the project began with the closing of the institution’s Fogg Museum and Busch-Reisinger museums in 2008, he’s taken the iconic Italian Renaissance-style courtyard at the heart of the 1927 Fogg, which has been protected with listing on the National Register of Historic Places since the 1980s, and extended it upward and crowned it with a futuristic-looking, steel and glass pyramid that floods the five-story-tall space with sun.

Piano first made his mark as a post-modern punk with his designs for Paris’s Pompidou Centre in the 1970s, which seemed to expose all the guts of the museum  . . . .”

“Queens Museum to open Indian art exhibition next year”

“Queens Museum to open Indian art exhibition next year”

Via “American Bazaar“

“NEW YORK: The Queens Museum has announced that it will open an entire exhibition entitled “After Midnight: Indian Modernism to Contemporary India (1947-1997)” in January 2015, which will highlight important works of art and track the growing modernity of India during its first 50 years of independence.

Malini Shah, Sudhir Vaishnav, Sunil Modi and other community members along with Tom Finkelpearl, President and Executive Director, Debra Wimpfheimer, Director Stategic Partnerships, Hitomi Iwasaki, Director and Curator and Manjari Sihare Curatorial Manager.

In a statement, the museum explained that the timeframe was chosen because its beginning and end dates are significant checkpoints in Indian history. The year 1947 is obviously important because it is when Indian gained independence from the British, but also because it saw the birth and rise of the Progressive art movement in India. The year 1997, when India turned 50, was marked by “economic liberalization, political instability . . . .”

“Georgia Museum of Art to host young scholars’ symposium on art and diplomacy”

“Georgia Museum of Art to host young scholars’ symposium on art and diplomacy”

by UGA News Service via “Online Athens“

“The Georgia Museum of Art at the University of Georgia will host an emerging scholars symposium, “While Silent, They Speak: Art and Diplomacy,” March 28-29. Organized by the Association of Graduate Art Students at UGA, the symposium will be held in conjunction with the exhibition “Art Interrupted: Advancing American Art and the Politics of Cultural Diplomacy.” The symposium and associated events are free and open to the public.

The theme of the symposium expands the scope of the exhibition, which focuses on a 1940s U.S. State Department project that assembled a traveling exhibition of modern American art, by addressing the broader theme of diplomacy throughout the history of visual and material culture. The visual arts have been used to promote and facilitate diplomatic agendas, yet they have also challenged or impeded diplomatic efforts. Through the process of cross-cultural exchange, an object or image may shift in value and meaning, thereby illuminating, obscuring or reinforcing cultural differences. . . . .”