December 10-14

MASSACHUSETTS

Photography by James Zimmerman.

Sculpture from the Permanent Collection, Provincetown Art Association and Museum, Provincetown, MA
On view through March 27, 2016
At PAAM, the holdings of local and regional art is extensive and dynamic, comprising over 3,000 works by over 700 twentieth century and contemporary artists who have worked in Provincetown and on Cape Cod. The PAAM collection weaves together at least three major art movements —each a significant strand of American art history—and creates perspectives that uniquely position the Provincetown art colony as a pertinent fixture to the larger art world. Click here to continue reading.

ILLINOIS

Andy Warhol. Liz #3 [Early Colored Liz], 1963. The Stefan T. Edlis Collection, Partial and Promised Gift to the Art Institute of Chicago. © 2015 The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

The New Contemporary/Contemporary Art Galleries Reopen, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
December 13, 2015
This December, we reopen our galleries of contemporary art, unveiling the largest gift in the Art Institute’s 136-year history: 44 iconic works by artists such as Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, and Jasper Johns. Generously donated by Chicago collectors Stefan Edlis and Gael Neeson, these 44 paintings, sculptures, and photographs transform the museum’s presentation of contemporary art, bringing new depth and perspective to the Art Institute’s already strong holdings and making this collection the strongest of any encyclopedic art museum in the world. The Art Institute has been committed to collecting and exhibiting contemporary art since the museum’s founding in the 19th century, when Impressionism was considered “contemporary.” Our rich collections today are largely the result of the generosity and vision of private collectors who have chosen to become great benefactors, and the Edlis/Neeson gift is the latest chapter in this long legacy of patronage and support. Click here to continue reading.

TEXAS

Moderno: Design for Living in Brazil, Mexico, and Venezuela, 1940-1978, Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, TX
On view through January 17, 2016
The Blanton Museum of Art at the University of Texas at Austin presents Moderno: Design for Living in Brazil, Mexico, and Venezuela, 1940–1978. Organized by the Americas Society in New York, the exhibition is the first to examine how design transformed the domestic landscape of Latin America, during a period marked by major stylistic developments and social and political change. The presentation features over 130 works, including furniture, ceramics, metalwork, textiles, and graphic design by Lina Bo Bardi, Clara Porset, Miguel Arroyo and others. To further highlight this innovative chapter in the history of Latin American modernism, the Blanton’s showing will expand upon the New York presentation to include additional furniture, domestic objects, and a selection of Brazilian, Mexican, and Venezuelan paintings from both the Blanton’s holdings and private collections. Click here to continue reading.

LOUISIANA

George Inness, Pastoral Scene, 1857. Oil on canvas, framed: 46 1/2 x 57 in (118.11 x 144.78 cm). Museum purchase, Deaccessioned Art Fund, 2007.45.

Visions of US: American Art at NOMA, New Orleans Museum of Art, New Orleans, LA
On view through January 24, 2016
Visions of US explores evolving ideas about American cultural identity from the 18th through 20th centuries. Drawn from NOMA’s world-class collection of American art, the exhibition brings together paintings, sculptures, photography and decorative arts to tell a rich and inclusive story about how we imagine and represent the United States. Featuring art from across America’s vast history and geography, Visions of US celebrates the cultural diversity and multitude of people and perspectives that make up our view of the United States. The exhibition uncovers dynamic points of connection between American artists working across the country—and even world—to craft the many different Visions of US that compose the country today. American art, with a particular emphasis on artists working in Louisiana and the South, has long been one of NOMA’s key collection strengths.Click here to continue reading.

TENNESSEE

Wonder, Whimsy, Wild: Folk Art in America, Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, Memphis, TN
On view through February 28, 2016
This extraordinary exhibition highlights American folk art from New England and the Midwest made between 1800 and 1925. Among the paintings are portraits, still lifes, landscapes, and allegorical paintings, while the objects include sculptures, commercial signs, furniture, and household objects. These works were made by minimally trained or self-taught artists in rural areas and did not reflect the academic models of artistic taste in the urban centers of the East Coast. Yet, because of the large number of professional and amateur artists who created folk art in the years following the Nation's founding—and the sheer quantity of art they produced—folk art was the prevalent art form in the United States for more than a century. Click here to continue reading.

Image courtesy of Vulcan Inc.

WASHINGTON

The Figure in Process: de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015, Pivot Art + Culture, Seattle, WA
On view through February 28, 2016
The Figure in Process: de Kooning to Kapoor 1955-2015 features masterworks by some 20 internationally renowned contemporary and modern artists. The exhibition explores the interpretation of the human figure through works made over six decades by artists from around the world, drawn from public and private Pacific Northwest and international collections. The Figure in Process presents seldom-seen paintings by modern masters such as Francis Bacon, Lucien Freud, David Hockney and Willem de Kooning, as well as sculptures by Barry X Ball, Alberto Giacometti and Anish Kapoor. Click here to continue reading.

BERLIN

Max Beckmann, Selbstbildnis Florenz (Self-Portrait, Florence), 1907. Hamburger Kunsthalle, loan from a private collection / bpk, Photo: Elke Walford, © VG BILD-KUNST Bonn, 2015.

Max Beckmann and Berlin, Berlinische Galerie Museum of Modern Art, Berlin

On view through February 15, 2016
As the Berlinische Galerie marks its fortieth anniversary, the exhibition "Max Beckmann and Berlin" will focus for the first time attention on the decisive role the city played in the artist’s work. The art historian Julius Meier-Graefe, a contemporary of Beckmann’s, succinctly summed up the relationship between the artist and the city in 1924: “Max Beckmann is the new Berlin." Max Beckmann (Leipzig 1884 –1950 New York City) spent two lengthy periods living in Berlin – one from 1904 until 1914, before the First World War, and another from 1933 until 1937, arriving after the National Socialists took power and remaining until he emigrated to Amsterdam. But even in the years between 1915 and 1933, when the artist had moved his principal residence to Frankfurt am Main, he fostered close personal and professional ties with Berlin. He visited the city frequently and maintained his presence in the arts scene of the Weimar Republic through numerous solo and joint exhibitions. Click here to continue reading.