Event
Legacy: The Emily Fisher Landau CollectionPost an Event »
San Jose Museum of Art
June 5 - September 14, 2014Info
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http://www.sjmusart.org/
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(408) 271-6840
Opening reception for members: Wednesday, June 4
Free community day and 45th-anniversary open house: Saturday, June 7, from 11 AM to 8 PM.
Other related public programs include two DIY Art: Summer Sundays, which will combine an art-making activity inspired by works in Legacy with a gallery talk (July 20 and August 17, 1 – 4 PM). On Thursday, July 17, from 7 – 10 PM, the Museum’s popular after-hours program ArtRage will feature music and retro DIY Art activities from the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s.
A landmark exhibition of postwar American art by such prominent artists as Jasper Johns, Willem de Kooning, Barbara Kruger, Jenny Holzer, Ed Ruscha, and Andy Warhol. The exhibition is drawn from the historic gift of art pledged to the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, by private collector Emily Fisher Landau.
“Legacy gives Bay Area audiences access to extraordinary works by a pantheon of innovative and pivotal artists,” said Susan Krane, Oshman Executive Director. “These stellar American artists are now part of the American canon of contemporary art history. Yet when Emily Fisher Landau collected their art, they were radically adventurous and far from famous. The collection she shaped with such gumption is an exciting overview of one of the most important and expansive periods in American art, when no few styles or movements held sway.”
Legacy comprises some seventy works by thirty-eight artists who pushed the boundaries of painterly abstraction, realism, and social commentary. The broad variety of media represented includes painting, ink on paper, collage, screen printing, and sculpture. The exhibition encompasses many postwar art movements: abstract expressionism, pop art, minimalism, conceptualism, feminist art, and postmodernism.
“These artworks heralded seismic changes, not just in American society, but in the way the artist’s role has evolved over the decades,” said Susan Leask, acting senior curator at the San Jose Museum of Art. “This exhibition offers insights into the visual thinking and political consciousness of American artists from the 1960s through 2002, and takes a particularly close look at the 1970s and 1980s.”
On view will be works by Carl Andre, John Baldessari, Matthew Barney, Peter Cain, Willem de Kooning, Carroll Dunham, William Eggleston, Eric Fischl, Felix Gonzalez-Torres, Rodney Graham, Keith Haring, Jenny Holzer, Peter Hujar, Michael Hurson, Neil Jenney, Joseph Kosuth, Barbara Kruger, Annette Lemieux, Sherrie Levine, Glenn Ligon, Robert Longo, Robert Mapplethorpe, Agnes Martin, John McLaughlin, Martin Puryear, James Rosenquist, Susan Rothenberg, Allen Ruppersberg, Lorna Simpson, Kiki Smith, Mark Tansey, Al Taylor, Cy Twombly, Andy Warhol, and David Wojnarowicz. Also highlighted in Legacy are works by some of the artists that Emily Fisher Landau collected in depth—Richard Artschwager, Jasper Johns, and Ed Ruscha—a reflection of her longstanding relationships with these artists.