Americas in Paris: Article
“An Interview with Debra Bricker Balken and Lynn Gumpert, curators of Americans in Paris: Artists Working in Postwar France, 1946-1962 (Grey Art Gallery, 2024)—Part Two”
Miranda, April 24, 2024
by Lara Cox
The exhibition Americans in Paris: Artists Working in Postwar France, 1946-1962, running between March and July 2024, examines the art of US expats in Paris following World War II. The following is the second of a two-part interview with the show’s curators, Debra Bricker Balken and Lynn Gumpert. In this second part, the curators discuss the title of their show, which constitutes a reference to Vincente Minnelli’s famous film An American in Paris (1951, starring Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron). Their choice to pluralize “American” reveals much about their conceptual approach. They also discuss the inter-influence but also tensions between French and US artists of the post-war period.