October 12, 2020 By Saga Beus While provenance—the documentation of an object’s journey from maker to collector or collection through acquisition, sale, exchange, or donation—is crucially important in the museum world in establishing legitimate ownership and ethical collection practices, it can also tell us a lot about cultural exchange, colonialism, and the history of museums […]
October 12, 2020 By Saga Beus An examination of the Museum of Modern Art’s controversial 1984 exhibition “Primitivism” in 20th Century Art: Affinity of the Tribal and the Modern helps put the relationship between Western art history and non-Western art into historical perspective. The exhibition centered on the Primitivist movement that emerged in Europe at […]
October 12, 2020 By Saga Beus “Primitivism” went on view at a MoMA that still adhered to its chronological “isms”-based approach to defining modern art, which posited a clear evolution from Impressionism to Post-Impressionism to Cubism, and so on. The exhibition was hindered by its focus on individual artists and on a largely Euro-American progression […]
August 21, 2020 By Géranne Darbouze Religion is a driving force in culture, and this is especially evident in Spain. From Ancient Egyptian cults to the pagan rituals that helped fuel the Roman empire, to the Islamic traditions of the Ottoman Turks, to the animistic beliefs of West and Central Africa, religions have developed methods […]
August 21, 2020 By Géranne Darbouze Doménikos Theotokópoulos (1541–1614), better known as El Greco, was a Mannerist artist born in Greece and active in Spain during the later 16th and early 17th centuries. Fascinated with the depiction of religious subject matter, he worked hard to perfect his presentation of such images. Between the 1540s and […]
August 21, 2020 By Géranne Darbouze In considering the notion of the ideal nobleman in the context of Baroque Spain, we must attend to the work of painter Juan de Valdés Leal, who was a primary influence on the religious experiences of visitors not only to the hospital and chapel of Santa Caridad in Seville, […]
August 21, 2020 By Géranne Darbouze Luisa Roldán (1652–1706), also known as La Roldana, was an enormously influential woman sculptor of the 17th century, and in considering the topic of landscape in Spanish Mannerist and Baroque Nativity-related scenes, Roldán’s The Repose in Egypt should not be overlooked. A polychrome terracotta sculpture dating from near the […]
August 21, 2020 By Géranne Darbouze Another artist known primarily for his religious works, whose art also speaks volumes about the artistic entanglement of painting and sculpture, is the Spanish Baroque painter Francisco de Zurbarán (1598–1664). A passionate follower of the Catholic faith, Zurbarán crafted his images from a combination of real-life models and the […]