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c. 1879-80 (130 Kb); "Seated Dancer"; Charcoal and pastel on paper mounted on
pasteboard, 63.5 x 48.7 cm (25 x 19 1/8 in); The Hermitage, St. Petersburg; No.
GR 155-99. Formerly collection Otto Krebs, Holzdorf.
In
Paris, Degas came to know Édouard Manet and in the late 1860s he turned to
contemporary themes, painting both theatrical scenes and portraits with a strong
emphasis on the social and intellectual implications of props and setting. In
the early 1870s the female ballet dancer became his favorite theme. He sketched from a live model in his
studio and combined poses into groupings that depicted rehearsal and performance
scenes in which dancers on stage, entering the stage, and resting or waiting to
perform are shown simultaneously and in counterpoint, often from an oblique
angle of vision. On a visit in 1872 to Louisiana, where he had relatives in the
cotton business, he painted The Cotton Exchange at New Orleans
(finished 1873; Musée Municipal, Pau, France), his only picture to be acquired
by a museum in his lifetime. Other subjects from this period include the
racetrack, the beach, and cafe interiors. After 1880, Pastel became Degas's
preferred medium. He used sharper colors and gave greater attention to surface
patterning, depicting milliners, laundresses, and groups of dancers against
backgrounds now only sketchily indicated. For the poses, he depended more and
more on memory or earlier drawings. Although he became guarded and withdrawn
late in life, Degas retained strong friendships with literary people. In 1881 he
exhibited a sculpture, Little Dancer (a bronze casting of which is
in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston), and as his eyesight failed thereafter he
turned increasingly to sculpture, modeling figures and horses in wax over metal
armatures. These sculptures remained in his studio in disrepair and were cast in
bronze only after his death. EB.
Surrealism and Modernism
from the Collection of the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art
Phillips Collection,
Washington, DC, USA
The Phillips
Collection welcomes Surrealism and Modernism from the Collection of the
Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, a selection of 59 paintings, collages, and
sculptures by the most significant avant-garde artists of the early twentieth
century. Surrealism and Modernism represents an outstanding array of major
artistic movements in the twentieth century—from expressionist landscapes and
classic abstract painting to surrealist illusionism and abstract expressionism.
This exhibition also provides a look at a unique era in the history of
collecting by American museums, when aesthetically adventurous directors
struggled to make the case for modern art to a suspicious public through
purchases and exhibitions of work by living artists from Europe, America and
Latin America. Although located a few hours away from New York, the Wadsworth
Atheneum in the 1930s scored a series of acquisition firsts of the kind that
might have been expected of the Museum of Modern Art.
Building on the grandest scale: an
Albertopolis for the Gulf
An unprecedented plan
for a series of new museums takes shape in Doha, Qatar
Virtually nothing compares with the scale and ambition of the museums planned for Qatar’s capital Doha. Most of the buildings will be dotted along the Corniche, the broad, palm-lined avenue that circles the central bay of Doha, itself due to be completely redesigned by the French architect Jean Nouvel. For the moment (and there are other projects) the National Council is working on five museums. The Chinese-American architect I.M. Pei, now in his 80s, was coaxed out of retirement to design the Museum of Islamic Art. Mr Pei’s chunky, stone-clad building will rise directly out of the water on an artificial island at one end of the Corniche. It is scheduled to open in 2006. For the Qatar National Library and National History Museum , the Japanese architect Arata Isozaki has produced an amazingly futuristic structure which stands on three mammoth pillars. An inverted pyramid structure suspended halfway up the pillars will house the library, the National History Museum will be housed below. Even more extraordinary are Santiago Calatrava’s plans for the Museum of Photography, an ultra-light structure consisting of two immense curved “wings” which will open and close with the light. The Scottish architect Catherine Findlay has been chosen to renovate an existing castle in the centre of Doha, which will become the Museum of Traditional Clothes, and the old Qatar National Museum is also to be renovated and will exhibit Qatari material.-By Georgina Adams
Continues on the following pages.