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Dobrzynski on Culture</p></div><div class="widget-area header-widget-area"><section id="text-4" class="widget widget_text"><div class="widget-wrap"> <div class="textwidget"><p><a href="http://www.artsjournal.com/ajblogs"><img decoding="async" src="http://www.artsjournal.com/diacritical/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/ajblogslogo.gif" /></a></p> </div> </div></section> <section id="search-3" class="widget widget_search"><div class="widget-wrap"><form class="search-form" method="get" action="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/" role="search" itemprop="potentialAction" itemscope itemtype="https://schema.org/SearchAction"><label class="search-form-label screen-reader-text" for="searchform-1">Search the site ...</label><input class="search-form-input" type="search" name="s" id="searchform-1" placeholder="Search the site ..." itemprop="query-input"><input class="search-form-submit" type="submit" value="Search"><meta content="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/?s={s}" itemprop="target"></form></div></section> </div></div></header><div class="site-inner"><div class="content-sidebar-wrap"><main class="content" id="genesis-content"><article class="post-5476 post type-post status-publish format-standard has-post-thumbnail category-uncategorized entry" aria-label="How to Attract Visitors to an “Esoteric” Exhibit" itemscope itemtype="https://schema.org/CreativeWork"><header class="entry-header"><h2 class="entry-title" itemprop="headline"><a class="entry-title-link" rel="bookmark" href="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/2019/06/how-to-attract-visitors-to-an-esoteric-exhibit.html">How to Attract Visitors to an “Esoteric” Exhibit</a></h2> </header><div class="entry-content" itemprop="text"> <p><em>Book of Beasts: The Bestiary in the Medieval World</em> is notable for several reasons. But the one I want to dwell a little on here is a point I made in the final paragraph of <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/book-of-beasts-the-bestiary-in-the-medieval-world-review-wondrous-records-of-animal-lore-11560596400" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label=" (opens in a new tab)">my review of this show</a> at the Getty Museum for <em>The Wall Street Journal</em>, which was published in Monday’s paper. </p> <p>Here’s what I wrote: “<em><a href="https://www.getty.edu/visit/cal/events/ev_2402.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label="Book of Beasts (opens in a new tab)">Book of Beasts</a></em> demonstrates well how an esoteric subject can appeal to the general public without stooping to conquer, without losing its scholarly approach. It shows the bestiary to be a wondrous thing.”</p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" width="1024" height="903" src="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/IMG_6363-1024x903.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-5477" srcset="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/IMG_6363-1024x903.jpg 1024w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/IMG_6363-300x264.jpg 300w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/IMG_6363-768x677.jpg 768w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure> <p>We’ve all seen museums do a lot of odd things in recent years in attempts to draw people into their galleries–cat video contests, show-your-own-art alongside masterpieces, crowdsourcing curatorial decisions, mixing up unrelated art, and so on. Some may have “worked,” in the sense that they did attract visitors–but generally only for the one exhibit or particular gesture of outreach. </p> <p>Instead, the Getty, with <em>Book of Beasts</em>, generally took the high road. No dumbing down, no “unicorn days,” no silly contests. The museum has scheduled a talk linking the show to Harry Potter–but at least is is a lecture. It also added, in the final gallery of this exhibition, several contemporary art pieces–but not only were they well-chosen, but also the Getty marked them off by painting the walls in that gallery white, unlike the colored walls of the rest of the exhibit. That helped set a different tone.</p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" width="756" height="1024" src="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/B3-EG736_BESTIA_16H_20190614123259-756x1024.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-5478" srcset="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/B3-EG736_BESTIA_16H_20190614123259-756x1024.jpg 756w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/B3-EG736_BESTIA_16H_20190614123259-222x300.jpg 222w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/B3-EG736_BESTIA_16H_20190614123259-768x1040.jpg 768w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/B3-EG736_BESTIA_16H_20190614123259.jpg 1274w" sizes="(max-width: 756px) 100vw, 756px" /></figure> <p>What did the Getty do right, then? For this first major museum exhibition on bestiaries, it assembled a third of the worldâ€™s surviving Latin illuminated bestiaries, plus others in other languages, and borrowed tapestries, ivories, objects, other manuscripts, paintings, even medieval ceiling fragments, to illustrate theses books’ influence. It gave them a beautiful display despite the low lighting needed to preserve the manuscripts. It built listening stations through the exhibit that explain the signifcance of certain animals, including fantastical ones like the bonnacon and the griffin. It published a beautiful and enlightening catalogue. Etc.</p> <p>Ok, you say, but it is the Getty, which has lots of money, To which I say, those overtures created by other museums to bring in people cost money too. </p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="768" src="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/IMG_6368-1024x768.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-5479" srcset="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/IMG_6368-1024x768.jpg 1024w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/IMG_6368-300x225.jpg 300w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/IMG_6368-768x576.jpg 768w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure> <p>If you have a chance to visit the Getty for this exhibition, I think you’ll agree with my verdict. In another passage in my review, I wrote:</p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="974" src="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/24BB9A57-B826-46EB-8903-5CF4B5D1A1EE-1024x974.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-5480" srcset="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/24BB9A57-B826-46EB-8903-5CF4B5D1A1EE-1024x974.jpeg 1024w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/24BB9A57-B826-46EB-8903-5CF4B5D1A1EE-300x285.jpeg 300w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/24BB9A57-B826-46EB-8903-5CF4B5D1A1EE-768x731.jpeg 768w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/24BB9A57-B826-46EB-8903-5CF4B5D1A1EE.jpeg 1600w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure> <p>“Bestiaries were like animal encyclopedias, but with a higher purpose: Created by inventive artists and scribes, they were intended to enkindle in readers awe for the natural world and to impart religious stories and moral allegories.”</p> <p>The Getty show seems to me to have striven to create awe for bestiaries–and it succeeded. I’ve posted a few samples–and there is more online at the Getty website. </p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="730" src="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/EB437C57-9342-4D8D-8C29-9E117CF149C0-1024x730.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-5481" srcset="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/EB437C57-9342-4D8D-8C29-9E117CF149C0-1024x730.jpeg 1024w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/EB437C57-9342-4D8D-8C29-9E117CF149C0-300x214.jpeg 300w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/EB437C57-9342-4D8D-8C29-9E117CF149C0-768x548.jpeg 768w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/EB437C57-9342-4D8D-8C29-9E117CF149C0.jpeg 1600w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure> <p></p> </div></article><article class="post-5467 post type-post status-publish format-standard category-uncategorized entry" aria-label="Eye On San Diego–For Art!" itemscope itemtype="https://schema.org/CreativeWork"><header class="entry-header"><h2 class="entry-title" itemprop="headline"><a class="entry-title-link" rel="bookmark" href="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/2019/06/eye-on-san-diego-for-art.html">Eye On San Diego–For Art!</a></h2> </header><div class="entry-content" itemprop="text"> <p>San Diego, you may be surprised to learn, is not only the eighth largest U.S. city by population, but also among the fastest growing. Yet people to tend talk about its virtues in terms of the beach, sports, the zoo and the Navy–not its art offerings. </p> <p>Surprise! San Diego has a lot to offer in art, and if the current exhibit at the San Diego Museum of Art is any indication, it has great ambitions, too. </p> <p>I was there last month to see and review for <em>The Wall Street Journal</em> <em><a rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label="Art and Empire: The Golden Age of Spain (opens in a new tab)" href="https://www.sdmart.org/exhibition/art-empire-the-golden-age-of-spain/" target="_blank">Art and Empire: The Golden Age of Spain</a></em>, which it calls “the first exhibition in the United States to expand the notion of the â€œGolden Ageâ€ to include the Hispanic world beyond the shores of the Iberian Peninsula.” While other museums have included New Spain art, I believe–at least a little of it–this one also includes Flanders, the southern half of Italy and the Philippines as well as the country’s American territories. </p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Anguissola-842x1024.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-5468" /><figcaption>by Anguissola</figcaption></figure> <p>The ambition is clear both in that scope and the fact the the museum drew on its own collection for one-fifth of the works in the show. Whether or not that was because of cost management–loans, insurance and shipping cost a lot–it does not matter. The museum’s own works exceeded the quality bar–sometimes by a lot. </p> <p>Here’s a <a rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label="link to my review (opens in a new tab)" href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/art-empire-the-golden-age-of-spain-review-beyond-iberian-borders-11560200363" target="_blank">link to my review</a>. </p> <p>You can judge for yourself whether or not the museum persuades visitors that, as I put it, “The global trade of goods, people and ideas among [Spain and its territories], the museum asserts, fostered a cultural exchange that was multidirectional, not one-way from Spain.”</p> <p>I concluded “not really.” But that’s almost beside the point: I admired the quality and the choices of art on view, with the the masterpiece of all masterpieces there being Zurbaran’s <em><a href="https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/francisco-de-zurbaran-saint-francis-in-meditation-1">St. Francis in Meditation</a></em>, on loan from London’s National Gallery. </p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="833" src="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Cotan-1024x833.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-5469" srcset="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Cotan-1024x833.jpg 1024w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Cotan-300x244.jpg 300w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Cotan-768x625.jpg 768w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Cotan.jpg 1274w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /><figcaption>by Cotan</figcaption></figure> <p>And what of the items from the museum’s permanent collection? I had many favorites, including Zurbaran’s <em>Agnus Dei</em>, CotÃ¡nâ€™s <em>Quince, Cabbage, Melon, and Cucumber</em>, El Greco’s <em>The Penitent Saint Peter</em>, Pedro de Mena’s San Diego of AlcalÃ¡ and Sofonisba Anguissola’s <em>Portrait of a Spanish Prince</em>. Among others! </p> <p>I should add that the Denver Art Museum also lent many wonderful works from its Spanish Colonial collection, a favorite being Baltasar Echave IbÃa’s oil-on-copper <em>The Road to Calvary</em>.  </p> <p>But back to San Diego: Across the Balboa Park plaza from SDMA is the Timken Museum, which is also full of treasures. </p> <p>Those are just two reasons why San Diego should be on everyone’s art trail; it’s not perhaps a major destination for art, but give it more time. I think it will be.</p> </div></article><article class="post-5448 post type-post status-publish format-standard category-uncategorized tag-exhibitions tag-gagosian tag-jonas-wood tag-museum-ethics tag-museums entry" aria-label="Why Is this Museum Exhibition So Troubling?" itemscope itemtype="https://schema.org/CreativeWork"><header class="entry-header"><h2 class="entry-title" itemprop="headline"><a class="entry-title-link" rel="bookmark" href="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/2019/04/why-is-this-museum-exhibition-so-troubling.html">Why Is this Museum Exhibition So Troubling?</a></h2> </header><div class="entry-content" itemprop="text"> <p>Several weeks ago, I visited the Dallas Museum of Art to see an exhibition of works by Jonas Wood (b. 1977) and to review it for <em>The Wall Street Journal</em>. (<a rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label="Here's the link (opens in a new tab)" href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/jonas-wood-review-interiors-gone-wild-11554152450" target="_blank">Here’s the link</a>.) </p> <p>Wood’s paintings–mostly–are striking. He makes landscapes, still lifes, interiors, portraits and various combinations of those genre. They have wall power. They are easy to like, with lots of color, conventional, pleasing images, I am posting several here. </p> <p>Here’s one line from review: ” Using photographs and magazine pictures as source materialsâ€”sometimes just as they are, sometimes manipulated or made into a mÃ©langeâ€”Mr. Wood (b. 1977) creates flat, graphic, realistic images with a dollop of Pop. He uses bright, appealing colors. He sometimes compresses or distorts the spaces, but not in a disorienting wayâ€”doors, windows, trees are just a bit misaligned. He makes paintings you want to hang in your modern home.”</p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="948" height="1024" src="http://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-JungleKitchen-948x1024.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-5449" srcset="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-JungleKitchen-948x1024.jpg 948w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-JungleKitchen-278x300.jpg 278w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-JungleKitchen-768x829.jpg 768w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-JungleKitchen.jpg 1274w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 948px) 100vw, 948px" /></figure> <p>I liked them (mostly).</p> <p>But Wood’s work also troubles me, as does the origins of this exhibition. Again, quoting myself: </p> <p>“He cites Alexander Calder as a major influence, and both â€œOvitzâ€™s Libraryâ€ and â€œClipping E2â€ (2013) incorporate Calder mobiles. Other images, in pose or color or composition, refer to the work of David Hockney, Stuart Davis, Picasso, Rousseau and Vuillard, to name a few. Patterns repeatedly run through his paintings, as they did Matisseâ€™s, and Mr. Woodâ€™s â€œClippingsâ€ series recalls both Matisse cutouts and Ellsworth Kelly plant drawings. Like Jasper Johns, Mr. Wood uses hatchworkâ€”for example, to create the snow-laden tree branches of his lovely â€œSnowscape With Barnâ€ (2017).</p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="903" src="http://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-SnowscapeWBarn-1024x903.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-5450" srcset="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-SnowscapeWBarn-1024x903.jpg 1024w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-SnowscapeWBarn-300x265.jpg 300w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-SnowscapeWBarn-768x678.jpg 768w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-SnowscapeWBarn.jpg 1274w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure> <p>That painting also contains what may be his most brazen reach for greatness by association. In a famous story from 1832, as John Constable was laboring to enrich the colors of a nearly finished masterpiece at the Royal Academy, J.M.W. Turner upstaged him by adding a bright red buoy with one daub to his own almost monochromatic seascape hanging nearby. Could it be a coincidence that Mr. Wood plants a red shovel in his snow scene in about the same spot on his canvas as Turnerâ€™s buoy?”</p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="808" height="1024" src="http://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-ClippingA2-808x1024.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-5451" srcset="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-ClippingA2-808x1024.jpg 808w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-ClippingA2-237x300.jpg 237w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-ClippingA2-768x974.jpg 768w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-ClippingA2.jpg 1274w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 808px) 100vw, 808px" /></figure> <p>Just as troubling, why did Wood–of all the contemporary artists in the world–merit a museum exhibition after calling himself an artist for only a dozen years? The museums says its collectors (read “patrons” and perhaps “trustees”) own his works. So do many of the prominent, billionaire collectors who lent their works to the show–Eli Broad, Aby Rosen, the Marciano brothers, Michael Ovitz and more. It did not hurt that his major New York gallery, Gagosian, was also willing to be a “major” sponsor of the exhibition. Not coincidentally, Gagosian “is pleased to present new paintings and works on paper by Jonas Wood” at its Chelsea gallery opening Apr. 24. </p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="774" src="http://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-OvitzsLibrary-1024x774.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-5452" srcset="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-OvitzsLibrary-1024x774.jpg 1024w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-OvitzsLibrary-300x227.jpg 300w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-OvitzsLibrary-768x581.jpg 768w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/JW-OvitzsLibrary.jpg 1274w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure> <table class="wp-block-table"><tbody><tr><td><strong>So, the “market” fix was in for Jonas Wood. But the whole thing makes me queasy. The museum is being used.</strong></td></tr></tbody></table> <p> </p> <table class="wp-block-table"><tbody><tr><td></td></tr></tbody></table> </div></article><article class="post-5437 post type-post status-publish format-standard category-uncategorized entry" aria-label="Hirshhorn Museum: On A Roll" itemscope itemtype="https://schema.org/CreativeWork"><header class="entry-header"><h2 class="entry-title" itemprop="headline"><a class="entry-title-link" rel="bookmark" href="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/2019/04/hirshhorn-museum-on-a-roll.html">Hirshhorn Museum: On A Roll</a></h2> </header><div class="entry-content" itemprop="text"> <p>Continuing its good tidings, the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, D.C., just announced a special acquisition: As disclosed in an article I wrote for <em>The Art Newspaper</em>, which was published last week, the Hirshhorn has bought Yayoi Kusama’s very first Infinity Room, called <em>Phalli’s Field, </em>which she made in 1965.</p> <p>The acquired work is a reconfiguration of that piece–whose elements were taken back to Japan and the piece deconstructed long ago. Kusama reconceived it for the international traveling exhibition of her Infinity Rooms, which was organized by the Hirshhorn. </p> <p>When Kusama made the piece in 1965, it was a breakthrough. As I wrote for TAN: “For two years she had been sewing and stuffing dozens of cotton protuberances, painted with red polka dots, attaching them to chairs and other objects, and grouping them to evoke a terrain of phalluses. But the labour was intensive, and she alighted on the idea of using mirrors to achieve the desired effect.”</p> <p>Read <a rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label="the entire story (opens in a new tab)" href="https://www.theartnewspaper.com/news/hirshhorn-gets-yayoi-kusama-s-first-infinity-mirror-room" target="_blank">the entire story</a>, which is fairly short, here. </p> <p>The 2017 reconfiguration of <em>Phalli’s Field</em> took what had been shown in open space and put it in a room, like the Infinity Room pieces that followed it. </p> <p>Here’s what it looked like in 1965, with Kusama enjoying it:</p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="http://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Kusama1965.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-5438" /><figcaption>Yayoi Kusama Installation view of Infinity Mirror Roomâ€”Phalliâ€™s Field,1965, in Floor Show, Castellane Gallery, New York, 1965 Sewn stuffed cotton fabric, board, and mirrors Courtesy of Ota Fine Arts, Tokyo/Singapore; Victoria Miro, London; David Zwirner, New York. Â© Yayoi Kusama Photo: Eikoh Hosoe</figcaption></figure> <p>As I alluded in the opening line of this post, the Hirshhorn benefited from the Kusama show, not least because it raised the museum’s profile in both Washington and around the country. It enabled director Melissa Chiu to attract new trustees, who–it is to be hoped–will provide more support for the museum. And it helped push the museum’s attendance to a record last year, past the 1 million mark. “[Kusama] and her work attracted visitors that had never come to the museum before,â€ Chiu told me. </p> <p>â€œIt has had a lasting effect on public awareness of the museum,â€ she added. â€œFor us it was a complete game-changer. People said to me â€˜I never thought Iâ€™d see lines outside the Hirshhorn.â€™ ” </p> <p>That all got Chiu thinking: Since Kusama has such a great impact, Chiu decided to acquire this piece, and she spent the museum’s own money–it was not a donation–on it. </p> <p></p> </div></article><article class="post-5425 post type-post status-publish format-standard category-uncategorized tag-exhibitions tag-kimbell entry" aria-label="Thank Heaven for Museum Renovations!" itemscope itemtype="https://schema.org/CreativeWork"><header class="entry-header"><h2 class="entry-title" itemprop="headline"><a class="entry-title-link" rel="bookmark" href="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/2019/03/thank-heaven-for-museum-renovations.html">Thank Heaven for Museum Renovations!</a></h2> </header><div class="entry-content" itemprop="text"> <p>I’ve been away for a few weeks–but I don’t want you to miss notice of an excellent exhibition at the Kimbell Art Museum: <em><a href="https://www.kimbellart.org/exhibition/lure-dresden-bellotto-court-saxony" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label="The Lure of Dresden: Bellotto at the Court of Saxony (opens in a new tab)">The Lure of Dresden: Bellotto at the Court of Saxony</a>,</em> which runs until Apr. 28. For the headline above, I used the first words of my review of the show, which was published in <em>The Wall Street Journal</em> while I was away.</p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="751" height="1024" src="http://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/0292AC66-6B14-4B11-9800-34D0E58126DB-751x1024.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-5430" srcset="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/0292AC66-6B14-4B11-9800-34D0E58126DB-751x1024.jpeg 751w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/0292AC66-6B14-4B11-9800-34D0E58126DB-220x300.jpeg 220w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/0292AC66-6B14-4B11-9800-34D0E58126DB-768x1047.jpeg 768w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/0292AC66-6B14-4B11-9800-34D0E58126DB.jpeg 1537w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 751px) 100vw, 751px" /></figure> <p>That’s because Bellotto’s panoramic pictures are on loan from the GemÃ¤ldegalerie (Picture Gallery) of the Dresden State Art Collections. While it is renovating, it shipped 24 of its signature paintings to the Kimbell. </p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="865" height="1024" src="http://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/506F352C-200E-48C4-A794-A2DB06E543F6-865x1024.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-5432" srcset="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/506F352C-200E-48C4-A794-A2DB06E543F6-865x1024.jpeg 865w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/506F352C-200E-48C4-A794-A2DB06E543F6-253x300.jpeg 253w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/506F352C-200E-48C4-A794-A2DB06E543F6-768x909.jpeg 768w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/506F352C-200E-48C4-A794-A2DB06E543F6.jpeg 1728w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 865px) 100vw, 865px" /></figure> <p> Bernardo Bellotto (1721-1780) was born a year before his uncle, Giovanni Antonio Canaletto. began to make view paintings Bellotto studied with his uncle while in his teens, soon gained admittance to the painters’ guild, and in 1747, when he was still in his twenties, he accepted a call to Dresden from the Elector of Saxony, Frederick-Augustus II. He wanted Bellotto to record his grand, baroque city and, later, to paint Pirna, a small town about 12 miles southeast of Dresden whose medieval castle functioned as a lookout for trade routes to Bohemia.</p> <p> Bellotto painted his Dresden panoramasâ€”seven of which are on view hereâ€”from a distance, often from an angle. He left the top half of his canvases for sky and clouds, the better to orchestrate different lighting and atmospheric effects. When the sun was shining, he limned the building reflections on the water (the Elbe River runs through most of his Dresden paintings) to perfection. </p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="858" height="1024" src="http://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/229BF204-702F-4E9C-8381-25B4B52E314B-858x1024.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-5431" srcset="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/229BF204-702F-4E9C-8381-25B4B52E314B-858x1024.jpeg 858w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/229BF204-702F-4E9C-8381-25B4B52E314B-251x300.jpeg 251w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/229BF204-702F-4E9C-8381-25B4B52E314B-768x917.jpeg 768w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 858px) 100vw, 858px" /></figure> <p>Yet, as I wrote for the <em>Journal</em>: “But what distinguishes Bellottoâ€™s works is their balance, their harmony and, most of all, their life. In his very first view painting for this new patron, â€œDresden from the Right Bank of the Elbe above the Augustus Bridgeâ€ (1747), a woman hangs her laundry not far from a little conversation between a stout castrato, the kingâ€™s physician and a Turkish servant, while a court jester looks on, a little white dog at his feet. Such little insertions, a mix of the mundane and the prominent, figure in all of Bellottoâ€™s view paintings. They donâ€™t necessarily reflect what actually happenedâ€”they convey a sense of verisimilitude rather than truth.”        </p> <figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="768" src="http://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/7F93020E-9D09-4BA1-A898-5E563ACD61B0-1024x768.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-5433" srcset="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/7F93020E-9D09-4BA1-A898-5E563ACD61B0-1024x768.jpeg 1024w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/7F93020E-9D09-4BA1-A898-5E563ACD61B0-300x225.jpeg 300w, https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/7F93020E-9D09-4BA1-A898-5E563ACD61B0-768x576.jpeg 768w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure> <p>Bellotto created those little vignettes of life in all of his pictures. That’s why, as I wrote in the review, I think this exhibition should be popular, even if Bellotto is not a household name: People love details in art, as anyone who ever eavesdropped in a museum can attest. Bellotto delivers in that respect, among many others. </p> <p>I’m using a few details as illustration here so you can see the life–you can see some entire paintings on the Kimbell website and in the <em>Journal</em>. </p> </div></article><div class="archive-pagination pagination"><div class="pagination-next alignright"><a href="https://www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts/page/2" >Next Page »</a></div></div></main><aside class="sidebar sidebar-primary widget-area" role="complementary" aria-label="Primary Sidebar" itemscope itemtype="https://schema.org/WPSideBar" id="genesis-sidebar-primary"><h2 class="genesis-sidebar-title screen-reader-text">Primary Sidebar</h2><section id="featured-page-3" class="widget featured-content featuredpage"><div class="widget-wrap"><h3 class="widgettitle widget-title">About Judith H. Dobrzynski</h3> <article class="post-639 page type-page status-publish entry" aria-label="Judith H. Dobrzynski"><div class="entry-content"><p>Now an independent journalist, I've worked as a reporter in the culture and business sections ofÂ The New York Times, and been the editor of the Sunday business section and deputy business editor thereÂ as well as a senior editor ofÂ Business Week and the managing editor of CNBC, the cable TV</p></div></article></div></section> <section id="featured-page-4" class="widget featured-content featuredpage"><div class="widget-wrap"><h3 class="widgettitle widget-title">About Real Clear Arts</h3> <article class="post-638 page type-page status-publish entry" aria-label="Real Clear Arts"><div class="entry-content"><p>This blog is aboutÂ culture in America as seen through my lens, which is informed and colored by years of reporting not only on the arts and humanities, but also on business, philanthropy, science, government and other subjects. 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