Atlanta, GA.- The High Museum of Art is proud to present “Picasso to Warhol” from October 15th through April 29th 2012. The exhibition will present approximately 100 works of art created by 14 of the most iconic artists from the 20th century: Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Constantin Brancusi, Piet Mondrian, Fernand Léger, Marcel Duchamp, Giorgio De Chirico, Joan Miró, Romare Bearden, Alexander Calder, Jackson Pollock, Louise Bourgeois, Jasper Johns and Andy Warhol. The exhibition will be one of the largest concentrations of modern art masterpieces to ever be exhibited in the southeastern United States.
The achievements of these pioneers of modern art will be presented in depth, exploring each artist’s stylistic development and highlighting their role in the most important artistic developments of the twentieth century, including the invention of Cubism, the emergence of abstraction and the development of Surrealism. Highlights of the exhibition include, “Dance (I) by Henri Matisse, “Girl Before a Mirror” and “Night Fishing at Antibes” by Pablo Picasso, “Map” by Jasper Johns, “Self-Portrait (1966)” by Andy Warhol, “Bird in Space” by Constantin Brancusi and “Number 1A” by Jackson Pollock. The exhibition is a continuation of the High Museum’s collaboration with The Museum of Modern Art, New York (MoMA), who have loaned all the pieces on show.
The High Museum of Art (coloquially the High), located in Atlanta, is the leading art museum in the Southeastern United States and one of the most-visited art museums in the world. Located on Peachtree Street in Midtown, the city’s arts district, the High is a division of the Woodruff Arts Center. The Museum was founded in 1905 as the Atlanta Art Association. In 1926, the High family, for whom the museum is named, donated their family home on Peachtree Street to house the collection following a series of exhibitions involving the Grand Central Art Galleries organized by Atlanta collector J. J. Haverty. Many pieces from the Haverty collection are now on permanent display in the High. A separate building for the Museum was built adjacent to the family home in 1955. On June 3, 1962, 106 Atlanta arts patrons died in an airplane crash at Orly Airport in Paris, France, while on a museum-sponsored trip. Including crew and other passengers, 130 people were killed in what was, at the time, the worst single plane aviation disaster in history. Members of Atlanta’s prominent families were lost including members of the Berry family who founded Berry College. During their visit to Paris, the Atlanta arts patrons had seen ‘Whistler’s Mother’ at the Louvre. In the fall of 1962, the Louvre, as a gesture of good will to the people of Atlanta, sent ‘Whistler’s Mother’ to Atlanta to be exhibited at the Atlanta Art Association museum on Peachtree Street. To honor those killed in the June 3, 1962 crash, the Atlanta Memorial Arts Center was built for the High. The French government donated a Rodin sculpture “The Shade” to the High in memory of the victims of the crash. In 1983, a 135,000-square-foot (12,500 m2) building designed by Pritzker Prize winning architect Richard Meier opened to house the High Museum of Art. The Meier building was funded by a $7.9 million challenge grant from former Coca-Cola president Robert W. Woodruff matched by $20 million raised by the Museum.
In 2002, three new buildings designed by Renzo Piano more than doubled the Museum’s size to 312,000 square feet (29,000 m2). The Piano buildings were designed as part of an overall upgrade of the entire Woodruff Arts Center complex. In 2008, the Museum inked an US$18 million deal for a three-year revolving loan of art from the Musée du Louvre in Paris, resulting in the museum’s highest attendance ever. The Museum has an extensive anthology of 19th- and 20th-century American art; significant holdings of European paintings and decorative art; a growing collection of African American art; and burgeoning collections of modern and contemporary art, photography and African art. The High is also dedicated to supporting and collecting works by Southern artists and is distinguished as the only major museum in North America to have a curatorial department specifically devoted to the field of folk and self-taught art. The High Museum holds more than 12,000 works of art in its permanent collection. Included in this collection are 19th and 20th century American art; European art; decorative arts; modern and contemporary art and photography. Highlights of the permanent collection include works by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, Claude Monet, Martin Johnson Heade, Dorothea Lange, Clarence John Laughlin, and Chuck Close. The High places special emphasis on supporting and collecting works by Southern self-taught artists, such as Howard Finster, and includes a contextual installation of sculpture and paintings from his Paradise Gardens. The Museum includes a curatorial department specifically devoted to the field of self-taught art, a distinction unique among North American museums. The High’s Media Arts department produces an annual film series and festivals of foreign, independent and classic film. Special exhibitions at the High feature strong global partnerships with other museums such as the Louvre and with the Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore and the Opificio delle pietre dure in Florence. Visit the museum’s website at … http://www.high.org