Omaha, NE.- The Joslyn Art Museum is pleased to announce the opening of its reinstalled north-wing galleries with a new presentation of the museum’s renowned collection of American and American Western Art. “Art in America: Colonial Times to the Present” highlights the history of American painting from 1750 to 1950, and features a new interpretation of the Museum’s collection of art of the American West and Plains Indian cultures. Toby Jurovics, Joslyn’s chief curator and Richard and Mary Holland Curator of American Western Art, said the galleries offer a new look at familiar favorites as well as important works that have been off view for many years. “Our desire is to offer a more cohesive narrative of the history of American Art, arranging our collection of painting, sculpture, and decorative arts chronologically from the Colonial period to the rise of Modernism in the twentieth century”.
The galleries are also rich with new views of Joslyn’s nationally recognized collection of art of the American West, including its world-renowned Maximilian-Bodmer Collection. Jurovics noted, “One of our goals was to integrate the history of Euro-American art and exploration of the West with that of the American Indian cultures that inhabited the Upper Missouri River region. Works by Karl Bodmer and Alfred Jacob Miller, as well as key paintings by Charles Bird King and Henry Inman and objects from our collection of American Indian art, present the history of the peoples and landscape of the High Plains in a cohesive fashion for the first time at Joslyn”. Portraits by James Peale (1749–1831) and Erastus Salisbury Field (1805–1900); early American furniture illustrating both a lingering European influence and a newly developing Federalist style; paintings by Thomas Cole (1801–1848) and Thomas Doughty (1793–1856), representing the Hudson River School — the first distinctly American art style. The ‘American Origins’ gallery illustrates the emergence of an American art that reflected the new republic’s ideals and growing prosperity following the Revolution.
Ceremonial and utilitarian artifacts created by Indian tribes of the High Plains; portraits of American Indians done in the field by artist-explorers George Catlin (1796–1872), Karl Bodmer (1809–1893), and Alfred Jacob Miller (1810–1874); and studio portraits of Plains Indians painted by Charles Bird King (1785–1862) in Washington, D.C., and replicated in Philadelphia by Henry Inman (1801–1846). Combined, these installations reflect a vital profile of the peoples and culture of the Upper Missouri regionand are featured in the ‘Across the Wide Missouri and Faces of the Upper Missouri’ gallery
Scenes of everyday life by John George Brown (1831–1913), William Harnett (1848–1892), and Eastman Johnson (1824–1906); the rise of a new vision of landscape in paintings by Eanger Irving Couse (1866–1936) and Albert Blakelock (1847–1919); and American artists such as William Merritt Chase (1849–1916), Thomas Eakins (1844–1916), and John Singer Sargent (1856–1925), who were gaining recognition internationally in the latter half of the century are all featured in the ‘An Expanding Presence’ gallery. The works in the ‘The Romantic Horizon and The Myth of the West’ gallery illustrate the diversity of interests and growing international presence of American artists in the second half of the nineteenth century. Grand, dramatic landscapes by Albert Bierstadt (1830–1902), Thomas Hill (1829–1908), Thomas Moran (1837–1926), and Worthington Whittredge (1820–1910), artists who traveled West and created paintings that inspired a nation. The artists in this gallery helped to shape an idealized image of the western landscape as an untouched wilderness that has persisted to the present day. Artist-illustrators such as Frederic Remington (1861–1909), Charles Marion Russell (1864–1926), Charles Schreyvogel (1861–1912), William Robinson Leigh (1866–1955), and Maynard Dixon (1875–1946). Painters in this gallery created an image of the West as a rough-hewn paradise of rugged landscapes and daring action.
The final gallery, ‘Realism, Abstraction, and Regionalism’ features Robert Henri (1865–1929) and John Sloan, whose realist work elevated the contemporary city and its inhabitants to the subject of fine art; abstraction and the influences of the European avantgarde in paintings by Stuart Davis (1892–1964) and Raymond Jonson (1891–1982); and the Regionalists Grant Wood (1892–1942), Thomas Hart Benton (1889–1975), and John Steuart Curry (1897–1946). The artists in this gallery reflect the complex and competing themes in American art during the first half of the twentieth century.
Joslyn Art Museum was a generous gift to the people of Omaha from Sarah H. Joslyn (1851–1940) in memory of her husband, George A. Joslyn (1848–1916), in his day, the richest man in Nevada, thanks to his interests in paper mills and publishing. When associates suggested he move his business headquarters East, George answered that his money had been “made in Omaha and it would be spent in Omaha.” After her husband’s death, Mrs. Joslyn devoted herself to creating a memorial that would perpetuate their shared interests in music and art, as well as benefit the greatest number of people possible. She decided to build a concert hall surrounded with art galleries. When it opened on November 29, 1931, the new museum received several private collections as gifts, as well as collections from the Art Institute of Omaha and the Friends of Art. The extraordinary Art Deco building was hailed not only as an important addition to the city of Omaha, but to modern American architecture as well. In 1938 it was listed among the 100 finest buildings in the United States. Construction took three years and cost almost $3 million. The three-level interior comprises some 38 marbles from around the world and includes stone from Italy, France, Germany, Belgium, and Morocco. The exterior and retaining wall alone filled 250 boxcars with George Pink (Etowah Fleuri) marble. The building’s architects utilized Native American themes throughout the museum interior and on the east entrance columns. Moravian floor tiles used in the colorful Storz Fountain Court include symbols for literature, music, architecture, and painting. The Walter and Suzanne Scott Pavilion, a 58,000 square-foot addition designed by renowned British architect Norman Foster, Baron Foster of Thames Bank, and built in 1994 at a cost of $15.95 million, connects to the original Memorial building with the glorious glass ConAgra Foods Atrium. In 2007, Joslyn celebrated 75 years of achievement and inspiration with an exciting year of events and programs recognizing the Museum’s permanent collection, special exhibitions, building, campus, and community partnerships. Visit the museum’s website at … http://www.joslyn.org
