Art Of The Day Weekly
#515 - from 17 May 2018 to 23 May 2018
Patrick Heron, Interior with Garden Window, 1955. Oil paint on canvas, 1219.2 x 1524 mm. Private collection © Estate of Patrick Heron. All Rights Reserved, DACS 2018.
IN THE AIR
Heron, a British Matisse
ST. IVES - The art of Patrick Heron - according to his own expression - could be summarized by saying that color is a means, but also a subject. Though lesser known than his compatriots - Bacon, Freud, or even Auerbach- Patrick Heron (1920-1999) was a major British artist of the 20th century. This retrospective traces his creation from the years of the Second World War up to his older age, from 1943 to 1996. It is set up on the last floor of the Tate St. Ives, in the extension signed by Jamie Robert in 2017. Though he was born in Leeds, Heron quickly felt home was Cornwall, where his family settled when he was five years old. It was after living in London and Cambridge, that he came back to live here definitely in 1956. He became close to the artist community, in particular Barbara Hepworth and Ben Nicholson, while remaining very open to the world - a major influence being Cézanne and Matisse, and throughout his life he developed, parallel to his artistic production a real critic's talent, writing for the best art reviews.
• Patrick Heron at the Tate St. Ives, from 19 May to 30 September 2018.
EXHIBITIONS
Josef Albers, To Mitla, 1940, oil on masonite, 53.3 × 71.1 cm. © The Josef and Anni Albers Foundation, Bethany, Connecticut, by SIAE 2018
Albers, The Mexican connection
VENICE - When talking of Josef Albers (1888-1976), we immediately think of the Bauhaus, of which he was one of the most famous professors. But after he fled Nazism he had a second life in America. In the USA of course, where he emigrated in 1933, and where he was invited to teach at the famous Black Mountain College, but in Mexico as well. He earnestly visited the Precolombian sites, that had an obvious influence on him and his concept of forms(renewing his abstract inspiration) and of colors (adobe). His wife Anni also underwent the same influence in her textile production. Aside from the paintings the exhibition shows some very rare documents, such as the on-site photographs and the collages inspired by the antique architecture.
• Josef Albers in Messico at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, from 19 May to 3 September 2018.
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Bawden, illustration in his blood.
DULWICH - Like Alfred Latour, recently celebrated in Arles, Edward Bawden (1903-1989) is one of those highly gifted creators who had no qualms combining art and advertising. Unfortunately this led to locking up his art in a commercial dimension – hence considered inferior. He drew motifs for Fortnum & Mason or for airlines, and produced book covers, but he also had an abundant production as an engraver (with a clear inkling for linocut), as a painter - he was one of the renovators of English watercolours with his friend Paul Nash. He was known for his landscapes and his views of the English coast, and was also a great traveller, taking advantage of his status of painter for the army during the Second World War. He left in particular a painted testimony on the "Arabs in the marsh" in Iraq that completes the one of his compatriot Wilfred Thesiger.
• Edward Bawden at the Dulwich Picture Gallery, from 23 May to 9 September 2018.
Gianfranco Baruchello, More news in a moment (detail), 1966, inlay, industrial varnish, collage, metallic carding. Private Collection. Photo Ezio Gosti.
A Second Chance for Baruchello
TRENTO- Though he is well over 90, it seems Gianfranco Baruchello (born in 1924) is finally getting the recognition he deserves. He was recently honoured with his first exhibition in France at Villa Arson, Nice (until 27 May). The artist from Liguria (he was born in Livorno) is also experiencing a second youth in Italy. The MART of Trento and Rovereto dedicates a retrospective to him, underlining his very surrealist liking for crossings, for impromptu encounters between techniques, materials, and inspirations.
• Gianfranco Baruchello, at the MART, from 19 May to 16 September 2018.
Viollet-le-Duc, the traveller
VERSAILLES - Viollet-le-Duc experienced a long purgatory, as he was seen as the supporter of a renewal of Gothic art. He is widely reevaluated today, in his various components, among them that of a relentless restorer. His lesser known side, that of a traveller, is the object of a small exhibition based on the collection of the musée Lambinet in Versailles (donated by Mme Sureda, one of his friends, who accompanied him in particular in his Alpine expeditions). We see him travelling throughout the French provinces of his time, for the Voyages pittoresques of Baron Taylor, as well as on an initial trip to Italy, where Ingres received him at the Académie de France. He systematically brought back from all his construction sites - Vézelay or Mont Saint-Michel -, countless sketches. That unlimited appetite for drawing never diminished.
• Viollet-le-Duc voyageur at the musée Lambinet, from 19 May to 15 July 2018.
OPENINGS OF THE WEEK
JÛRGEN KLAUKE
19 May 2018 - PARIS - Galerie Suzanne Tarasiève
A German artist that was one of the first to tackle the issue of gender