UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — The Palmer Museum of Art at Penn State has announced an exciting and diverse schedule of exhibitions for 2019. Highlights include an ambitious loan exhibition featuring works by Pennsylvania-native John Sloan, exhibitions of prints and works on paper by an international roster of artists, a major show highlighting modernist photographers enthralled with Mexico, and two exhibitions examining the powerful work of noted African-American artists of the 20th century.
The new year starts with the opening in early February of "From the Rooftops: John Sloan and the Art of a New Urban Space." Organized by the Palmer Museum of Art, this groundbreaking exhibition brings together dozens of works by Ashcan School painter Sloan, as well as by some of his peers and protégés, all focused around the allure of the New York City rooftop. The show is accompanied by a rich array of programming in the form of lectures, gallery talks, and community art events.
On view in the summer will be "Under the Mexican Sky: A Revolution in Modern Photography," which will spotlight the magnetic glory of Mexico City in the 1920s and ’30s and the modern artists and photographers who crossed borders to live and work there.
The 2019 season will close with "Augusta Savage: Renaissance Woman," a retrospective of the hugely influential artist-activist of the Harlem Renaissance.
See the list below for complete information for the 2019 exhibition schedule.
For more information, visit the Palmer website at palmermuseum.psu.edu.
Palmer Museum of Art 2019 exhibition schedule
"Subjective Spaces: Drawings and Collages by Robert Reed"
Jan. 5 to May 19
Artist and educator Robert Reed, a faculty member in Yale University’s School of Art for nearly 50 years, influenced the teaching and creative practices of generations. This exhibition is being organized in collaboration with the Stuckeman School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture, which is celebrating Reed’s career with a series of drawing workshops, discussions and lectures in February 2019. Organized by the Palmer Museum of Art.
"Amazing Stories: Recent Acquisitions"
Jan. 12 to May 26
This exhibition highlights a large selection of prints by artists whose work relies heavily on representation and storytelling to explore ethnic identity and stereotypes, multicultural histories, and personal narratives. Artists featured include Claudia Bernardi, Squeak Carnwath, Sue Coe, Claudio Dicochea, Leonor Fini, Hung Liu, Jenny Morgan, Mimmo Paladino, Roger Shimomura, and Vincent Valdez, among others. Organized by the Palmer Museum of Art.
"From the Rooftops: John Sloan and the Art of a New Urban Space"
Feb. 3 to May 12
Ashcan School painter and Pennsylvania-native John Sloan was preoccupied with the New York City rooftop perhaps more than any other American artist in the first half of the 20th century. This setting factors into some of his most iconic works. The exhibition offers the first in-depth examination of Sloan’s lifelong interest in the urban rooftop by bringing together nearly 30 of his paintings, prints and drawings. In addition to major loans of works by Sloan, the exhibition expands on the visual culture of “the city above the city” and includes examples by more than a dozen notable contemporaries who were also captivated by rooftop locales, including George Ault, William Glackens, and Reginald Marsh. Organized by the Palmer Museum of Art, the exhibition is accompanied by a publication and will travel to the Hyde Collection in June 2019.
"Under the Mexican Sky: A Revolution in Modern Photography"
June 1 to July 28
Mexico City in the 1920s and ’30s was the scene of one of the great artistic flowerings of the 20th century and served as a magnet for international artists and photographers. Foremost among the expatriate photographers was Edward Weston, who reinvented his approach to picture-making during his three years in Mexico in the mid-1920s. The soft-focus painterliness of his earlier studio portraiture gave way under the brilliant Mexican sun to crystalline landscapes and evocative still lifes. Meanwhile, his Italian paramour and protégée, Tina Modotti, created photographs that would place her in the pantheon of great photographers of the era. This exhibition features rare vintage Mexican masterworks by both Weston and Modotti from the 1920s, as well as photographs from the 1930s by New Yorker Paul Strand, Frenchman Henri Cartier-Bresson, and Mexico’s own Manuel Álvarez Bravo. Organized by art2art Circulating Exhibitions and featuring photographs from the collection of Michael Mattis and Judith Hochberg.
"Myth Meets Modernism: The Manuel Álvarez Bravo Portfolio"
June 11 to Aug. 4
Hand-selected by the artist in 1977, this portfolio of 15 prints spans several decades and reveals the prodigious Mexican photographer’s career-long preoccupation with myth, folklore and death. Álvarez Bravo’s subjects, like those of his contemporaries Tina Modotti, Edward Weston, and Paul Strand, are seen through a distinctly modernist lens. Organized by the Palmer Museum of Art.
"George Miller and American Lithography"
June 18 to Sept. 15
This exhibition focuses on the role printer George Miller played in making fine art lithography an accessible medium in the early years of the 20th century. The list of American artists attracted to his workshop reads as a veritable who’s who of printmakers for whom lithography became an important means of expression, including Thomas Hart Benton, Howard Cook, John Steuart Curry, Stuart Davis, Adolf Dehn, Mabel Dwight, Don Freeman, Wanda Gág, Ellison Hoover, Doris Lee, Louis Lozowick, Reginald Marsh, Robert Riggs, and Stow Wengenroth. Organized by the Palmer Museum of Art.
"The Web of Life: John Biggers and the Power of Pedagogy"
Aug. 18 to Dec. 15
Acclaimed muralist, draftsman and teacher John Biggers spent several formative years at Penn State immediately following World War II. Drawn primarily from the permanent collection, this exhibition examines his work in relation to two important mentors: art educator Viktor Lowenfeld and artist Charles White. The exhibition highlights a selection of works on paper from the late 1940s to the early 1960s, charting Biggers’ engagement with mural painting, black subject matter, and African culture. Organized by the Palmer Museum of Art.
"Augusta Savage: Renaissance Woman"
Aug. 24 to Dec. 8
Featuring nearly 50 works of art, including sculptures, paintings and works on paper, this exhibition will be the first to reassess Harlem Renaissance artist Augusta Savage’s contributions to art and cultural history in light of her role as an artist-activist. A gifted sculptor, Savage (1892–1962) later became a significant teacher, leader and catalyst for change. Overcoming poverty, racism and sexual discrimination, Savage became one of this country’s most influential artists of the 20th century, playing an instrumental role in the development of many celebrated African-American artists, including William Artis, Romare Bearden, Gwendolyn Bennett, Robert Blackburn, Gwendolyn Knight, Jacob Lawrence, and Norman Lewis, whose works also are included in the exhibition. A prodigious and highly acclaimed artist in her own right, she created works that elevated images of black culture into mainstream America. Organized by the Cummer Museum in Jacksonville, Florida.
"Fantasy and Reality: The World According to Félix Buhot"
Sept. 29 to Dec. 15
Félix Buhot was one of the most original printmakers in France during the last quarter of the 19th century. This exhibition, selected entirely from a private collection, examines the full range of Buhot’s graphic effort, from his highly imaginative intaglios to the more somber lithographs, a medium to which he turned near the end of his career. Also featured are several drawings and paintings related to the prints. Organized by the Palmer Museum of Art.
About the Palmer Museum of Art
The Palmer Museum of Art on the Penn State University Park campus is a free-admission arts resource for the University and surrounding communities in central Pennsylvania. With a collection of 9,000 objects representing and spanning a variety of cultures and centuries of art, the Palmer is the largest art museum between Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. Areas of strength include the museum’s collection of American art from the late 18th century to the present; Old Master paintings; prints and photography; ceramics and studio glass; and a growing collection of modern and contemporary art. The museum presents 10 exhibitions each year and, with 11 galleries, a print-study room, a 150-seat auditorium, and an outdoor sculpture garden, the Palmer Museum of Art is the leading cultural resource for the region.
Museum hours are 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday; noon to 4 p.m. on Sundays; and 6 to 9 p.m. on Third Thursdays. The museum is closed Mondays and some holidays.
The Palmer receives state arts funding support through a grant from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, a state agency funded by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
For more information on the Palmer Museum of Art or for the calendar of upcoming events, visit palmermuseum.psu.edu.