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Saturday, May 26, 2012

CULTURE

elles@centrepompidou: Shopping Museum-Worthy Artists on eBay

 

Artists featured in elles@centrepompidou: Painter Helen Frankenthaler sitting amidst her art, circa 1956. (Photo by Gordon Parks/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images); artist Louise Bourgeois posing with one of her sculptures, titled 'Baroque,' at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, 1983. (Photo by Ted Thai/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images)

According to curator Camille Morineau, the exhibition elles@centrepompidou, currently on view at the Centre Pompidou in Paris is a “risk” and a very “un-French” thing to do in a country, she tells us, where “very few people notice that sometimes there are no women” represented in an exhibition. Nevertheless, since May, 2009 and continuing for almost two years through February, 2011, The Centre Pompidou, a renowned institution with the largest collection of contemporary and modern art in Europe, is devoting two floors exclusively to the work of women artists from its 50-year-old collection. The exhibition features a rotating selection culled from 500 works from 200 international artists, alive and deceased, working in all mediums: film, photography, video, music, performance, painting, drawing, sculpture, installation, design and architecture. The works date from the 20th and 21st centuries and range from pioneers of feminist art like Serbian Marina Abramovic to contemporary artists like Britain’s Tracey Emin.

Tracey Emin poses next to one of her works at her show at the White Cube Gallery in London, 2005. (ODD ANDERSEN/AFP/Getty Images)

Morineau says that only 25 percent of the Pompidou’s collection is composed of women artists and of that 25 percent, only 11 percent were on view before the elles@centrepompidou exhibition opened. As for what prompted her to undertake what she described to the Los Angeles Times as a "revolutionary gesture of affirmative action:" While studying in the United States 20 years ago, Morineau encountered women’s and gender studies classes and longed to find the same back in Europe where women's work, even today, is “not a subject.” She hopes that the exhibition will help call attention to the subject of women's studies and further the exposure of and cultural conversation about women's work. After years spent strategizing and planning and almost a year after its opening, she is still thrilled to see the exhibition thriving.

Anne Spurgeon, visual artist and educator at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, acknowledges the importance and relevance of this exhibition, stating that “Women artists in the United States began taking action in the 1960s, making works that specifically addressed their own lives and experiences, thus creating an agenda that is still present and topical today. Historically, this may be the difference between the U.S. and France concerning women’s art, especially feminist work.” 

The elles@centrepompidou exhibition is the third large-scale themed exhibition at the museum, following “The Big Bang” in 2005 and “Movement of Images" in 2006-07. The lowercase text and now-universal @ sign in its title emphasize the immediacy of the art and remind us that elles@centrepompidou isn’t a stodgy, out-of-the-archives exhibition, but a vibrant collection of some of the most important artists of our time.

We found the work of many of the artists from the exhibition on eBay, including books and even original artwork and first-edition monographs.

 

Tracey Emin “Srangeland” Book (buy it now price, $9.77) Intimate memoirs from controversial British artist Tracey Emin, who in 1993 set up shop in England with fellow artist Sarah Lucas to sell their work, and 15 years later, was awarded a major solo retrospective that toured Europe.

 

Diane Arbus Aperture Monograph (buy it now price, $2,350) A year after her death at age 48, native New Yorker Diane Arbus became the frst American photographer to have her work displayed at the Venice Biennale. Her now-iconic work is available in this first edition monograph collection.

 

Sonia Delaunay Lithograph (buy it now price, 2,500) Sonia Delaunay was the first living female artist to have a retrospective at the Louvre in Paris, France in 1964. This lithograph is an example of her use of geometric abstraction, which she referred to as Orphism.

 

 Zaha Hadid Five Piece Place Setting (buy it now price, $169.98) British Iraqi Zaha Hadid is one of the most influential architects working today. She is known as much for her completed projects around the world as well as for conceptual and theoretical designs that were sometimes never built. Here’s a chance to own cutlery she designed.

 

Louise Bourgeois DVD (buy it now price, $24.56) This documentary of French artist Louise Bourgeois includes conversations with the artist, who was in her nineties when the film was made and is still working today at the age of 98. 

Cindy Sherman Original Silver Gelatin Print (buy it now price, $5,000) This print from American photographer Cindy Sherman is from her now-iconic series the “Complete Untitled Film Stills.” She continues to explore self portraiture today and has inspired countless budding photographers to do the same. 

 

 

Dorothea Tanning Signed Lithograph (buy it now price, $1,750) An Illinois native who lived in Paris for nearly 30 years, Dorothea Tanning worked closely with the Surrealists. She returned to the U.S. in 1974, following her retrospective at the Centre Pompidou and the death of her husband, artist Max Ernst. The 99-year-old artist lives in New York.

 

Sophie Calle “Did You See Me?” Book (buy it now price, $52.38) Sophie Calle is a French conceptual artist who plays with our notions of public and private space. Whether she is following a stranger, hiring a private detective to follow her, or sleeping at the top of the Eiffel Tower in a bed while strangers tell her five minute stories, Calle is always fascinating. This book examines her deeply intersected life and work. 

 

Helen Frankenthaler Aquatint Etching (buy it now price, $12,000) An important figure in the Abstract Expressionist movement, Helen Frankenthaler worked along giants like Jackson Pollock. This work is closer to her Color Field paintings, which became known for their “halo” effect.  A native New Yorker, Frankenthaler is currently 81-years-old and lives in Connecticut. 

 

Mariko Mori Book (buy it now price, $23.66) Born in 1967 in Japan, Mariko Mori creates futuristic, surreal photographs and video installations, combining elements of modern Japanese culture with Eastern mythology. Mori worked as a model and studied fashion design, which has influenced her work.

 

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ee638b52-3a1d-4c54-a798-88e471ef5bd2 Thu, 30 Dec 2010 11:59:27 PST Thu, 30 Dec 2010 11:59:27 PST
joan
comment-post

I would like to find a picture of the lord prayer with the praying hands on it i would like to no do you still have that one could you please let me know if you have that one you can email me and let me know by sending to my email joangarrett@cavtel.net thankyou.

2de29941-e27b-4fcd-82d4-1d12f11e6ba4 Thu, 30 Dec 2010 12:02:02 PST Thu, 30 Dec 2010 12:02:02 PST
joan
comment-post

this is not anonymous this letter goes to home interiol

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