Boston College McMullen Museum of Art Hosts Premier Belgian Art |
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| Tuesday, 20 February 2007 02:14 |
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CHESTNUT HILL, MA – The McMullen Museum of Art at Boston College presents A New Key : Modern Belgian Art from the Simon Collection. The exhibition is on view through July 22, 2007, and comprises 53 works of art, most in their first North American display. This is also the first time that this selection of works has been displayed together as a group.
“These works are not only extraordinarily beautiful, but they offer a fascinating window into the development of modern art. Belgium is clearly revealed as an indispensable font of Expressionism and Surrealism," said Boston College Fine Arts Department Professor Jeffery Howe, exhibition curator and leading American historian of modern Belgian art. The exhibition provides a choice and rich sampling that epitomizes the extraordinary accomplishments of Belgian artists from the late nineteenth century to World War II. During this period, which defined modernism, Belgium was transformed by artistic breakthroughs and cataclysmic political and social upheavals. American audiences have had few opportunities to see Belgian art of this era, and many of the artists featured in the exhibition are rarely displayed in the United States. The exhibition comprises 48 paintings, one drawing and four sculptures, which were chosen from a large collection to exemplify the national character of Belgian art. These works have never before been displayed together, and as a group, they tell the story of Belgian artistic vision, doubt and perseverance through the six themes in which they will be grouped in the exhibition: Looking Outward: Landscape and Village Scenes; Work and Labor; The View from Within: Interiors and Still life; The Human Dimension: The Figure; The Impact of the First World War; The Fantastic and Carnivalesque.
A New Key, they explain, seeks to understand modernism more fully by exploring Belgium through its art as a place—rooted in history and geography—where issues of political identity and linguistic identity have been particularly challenging. “The exhibition,” organizers note, “will introduce Americans to the extraordinary visual virtuosity of one of the world’s great artistic traditions, with which they are largely unfamiliar. The Simon Collection Exhibition Catalogue Exhibition Organizers The McMullen Museum is renowned for organizing interdisciplinary exhibitions that ask new questions and break new ground in the display and scholarship of the works on view. It serves as a dynamic educational resource for all of New England as well as the national and the international community. The Museum displays its notable permanent collection and mounts exhibitions of international scholarly importance from all periods and cultures of the history of art. In keeping with the University’s central teaching mission, the Museum’s exhibitions are accompanied by scholarly catalogues and related public programs. The 10th anniversary of the formal reopening of the Museum was marked in 2003-04.The Charles S. and Isabella V. McMullen Museum of Art was named in 1996 in honor of the late parents of the late Boston College benefactor, trustee and art collector John J. McMullen. Visit : www.bc.edu/artmuseum Click on logo below to add this article to your favorite Social Website ~ |
According to organizers, modernist scholarship has focused on Paris, Berlin, Moscow and New York as the centers of modern art. To focus only on art produced in these cities does not do justice to local traditions—which produced significant works of art, deeply rooted in their cultural context. This exhibition challenges the canon by examining Belgium. It reveals how the history of modern art looks different when viewed from the vantage point of this “marginal” center—hence the exhibition title, “A New Key.” 
The exhibition will explore how each of these themes reveals questions of meaning and identity that haunted Belgian artists during this period. Belgium has an unusually complicated history, and it often seems impossible to separate historical facts from ideology and national myths, according to organizers. But they note that “works of art may provide an ideal model for the nature of historical interpretation, because of the importance of subjective factors.” 
