Los Angeles, CA—The Hammer Museum is the debut venue for the major traveling exhibition The Société Anonyme: Modernism for America, featuring approximately 240 works by more than 100 artists who shaped the development of modern art in the early 20th century. Organized by Yale University Art Gallery, the exhibition draws from Yale’s renowned collection of artworks held by the legendary Société Anonyme, Inc. and donated in the 1940s by artists Katherine S. Dreier and Marcel Duchamp.  The exhibition is on view at the Hammer Museum until August 20, 2006, before traveling to The Phillips Collection, Washington DC; the Dallas Museum of Art, TX; and the Frist Center for the Visual Arts, Nashville, TN. 

The Société Anonyme: Modernism for America marks the first time that a substantial portion of works from Yale’s famed Société Anonyme Collection has been permitted to travel and provides an unprecedented opportunity for West Coast audiences to see a large group of works by such seminal 20th-century artists as Constantin Brancusi, Marcel Duchamp, Wassily Kandinsky, Piet Mondrian, Man Ray, and Joseph Stella, along with lesser-known artists who made significant contributions to modernism.

The exhibition and accompanying publication have been organized by Jennifer R. Gross, the Seymour H. Knox, Jr., Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, with Susan Greenberg, the Horace W. Goldsmith Assistant Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, both of the Yale University Art Gallery.

Known as America’s first “experimental museum” for modern art, the Société Anonyme, Inc. was founded in New York in 1920 by Katherine S. Dreier, Marcel Duchamp, and Man Ray in order to promote contemporary art among American audiences.  The group’s name is the French phrase denoting a company, and meaninglessly translates as “Incorporated, Inc.”  Its founding came at a time when there were no museums in the U.S. that specialized in modern art, as the Société Anonyme preceded the opening of The Museum of Modern Art in New York by nearly a decade.  A founding philosophy of the Société Anonyme was that the story of modern art should be created and chronicled not by historians or academics, but by artists.  During its 30 years of activities, the Société Anonyme fulfilled this mission by organizing more than 80 exhibitions as well as lectures and other educational programs, publishing more than 40 catalogues, and amassing an exceptional collection of European and American art dating primarily from 1920 through 1940.  In 1941, Dreier and Duchamp gave the majority of this collection to Yale. Dreier also bequeathed to Yale much of her personal collection, which included one of the largest holdings of works by Marcel Duchamp in the U.S.  

“As a museum dedicated to recognizing the crucial role of the artist in all aspects of contemporary culture, the Hammer Museum is very pleased to present this collection of work with a similar focus assembled by such legendary avant-garde artists,” said Ann Philbin, director of the Hammer Museum.  “We are honored to inaugurate this important exhibition’s two-year tour by presenting these rare and influential works to Los Angeles-area audiences.”

THE EXHIBITION
The Société Anonyme: Modernism for America includes a large selection of paintings, sculpture, drawings, and prints, as well as historical photographs and other memorabilia documenting the Société Anonyme’s history and activities.  The installation recreates a series of Société Anonyme exhibitions, including the organization's inaugural 1920 exhibition designed by Marcel Duchamp.

Works by important American pioneers of modernism include Joseph Stella’s Brooklyn Bridge (1919-20), one of the artist’s signature images; Man Ray’s sculptural Lampshade (1921); and Arthur Dove’s Sunrise III (1936-37).

Artists represented include Josef Albers, Alexander Archipenko, Jean Arp, Umberto Boccioni, Constantin Brancusi, Georges Braque, Alexander Calder, Giorgio de Chirico, Théo van Doesburg, Arthur Dove, Katherine Sophie Dreier, Marcel Duchamp, Suzanne Duchamp, Louis Michel Eilshemius, Max Ernst, Oskar W. Fischinger, Naum Gabo, Paul Gauguin, Arshile Gorky, Juan Gris, Marsden Hartley, Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, Fernand Léger, Jacques Lipchitz, El Lissitzky, Kazimir Malevich, Franz Marc, Henri Matisse, Roberto Matta, Joán Miró, László Moholy-Nagy, Piet Mondrian, Emil Nolde, Francis Picabia, Pablo Picasso, Liubov Popova, Man Ray, Odilon Redon, Kurt Schwitters, Edward Steichen, Joseph Stella, Sophie Täuber-Arp, Vincent van Gogh, Jacques Villon, and others.

Highlights include a major work by Duchamp: Tu m’, a 10-foot-long canvas commissioned by Dreier in 1918.  The painting, the title of which may refer to “Tu m’ennuis,” French for “You bore me,” has been interpreted as the artist’s farewell to oil painting and wittily reprises many of his earlier works.  Other works in the exhibition include Francis Picabia’s Midi (ca. 1923-26); Kandinsky’s The Waterfall (1909), an early landscape painted during his sojourn in Munich; Kasimir Malevich’s The Knife Grinder (1912-13), a work in which he experiments with Cubism and Futurism’s multiplicities of form; Brancusi’s Yellow Bird (1919); Suzanne Duchamp’s Chef d’Oeuvre Accordion (1921); Kurt Schwitters’s Monument to the Artist’s Father (ca. 1922-23); and Mondrian’s Fox Trot A (1930), inspired by one of the artist’s favorite dances.

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