The Whitney Collection at 75th Anniversary Exhibit

Wednesday, 21 June 2006 15:44

New York City - On the occasion of the Whitney's 75th anniversary, the entire museum is dedicated to Full House: Views of The Whitney's Collection at 75, a presentation drawn from the permanent collection.  Organized around transformative moments, or “flashpoints,” in American art, Full House proposes a series of dynamic dialogues between works of art across all media, spanning the 20th century to the present.  The exhibition is on view from June 29 through September 3, 2006.

This is one of the few times that the Breuer building has been devoted exclusively to the display of the collection.  “Building on the Whitney's founding mission to support new artists and emerging art forms, the exhibition proposes an active conversation between the present and the past,” said Donna De Salvo, Associate Director of Programs and Curator, Permanent Collection.

Three of the Museum's main floors are organized around concentrations of works largely associated with key paradigmatic shifts in American Art: Abstract Expressionism, Pop Art and Minimalism.  The fourth floor is anchored by Minimalist works of the mid 1960s to early 1970s and explores ideas related to industrial production, materiality, and conceptual practices.  The third floor takes Pop art as its focal point, with works from the 1960s installed within the context of a range of historical and contemporary developments, including those that address urbanism, consumerism, appropriation, and politics.  The second floor is centered on art of the late 1940s and early 1950s, when Abstract Expressionism was at its apex.  Works investigating the transcendent and spiritual qualities in art circumnavigate this core.

The fifth floor of the museum is dedicated to a large-scale presentation of work by Edward Hopper, whose legacy is intimately connected to the Whitney.  The Museum’s vast collection of works by Hopper is supplemented by key loans, including such major paintings as the Art Institute of Chicago's Nighthawks and the Museum of Modern Art's New York Movie, which will be shown in a rare presentation with their preparatory drawings and Hopper's Journal entries.  Calder’s Circus, one of the Whitney’s most beloved works, is newly installed in the Lobby Gallery. 

About the Whitney Museum
The Whitney Museum of American Art is the leading advocate of 20^th- and 21^st-century American art.  Founded in 1930, the Museum is regarded as the preeminent collection of American art and includes major works and materials from the estate of Edward Hopper, the largest public collection of works by Alexander Calder, Louise Nevelson, and Lucas Samaras, as well as significant works by Jasper Johns, Donald Judd, Agnes Martin, Bruce Nauman, Georgia O'Keeffe, Claes Oldenburg, Kiki Smith, and Andy Warhol, among other artists.  With its history of exhibiting the most promising and influential American artists and provoking intense debate, the Whitney's signature show, the Biennial, has become the most important survey of the state of contemporary art in America today.

Visit The Whitney Museum of American Art at : www.whitney.org