12
|
curatorial report The Museum’s Curatorial Department delivered scholarly exhibitions and acquired two significant collections of folk and self-taught art in fiscal year 2012. The curatorial team and their partners at the Chipstone Foundation originated all of the year’s exhibitions, including a survey of the Anthony Petullo acquisition, a historical romp through nineteenth-century French prints, and several cutting-edge contemporary installations. The generous donation by Anthony Petullo of his world-class self-taught art collection, which the Museum celebrated with an exhibition and a beautifully illustrated catalogue, made the Milwaukee Art Museum a global leader in the field. This gift helped secure another major bequest, from Pulitzer Prize– winning playwright Lanford Wilson, a noted collector of self-taught art. Farther afield, curatorial staff served as consultants, in collaboration with the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, on the new Frank Lloyd Wright Gallery at the SC Johnson Company headquarters in Racine, one of Wright’s architectural masterpieces. Both the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation and the SC Johnson Company were instrumental in the Museum’s exhibition Frank Lloyd Wright: Organic Architecture for the 21st Century in 2011. This was a wonderful opportunity to assist community partners on a project that keeps work by America’s greatest architect (a Wisconsin native) in the public eye.
Acquisitions Folk and Self-Taught Art
The Museum’s Folk and Self-Taught Art collection grew by more than 450 works, thanks to the Anthony Petullo Collection and the Lanford Wilson Collection—two large gifts whose scale and scope complement the Museum’s already strong collection. Among the artists represented are Eddie Arning, Minnie Evans, Henry Darger, William Hawkins, Bill Traylor, Fredrich SchröderSonnenstern, Alfred Wallis, Joseph Yoakum, and Anna Zemánková. The unique focus of the Petullo Collection on European self-taught art means that the Museum now holds the most extensive grouping of this work in any American museum or private collection, and with the addition of the Wilson Collection, establishes the Museum as a leading American institution for selftaught material.
| 2012 annual report
American Art
The American Collections were enriched with the acquisition of three major paintings in 2011–2012: a set of pendant portraits painted in 1780–81 by Charles Willson Peale, and a landscape view of Harper’s Ferry, WV, painted in 1808 by Francis Guy—now the earliest American landscape in the collection. 20th-Century Design
A highlight in the year for 20th-century design was the acquisition of George Mann Niedecken furniture. Adding depth to the already strong collection, the Vanity with Mirror (ca. 1904–07), Dining Table and Chairs (ca. 1907), Armchair (ca. 1907), and Serving Table (1911) show the Milwaukee designer’s adoption of fresh aesthetics, which propelled his clients out of the Victorian era. These objects were celebrated in an installation on the Museum’s Lower Level. Also featured was the newly acquired Hanging Basket (ca. 1900) ironwork by Cyril Colnik, the first example of this Milwaukee craftsman to enter the Museum’s Collection. Photographs
Several important contemporary photography works entered the Collection this fiscal year. Uta Barth’s … and to draw a bright white line with light (Untitled 11.1) (2011) is part of the artist’s breakthrough series of works, Grounds, in which she made background items such as walls or curtains appear blurry in an attempt to remove the issue of subject matter. The fall exhibition Taryn Simon: Photographs and Texts featured three of Simon’s projects that challenge the seeming transparency of photographs; the Museum acquired four works that represent the breadth of these projects. Other important acquisitions include Mike Miller; 24 years old; Allentown, Pennsylvania; $25 (1990–92) by Philip-Lorca diCorcia; the rare vintage print Beverly Boulevard and La Brea Avenue, Los Angeles, California, June 21, 1975 (1975) by Stephen Shore; and the Photography Council’s annual gift, Reverie (2006), a work by emerging artist Kelli Connell.