WD | Culture | Events
Events Listings *Please check the venue for times. Venue locations are subject to change.
ART MARCH 1 TO JULY 5
Degas at the Opéra
An exuberant display of fecund imagination and keen observation, Edgar Degas’s renowned images of the Paris Opéra are among the most sophisticated and visually compelling works he ever created. Celebrating the 350th anniversary of the Opéra’s founding, “Degas at the Opéra” will present approximately 100 of the artist’s best-known and beloved works in a range of media, including paintings, pastels, drawings, prints and sculpture. NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART
MARCH 4 TO 29
Marrakech Portraits by Steve Alderton
Steve Alderton’s trip to Marrakech, taken about a year before his unexpected death last summer, inspired this series of portraits. While leaving a few pieces possibly unfinished or in the process of being altered, he left an opening for a dialogue as to when an artist feels their work to be complete. These paintings — some including vivid pastels, others layered in Warhol-like quadrants of color, and others quite still, half in shadow — share a haunted profundity. TOUCHSTONE GALLERY
MARCH 6 TO 26
True and False
This new group exhibition showcases vibrant and diverse multimedia installation works by three contemporary Korean artists who explore the blurring of truth in modern society. Tae Eun Kim, Su Hyun Nam and Ahree Song each place their work in the context of today’s fast-paced, complex world, where clear distinctions between fiction and reality are increasingly lacking. As absolute notions such as true and false or possible and impossible become ever more obscure, advanced technology continues to overcome humanity’s perceived limitations and our very ability to comprehend it. KOREAN CULTURAL CENTER
THROUGH MARCH 8
Visual Memory: Home + Place
This mid-career survey of multimedia artists Scherezade García and Iliana Emilia García explores how each artist reflects upon constructed notions of human geography and history in a creative multidisciplinary approach. Generating a provocative and incisive rethinking about the possibilities of visual memory, they engage with timeless universal concerns about global migration, settlement and the spaces we occupy. ART MUSEUM OF THE AMERICAS
THORUGH MARCH 15
Landscape in an Eroded Field: Carol Barsha, Heather Theresa Clark, Artemis Herber Depicting nature and the environ-
ment is one of the most ancient and elemental expressions of art. From cave painting to Dutch still lifes to social practice incorporating life forms, artists have always been attentive and responsive to the world around them. This exhibition spans landscape painting that takes no social or political stance to multimedia painting and sculpture but puts climate change at the center of its meaning.
AMERICAN UNIVERSITY MUSEUM
MARCH 28 TO AUG. 2
Meeting Tessai: Modern Japanese Art from the Cowles Collection
Tomioka Tessai is a prime example of a modern Japanese painter. Contemporaries praised his works as being exceptionally modern, and they recognized parallels between Tessai’s work and European postimpressionism. Paintings by Tomioka Tessai (1836–1924) were so esteemed that he was one of the first Japanese artists to have his works shown in the United States. “Meeting Tessai” is the first one held at a major museum in the United States in more than 50 years to explore the significance of pan-East Asian influences — a pertinent topic in today’s interconnected world — through the work of Tessai and modern Japanese painting. ARTHUR M. SACKLER GALLERY
THROUGH APRIL 19
Delita Martin: Calling Down the Spirits
Multimedia artist Delita Martin (b. 1972) makes large-scale prints onto which she draws, sews, collages and paints. Martin’s meticulous, multilayered works create a powerful presence for her subjects: black women and men depicted on a monumental scale. Through her imagery, Martin forges a new iconography that is rooted in African tradition, personal recollections and physical materials. NATIONAL MUSEUM OF WOMEN IN THE ARTS
THROUGH APRIL 26
Dialog: Landscape and Abstraction – Freya Grand and AMA’s Permanent Collection
This exhibition pairs important 20th-century abstract works by artists in the OAS Art Museum of the Americas’s permanent collection with works by contemporary landscape painter Freya Grand. The pairings of Grand and artists living and working in the Americas (1960-73) convey a common dialogue through their shared forms, textures, symbols, color and composition. Here, Grand’s immersive landscapes derived from her experiences in remote regions of Ecuador, Peru, Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica and the Galapagos Islands intermingle with those of such stalwarts of the OAS AMA’s art collection as Maria Luisa Pacheco (Bolivia), Angel Hurtado (Venezuela) and Anibal Villacis (Ecuador). ART MUSEUM OF THE AMERICAS
THROUGH APRIL 30
A New Light: Canadian Women Artists
“A New Light” offers visitors a
32 | THE WASHINGTON DIPLOMAT | MARCH 2020
sneak preview of pieces by 27 renowned Canadian women artists that will then be showcased in various prominent locations within the embassy in D.C. The Embassy of Canada is proud to display over 180 art pieces by Canadian artists throughout its chancery. As part of a 2020 revision of its art plan, the embassy is incorporating these new works that illuminate Canada’s diversity and showcase not only the diverse backgrounds of the artists, but also the various media with which they work.
EMBASSY OF CANADA
THROUGH MAY 1
Liquid City and 41 Estações
The Art Museum of the Americas presents the series “Liquid City” by Canadian photographer Frank Rodick and “41 Estações” by Brazilian photographer Luciano Siqueria. Based in Montreal, Rodick produced the 40 images of “Liquid City” in the 1990s in Montreal, Toronto, Tokyo, New York, Hamburg and Berlin. In these works, the city becomes a condition as opposed to a specific place — a theater of transience where he destabilizes the image by breaking down the boundaries between foreground, background and subject. In “41 Estações,” Siqueria, a Brazilian sound designer and musician, uses his daily experiences in the Rio de Janeiro subway system to highlight the routines, promises and uncertainties of human displacement amid an urban landscape. Viewings are by appointment and can be made by calling (202)370-0151 ART MUSEUM OF THE AMERICAS F STREET GALLERY
THROUGH MAY 1
Women: A Century of Change
As we approach the 100th anniversary of the U.S. constitutional amendment confirming women’s right to vote, this powerful new exhibition and book from National Geographic showcases iconic women around the world. The exhibition’s stunning photographs, drawn from National Geographic’s unparalleled image collection, span nine decades and feature a myriad of countries. NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MUSEUM
THROUGH MAY 3
True to Nature: Open-Air Painting in Europe, 1780-1870
An integral part of art education in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, painting en plein air was a core practice for avantgarde artists in Europe. Intrepid artists — highly skilled at quickly capturing effects of light and atmosphere — made sometimes arduous journeys to paint their landscapes in person at breathtaking sites, ranging from the Baltic coast and Swiss Alps to the streets of Paris and ruins of Rome. Drawing on new scholarship, this exhibition of some 100 oil sketches made outdoors across Europe during that time includes several recently discovered works and explores issues such as attribution, chronology and technique. NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART
The Washington Diplomat THROUGH MAY 17
Hearts of Our People: Native Women Artists
Women have been a predominant creative force behind Native American art, yet their individual contributions, for centuries, have largely remained unrecognized and anonymous. In the first major thematic exhibition to explore the artistic contributions of Native women, “Hearts of Our People” celebrates the achievements of these Native women and establishes their rightful place in the art world. RENWICK GALLERY
THROUGH MAY 24
Riffs and Relations: African American Artists and the European Modernist Tradition
This exhibition presents works by African American artists of the 20th and 21st centuries together with examples by the early 20thcentury European artists with whom they engaged. European modernist art has been an important, yet complicated influence on black artists for more than a century. The powerful push and pull of this relationship constitutes a distinct tradition for many African American artists who have mined the narratives of art history, whether to find inspiration, mount a critique or claim their own space. THE PHILLIPS COLLECTION
THROUGH MAY 24
Robert Franklin Gates: Paint What You See
“Robert Franklin Gates: Paint What You See” showcases an adventurous artist who greatly influenced the course of Washington art from his arrival from Detroit in 1930, at the age of 24, until his death in 1982 as an AU Professor Emeritus. He was a muralist, painter, printmaker, draftsman, and professor at the Phillips Gallery School and then American University for over 40 years. AMERICAN UNIVERSITY MUSEUM
THROUGH MAY 24
Volkmar Wentzel
Volkmar Kurt Wentzel (b. Dresden, 1915-2006) arrived in Washington, D.C., in the early 1930s. When the Great Depression led to prohibitive housing costs in D.C., he moved to West Virginia to join a community with Robert Gates and several other artists who had become close friends. In 1937, back in Washington, purchased a new camera and began photographing the series “Washington by Night.” First lady Eleanor Roosevelt, out for a stroll one evening, encountered Volkmar and purchased several of his pictures. Volkmar completed his Washington photographs and brought them to National Geographic. The event led to his 48-year photographic career as a National Geographic photographer. AMERICAN UNIVERSITY MUSEUM
THROUGH MAY 25
Chiura Obata: American Modern
Chiura Obata (1885-1975) ranks among the most significant Japanese American cultural artists and figures of the 20th century. Best known for his majestic views
of the American West, Obata brought a distinctive trans-Pacific style to the arts community of California as an artist and teacher. This major traveling retrospective presents the most comprehensive survey to date of his acclaimed and varied body of work, from bold landscape paintings of the Grand Canyon and Yosemite National Park to intimate drawings of his experiences of the mass incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II.
SMITHSONIAN AMERICAN ART MUSEUM
THROUGH MAY 25
Graciela Iturbide’s Mexico
For the past 50 years, Graciela Iturbide has produced majestic, powerful and sometimes visceral photographs. She is considered one of the greatest contemporary photographers in Latin America. This monumental survey of photographs of Mexico spans Iturbide’s career with images from 1969 through 2007. It encompasses compelling portrayals of indigenous and urban women, explorations of symbolism in nature and rituals, and haunting photographs of personal items left after the death of Frida Kahlo. NATIONAL MUSEUM OF WOMEN IN THE ARTS
THROUGH JUNE 7
Natural Beauties: Exquisite Works of Minerals and Gems
For centuries, nature’s most enduring materials, like malachite, jade, amethyst and lapis lazuli, have been carved, polished and mounted into beautiful works of art. Hillwood founder Marjorie Merriweather Post was known for the incredible gems and jewelry that signaled her unparalleled taste, but the hardstone objects that make up a less well-known area of her connoisseurship are equally impressive and exquisite. This special exhibition is the first at Hillwood to focus on finely crafted objects that incorporate these exceptional stones and minerals. HILLWOOD MUSEUM, ESTATE & GARDENS
THROUGH JUNE 14
Raphael and His Circle
Raphael (1483-1520) was one of the greatest artistic figures working in the Western classical tradition. In celebration of the 500th anniversary of his death, the gallery presents 25 prints and drawings in an intimate installation that illustrates how the combination of artistic traditions, wide range and immediate influence of Raphael’s art shaped the standard of aesthetic excellence for later artists. NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART
THROUGH JULY 5
I Am… Contemporary Women Artists of Africa
Taking its name from a 1970’s feminist anthem, “I Am… Contemporary Women Artists of Africa” draws upon a selection of artworks by women artists from the National Museum of African Art’s permanent collection to reveal a more contemporary feminism that recognizes the contributions of women to the most pressing issues of their times. With ex-
|
March 2020
perimental and sophisticated use of diverse media, the 27 featured artists offer insightful and visually stunning approaches to matters of community, faith, the environment, politics, colonial encounters, racism, identity and more.
NATIONAL MUSEUM OF AFRICAN ART
THROUGH JULY 5
Delight in Discovery: The Global Collections of Lloyd Cotsen
Over his lifetime, Lloyd Cotsen was known as many things: a philanthropist, the CEO of skin and hair care company Neutrogena and an accumulator of art. Though he was best known for his professional work, his personal legacy is the Cotsen Foundation for the Art of Teaching and his worldrenowned collections of textiles, basketry and folk art. This exhibit highlights the global spectrum of his interests, primarily through textile fragments and garments collected over a 60-year period. THE GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY TEXTILE MUSEUM
THROUGH SEPT. 7
Pat Steir: Color Wheel
The Hirshhorn will host the largest painting installation to date by the acclaimed abstract painter Pat Steir. The exhibition is an expansive new suite of paintings by the artist, spanning the entire perimeter of the Museum’s second-floor inner-circle galleries, extending nearly 400 linear feet. HIRSHHORN MUSEUM AND SCULPTURE GARDEN
THROUGH SEPT. 13
Lee Ufan: Open Dimension
“Lee Ufan: Open Dimension” is an ambitious site-specific commission by the celebrated Korean artist Lee Ufan. The expansive installation, featuring 10 new sculptures from the artist’s signature and continuing “Relatum” series, marks Lee Ufan’s largest single outdoor sculpture project in the US, the first exhibition of his work in the nation’s capital, and the first time in the Hirshhorn’s 45-year history that its 4.3-acre outdoor plaza has been devoted, almost in its entirety, to the work of a single artist. HIRSHHORN MUSEUM AND SCULPTURE GARDEN
THROUGH OCT. 12
Marcel Duchamp: The Barbara and Aaron Levine Collection
Featuring the recent gift of over 50 major historical works, including more than 35 seminal works by Marcel Duchamp, this exhibition comprises an unparalleled selection of art, thoughtfully acquired over the course of two decades and offering a rarely seen view of the entire arc of Duchamp’s career. This is the first stage of a two-part exhibition on the life and legacy of Duchamp. The second stage, opening spring 2020, will examine Duchamp’s lasting impact through the lens of the Hirshhorn’s permanent collection, including significant works by a diverse roster of modern and contemporary artists. HIRSHHORN MUSEUM AND SCULPTURE GARDEN
