Not About Face: Identity and Appearance, Past and Present

Not About Face Identity and Appearance, Past and Present

Zimmerli Art Museum and Department of Art History, both Rutgers University, supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

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The exhibition seminar, Not About Face: Identity and Appearance, Past and Present, is part of a multi-year collaboration supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The seminar, which took place in the spring of 2012, was organized in anticipation of an exhibition that opens in 2014 at the Zimmerli Art Museum on the entwined, though sometimes contradictory, themes of identity and portraiture.

Rather than focusing exclusively on the face and the notion of “likeness,” we aimed to explode the conventional ideas about portraiture by investigating how contemporary systems of establishing identity—DNA, fingerprints, medical X-rays, genome-mapping, for example—have influenced our understanding. We also considered the various ways that one can construct a portrait without relying on the face—or even the human figure. Because the exhibition seminar was designed to give students access to the full range of curatorial work necessary in organizing an exhibition, we held meetings with conservators who reviewed selected objects and described necessary conservation treatments, framing experts who suggested the best practices for reframing art or restoring damaged frames, museum editors, and artists who described their work and their approach to the portrait. The seminar culminated with a graduate student colloquium in which they presented their research findings.

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Not About Face Identity and Appearance, Past and Present

A collaborative project between the Zimmerli Art Museum and Department of Art History, both Rutgers University, supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

CONTRIBUTORS Faculty leaders and graduate students in art history

Corina Apostol

Sara Berkowitz

Kelsey Brosnan

Heather Cammarata-Seale

Boyoung Chang

Allison M. Cooper

Seraphina Ferraro

Natalie Fleming

Elvis Fuentes

Donna Gustafson*

Virginia Allison Harbin

Alexis Jason-Mathews

Stephen Mandravelis

Josephine Rodgers

Kate scott

Susan Sidlauskas*

*Faculty

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Foreword by Suzanne Delehanty. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Introduction by Donna Gustafson and Susan Sidlauskas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 Thomas Ball, Margaret Van Nest by Kelsey Brosnan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Louis Léopold Boilly, Réunion de 35 Têtes Diverses (Group of 35 Heads) by Alexis Jason-Mathews. . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Achille Devéria, Portrait of Alexandre Dumas by Elvis Fuentes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 Gerard Edelinck, Portrait of Philippe de Champaigne by Sara Berkowitz. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Nan Goldin, Self Portrait Laughing, Paris by Boyoung Chang. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Gennady Gushchin, Renaissance Portrait by Elvis Fuentes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 Robert Horsfall, Portrait of a Young Lady in Black by Virginia Allison Harbin. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22 Charles Cromwell Ingham, Lady in White by Virginia Allison Harbin. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 Eastman Johnson, Catherine Law Zabriskie by Natalie Fleming. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 Alex Katz, Double Portrait by Allison M. Cooper. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28 Alex Katz, Vincent by Heather Cammarata-Seale. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 Vitaly Komar and Alexander Melamid, The Origins of Socialist Realism by Corina L. Apostol . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32 Attributed to Petr Levitsky, Portrait of Princess Ekaterina Nikolaevna Lopukhina (Portrait of a Lady)

by Kelsey Brosnan. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34 Igor Makarevich, 25 Memories of a Friend by Boyoung Chang. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36 Alice Neel, Nancy and Olivia by Josephine Rodgers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38 Attributed to Ammi Phillips, Lucretia Harris Holmes by Natalie Fleming. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 Robert Rauschenberg, Autobiography by Josephine Rodgers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 Robert Riger, Willie Mays Steals Third Base, Brooklyn, NY by Stephen Mandravelis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 Shai-Ziia (Ziiakhan Shaigeldinov), Karl Marx in a Spider’s Web by Corina L. Apostol. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46 Cindy Sherman, Untitled (Madonna) by Allison M. Cooper. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48 John Sloan, Memory by Josephine Rodgers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 Jane Stuart, George Washington by Stephen Mandravelis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Le Divan Japonais by Seraphina Ferraro. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 Toyohara Kunichika, Actors by Seraphina Ferraro . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56 Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn, Self Portrait at a Window by Sara Berkowitz. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58 Andy Warhol, Cindy Pritzker by Heather Cammarata-Seale. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 Unidentified Artist, Portrait of an Artist in Her Studio by Alexis Jason-Mathews. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62

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Foreword

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his e-book, the Zimmerli’s first online publication, is a key component of a new multiyear collaboration between the Zimmerli Art Museum and the Department of Art History at Rutgers University, made possible by the generous support of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

Capitalizing on the strengths of the Zimmerli and the Department of Art History, this initiative is centered on the firsthand study of works of art in the museum’s collection and embraces two multifaceted projects. Each project, in turn, has two phases. The first phase focuses on the academic community and includes a graduate exhibition seminar, an e-book written by participating graduate students, and a colloquium for student papers and dialogue with faculty from the arts and sciences. The second phase of each project is designed to benefit both the academic community and the wider public and features a major exhibition, a publication, and interdisciplinary colloquium. The Mellon Foundation’s award also supports annual summer internships for two graduate students from the Department of Art History. We are most grateful to the Mellon Foundation for its generous support of this dynamic model for collaboration.

We launched this exciting new venture in 2012.

It opened with a graduate exhibition seminar called “Not About Face: Identity and Appearance, Past and Present,“ which was cotaught by Dr. Donna Gustafson, the Zimmerli‘s Andrew W. Mellon Liaison and Curator, and Professor Susan Sidlauskas, a specialist in nineteenth-century art and the author of many studies on portraits. The class met in the museum and participated in all

the curatorial efforts leading to the exhibition’s opening at the Zimmerli in 2014. In the seminar, thirteen students debated the aesthetic merits of a wide range of portraits drawn from the Zimmerli’s collection. They met with a conservator and an expert in period framing and considered the portrait from these perspectives. They visited museums in New York and Philadelphia and suggested loans for the exhibition. They wrote papers, which they delivered with aplomb to an audience of faculty, students, and guests at the museum in May 2012.

I extend my warm thanks to Donna and Susan for their leadership, and to the students in the exhibition seminar: Corina Apostol, Sara Berkowitz, Kelsey Brosnan, Heather CammarataSeale, Boyoung Chang, Allison Cooper, Seraphina Ferraro, Natalie Fleming, Elvis Fuentes, Virginia Allison Harbin, Alexis Jason-Mathews, Stephen Mandravelis, and Josephine Rodgers. Individually and collectively, these thirteen students exceeded our already high expectations for their intellectual curiosity, their interdisciplinary investigations, and their cogent analysis of what the portrait means in a larger field of inquiry.

In 1997, the Mellon Foundation stimulated a transformative era of cooperation between our nation’s college and university art museums and their academic communities when the foundation’s leaders established a granting program to foster this integration. The Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers was fortunate to be among the first university art museums in the country to receive such an award. When, in 2009, the Zimmerli set out to reinvigorate the

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museum’s role as a vital center for academic and student life, this Mellon Foundation support provided the springboard and allowed us to signal our seriousness of purpose by creating the first full-time, senior level position in the Zimmerli’s history to serve as liaison to the academic community.

In the last three years, to our delight, we have seen the museum’s connections to a wide range of university departments blossom. We continue to encourage graduate and undergraduate students and faculty from all disciplines to find points of connection with the Zimmerli’s collection, exhibitions, and programs. Our embrace of the full academic community is matched by our special connections to the Department of Art History at Rutgers, home to a talented faculty, a strong PhD program, and a Curatorial Certificate Program, offered to both MA and PhD students at Rutgers. I extend my deep appreciation to Catherine Puglisi, Chair of the Department of Art History; Joan Marter, Board of Governors Professor and Director of the Curatorial Studies Program; Susan Sidlauskas, Director of the department’s graduate program and willing partner in the first project; and our colleagues in art history for their support of this endeavor.

The staff of the Zimmerli, as always, rose to the challenge and contributed to the success of this enterprise in countless ways with great enthusiasm. I extend my heartfelt thanks to each and all. Collaborations create wonderful synergies but also demand time and effort. In particular I wish to thank Donna Gustafson for leading the project on the Zimmerli’s behalf with

great intelligence and grace. We extend our thanks to Christine Giviskos, Associate Curator of European Art; Jane Sharp, Research Curator, Dodge Collection; Marilyn Symmes, Curator of Prints and Drawings and Director of the Morse Research Center; and Julia Tulovsky, Associate Curator of Russian and Soviet Nonconformist Art. Each of these members of the Zimmerli’s curatorial team provided advice and suggested works from the collection for an initial checklist of the exhibition for students participating in the seminar to consider. Operations Manager Edward Schwab and Registrar Leslie Kriff, along with Associate Registrar Margaret Molnar and Assistant Registrar Kiki Michael, made the considerable logistics of mounting a seminar class appear seamless…no easy feat. I also thank Stacy Smith, Manager of Publications and Communications, who with the help of Kate Scott, PhD Candidate in Art History and Graduate Curatorial Assistant at the Zimmerli, assembled this e-book with great care in the midst of many other assignments.

This initiative at the Zimmerli Art Museum embodies the university’s commitment to teaching, research, and outreach. In the first phase of its unfolding, this multiyear program is sparking the creativity of colleagues from every part of the university, who are working across disciplines for the benefit of the students at Rutgers and the broader community, an affirmation that art is indispensable to the welleducated citizen in the twenty-first century.

Suzanne Delehanty Director

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Introduction

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ithin the Western tradition, a portrait has been historically defined as the visual representation of an individual distinguished by references to the subject’s character, social position, wealth, or profession.

While artists from some cultures have focused on specific attributes, social standing, or heroic exploits as markers of identity, others strive for a visual likeness, but not necessarily a photographic likeness. The purposes of portraiture are varied and continue to shift with cultural priorities and changes in perceptions of the self. Portraits have been used by rulers as visual reminders of their power, and by less prominent people as records of their family ties. Individuals joined together in a common enterprise have been commemorated in group portraits. Important cultural figures have been honored by portraits and so have characters from fiction, the historical past, and mythology.

Contemporary artists have used portraiture as a tool to confront ideas about personal, social, and political identities.

We hoped to break through the traditional discussions of portraiture by approaching the subject through a lens that was wide enough to include a fragment, a genetic marker, or a representation without a face. We hoped to show that artists have worked in and beyond the traditions of portraiture to create works that explode boundaries. This is particularly true, of course, for contemporary artists who use canny interventions to dismantle the staid traditions of portraiture and play with our conditioned responses to the portrait. We also worried over the divisions between the portrait as fine art

versus the portrait as documentary evidence, snapshot, or instrument of control or commerce.

Aptly titled, “Not About Face: Identity and Appearance, Past and Present,” the graduate exhibition seminar that resulted in this e-book moved beyond the face and the notion of “likeness.” We investigated how contemporary systems of establishing identity— DNA, fingerprints, medical x-rays, and genome mapping, for example—have influenced our understanding of identity and the portrait.

We also considered the various ways that one can construct a portrait without relying on the face—or even the human figure. The students in the class debated the question of what exactly distinguished a portrait: Was it a person in a certain pose? Could an image of a room, a dress, or a piece of jewelry made with the hair of a deceased individual be called a portrait?

Could an object be a portrait? What were the differences between a portrait, a relic, and a souvenir? The students showed themselves to be intrepid explorers in our quest for unconventional portraits and helped to expand and then rein in the focus of the exhibition. They read widely to bring an interdisciplinary approach to the subject and researched artists outside of the Zimmerli’s collection as suggestions for additional loans.

The seminar culminated in the Andrew W. Mellon Graduate Student Colloquium, “De-Facing the Portrait,” organized by the museum and the Department of Art History. Presenting papers on artists who have focused on portraits, the students approached their subjects through such themes as surface and depth, the identified and the anonymous, the individual and the collective,

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and the ambiguities of scale. In the interests of continuing the interdisciplinary discussions that had characterized our thinking, we invited four respondents from the fields of photography, art history, biomedical engineering and vision research, and medicine who shared their own thoughts about looking at faces. We thank our esteemed colleagues who served as respondents: Sylvia Yount, Chief Curator and Louise B. and J. Harwood Cochrane Curator of American Art, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts; Gary Schneider, Professor, Mason Gross School of the Arts, Rutgers; Thomas Papathomas, Professor, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Director of the Laboratory of Vision Research, and Busch Campus Dean; and Charletta Ayers, MD, MPH, Associate Professor, Director, General OB/GYN, Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Services UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School.

We also take this opportunity to commend our students for their hard work, innovative thinking, and willingness to step outside conventions: Corina Apostol, Sara Berkowitz, Kelsey Brosnan, Heather Cammarata-Seale, Boyoung Chang,

Allison Cooper, Seraphina Ferraro, Natalie Fleming, Elvis Fuentes, Virginia Allison Harbin, Alexis Jason-Mathews, Stephen Mandravelis, and Josephine Rodgers. These thirteen students were assigned a difficult task. We asked them to select two or three objects from our initial pool of possibilities and write extended label copy of 100 to 150 words each. To do so they had to focus their thoughts and be both concise and accessible.

We believe they succeeded admirably. As a fitting tribute to our students, we include their own self-selected portraits. We also thank Kate Scott, PhD. Candidate in Art History and Graduate Curatorial Assistant at the Zimmerli who served as the e-book’s project manager, Zimmerli’s Publications and Communications Manager Stacy Smith, Assistant Registrar Kiki Michael, and the publication editor Carolyn Vaughn.

Donna Gustafson Andrew W. Mellon Liaison for Academic Programs and Curator Susan Sidlauskas Professor of Art History, Rutgers University

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Thomas BALL American (1819–1911) Margaret Van Nest circa 1870 Marble 22 3⁄4 in. (57.8 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers 1345

Thomas Ball began his career cutting silhouette profile portraits for patrons in his native Boston, but he is best known for his marble and bronze representations of contemporary politicians and performers.

He lived in Florence , Italy, from 1865 until 1897, where he worked closely with other American expatriates, including Frank Duveneck, Daniel Chester French, Hiram Powers, and Anne Whitney.

The subject is the daughter of the prominent New York merchant and Rutgers College Trustee Abraham Van Nest. The naturalism of her clothing and individualization of her features exemplify the artist’s American Realist style.

Kelsey Brosnan

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Louis Léopold BOILLY French (1761–1845) Réunion de 35 Têtes Diverses (Group of 35 Heads) circa 1825 Lithograph 16 7⁄8 x 21 1⁄8 in. (42.9 x 53.6 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Museum Purchase 2002.0234

This lithograph is a reverse image of a painting that Boilly created between 1823 and 1828. Towards the end of his career, Boilly demonstrated an increased interest in facial expression, particularly the grimace, and its distorting effects on the face. This image is not a “portrait,” however; the expressions are based on close observation of human faces, but none of the figures in the group are intended to represent actual individuals. Rather, the print can be read as a warning about the potentially distorting effects of expression, making it a cautionary tale about reading too much into a person’s face.

Alexis Jason-Mathews

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Achille DEVÉRIA French (1800–1857) Portrait of Alexandre Dumas 1830 Lithograph 14 x 10 1⁄4 in. (35.6 x 26 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Museum Purchase 80.034.009

A prolific creator of erotic images for his father-in-law’s lithography business, Achille Devéria was also a noted portraitist of prominent figures, including Jacques-Louis David and Honoré de Balzac. This portrait of Alexandre Dumas père was realized at an early stage of their respective careers, presumably before the July Revolution of 1830, which ousted King Charles X and in which Dumas participated.

Of Creole background, Dumas was a target of ostracism for his mixedrace status and womanizing habits, despite being one of France’s most commercially successful authors. With the relaxed and delicate pose of the sitter as a dandy, Devéria reminds the viewer of the pleasure Dumas’s work gave to France. Devéria became director of the Bibliothèque Nationale’s Department of Engravings and assistant curator of the Louvre’s Egyptian Department in 1849.

Elvis Fuentes

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Gerard EDELINCK Flemish (1640–1707) Portrait of Philippe de Champaigne 1676 Engraving 15 5⁄8 x 13 1⁄8 in. (39.8 x 33.5 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Raymond V. Carpenter Estate 0558

One of the great masters of seventeenth-century engraving, Gerard Edelinck came to Paris as a student and quickly surpassed his peers and teachers, eventually earning the esteemed title of Engraver to the King.

This engraving is based on the lost 1668 self portrait of the renowned French painter Philippe de Champaigne. The engraving was Edelinck’s submission piece to the French Academy, and to prove his skill, he replicated the painting in exacting detail, even down to copying the work’s earlier date on the scroll. It remained Edelinck’s favorite of the 400 engravings produced during his career.

Sara Berkowitz

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Nan GOLDIN American (born 1953) Self Portrait Laughing, Paris 1999 Cibachrome print 16 1⁄8 x 20 1⁄8 in. (41 x 51 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Herbert and Lenore Schorr 2005.0165

Nan Goldin documents her life and her community by photographing her friends and acquaintances in intimate settings. In this self-portrait photograph, the artist seems to be caught unawares. Taking up most of the frame, her face and body make a drastic contrast with the blurred, dark background. The theatrical lighting and the glow of her skin dramatize her facial expression, and the snapshot style of the photograph appears to capture an intense emotional moment from an insider’s perspective.

Boyoung Chang

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Gennady GUSHCHIN Russian (born 1940) Renaissance Portrait, from the series Alternative Museum 1989–1990 Photocollage 21 1⁄2 x 16 7⁄8 in. (54.6 x 42.8 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Norton and Nancy Dodge Collection of Nonconformist Art from the Soviet Union D14577

The collapse of the Soviet Union, presided over by Mikhail Gorbachev, set off a transitional period in Russia during the 1980s and 1990s. History was rewritten, and artists revisited historical painting to reassess the past. In this picture, Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, the quintessential Renaissance icon, subverts and interferes with the portrait of Gorbachev, who led the transition towards capitalism—considered by some to be a kind of Renaissance. Formerly a classically trained sculptor, Gushchin realized this work as part of a series of photocollages, Alternative Museum (1989–1990), which recast propagandistic images of the Soviet era. Neither antagonistic nor celebratory, Gushchin’s work suggests a counter-narrative that speaks to Russia’s complex relationship with the West.

Elvis Fuentes

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Robert HORSFALL American (1868–1948) Portrait of a Young Lady in Black circa 1891 Oil on canvas 29 1⁄2 x 24 1⁄2 in. (74.9 x 62.2 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Dr. Helgi Johnson H0758

Robert Horsfall was trained as a painter in Munich and Paris before returning to the United States to establish a career as a natural science illustrator. He also worked for the American Museum of Natural History in New York painting lifelike backgrounds for the museum’s dioramas and large oil paintings of landscapes and birds. In this haunting portrait, Horsfall depicts his subject in a contemplative pose with her head tilted slightly back and hands lightly clasped. Her luminous pale skin stands in stark contrast to her voluminous black dress and the painting’s neutral background. This portrait was likely made during the artist’s training abroad in Munich, where he focused on painted portraits. A large collection of his work was acquired by Rutgers University in 1957 through a donation from university professor Helgi Johnson.

Virginia Allison Harbin

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Charles Cromwell INGHAM American, born Ireland (1796–1863) Lady in White circa 1850–1860 Oil on canvas 36 x 28 in. (91.5 x 71 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Margaret and Elizabeth Baldwin 0140

Charles Cromwell Ingham trained as a painter at the Dublin Institute of Art with the portraitist William Cuming. Upon his arrival in New York in 1816, he quickly established himself as a fashionable painter of ladies’ portraits. His style is characterized by subtle glazes and a careful attention to texture and costume details. Such fine handling of detail, apparent in this painting of an unknown woman, made him a popular choice for portraits of young women. The subject’s soft auburn hair is meticulously painted one strand at a time, and her elegant white dress floats around her youthful figure.

Virginia Allison Harbin

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Eastman JOHNSON American (1824–1906) Catherine Law Zabriskie circa 1892 Oil on canvas 29 7⁄8 x 25 in. (76 x 63.5 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Frederick Wessels Bogert and Jane Zabriskie 0334

Although Eastman Johnson is best known for his genre paintings of Southern life, he began and ended his career as a portraitist.

Academically trained in Germany, France, and Holland, Johnson returned to America to create portraits of renowned American figures such as Ralph Waldo Emerson and John Quincy Adams. Towards the end of his career, he often relied on photographs to produce representations of his sitters. This portrait was commissioned by Catherine Law Zabriskie’s family after her death in 1892, and his source for her likeness remains unknown. It is possible that the sitter had commissioned previous portraits that served as models for this one; she had become wealthy after her father bequeathed her 139 acres of New Jersey farmland in 1865.

Natalie Fleming

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Alex KATZ American (born 1927) Double Portrait circa 1960 Lithograph 9 7⁄8 x 12 1⁄4 in. (25.2 x 31 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Michael Sherman 1994.0413

Alex Katz is best known for painting large-scale, colorful portraits. His subjects often include his wife Ada and son Vincent. In this lithograph, Double Portrait, Katz represents Ada in duplicate. The small, intimate, and sketchlike figures at first appear to be true replications of each other, but upon closer observation, differences emerge. The image on the right appears to be more freely drawn, while the figure on the left maintains a more rigid structure. While it is impossible to know the artist’s intention, it appears that the image on the left was drawn first, from life, while the second was drawn more quickly from memory.

Allison M. Cooper

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Art © Alex Katz/Licensed by VAGA, New York, NY

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Alex KATZ American (born 1927) Vincent 1982 Sugarlift aquatint on Arches Cover paper 54 5⁄8 x 28 7⁄8 in. (138.7 x 73.3 cm) Printer: Orlando Condeso, Condeso and Brokopp Studios, New York Publisher: Brooke Alexander, Inc., New York Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Brooke Alexander 82.040.001.004

Using printmaking’s ability to simplify forms, Katz portrays his son Vincent in a manner that blends figuration and abstraction. Vincent is depicted in monumental scale and cropped below the shoulders, like an antique bust. Floating on a field of white, he stares off into the distance.

His face is composed of simple yet bold shapes in a variety of peachy hues and dark browns. The smoothness of his facial features contrasts with the texture and pattern of his attire. By privileging surface over depth, Katz focuses on Vincent’s outer appearance rather than his inner self.

Heather Cammarata-Seale

Art © Alex Katz/Licensed by VAGA, New York, NY

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Vitaly KOMAR and Alexander MELAMID Russian (born 1943 and 1945)

The Origins of Socialist Realism, from the Nostalgic Socialist Realism series 1983 Oil on canvas 72 1⁄2 x 48 in. (183.5 x 122 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Norton and Nancy Dodge Collection of Nonconformist Art from the Soviet Union 2001.0415

In this collaborative work, Russian artists Vitaly Komar and Alexander Melamid adapt an official portrait of Joseph Stalin, subverting the prescribed representation of the leader in the Soviet Union. While keeping within the Soviet tradition of Socialist Realism in portraiture, the artists destabilize the official image of Stalin by including references to other cultural works and styles, such as Italian Baroque, French Neoclassicism, and Greek mythology. The artists purposefully aggrandize Stalin’s solemn stature, while at the same time including a nude Muse of Painting in the composition. Her presence breaks the conventions of decorum and hierarchy in official portraiture of the time.

Through humorous and unexpected interventions, Komar and Melamid bring into question the function of painting in solidifying myths of state power and authority. Thus, they critique both Stalin’s role in establishing a single, totalizing aesthetic program and, implicitly, the artists who followed his directives.

Corina L. Apostol

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Attributed to Petr LEVITSKY Russian (1735–1822) Portrait of Princess Ekaterina Nikolaevna Lopukhina (Portrait of a Lady) 1799 Oil on canvas 36 1⁄4 x 28 3⁄8 in. (92.1 x 72.1 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers George Riabov Collection of Russian Art Donated in memory of Basil and Emilia Riabov PG1990.1732

Little is known about the artist of this painting, which is thought to be a portrait of Princess Ekaterina Nikolaevna Lopukhina (1763–1839) of Russia. The princess wears a frothy empire-waist gown and an embroidered shawl, as well as a large jeweled cameo featuring the portrait of an older woman in a white powdered wig. Ekaterina came from the noble Lopukhin family, and her cameo probably bears the likeness of one of her famous female ancestors—possibly Eudoxia Lopukhina (1669–1731), the first wife of Peter the Great and grandmother of Peter II. Kelsey Brosnan

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Igor MAKAREVICH Georgian (born 1943) 25 Memories of a Friend 1978 Plaster casts in wood frame 33 5⁄8 x 33 5⁄8 x 3 1⁄8 in. (85.5 x 85.5 x 8 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Norton and Nancy Dodge Collection of Nonconformist Art from the Soviet Union 2000.1115

This sculpture includes 25 casts of the artist’s face set in differentcolored compartments, the vivid hues contrasting with the white grid that separates them. Reflecting the artist’s interest in themes of suffering and death, this work is one of Makarevich’s projects using his own face and body. During the several minutes it took for the original plaster mold to harden around his face, he was disconnected from the outside world. In a sense, the frame enclosing each cell alludes to a coffin, and each face suggests a different memory. One of Moscow’s “unofficial” artists, Makarevich uses the subjects of death and suffering, banned in official Soviet art, to protest the optimism of the officially sanctioned art.

Boyoung Chang

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Alice NEEL American (1900–1984) Nancy and Olivia 1982 Color lithograph 25 5⁄8 x 23 5⁄8 in. (65 x 60 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Dr. David and Ruth Robinson Eisenberg 2006.0461

This color lithograph by Alice Neel reprises a 1967 oil painting of the same title depicting Neel’s daughter-in-law Nancy and granddaughter Olivia. In both the painting and the print Neel evokes the difficult balancing act of motherhood by presenting Nancy and her child awkwardly entwined together and positioned on the chair as if they are about to fall. Nancy gazes directly at the viewer, seeming to contemplate the challenges of motherhood. She later recalled, “I thought the uncomfortable look I have in the portrait was just me trying to keep Olivia still, but what Alice picked up on is that I didn’t know what I was doing.”

Josephine Rodgers

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Attributed to Ammi PHILLIPS American (1788–1865) Lucretia Harris Holmes circa 1828 Oil on canvas 28 1⁄2 x 23 1⁄2 in. (72.4 x 59.7 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Lee Knox Trent 1990.0401

To viewers today, Phillips’s portraits may appear too simplistic to function as accurate representations of his sitters; however, he and his portraits were highly praised in American upper class circles during his lifetime. The acclaimed history painter John Vanderlyn spoke with envy about Phillips’s social and professional standing, and mentioned that Phillips’s patrons were satisfied with their likenesses. The sitter in this painting, Lucretia Harris Holmes, came from a well-established American lineage. Her grandfather, Israel Harris, volunteered with Ethan Allen and participated in the capture of Ticonderoga during the Revolutionary War. Natalie Fleming

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Robert RAUSCHENBERG American (1925–2008) Autobiography 1968 Offset lithograph Each panel 63 3⁄4 x 48 7⁄8 in. (162 x 124 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Marian B. Javits 1992.0158.001-003

Robert Rauschenberg began to experiment with lithography in the 1960s at Universal Limited Art Editions (ULAE) in Long Island, founded

by Tatyana Grosman. Originally, he intended for this large-scale selfportrait to be printed as a single vertical panel, but it was not technically possible. The editioned lithograph was instead printed on three separate panels, each containing a coherent composition, to be displayed either vertically or, as presented here, as a horizontal triptych.

Autobiography reveals details of the artist’s life through the enigmatic juxtaposition of astrological, metaphysical, and spiritual visual devices.

Beginning at the left edge of the first panel, we see an almost lifesized x-ray of the artist, surrounded by a circular astrological chart. The second panel creates a collage of experiences, with a fingerprint-shaped oval encircling the artist’s family portrait at its center. The narrative ends with Rauschenberg’s career as an artist, represented by his performance of the work Pelican in 1963 in Washington, D.C. The scale and range of these descriptive inventions immerse the viewer in the artist’s personal history.

Josephine Rodgers

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Art Š Robert Rauschenberg Foundation/Licensed by VAGA, New York, New York

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Robert RIGER American (1924–1995) Willie Mays Steals Third Base, Brooklyn, NY 1955 Gelatin silver print 16 x 20 in. (40.6 x 50.8 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Anne and Arthur Goldstein 2007.0211

“Art needs conviction. You have to believe that a young baseball player sliding into third base on a steal and losing his cap is the subject of art, that art is fixing an image in a ballpark in Brooklyn where a few thousand people are watching on a Wednesday afternoon.”

—Robert Riger, April 1995

Widely considered one of the greatest baseball players ever, Willie Mays is depicted here stealing third base, a pivotal play in the New York Giants’ 8-5 victory over the Brooklyn Dodgers on September 17, 1955.

Unlike both the traditional portrait of the baseball player—the baseball card—and the other portraits collected here, this image of Mays is not a posed collaboration between artist and sitter, but a document of an event at which the photographer was an observer. Riger, a prominent sports photographer and illustrator for Sports Illustrated, sought not just to capture the likenesses of athletes but to manifest the frantic energy and atmosphere of the peak moment of competition.

Stephen Mandravelis

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SHAI-ZIIA (Ziiakhan Shaigeldinov) Kazakhstani (1950–2000) Karl Marx in a Spider’s Web 1987 Oil on canvas with barrettes 33 7⁄8 x 25 5⁄8 in. (86 x 65 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Norton and Nancy Dodge Collection of Nonconformist Art from the Soviet Union 2000.0738

In this unusual portrait of the German philosopher Karl Marx, Kazakhstani artist Shai-Ziia undermines the prescribed representation of the originator of Marxism. He does so by covering the surface of a realistic depiction of Marx with barrettes—usually reserved as decorations for women’s hair. The humorous discrepancy between the feminine articles covering Marx’s portrait and the solemnity of the figure signals the artist’s dialogue with the inherently artificial nature of this mythical persona. He not only points to his own break with the tenants of Socialist Realism, but also underscores the patriarchal order maintained through hierarchical portraits of male leaders. In the Soviet Union, the iconic image of Marx had become less a portrait of the actual man than a representation of Marx as a symbolic figurehead for state propaganda, a ubiquitous image propagated by the media throughout the Soviet era.

Corina L. Apostol

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Cindy SHERMAN American (born 1954) Untitled (Madonna) 1975/1997 Gelatin silver print 17 3⁄4 x 13 in. (45.2 x 33 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Anne and Arthur Goldstein 2011.006.002

Cindy Sherman first became well known for her black-and-white Untitled Film Stills (1977–1980), in which she uses herself as the subject in a series of photographs reminiscent of images from cinema—though none of her stills were appropriated from any existing film. In these images, the artist employs theories of feminist cinema to comment on Western society, its reflection in film, and the mundane. Here, by adorning herself with a white headscarf and using a dramatic black background to create stark contrasts in light and dark, she devises an ambiguous image that appropriates traditional imagery of the Virgin Mary and creates a dramatic portrait akin to those of American movie stars of the silent film era.

Allison M. Cooper

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John SLOAN American (1871–1951) Memory 1906 Etching 7 1⁄2 x 8 7⁄8 in. (19 x 22.5 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Mrs. Robert Gordon McKay 60.016.003

This group portrait including Robert Henri, shown on the left, and John Sloan, on the right, depicts the two artists sketching together. After moving to New York from Philadelphia, Sloan and his wife Dolly enjoyed many quiet evenings with Henri and his wife Linda in Henri’s studio.

When Linda passed away in 1906, Sloan set out to complete a memorial etching for Henri. Sloan made the choice not to depict Linda alone.

Instead, this group portrait expresses the intimacy of friendship and shared memories. Personalized details, such as the way Linda curves her hands on the table while reading aloud to the group and the family portraits displayed on the shelf, appear throughout the composition.

Dolly, suggestively framed by the picture that hangs behind her, gazes directly at the viewer, seeming to assess the passage of time.

Josephine Rodgers

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Jane STUART American (1812–1888) George Washington 19th century Oil on canvas 29 7⁄8 x 24 3⁄4 in. (76 x 63 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Mary G. Jameson in memory of her husband Edwin C. Jameson 1194

This painting is a copy of the famous Athenaeum Portrait of George Washington (1796, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston/National Portrait Gallery, Washington) by Gilbert Stuart. In late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century America, there was a high demand for images of Washington, the hero of the Revolution and the nation’s first president.

However, before mass reproduction of images was possible, artists had to execute copies by hand. Gilbert Stuart produced between 70 and 75 copies of the Athenaeum Portrait over 30 years, referring to them as his “one hundred dollar bills.” But when he died penniless in 1828, his daughter and assistant Jane Stuart continued to paint copies of her father’s work to support her large family. This painting is one of about 60 copies of the Athenaeum Portrait produced by the younger Stuart.

Stephen Mandravelis

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Henri de TOULOUSE-LAUTREC French (1864–1901) Le Divan Japonais 1893 Color lithograph 30 3⁄4 x 24 in. (78 x 61 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Fifteenth Anniversary Gift of the Rutgers Class of 1958 73.009.001

In this advertisement for the Café du Divan Japonais, a nightclub decorated in the style of a Japanese theater and catering to the working class, Toulouse-Lautrec incorporates elements borrowed from Japanese ukiyo-e prints: flat planes of color, sharp edges, and asymmetrical composition. The text accompanying the image is also reminiscent of ukiyo-e tradition, which sought to portray transient, everyday subjects.

Here, the dancer Yvette Guilbert is recognizable onstage—despite the absence of her head in the tilted interior—by Lautrec’s inclusion of her trademark long black gloves. In the audience sit the art critic Édouard Dujardin and Jane Avril, another famous dancer.

Seraphina Ferraro

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TOYOHARA Kunichika (born ŌshimaYasohachi) Japanese (1835–1900) Actors 19th century Ukiyo-e woodblock print Three sheets, each 13 7⁄8 x 9 1⁄8 in. (35.1 x 23.1 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Martin Levine 81.038.005.01-03

One of the last great ukiyo-e artists of the nineteenth century, Kunichika created many portraits of actors in kabuki theater, the classical Japanese dance drama performed solely by men. The actors depicted here are (left to right) Nakamura Shikan, Ichikawa Kudanji, Onoe Kikugoro, and Iwai Hanshiro. Deviating from a traditional layout, which would have featured one central figure in a vertically oriented space, Kunichika presents actors performing a scene. Unlike western traditions of portraiture, Japanese ukiyo-e portraits were not tied to naturalistic representation, so actors are identifiable not by their faces but by their costumes and the writing in kanji script accompanying them.

Seraphina Ferraro

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Rembrandt Harmensz. van RIJN Dutch (1606–1669) Self Portrait at a Window 1648 Etching, drypoint, and burin 6 1⁄4 x 5 1⁄8 in. (16 x 13 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of Raymond V. Carpenter Estate 0866

In this self-portrait, Rembrandt depicts himself at work in his studio.

Momentarily distracted by our arrival, he looks up from his work—a theme rarely explored in his previous etchings. Many of the artist’s earlier self-portrait etchings present him as a character with flamboyant hats and props, removed from his art-making processes. Here, Rembrandt dons a simple hat and craftsman’s garb and embraces his artistic profession. By portraying himself without theatricality or embellishment, he makes his simple appearance and studio craft the focus of the print. Instead of representing himself without pretensions, though, this artist-character becomes another guise created by Rembrandt in his experiments with identity.

Sara Berkowitz

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Andy WARHOL American (1928–1987) Cindy Pritzker 1981 Polacolor 2, “Andy Warhol” stamped on lower right corner Each 3 1⁄4 x 2 7⁄8 in. (9.5 x 7.3 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Gift of the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts 2008.004.017, 2008.004.022-024

Serving as the source imagery for commissioned portraits from the 1980s, these photographs document Warhol’s interactions with his clients. They also represent his exploration of the tense relationship between authenticity and celebrity. During photo shoots, Warhol encouraged his subjects to mimic poses seen in advertisements and headshots and often attempted to mask their imperfections by applying a thick layer of white makeup to willing female sitters. Coupled with the Polaroid camera’s bright flash, the makeup flattened his sitters’ facial features. By directing each person’s actions and altering his or her appearance, Warhol produced an artificial interpretation of his subject rather than a true likeness.

Heather Cammarata-Seale

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Š 2012 The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

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Unidentified Artist French Portrait of an Artist in Her Studio circa 1790 Oil on canvas 29 7⁄8 x 27 1⁄2 in. (76 x 70 cm) Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers Transfer from the New Jersey State Museum, Trenton Gift of the Kress Foundation 1995.1045

Anonymous portraits present an interesting problem. When neither the name of the artist nor the sitter is certain, the painting might be seen as lacking identity and meaning. However, much can be discerned from studying the details of the image itself. The brushes and maulstick in the woman’s hand, the easel in front of her, and the paint cabinet in the lower right corner clearly mark her as an artist, but what of the other subjects in the room? It has been suggested that the youth is the woman’s son and that the man she is painting is her husband. Can this image be read as a combined self- and family portrait that shows the woman not just as an artist but as a wife and mother? This would have been unusual in the eighteenth century, but it may have arisen out of the convenience of conveying both messages in a single canvas, rather than separating them into two distinct paintings.

Alexis Jason-Mathews

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© 2012, Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers University. All rights reserved.

Photo Credits All images Photo Peter Jacobs, except for 13, 37, 55, 61, and 63, which are Photo Jack Abraham.

FRONT AND BACK COVERS & VERSO IMAGES Robert Rauschenberg, Autobiography, 1968. Offset lithograph.

Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers. Gift of Marian B. Javits.

Art © Robert Rauschenberg Foundation/Licensed by VAGA, New York, New York Ebook Production Content Editors Donna Gustafson, Ph.D. and Susan Sidlauskas, Ph.D. Manuscript Editor Carolyn Vaughan Project Coordinator Kate Scott Publication Manager Stacy Smith Designed by DeSantis Creative Support The Zimmerli Art Museum is supported by Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, as well as the income from the Avenir Foundation Endowment Fund, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Endowment Fund, and the Voorhees Family Endowment Fund, among others.

Additional support comes from the Estate of Victoria J. Mastrobuono and the New Jersey State Council on the Arts/Department of State, a Partner Agency of the National Endowment for the Arts. Contributions from other corporations, foundations, and individuals, as well as earned income, also provide vital annual support for the Zimmerli’s operations and programs.

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