Germany’s Bauhaus school—the most famous and influential Modernist institution in the Twentieth Century—-brought together an extraordinary array of artists, architects, and designers in a remarkable dialogue about the nature of Modern art. Seeking to rethink the very form of contemporary life, the faculty and students of the Bauhaus (literally, “house of building”) created dazzling experiments in the visual arts. Between its founding in 1919 and 1933, when it was shuttered by the Nazis, it formed a close partnership among craft, design and production, influencing what we now call industrial design in ways that are still felt today. Marking the 90th anniversary of the establishment of the Bauhaus — and the 80th anniversary of the founding of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), the New York City museum has organized “Bauhaus 1919-1933: Workshops for Modernity.” On view through January 25, the exhibition brings together more than 400 works that document the impressively broad range of the school’s activities, including furniture, architecture, industrial design, graphics, photography, ceramics, theater and costume design, painting and sculpture.
Sparkling color and fine line drew strong and steady traffic to Boston’s 1884 Cyclorama building for the 13th annual Boston International Fine Arts Show November 12–15, now a major event on the autumn calendar.
As part of an ongoing rotation of quilts from its permanent textile collection, the Charleston Museum will showcase the “craziest” quilts in the collection December 5 to March 28.
On October 16, Country Style Auctions auctioneer Al Baker liquidated and sold out a complete 500-lot estate in less than four hours. “We had the biggest crowd ever,” said Tony Zipp in the days that followed his 15th American stoneware and redware pottery auction October 31 at the York Fairgrounds. Zipp and family, doing business as Crocker Farm, offered more than 425 lots of pottery and associated items.
Fuller’s Fine Art Auction on October 3 was packed with lively bidders from the trade as well as the general public for artworks from the estate of Betty Gordon and various private collections.
The work of American artist Charles Burchfield (1893–1967) is reexamined by the Hammer Museum, in conjunction with the Burchfield Penney Art Center, in “Heat Waves in a Swamp: The Paintings of Charles Burchfield,” on view in Los Angeles through January 3.
Some 500 dealers turned out for Stella Show Mgmt Co.’s Pier Antiques Show November 14 and 15, which offered everything from classic and formal antiques, Americana and Twentieth Century Modern to vintage fashions and collectibles.
The Dallas Museum of Art has acquired a major work for its decorative arts collection: a corner chair with sinuous fretwork design by Charles Rohlfs (1853–1936). It is one of the most inventive and whimsical examples of household furniture by one of America’s most virtuosic furnituremakers.
When Sanford Smith announced last year that he would combine Modernism, the granddaddy of the Park Avenue Armory shows, with ART20, its younger sibling, no one could have predicted the strength of the fusion.
Alice Kibort died at Brigham & Women’s Hospital on December 1 at the age of 69 following a battle with T-cell lymphoma. She was a major presence at antiques shows throughout the East Coast. The dust has settled after a busy three-day gathering of the fall installment of Music Valley Antiques Show that saw dealers, their collections and collectors descend on the Tennessee State Fairgrounds October 29–31.
Jenkins Management filled three large halls with antiques and their dealers for the Tailgate Antiques Show October 30–31 at the Tennessee State Fairgrounds.
Vasily Kandinsky (1866–1944), a pioneer of abstraction and important theorist of Modernism, is among the most important and influential painters of the Twentieth Century. One of the first Western artists to create pictures without figurative motifs, he was also the first abstract artist to explain and justify what he was doing. His theoretical writings are among the most significant texts written by any artist of the last century. Fortunately, Kandinsky’s high art historical stature is matched by the extraordinary quality of his artwork, from early naturalistic landscapes and fairytale subjects to nature-based abstractions and geometric compositions to “pure” abstractions. Kandinsky’s pivotal role in the emergence of abstract art is beautifully demonstrated in “Kandinsky,” a full-scale retrospective of his work on view at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City through January 13. It comprises nearly 100 of the artist’s most important canvases, complemented by more than 60 works on paper.
“Velázquez Rediscovered,” an exhibition that opened recently at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, features a newly identified painting by Velázquez, “Portrait of a Man,” formerly ascribed by the museum to the workshop of Velázquez and recently reattributed to the master himself following its cleaning and restoration.
The 38th special auction of fine Asian art October 30–31 was one of the best ever held at Nagel Auction, grossing total sales of $10.2 million.
On Saturday, November 28, Sandwich Auction House set a new auction record with the sale of a Zedekiah Belknap (1781–1858) portrait painting for $419,750, owner/auctioneer Duncan Gray announced. The early Nineteenth Century painting depicts two children with a cat sitting on a sofa. Nearly 250 lots of fine art crossed the auction block at Shannon’s auction of fine American and European paintings, drawings, prints and sculpture during a sale that was passionately received by bidders from around the world. The October 29 auction grossed an impressive $3.6 million.
A show that has earned its stripes in just nine short years, the Wethersfield Antiques Show opened on November 20 to a large and enthusiastic crowd.
“Horace Walpole’s Strawberry Hill” is on view through January 3 at the Yale Center for British Art. Walpole’s vast collection as it was formed and arranged at Strawberry Hill has never been the subject of a comprehensive critical study, until this exhibition.
Evocative paintings made by local artist Charles W. Ward (1900–1962) are being exhibited at the James A. Michener Art Museum. “Charles W. Ward: Paintings for People” will remain on view through February 14.
Cape Cod auction house Eldred’s packed up some 1,200 Asian art objects, its staff, and trekked over the canal to greater Boston for a two-day sale December 2 and 3.
Found among a hoard of prints and paintings in a Newtown home, and undisturbed for several decades, a portrait of a young lady holding a red book and sitting in a stenciled Sheraton chair by Sheldon Peck was sold at Fairfield Auction on November 22.
The Flagler Museum presents “A Spirit of Simplicity: American Arts and Crafts from the Two Red Roses Foundation,” on view through January 3.
January 3 is the closing date for Montclair Art Museum’s “Cézanne and American Modernism,” the first exhibition to examine fully the influence of Paul Cézanne (1839–1906) upon modern American artists from 1907 to 1930.
Eager for fresh antiques after the satiety of Thanksgiving, buyers came to the 37th annual Peabody Essex Museum Antiques Show November 27–29 prepared to buy and prepared to have some fun.
The Richmond Antiques Spectacular was a full house of dealers offering antiques to a very appreciative crowd November 21–22 at The Showplace.
Thomas Hoving, whose charismatic but controversial leadership of New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art is summed up in his autobiography Making the Mummies Dance, has died. He was 78.
The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts has acquired a painting by Edward Mitchell Bannister (1828–1901), the first black artist to receive widespread acclaim in the United States.
For the 28th consecutive Thanksgiving weekend Bettianne Sweeney gathered a large group of dealers and friends for the Holiday Antiques Show at the Kingsmill Marriott Hotel ballroom, November 27–29.
Rare first edition copies of Volumes I and II of The Federalist Papers brought almost $150,000 to lead the combined rare books and historical manuscripts sales at Heritage Auctions recently.
I awoke Christmas morning
The second annual American Art Fair opened to a capacity crowd on November 30 and went on to welcome a steady stream of collectors and museum curators through its closing hour on December 3.
Nevermind the tree lighting across town at Rockefeller Center, the Park Avenue Armory shone the brightest on December 2 as it hosted a glittering preview attended by a who’s who of New York society and celebrities and, of course, antiques and art collectors at the newly rebranded show, Avenue Antiques & Art at the Armory.
The Mariani name continued to draw admirers and collectors on November 2, as Bonhams & Butterfields presented at auction, furniture and decorative arts from the collections of the late Antonio Mariani and his wife Liliane Mariani.
Chris Jussel, known to many Americans as the original host of the Public Broadcasting Service television series Antiques Roadshow and most recently a senior vice president at Samuel T. Freeman & Company, is leaving the Philadelphia auction house at the end of December. A pair of marine oil paintings by the British artist Thomas Buttersworth (1768–1842) sold recently for $33,925 at a multi-estate sale at Gordon S. Converse & Co.
Antiquarius has a rich history yet a key emphasis for the show marking its 52nd year on December 4–6, however, was a bit of rejuvenation.
A cardboard diorama advertising Mayo-Skinner Automatic Windshield Cleaner was a standout when it fetched $5,060 at a Peotone petroliana and advertising auction October 16 by Matthews Auctions, LLC, of Nokomis, Ill.
On view through March 1, the Museum of Modern Art presents the first major museum retrospective of the artist Gabriel Orozco, who since the early 1990s has forged a career marked by continuing innovation.
Some 60 watch enthusiasts were present for the recent auction at Patrizzi & Co. that achieved more than $6.2 million.
Early risers on December 6 were treated to a landscape altered by a confectionary coating of fresh snow as well as a glittering array of antiques at the Wilton Holiday Antiques Show, opening the doors of the field house to early buyers at 9 am.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art celebrates the 35th anniversary of the acquisition of the Packard Collection, comprising more than 400 works of Japanese art from collector Harry G.C. Packard, with the installation “Five Thousand Years of Japanese Art: Treasures from Packard Collection,” on view through June 6.
Nevermind the tree lighting across town at Rockefeller Center, the Park Avenue Armory shone the brightest on December 2 as it hosted a glittering preview attended by a who’s who of New York society and celebrities and, of course, antiques and art collectors at the newly rebranded show, Avenue Antiques & Art at the Armory.
Tom Jewett offers his remembrances of longtime friend and well known antiques dealer, Ted Hayward of The Yankee Smuggler Antiques, who passed away last week.
Reaching a pinnacle between the years 1880 and 1910, the Arts and Crafts Movement flourished throughout the United States and in Britain. Theorizing that the items one lived with should both beautify and inspire daily life, the general public reverted to an ideology that sought to abandon the bland furnishings associated with the machine-age and return to surroundings accentuated with handcrafted wares. Nowhere in America was the movement more prolific than in Chicago, and in recognition of that, the Art Institute of Chicago is currently presenting the exhibition “Apostles of Beauty: Arts and Crafts from Britain to Chicago.” On view through January 31, the exhibition presents nearly 190 examples encompassing the entire range of the movement, including ceramics, furniture, metalwork, paintings, photographs and textiles.
One of the most beloved paintings in The Frick Collection, Velázquez’s “King Philip IV of Spain,” has returned to view after an absence of several months. The portrait was cleaned and treated for the first time in more than 60 years, revealing for the first time in decades the virtuosity and sureness of Velázquez’s technique.
Grogan & Company’s December 7 sale was short (164 lots of paintings, prints and rugs) and sweet. The sweetness came when the etching “The Dyer,” a Venetian scene by James Abbot McNeill Whistler, brought $115,000.
An imperial Chinese box carved with five clawed dragons attracted the attention of the Chinese trade, which pushed it to $26,450 at Kaminski Auctions’ annual Thanksgiving weekend sale, November 28–29, that attracted a good crowd on both days.
The combination of the old and the new attracted a mixed crowd in search of the antique and the Twentieth Century to Landry Auctions’ December 5 auction.
Show organizer dmg world media reported increased attendance and brisk exhibitor sales at the 17th Annual Miami Beach Antique Jewelry & Watch Show conducted recently at the Miami Beach Convention Center.
The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts is presenting the largest retrospective of works by the celebrated British artist John William Waterhouse (1849–1917) through February 7. “J. W. Waterhouse: Garden of Enchantment” is the first large-scale monographic exhibition on Waterhouse’s work since 1978.
The Hours of Catherine of Cleves, a Fifteenth Century Dutch manuscript, is the subject of a major exhibition at the Morgan Library & Museum from January 22 through May 2. Titled “Demons and Devotion: The Hours of Catherine of Cleves,” the show includes nearly 100 individual pages from the manuscript.
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