The Metropolitan Museum of Art SCHEDULE OF EXHIBITIONS SEPTEMBER 2011 – JUNE 2012
LOOKING AHEAD:
• Opening November 1, 2011: New Galleries for the Art of the Arab Lands, Turkey, Iran, Central Asia, and Later South Asia
• Opening January 16, 2012: New American Wing Galleries for Paintings, Sculpture, and Decorative Arts
NEW EXHIBITIONS
The 9/11 Peace Story Quilt
August 30, 2011–January 22, 2012
The 9/11 Peace Story Quilt was designed by Faith Ringgold and created in collaboration with New York City students ages 8 to 19. The quilt poignantly conveys the importance of communication across cultures and religions to achieve the goal of peace. Comprised of three panels, each with 12 squares on the theme of peace, the quilt will be displayed in the Ruth and Harold D. Uris Center for Education alongside several of the students’ original works of art that inspired the quilt’s content.
The exhibition was organized by The Metropolitan Museum of Art in collaboration with the InterRelations Collaborative, Inc.
The Art of Dissent in 17th-Century China: Masterpieces of Ming Loyalist Art from the
Chih Lo Lou Collection
September 7, 2011–January 2, 2012
The collapse of the Ming dynasty (1368-1644) and subsequent conquest of China by semi-nomadic Manchu tribesmen was one of the most traumatic events in Chinese history. This wrenching era also spurred an enormous outpouring of creative energy, as many former Ming subjects turned to the arts to express their loyalty to the noble but doomed cause of Ming restoration and to assert their defiance and moral virtue. Drawn from one of the finest and most comprehensive private assemblages of the art of the Ming-Qing transition, the exhibition will showcase more than 60 landscape paintings and calligraphies that highlight the intensely personal styles created by the leading artists of that time. Particularly noteworthy are the clusters of exceptional works by Huang Daozhou, Hongren, Bada Shanren (Zhu Da), and Shitao.
The exhibition was organized by the Hong Kong Museum of Art of the Leisure and Cultural Services Department of HKSAR Government and the Chih Lo Lou Art Promotion (Non-profit Making) Ltd.
Infinite Jest: Caricature and Satire from Leonardo to Levine
September 13, 2011–March 4, 2012
Consisting mostly of works from the Metropolitan Museum’s rich collection of drawings and prints, the exhibition will explore humorous imagery from the Italian Renaissance to the present. The show will include sheets by Leonardo da Vinci, Eugène Delacroix, Francisco de Goya, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, and Enrique Chagoya, alongside works by artists more often associated with the genre such as James Gillray, Thomas Rowlandson, Honoré Daumier, and Al Hirschfeld. These works will explore the range of this age-old tradition from the elevated to the rudely humorous.
The exhibition is made possible by The Schiff Foundation.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
Press preview: Monday, September 12, 10:00 a.m.–noon
Heroic Africans: Legendary Leaders, Iconic Sculptures
September 21, 2011–January 29, 2012
Over the centuries across sub-Saharan Africa, artists have drawn upon various media to memorialize for posterity eminent individuals of their societies. They have achieved this in an
astonishingly diverse repertory of regional sculptural idioms, both naturalistic and abstract, that idealize their subjects through complex aesthetic formulations. The original patrons of such
depictions intended for them to commemorate specific elite members of a given community. For over a century, however, isolation of those creations from the sites, oral traditions, and socio-cultural contexts in which they were conceived has led them to be seen as timeless abstractions of generic archetypes.
This exhibition will consider eight landmark sculptural traditions from West and Central Africa created between the 12th and early 20th centuries in terms of the individuals who inspired their
creation. It will highlight the standardized aesthetic conventions apparent across a selection of 106 masterpieces that define particular regional genres, and will consider the cultural values that inform them. Selected for their artistic importance that has generated a critical mass of scholarship are the Akan of Ghana, ancient Ife civilization and the Kingdom of Benin of Nigeria, Bangwa and related chiefdoms of the Cameroon Grassfields, the Chokwe of Angola and Zambia, and the Luluwa, Hemba, and Kuba of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. This examination of major African forms of expression reveals the hidden meaning and inspiration of these great artistic achievements.
The exhibition is made possible in part by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, The Ceil & Michael E. Pulitzer Foundation, Inc., and the National Endowment for the Arts.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
Press preview: Monday, September 19, 10:00 a.m.–noon
Perino del Vaga in New York Collections
September 27, 2011—February 5, 2012
Perino del Vaga (Pietro Buonaccorsi, 1501-1547), one of the outstanding figures in Raphael’s workshop, was a leading innovator of the late Renaissance style known as Mannerism. The Metropolitan Museum recently acquired a painting and drawing by this rare but important master which will be featured in this exhibition. The centerpiece will be the painting Holy Family with Saint John the Baptist, a masterpiece from the artist’s early years in Rome (ca. 1525). The painting has been newly restored and will be featured with the Museum’s other recent acquisition by the artist, a highly finished drawing of Jupiter and Juno reclining on a marriage bed—a design for a tapestry for the artist’s Genoese patron, Andrea Doria. In addition to this superlative drawing, the exhibition will include approximately 20 related drawings and prints as well as a painting from a private collection and loans from the Morgan Library & Museum, the Tobey Collection, and other New York private collections.
Press preview: Monday, September 26, 10:00 a.m. - noon
“Wonder of the Age”: Master Painters of India, 1100-1900
September 28, 2011–January 8, 2012
An exhibition devoted to the connoisseurship of Indian painting, with works selected according to identifiable hands and named artists, dispelling the notion of anonymity in Indian art. New scholarship has begun to securely link innovations in style with specific artists and their lineages. The identities of individual artists and their oeuvre are defined through signed and attributed works, presented through the greatest works of Indian painting known. The high points of artistic innovation in Indian painting will be demonstrated through the works of the 40 greatest painters in the history of Indian art. Drawn from collections in India, Europe, and the United States, the exhibition will include some 220 works, each artist represented by seminal works.
The exhibition is made possible by MetLife Foundation.
Additional support is provided by Novartis Corporation.
It was organized by the Museum Rietberg Zurich in collaboration with The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
Press preview: Monday, September 26, 10:00 a.m.– noon
Stieglitz and His Artists: Matisse to O’Keeffe
October 13, 2011–January 2, 2012
This exhibition is the first large-scale presentation of paintings, sculptures, drawings, and prints from Alfred Stieglitz’s collection, acquired by the Metropolitan in 1949. In addition to being a master photographer, Stieglitz (1864-1946) was a visionary promoter of modern European and American art, and he assembled a vast art collection of exceptional breadth and depth. Through a succession of influential galleries that he ran in New York City between 1905 and 1946, Stieglitz exhibited many of the most important artists of the era, and he collected works by Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Constantin Brancusi, Gino Severini, Vasily Kandinsky, Georgia O’Keeffe, Marsden Hartley, John Marin, Charles Demuth, and Arthur Dove. For more than 60 years, The Alfred Stieglitz Collection has been the cornerstone of the Museum’s holdings of modern art. The exhibition features some 200 major works by European and American modernists, supplemented by photographs by the Photo-Secessionists and publications by Stieglitz—all from the Metropolitan’s holdings. Highlights include Picasso’s Woman Ironing andStanding Female Nude, Kandinsky’s Improvisation 27 (Garden of Love II), Brancusi’s Sleeping Muse, O’Keeffe’s Black Iris and Cow’s Skull: Red, White, and Blue, Demuth’s I Saw the Figure 5 in Gold, and Hartley’s Portrait of a German Officer.
The exhibition is made possible by the Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Foundation.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
Press preview: Tuesday, October 11, 10:00 a.m.–noon
The Making of a Collection:
Collectors of Islamic Art and The Metropolitan Museum of Art
November 1, 2011–Spring 2012
Due to the generosity of dedicated individuals who collected Islamic art and supported the Museum with outstanding gifts and donations, The Metropolitan Museum of Art now houses one of the largest comprehensive collections of this material in the world. This exhibition will consider the factors that directed and inspired major donor-collectors, whose gifts form the core of the collection of the Museum’s Department of Islamic Art.
Press preview: Monday, October 24, 10:00 a.m.–1 p.m.
The Game of Kings: Medieval Ivory Chessmen from the Isle of Lewis
November 15, 2011–April 22, 2012
More than 30 of the world’s most famous chess pieces—all part of a hoard unearthed in 1831 on the Isle of Lewis, off the west coast of Scotland—will be shown at The Cloisters, the branch of the Metropolitan Museum dedicated to the art and architecture of medieval Europe. Created in the mid-12th century, probably in Scandinavia, each piece is a precious miniature sculpture in walrus ivory. The game of chess as we know it today is one of the great legacies of the Middle Ages, and the Lewis chess pieces are among the earliest that include the full cast of characters found on modern boards. Reflecting medieval society in Europe, there are bishops (replacing the elephants of Indian and Persian chess traditions) and queens (supplanting the viziers who stand at the king’s side in Islamic tradition). The Lewis Chessmen are on loan from the British Museum.
The exhibition is made possible by the Michel David-Weill Fund.
Press preview: Monday, November 14, 10:00 a.m.–noon
Storytelling in Japanese Art
November 19, 2011–May 6, 2012
Japan has enjoyed a long tradition of narrative painting, one that continues even today with the popular contemporary Japanese cartoon (manga) and animation. Historically, the subjects of narrative painting have varied: romances of court ladies, aristocrats, and monks; heroic warriors’ tales of courage in the face of overwhelming odds; stories of miracles, celebratory events, and personal accomplishments; and tales of animals and ghosts. Illustrated tales appear in various formats: handscrolls (emaki), albums, books, hanging scrolls, and screens. This exhibition will show a wide variety of illustrated Japanese tales from the 13th to the 19th century that reflect the cultural and social landscape of the time. The exhibition will feature approximately 70 works, including a group of 30 illustrated handscrolls, the ideal format for continuous sequential illustration, and 20 scrolls, books, and screens from New York Public Library and other local collections as well as from the Museum’s own collection.
The exhibition is made possible by The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Foundation.
Additional support is provided by the Japan Foundation.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
Press preview: Monday, November 28, 10:00 a.m.–noon
Annual Christmas Tree and Neapolitan Baroque Crèche
November 22, 2011–January 8, 2012
The Museum will continue a long-standing holiday tradition with the presentation of its Christmas
tree, a favorite of New Yorkers and visitors from around the world. A vivid 18th-century
Neapolitan Nativity scene—embellished with a profuse array of diminutive, lifelike attendant
figures and silk-robed angels hovering above—will adorn the candlelit spruce. Recorded music
and lighting ceremonies will add to the enjoyment of the holiday display.
The exhibit of the crèche is made possible by gifts to The Christmas Tree Fund and
the Loretta Hines Howard Fund.
The Coe Collection of American Indian Art
December 6, 2011–May 28, 2012
Drawn from works given and bequeathed to the Metropolitan during the past decade by Ralph T. Coe of Santa Fe, New Mexico, the exhibition is comprised of some 30 objects made in natural materials from stone to animal hide. It features a wide range of Native American works that come from different times, from far-flung places, and from numerous distinct peoples. The oldest pieces in the Coe Collection date to some thousands of years BCE. The major part of the collection dates from the 19th to early 20th century, a period of great contact between Native Americans and outsiders of all sorts, from traders to missionaries to the U.S. army. The peoples of the Great Plains are prominent during this time, and objects such as the impressive, personalized hide shirts of important Indian men have come to identify American Indians in the public mind; there is such a shirt in the exhibition. Representing contemporary work, which is also found in the Coe Collection, is a mask dated to the year 2001—an imposing wood sculpture of a Noble Woman by the Northwest Coast Haida artist Robert Davidson is a product of a long, deeply felt tradition for the carving of wood.
The exhibition will be funded by Friends of the Arts of Africa, Oceania, and the Americas.
Press viewing: Monday, December 19, 10:00 a.m.–noon
Duncan Phyfe: Master Cabinetmaker in New York
December 20, 2011–May 6, 2012
Referred to during his lifetime as the "United States Rage," Duncan Phyfe (1768-1854) remains to this day America's best-known cabinetmaker. This will be the first major retrospective on Phyfe since 1922, when the Metropolitan mounted a monographic show on the cabinetmaker and his work. The exhibition will cover the full chronological sweep of Phyfe's distinguished career. It will include his earliest and best known furniture based on the published designs of Thomas Sheraton, as well as work from the middle and later stages of his career, when he adopted the richer "archaeological" antique style of the 1820s, and a refined, plain Grecian style based on French Restauration prototypes.
The exhibition is made possible by Karen H. Bechtel.
Additional support is provided by The Henry Luce Foundation, Dr. and Mrs. Paul Cushman, the Americana Foundation, Mr. Robert L. Froelich, and Mr. Philip Holzer.
It was organized by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
Press preview: Monday, December 19, 10:00 a.m.–noon
The Renaissance Portrait from Donatello to Bellini
December 21, 2011–March 18, 2012
It has been said that the Renaissance witnessed the rediscovery of the individual. The 15th century was certainly the first great age of portraiture in Italy, where for the first time artists produced likenesses and explored means of suggesting personality. Featuring many rare international loans, The Renaissance Portrait from Donatello to Bellini will present an unprecedented survey of portraiture in all media: paintings and sculpture as well as medals and drawings. Taken together, these works document the birth of portraiture in early modern Europe. The exhibition, which will be divided into three sections and span a period of eight decades, will begin in Florence, where independent portraits first appeared in abundance, then move to the courts of Ferrara, Mantua, Bologna, Milan, Urbino, Naples, and papal Rome, and end in Venice. Approximately 130 works will be on view by artists including Donatello, Botticelli, Verrocchio, Ghirlandaio, Mantegna, and Giovanni Bellini, testifying to the new vogue for and uses of portraiture in 15th-century Italy.
The exhibition is made possible by the William Randolph Hearst Foundation, the Diane W. and James E. Burke Fund, the Gail and Parker Gilbert Fund, and The Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation.
The exhibition was organized by Gemäldegalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
It is supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the Arts and the Humanities.
Accompanied by a catalogue.
Press preview: Monday, December 19, 10:00 a.m.–noon
NEW GALLERIES
New Galleries for the Art of the Arab Lands, Turkey, Iran,
Central Asia, and Later South Asia
Opening November 1, 2011
More than 1,000 works from the preeminent collection of the Museum’s Department of Islamic Art—one of the most comprehensive gatherings of this material in the world—will return to view this fall in a completely renovated, expanded, and reinstalled suite of 15 galleries. The organization of the galleries by geographical area will emphasize the rich diversity of the Islamic world, over a span of 1300 years, by underscoring the many distinct cultures within its fold.
Press preview: Monday, October 24, 10:00 a.m. – 1 p.m.
New American Wing Galleries for Paintings,
Sculpture, and Decorative Arts
Opening January 16, 2012
This third and final phase of the overall American Wing renovation project comprises 24 entirely new galleries on the wing’s second floor. Twenty-one of the galleries are for the display of the permanent collection of American paintings—including the rich holdings of such masters as Gilbert Stuart, Frederic Edwin Church, Winslow Homer, Thomas Eakins, and John Singer Sargent. Centered in the Grand Gallery will be Emanuel Leutze’s monumental and iconicWashington Crossing the Delaware. Interspersed among the pictures will be American sculptures, notably the work of Augustus Saint-Gaudens. Three other galleries, together with a grand pre-revolutionary New York interior, will display 18th-century American decorative arts, principally treasures of colonial furniture and silver. In the Henry R. Luce Center for the Study of American Art, on the mezzanine level, a concurrent renovation includes additional casework, touch-screen case labels, and upgraded computer access.
Part 1 of the American Wing renovation project opened in January 2007 with galleries dedicated to the classical arts of America, 1810-1845. Part 2, inaugurated in May 2009, included the renovated Charles Engelhard Court and the Period Rooms. After Part 3 is completed, nearly all of the American Wing’s 17,000 works will be on view, constituting an encyclopedic survey of fine art in the United States.
# # #
September 9, 2011
Click here to view the full Schedule of Exhibitions.
