The first comprehensive survey of William Glackens in nearly half a century, this exhibition will bring together 45 paintings and 20–25 works on paper from public and private collections throughout the United States. Glackens’s influential career spanned five decades and this exhibition will show a new generation the breadth of his oeuvre, displaying key works from each decade of his career and revealing his enchanting zest for life, as well as his arsenal of sophisticated techniques. Several important canvases and works on paper will be on public view for the first time.
Venues:
Nova Southeastern University’s Museum of Art, Fort Lauderdale, Florida, February 23–June 1, 2014
Parrish Art Museum, Water Mill, New York, July 20–October 13, 2014
Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia, November 8, 2014-February 2, 2015
The exhibition is highly selective, concentrating on the most pivotal, adventurous, accomplished, and distinctive works, including the magisterial
At Mouquin’s(1905) and
The Soda Fountain (1935).
William Glackens, Cape Cod Pier, 1908, oil on canvas, 26 in. x 32 in. NSU Museum of Art Fort Lauderdale, Gift of anonymous donor.
William James Glackens (American, 1870–1938), Armenian Girl, 1916. Oil on canvas, 32 x 26 inches (81.2 x 66 cm). The Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia and Merion, PA, BF176
Several works in the collection of the Barnes Foundation are included in the exhibition. A joyous and pure painter, Glackens also served as an advocate for the development of avant-garde art in America through his participation in the landmark exhibitions of The Eight (1908), the Armory Show (1913), and the Society of Independent Artists (1917).
Albert C. Barnes and William Glackens attended Philadelphia’s prestigious Central High School together. When they renewed their friendship in 1911, Glackens encouraged Barnes’s appreciation of modern French painting. Glackens went to Paris in 1912 on a buying trip, sending back works by Paul Cézanne, Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, and others. The men remained close, and Barnes became his most important patron and acknowledged his friend’s importance to his collecting endeavors: “The most valuable single educational factor to me has been my frequent association with a life-long friend who combines greatness as an artist with a big man’s mind.”
Curator: Avis Berman, independent writer and art historian
Related exhibition
Highlights from the William J. Glackens Collection
The Glackens Art Collection, bequeathed to Nova Southeastern University’s Museum of Art | Fort Lauderdale in 1991 by Ira Glackens, son of William J. Glackens, covers the artist’s versatile talent from 1892, when he made a living as an artist/reporter, to 1938, the year of his death, when he was internationally known as America’s Renoir. This encyclopedic collection boasts a wide variety of examples of Glackens’s artistry – from casual crayon sketches to a unique hand-carved wooden panel, from rare etchings to heartwarming family photographs. The William J. Glackens exhibition celebrates the publication of a brand-new scholarly manual for the Glackens Collection. The text, written by noted art historian and curator Elizabeth Thompson Colleary, discusses in depth many of the Glackens works on display here at the Museum of Art.
The William J. Glackens Exhibition is on view through February 20
From a must read article about the collection:
Some of the more important works received were the oils
Tugboat and Lighter (Fig. 11) and
Sledding, Central Park (Fig. 2),
and two tour-de-force drawings of New York street scenes that were assignments for magazine illustrations:
Far from the Fresh Air Farm (Fig. 7) and
Christmas Shoppers, Madison Square (Fig. 12).
Monograph
Edited by Avis Berman, Contribution by Elizabeth Thompson Colleary, Heather Campbell Coyle, Judith F. Dolkart and Alicia G. Longwell
Pub Date: February 18, 2014
Format: Hardcover
Category: Art - Individual Artists - Monographs
Publisher: Skira Rizzoli
Trim Size: 9-1/2 x 13
US Price: $55.00
CAN Price: $55.00
ISBN: 978-0-8478-4261-2
A monumental new monograph accompanying the first major retrospective in fifty years of the work of William Glackens, an important American realist painter. This richly illustrated volume provides a comprehensive introduction to William Glackens (1870-1938), one of the liveliest and most influential American painters of the early twentieth century. The finest examples of his works over a fifty-year career, including paintings previously unknown to the general public, are reproduced here-from intimate nudes, portraits, and figure studies to vivid still lifes, vibrant street scenes, and landscapes, in which he captured people and their surroundings with matchless spontaneity and spirit. The book features essays by important scholars examining the artist's relationship with French painting, his social observation and interest in costume, his depiction of women, and his role as a tastemaker.
About the Authors
Avis Berman is an independent writer and art historian. Elizabeth Thompson Colleary is an independent scholar. Heather Campbell Coyle is the curator of American art at the Delaware Art Museum. Judith F. Dolkart is the deputy director of art and archival collections and Gund Family Chief Curator at the Barnes Foundation. Alicia G. Longwell is the Lewis B. and Dorothy Cullman Chief Curator, Art and Education, Parrish Art Museum. Martha Lucy teaches in the art and art history department at Drexel University and was formerly associate curator at the Barnes Foundation. Patricia Mears is deputy director of the Museum at FIT, New York. Carol Troyen is an independent scholar and the Kristin and Roger Servison Curator Emerita of American Paintings at the MFA, Boston
