500 Years of Prints and Drawings Part I
Wednesday, August 29, 2001 - Sunday, December 30, 2001
This Fall, the Blanton presents a four-year series entitled 500 Years of Prints and Drawings, which will feature groups of intimate exhibitions that highlight the Blanton's encyclopedic collection of works on paper. With works of art representing the fifteenth through the twentieth centuries, the series draws exclusively from the Museum's own collection to present focused inquiries into an artist, technique, process, or artistic trend particular to a period of time in the history of Western art.
The five exhibitions embody this broad range of approaches, reflecting the Museum's ongoing and innovative research and the range, depth, and quality of its renowned collection. Each can be enjoyed on its own as a thematic exploration of works from one specific century; together, the exhibitions trace the history of the graphic arts since the Renaissance, revealing the rich array of traditions, techniques, uses, and developments of works on paper in Europe and the United States.
"From Idea to Object in Italian Renaissance Drawings"
An intimate exhibition of twenty drawings, "From Idea to Object" allows visitors to explore how drawing developed into a system for conceiving and preparing works of art in 16th -century Italy. Drawings by the same artist at different stages offer insight into the principal stages and function of this system. A recently acquired model for an altarpiece by Bernardino Campi is among the works on display.
"Rubens and His Engravers"
The Blanton explores the significant work of the group of engravers employed by Peter Paul Rubens in the 17th century, illuminating how the engravers fostered the distribution of Rubens' work and brought reproductive printmaking to unprecedented heights. This exhibition includes the finest impressions of these large-scale, highly detailed works. Prints by the major figures of the group–Bolswert, Pontius, Vorsterman, Lauwers, Van Sompel–as well as an example of an unusual woodcut after Rubens are on view.
"Early Aquatint from Saint-Non to Goya"
Through fifteen works, this focused exhibition illuminates the development of the aquatint technique, from its invention as a means of reproducing wash drawings, to its realization by Goya as an agent of distinctive expression. This exhibition provides a platform for exploring the late-18th-century evolution of aquatint into one of the most significant and lasting variations on the intaglio printmaking technique.
"The Image of Nature in Nineteenth-Century French Prints"
Featuring works by Corot, Daubigny, and other 19th-century French printmakers, this exhibition examines how artists responded to the explosion of industrialization and urbanization in 19th-century France by focusing on the landscape in their work. The prints presented in this exhibition demonstrate how nostalgia for a less complicated past fueled the rise of the landscape from a lesser category at the beginning of the century to the central artistic theme by its end, reflecting a desire to preserve, if not nature itself, at least its image.
"The Image of the City in Interwar American Prints"
Prints from the 1910s to 1930s highlight the shift in American printmaking from images of idyllic rural life and landscapes to the realities of the swiftly expanding city, its constantly changing skyline, and the new forces at work within it. Visitors have the opportunity to examine the common man's experience of the urban landscape through prints by artists such as George Bellows, Howard Cook, and Louis Lozowick.
This exhibition was organized by Jonathan Bober, Curator of Prints, Drawings, and European Paintings.
The five exhibitions embody this broad range of approaches, reflecting the Museum's ongoing and innovative research and the range, depth, and quality of its renowned collection. Each can be enjoyed on its own as a thematic exploration of works from one specific century; together, the exhibitions trace the history of the graphic arts since the Renaissance, revealing the rich array of traditions, techniques, uses, and developments of works on paper in Europe and the United States.
"From Idea to Object in Italian Renaissance Drawings"
An intimate exhibition of twenty drawings, "From Idea to Object" allows visitors to explore how drawing developed into a system for conceiving and preparing works of art in 16th -century Italy. Drawings by the same artist at different stages offer insight into the principal stages and function of this system. A recently acquired model for an altarpiece by Bernardino Campi is among the works on display.
"Rubens and His Engravers"
The Blanton explores the significant work of the group of engravers employed by Peter Paul Rubens in the 17th century, illuminating how the engravers fostered the distribution of Rubens' work and brought reproductive printmaking to unprecedented heights. This exhibition includes the finest impressions of these large-scale, highly detailed works. Prints by the major figures of the group–Bolswert, Pontius, Vorsterman, Lauwers, Van Sompel–as well as an example of an unusual woodcut after Rubens are on view.
"Early Aquatint from Saint-Non to Goya"
Through fifteen works, this focused exhibition illuminates the development of the aquatint technique, from its invention as a means of reproducing wash drawings, to its realization by Goya as an agent of distinctive expression. This exhibition provides a platform for exploring the late-18th-century evolution of aquatint into one of the most significant and lasting variations on the intaglio printmaking technique.
"The Image of Nature in Nineteenth-Century French Prints"
Featuring works by Corot, Daubigny, and other 19th-century French printmakers, this exhibition examines how artists responded to the explosion of industrialization and urbanization in 19th-century France by focusing on the landscape in their work. The prints presented in this exhibition demonstrate how nostalgia for a less complicated past fueled the rise of the landscape from a lesser category at the beginning of the century to the central artistic theme by its end, reflecting a desire to preserve, if not nature itself, at least its image.
"The Image of the City in Interwar American Prints"
Prints from the 1910s to 1930s highlight the shift in American printmaking from images of idyllic rural life and landscapes to the realities of the swiftly expanding city, its constantly changing skyline, and the new forces at work within it. Visitors have the opportunity to examine the common man's experience of the urban landscape through prints by artists such as George Bellows, Howard Cook, and Louis Lozowick.
This exhibition was organized by Jonathan Bober, Curator of Prints, Drawings, and European Paintings.