Artblog | Museums

August 6, 2017 by Roberta

Jarring at Delaware Contemporary, organized by Roberto Lugo, a conversation about racial violence that welcomes all

The small group exhibit, Jarring, creates a contemplative space to memorialize victims of racial hate crimes and to remember our shared humanity. Like great monuments in the public realm the works in this exhibition are accessible to all and valuable as history-telling by artists who care about what history is told.

July 20, 2017 by Andrea Kirsh

Mohamed Bourouissa, Urban Riders at the Barnes Foundation

Andrea writes an in depth and topical review of “Mohamed Bourouissa; Urban Riders” at the Barnes Foundation. The must-see exhibition features work from the Algerian artist alongside many of our very own Philadelphia artists, which together shape a project that began in 2014 in North Philadelphia when Bourouissa first visited the US.

July 14, 2017 by Michael Lieberman

The Woodmere Annual 76th Juried Exhibition

The Woodmere Annual is a juried exhibition open to artists living within 50 miles of the Chestnut Hill art museum. In it’s 76th year, Woodmere Art Museum selected a timely theme, and they “invited artists to submit work that contends with the importance of art in an era of heightened political uncertainty.” The exhibit is juried by Harry Philbrick who is the Founding Director of Philadelphia Contemporary. Michael Lieberman tells us more.

July 11, 2017 by Roberta

Getting lost at a political Documenta 14 and looking for community

Begun in 1955, the quinquennial art festival, Documenta, in Kassel, sprawls across the small German city in venues large and small, some easy to find and some, more challenging. Documenta 14, this year’s version, involves multitudes of artists and two cities, Kassel, Germany and Athens, Greece. The curatorial theme is displacement, dispossession, power, colonialism and restitution. Some art lovers feel that theme personally, as they struggle to find the art, get lost and experience their own lack of power. Roberta visited and reports.

July 5, 2017 by Roberta

Vox Populi, 319 galleries find temporary home at 990 Spring Garden, James Baldwin Celebration July 7-9 at Church of the Advocate, heartbreaking photos by Ada Trillo at Twenty-Two Gallery, Plus a couple great opportunities!

July 5, 2017 by Matthew Rose

Memento Mori, A trip through skulls, Sotheby’s, shot glasses and soap

Matthew Rose reflects on how artists, architects, and designers alike deal with objects that remind us of the dead. Catch a ride with Matthew as he explores the depiction of mortality dating back as far as the 16th century, and up to modern times.

July 2, 2017 by Andrea Kirsh

Guggenheim Museum’s rare move fills rotunda with its own collection, a summer must-see

Andrea reviews “Visionaries: Creating a Modern Guggenheim,” curated by Megan Fontanella, with artwork from five collectors whose gifts to the museum helped the Guggenheim define itself as a pioneering institution. A rare chance to see beautifully-conserved works by Modern masters like Brancusi, Pollock, Mondrian, the show is a must-see this summer, says Andrea.

June 14, 2017 by Evan Paul Laudenslager

Syria’s past and present in Cultures in the Crossfire at University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology

The University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology hosts a powerful exhibition that juxtaposes work of contemporary Syrian artist Issam Hourbaj with antiquities from the regions of Iraq and Syria. The result is a meditation on loss and destruction that emphasizes the human face of the complex past and present of this region.