On Saturday, November 10, The San Diego Museum of Art will open its new exhibition Charles Reiffel: An American Post-Impressionist. Charles Reiffel led the California plein-air school of landscape painting in the late 1920s. SDMA’s exhibition explores Reiffel’s relationship with nature and form and examines the influence of American Post-Impressionism and Expressionism on his work.
Reiffel moved from Silvermine, Connecticut, to San Diego in 1925. The Pacific shores and desert hills of Southern California renewed his imagination and art, but he did not experience the same kind of financial success there as he had back East. Though critics embraced Reiffel, collectors dismissed his paintings as “too modern.” Reiffel’s bold colors and rhythmic lines, interrupted by angular brush strokes, challenged the conservative style of local plein-air paintings. These quintessentially modern works, however, reveal the artist’s unique vision and “absolute command of the monumental landscape.”*
The exhibition catalogue, produced by Marquand Books and designed by Annabelle Gould, features an essay by San Diego–area curator Bram Dijkstra that considers the writers and artists who inspired Reiffel’s approach to art—from American transcendentalists such as Ralph Waldo Emerson, to painters such as Carl Marr. The 190-page book includes more than 70 full-color images and an exhibition timeline for Reiffel’s work.
To learn more about the exhibition and purchase tickets, visit SDMA.
*Ariel Plotek, Charles Reiffel: An American Post-Impressionist. (San Diego: The San Diego Art Museum), 15.
The New York Times recently featured an article on the new exhibition at the Denver Art Museum, Becoming van Gogh. The exhibition explores the unorthodox journey that Vincent van Gogh took to becoming an artist. Focusing on key periods in his life—his work in London and Paris for an art dealer, his attempted career in the church, and the spiritual crisis that influenced his decision to become an artist—Becoming van Gogh investigates the influences and beliefs that made up van Gogh’s approach to art.
Becoming van Gogh represents nearly a decade of DAM’s collaborative work with more than sixty institutions to bring together works that reveal van Gogh’s artistic progression. The exhibition features more than seventy paintings and drawings by van Gogh and includes works by the artists who influenced him, such as Camille Pissarro and Henri Toulouse-Lautrec.
Accompanying the exhibition is the publication Becoming van Gogh. The catalogue, produced by Marquand Books and designed by John Hubbard, illuminates van Gogh’s evolution through essays and a timeline of his artistic career. With more than 150 full-color illustrations, this 288-page book is an insightful consideration of one of the most significant and beloved artists of the modern era.
To learn more about Becoming van Gogh, visit DAM. To purchase your copy of the book, visit Yale University Press.
In 1976, with funds from Wright and the National Endowment for the Arts, WAC assembled its first collection, Works on Paper 1945–1975. The collection, which focuses on works on paper by a range of artists—including Willem de Kooning, Andy Warhol, Agnes Martin, and Josef Albers, represents a defining era in American art—one that pushed boundaries and challenged notions of what art is and can be.
In the last few years, the works have undergone condition analysis, conservation, and reframing. To celebrate the completion of this process, the Museum of Art presents the exhibition The Artist’s Hand: Works on Paper 1945–1975. The show opens today and runs through December 15. It is accompanied by a 136-page catalogue, produced by Marquand Books and designed by John Hubbard.The book includes more than sixty color illustrations of selected works and an essay by Wright that details the creation of the consortium.
To learn more about The Artist’s Hand: Works on Paper 1945–1975, visit the Museum of Art.
Marquand Books is pleased to publish the new book Trimpin: Contraptions for Art and Sound, designed by John Hubbard and edited by Anne Focke. Click over to our store for details. As a special addition to the book photographer Matthew Monroe is offering an exclusive print of the artist in front of an early installation called Sheng High. Click here for details.
Marquand Books is proud to produce the monograph Hard Truths: The Art of Thornton Dial, distributed by Prestel and designed by Jeff Wincapaw. The artist and exhibition have been generating a lot of buzz, including a recent article in the New York Times and chat with the artist’s son on NPR’s Studio 360.
Through September 18, 2011 at the Indianapolis Museum of Art.
Belgian artist Isabelle de Borchgrave’s exquisite costumes, made entirely out of paper, are on display at San Francisco’s Legion of Honor.
Marquand Books is proud to have produced the accompanying exhibition catalogue for the show, distributed by DelMonico Books/Prestel:
The exhibition catalogue explores the exquisite paper costumes of the Belgian artist Isabelle de Borchgrave. Author Jill D’Alessandro contextualizes de Borchgrave’s work against the rich tapestry of art and couture history, examining how the artist brings long-lost fashions to life through an intricate process of tailoring, crumpling, braiding, pleating and painting paper. Luxurious reproductions of de Borchgrave’s astonishing trompe-l’oeil effects offer an intimate encounter with the work, from the austere white dresses and Papiers à la Mode to the lavish Fortuny and Medici collections.
Pulp Fashion: The Art of Isabelle de Borchgrave is on view through June 5, 2011. Click here for complete exhibition info.
Marquand Books recently produced Birthe Piontek: The Idea of North for Portland, OR-based arts non-profit Photolucia. The German photographer’s powerful series of portraits explore life above 60th parallel.
Pointek discusses the series in this interview with Urbansand.
Dalí: The Late Work features important work created by the Spanish artist between 1940-1983. Some pieces have not been seen in decades, most notably “Santiago El Grande” and “Assumpta Corpuscularia Lapilazulina,” not publicly viewed since 1959. Atlanta magazine had this to say about the show and Marquand-produced exhibition catalogue designed by Jeff Wincapaw:
In short, Salvador Dalí: The Late Work…is an outside-the-box exhibition that should make Atlantans once again grateful to have a world-class art museum within footsteps of home…Art lovers can pick up the gorgeous, authoritative official catalog of the show published by the High Museum of Art and Yale University.
To whet your palate, watch this 1941 newsreel of a classic Dali dinner party:
For exhibition highlights full details click here.
The other night, I attended a reception and dinner for an exhibition of work by an artist who is no longer living. We produced the accompanying book—a handsome, substantial effort.
The exhibition is impressive. Many museum members and out-of-town visitors extolled the work, the selection of the paintings, and the installation. Smiles and congratulations came from all around.
The exhibition consists of 40 mourners from the tomb of John the Fearless, and three figures and one fragment of the architectural arcade from the tomb of Philip the Bold. Because the statuettes have been freed from the architectural framework that usually contains them, the figures will be seen in the round by the public for the first time ever.
The Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth, Texas is tracing the history of private art collection in Texas from the oil boom to today with a new exhibition showcasing the work of more than 40 collectors. The broad, impressive exhibition of ancient to modern European work features several major artists including Monet, Picasso, and Mondrian.
This Saturday, November 14 the Whatcom Museum of History and Art in Bellingham, WA celebrates the grand opening of its Lightcatcher building with the exhibition Out of Bounds: Art from the Collection of Driek and Michael Zirinsky:
The Lens of Impressionism: Photography and Painting from the Normandy Coast, a new exhibition at the University of Michigan Museum of Art, addresses how social, creative, and commercial advancements helped set the stage for early Impressionism and established Normandy as a cultural hub in the mid to late 1800s.
Marquand produced the accompanying catalog, featuring work by Manet, Monet, and Degas among others.
Marquand recently produced an exhibition catalog for the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore called Heroes: Mortals and Myths in Ancient Greece. Designed by Jeff Wincapaw, the book received flattery from the Paper Cuts books blog on the New York Times website:
…The catalog, distributed by Yale University Press, is easily one of the best I have ever seen on a classical subject.
In the video below, Dr. Gary Radke offers interesting facts and background on Michelangelo in anticipation of SAM’s new exhibit Michaelangelo Public and Private, opening tomorrow. Radke is Deans Professor of the Humanities at Syracuse University and curatorial adviser for the exhibit:
The Blanton Museum of Art in Austin is showcasing the work of Latin American artist Francisco Matto. It’s the first comprehensive exhibition of Matto’s work in the U.S., highlighting his place in the rise of modernist abstract art in Latin America.
In 1909, Seattle hosted the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition, a world’s fair that helped to establish the city as a new cultural and industrial hub. The fair had a wide range of exhibits, featuring a hearty nod to the Pacific Northwest’s connection to the Alaskan gold rush with an Eskimo village and a scale model of a coal mine. Other notable exhibits included a reenactment of a Civil War naval battle and the largest log cabin ever built.
To celebrate the 100th anniversary of the A-Y-P, Seattle is hosting many different centennial events throughout the year; one special treat is the Museum of History & Industry’s exhibit of the photographs of Frank H. Nowell, the official photographer of the A-Y-P. Nowell captured on film the construction of the fair, the various exhibits, and the events and celebrations held on the University of Washington’s campus throughout the summer of 1909.
Marquand recently produced Picturing the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition, a catalog of Nowell’s photographs of the fair, distributed by the University of Washington Press. Nowell’s images are also collected in an comprehensive database viewable through the University of Washington’s Digital Libraries, where you can browse through the other images that we sadly didn’t have space to include in the book, like this oddly charming bear made out of raisins. Luckily the slightly redundant giant lemon made out of lemons made the cut.
Statistics can be daunting but dry: 100 million trees cut down every year to make the paper for junk mail; 380,000 kilowatt hours of electricity wasted every minute; 2 million plastic bottles used every five minutes; 2.3 million Americans incarcerated in U.S. prisons in a single year. Renowned photographer Chris Jordan brings these staggering numbers to life in manipulated digital photographs that are at once alluring and shocking. A landscape of toothpicks, each representing a felled tree, stretches into the horizon; a looping maze of plastic cups reveals how many are used every six hours on airplane flights; and a replica of a Seurat masterpiece fashioned from aluminum cans becomes a lesson in waste. These astonishing photographs of great beauty reveal the devastating consequences of our culture of consumption.
As Paul Hawken notes, Jordan’s images are “a supplication to all who look upon them, to harm no more, to be mindful in all that we do, speak, and take.
A recent article in Dutch design website Materia features more examples of Jordan’s visionary work. Story is available here.
We’ve produced books about musicians before, most notably 5×1, a collection of Lance Mercer’s photographs of Pearl Jam. So when Rod Blackhurst, a photographer who has chronicled rock band The Fray on tour, approached us with a similar project, we were up for the challenge. The Fray: There and Back will be released in early February. A profile on the band in Denver Magazine includes an interview with Blackhurst:
“The band has always trusted my creative process and vision. Very rarely do they ask to take a look at what I’ve been shooting, and so I often find myself excited over a photograph trying to show them instead. My goal has always been to create art that I’m proud of. That’ll never stop being the plan.”
Today’s Wall Street Journal includes Richard B. Woodward’s review of “Art in the Age of Steam: Europe, America, and the Railway, 1830-1960.” The exhibition catalog, The Railway: Art in the Age of Steam, produced by Marquand and available from Yale University Press, was just what Woodward needed to complete his visit to the exhibition:
Too many curators these days fatigue museum-goers in a noble effort to be thorough. That’s not the case here. I left refreshed, wanting more. My cravings were satisfied where they should be, and at a more leisurely pace, in a group of outstanding essays for the catalog published by Yale University Press.
“Art in the Age of Steam” is on view at the Nelson-Atkins Museum in Kansas City, MO, through mid-January 2009.
The recent profile by Seattle P-I art critic Regina Hackett on Seattle-based artist Roy McMakin explores his broadly diverse career:
McMakin developed the initial identity for J. Crew stores, built the office furniture for the Getty Museum and created the set for “The Tonight Show With Jay Leno.” He also moves easily in the world of galleries, public art and museums.
He builds houses but is not an architect. He makes furniture for use and sculptural contemplation. Like a musician who plays slightly off the beat, everything he does contains at least an element of the unexpected.
The full article is available here. Purplish, an exhibition of McMakin’s drawings, photographs, and sculpture, is showing at the James Harris Gallery in Pioneer Square in Seattle until November 8.
In 2006, we began work on a series of exhibition catalogs highlighting the partnership between the Louvre Museum in Paris and the High Museum in Atlanta, recently featured on CNN travel. We’re pleased to announce that the sixth and final book in the series, The Louvre and the Masterpiece, is now available.
In conjunction with the exhibit at the Baltimore Museum of Art, Marquand Books is pleased to present the book Franz West, To Build a House You Start with the Roof. Designer Beverly Joel has conjured up a bold, surprising design to accompany the Austrian artist’s intellectually singular paintings and sculpture. If you’re in the Baltimore-Washington area, be sure to visit the West retrospective, hanging until January 4, 2009. For more info, check out the Baltimore Sun article here. The exhibit will also be featured at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, March 15-June 7, 2009.
