In the spring of 2009, I received a telephone call from Atlee Phillips, Texas art specialist at Dallas’s Heritage Auction Galleries. Although I’d never met Atlee, she told me that I’d soon think of her as “my new best friend.” A few days later, she arrived in my office with numerous photographs of a painting of the Battle of San Jacinto by Texas painter Henry Arthur McArdle (1836-1908). Although I knew that this painting had been executed in 1901, I had assumed it to have been destroyed in a fire and had stated as much in a footnote in my 1992 book, Painting Texas History to 1900. But Atlee’s photographs, taken by members of McArdle’s family, who owned the house in West Virginia where the painting had been stored in an attic since the 1950s, proved me wrong (fortunately). In November 2010, Heritage auctioned the painting, which was purchased by a private collector in Texas. Continue reading “Strange inheritance”
Tag: Art
Meet Alice Bidault, Dijon Fellow from ENSA
In August, Meadows School of the Arts hosted the Second Annual “From Dijon to Dallas” Exhibition, which featured the work of two fellows selected in a six-week exchange program. This year, the fellows were Andrew Davis (SMU MFA ’16) and Alice Bidault from Dijon. Dijon and Dallas are sister cities, and the program was established last year between the two schools, Meadows and the École Nationale Supérieure d’Art (ENSA). The exhibition opened at Liliana Bloch Gallery on August 23rd and closes on September 3rd. In October, both Andrew and Alice will launch a joint exhibition in Dijon.
Below is Alice’s interview about her work, and experience in Dallas and at SMU. It follows as the blog’s second one from last year’s Dijon fellow, Hugo Capron.
Continue reading “Meet Alice Bidault, Dijon Fellow from ENSA”
Meet Georgia Erger, Curatorial Fellow for the Hawn Gallery at Hamon
Georgia Erger is Hamon’s first Curatorial Fellow for the Hawn Gallery. She joined the staff last month at the beginning of July 2016. As Curatorial Fellow, she is responsible for much of the work in the Hawn Gallery, including development and installation of three exhibitions for the fall and spring semesters, publicity, and archival management of the gallery’s exhibition history. Previous to coming to Hamon, Georgia was Program Assistant, John B. Aird Gallery, and the Windgate Postgraduate Intern in Museum Studies at the Baum Gallery of Fine Art, University of Central Arkansas. Georgia completed her BA in art history at the University of Toronto, University College, and her MA at the Courtauld Institute of Art, London. We are thrilled to have her. Let’s get to know her better… Continue reading “Meet Georgia Erger, Curatorial Fellow for the Hawn Gallery at Hamon”
Collection Spotlight: Perry Nichols art work and papers
Perry Nichols (1911 – 1992), a Dallas native, was initially associated with the Texas regionalist artists of the 1930s and 1940s, and was also multitalented in many areas of art. Taught by local Dallas artists, Nichols entered the art world at an early age and worked in various art mediums throughout his life, including painting, particularly the technique called “trompe l’oeil” (“trick the eye”) mural painting, printmaking, and woodworking. The collection includes artwork, clippings, correspondence documents, ephemera, photographs, publicity, published works, and scrapbooks.
The Nichols collection consists of 11 works of art on paper and archival materials that include clippings, correspondence, documents, ephemera, photographs, publicity, and published works. The Nichols scrapbook contained artwork and archival material relating to the artist’s life and career. The items were removed for preservation purposes and placed in archival folders and boxes. A digitized copy of the scrapbook is available for viewing in Bywaters Special Collections. The archival material reflects Nichols’s diverse and multifaceted art career which included painting, printmaking, woodworking, and teaching. Supporting material consists of invitations to gallery openings, photographs of his family and friends, including some from his military days in San Antonio, and images of his paintings, murals, and “trompe l’oeil” work.
Please take a look at the detailed finding aid available through Texas Archival Resources Online.
Image: Courtesy of Perry Nichols Collection, Bywaters Special Collections, Hamon Arts Library, Southern Methodist University
Eva Hesse: review of the documentary
While travelling recently, I had a chance to attend a screening of the documentary film Eva Hesse, directed by Marcie Begleiter. The film draws from the large collection of diary entries and letters written by Hesse, now housed at the Allen Memorial Art Museum in Oberlin, Ohio, and makes generous use of archival photographs and footage of Hesse and her circle of New York City artists and writers during the 1960s. Featured in this film are Sol LeWitt (1928-2007), with whom Hesse maintained a close friendship, Robert Mangold and Sylvia Plimack Mangold, Paul Thek, Lucy Lippard, her former husband, Tom Doyle, and her older sister, Helen Hesse Charash, among others. The actress Selma Blair is the voice-over for the selected passages from the diaries and letters. Most of the still photography is black-and-white, and a few of the photographs are manipulated very subtly so that they appear to be slightly moving, creating a haunting effect. Hesse’s artwork presented in the film is beautiful, poignant, and profoundly personal.
Collection Spotlight: Mary Frances Doyle art work and papers
Mary Doyle (1904 – 2000), a Texas native, devoted her adult life to the art education of Dallas children and to the printmaking profession. She participated in many of the exhibitions organized by the women’s printmaking group the Texas Printmakers, formerly the Printmakers Guild, and remained active in art education organizations and other art groups: the Arlington [Texas] Art Association, the Dallas Art Education Club, the Dallas Museum of [Fine] Arts, the Dallas Print Society, and the Texas Fine Arts Association. The collection includes artwork, clippings, correspondence, documents, photographs, publicity, and published works related to her teaching and art career. The artwork consists of works by Doyle and her contemporaries. Continue reading “Collection Spotlight: Mary Frances Doyle art work and papers”
Inside Out/Outside In: Investigating the implications of the built environment on Veterans diagnosed with combat-related PTSD
The Hamon blog team invited Christina Donaldson, an interior designer and researcher, who participated in the panel discussion at Hamon on PTSD, The Social Costs of War: Trauma and the Trials of Homecoming, on April 5th, to contribute a posting on her research. This panel discussion was organized in conjunction with the Hawn Gallery exhibition, Travels in Ithaca, on view at Hamon until May 16th. Donaldson’s research examines the intersection of interior design and psychology, and how this interdisciplinary approach may yield a better understanding of combat-related PTSD.
We made you a playlist
Just in time for finals, the Libraries staff have released a playlist to help you focus while meeting your deadlines. A variety of musical styles are represented, including The Smiths, Leon Bridges, and W.A. Mozart (Rock me, Amadeus was an honorable mention). Here are some highlights, and you can experience the full playlist on Spotify. Continue reading “We made you a playlist”
Carlotta Corpron: Photography and Light
Artist and educator, Carlotta Corpron (1901-1988) is the subject of one of the current exhibitions at the Meadows Museum. Process and Innovation: Carlotta Corpron and Janet Turner, on view through June 5, 2016, presents the art of two women who worked as both artists and professors at separate Texan universities during the twentieth century. Highly experimental, both artists would come into their maturity of style in their respective media of photography and printmaking while teaching in Texas. Continue reading “Carlotta Corpron: Photography and Light”
Travels in Ithaca: A Guided Tour
The art exhibition Scott Gleeson: Travels in Ithaca charts an uncertain and perilous itinerary through the spaces of the Hamon Arts Library Foyer, Lobby, and the Mildred Hawn Gallery, calling viewers’ attention to the social costs of warfare as seen through the lens of Homeric myth. Each of the twelve graphic works in this site-specific installation reference significant events in the life of Odysseus leading up to his return to Ithaca and eventual murder at the hands of his illegitimate son Telegonus. Together, the twelve works constitute a theoretical proposition about one possible role abstract image making or architectural ornament might play if creative professionals chose to address veterans’ issues in their practices. The overarching question proposed by the exhibit is, “What is the social role or responsibility of the artist in responding to the social costs of war, promoting cultural memory of historical events, and facilitating the healing process for veterans and communities?” To address this question Travels in Ithaca imagines a very specific problem with psychotraumatology literature on the Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing therapy method: “How shall patients benefit from therapy in the absence of the therapist given the problems with long treatment delays in the VA healthcare system?” Travels in Ithaca posits deploying cheap, modular architectural ornamentation and graphic imagery designed to facilitate the self-administration of the EMDR method within domestic or institutional interiors.