The Drawing Center

Artists, when visiting NYC, make a point of visiting The Drawing Center, a special small art museum with a unique mission devoted to drawing.

The following is an excerpt from The Drawing Center website:

"The Drawing Center has been a unique and dynamic part of New York City's cultural life since 1977. The only not-for-profit institution in the country to focus on the exhibition of drawings, it was established to demonstrate the significance and diversity of drawings throughout history, to juxtapose work by master figures with work by emerging and under-recognized artists, and to stimulate public dialogue on issues of art and culture.

Called "one of the city's most highly respected small art museums" by The New York Times, The Drawing Center has become the country's preeminent venue for important contemporary and historical drawing exhibitions, attracting more than 55,000 visitors annually from the local area, across the country, and around the world. The Drawing Center has presented more than 230 exhibitions, published over 70 catalogs, and toured its exhibitions to prestigious museums around the world, including: Tate Britain, London, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, Australia (The Stage of Drawing); the Museum of Contemporary Art, Barcelona, Spain (The Prinzhorn Collection); and the Santa Monica Museum of Art (3 x Abstraction).

The Drawing Center's acclaimed exhibitions encompass a wide range of drawing traditions, such as Shaker Gift Drawings, Rajasthani Miniatures, Plains Indians Ledger Drawings, and Norval Morrisseau/Copper Thunderbird. Through a uniquely interdisciplinary approach, The Drawing Center's exhibitions have also related drawing to science (Ocean Flowers: Impressions from Nature), architecture (Constant, Inigo Jones, Louis Kahn), literature (Victor Hugo, Henri Michaux), theater (Picasso's Parade, Theater on Paper), film (Sergei Eisenstein), music (Musical Manuscripts), and choreography (Trisha Brown).

Historical Exhibitions focus on both acknowledged and under-recognized masters (such as Michelangelo, J.M.W. Turner, James Ensor, Marcel Duchamp, and Hilma af Klint) while Contemporary Exhibitions illuminate unexplored aspects of works by major living artists (such as Richard Serra, Louise Bourgeois, Ellsworth Kelly, Anna Maria Maiolino, Ellen Gallagher, and Richard Tuttle), and Selections Exhibitions present innovative work of emerging artists who are contributing to new interpretations of drawing. In the Drawing Room, which was opened across the street from the main gallery in 1997, emerging and under-recognized artists are encouraged to create experimental, cross-disciplinary work and site-specific installations.

Examples of artists whose work was first introduced to a wide public at The Drawing Center are: Terry Winters, Glenn Ligon, Janine Antoni, William Kentridge, Kara Walker, Shahzia Sikander, Margaret Kilgallen, and Julie Mehretu. The Drawing Center's Viewing Program has encouraged the development of thousands of emerging artists through one-on-one portfolio reviews with a curator, and through its curated public Artists Registry of over 2,500 emerging artists."

The currect exhibition on view at The Drawing Center is, Gego, Between Transparency and the Invisible
April 21 – July 21, 2007
Featured Artwork: Gego, Untitled, 1980-1982. Watercolor and crayon with scored lines on white wove paper, 26 1/2 x 18 7/8 inches. Museum purchase with funds provided by the Latin Maecenas in memory of Marisol Broido, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. © Fundación Gego.

Exhibit: Radical Lace & Subversive Knitting

Museum of Arts & Design , January 25 - June 17, 2007

Great title. This is an art exhibition that is worth checking out. “A provocative and timely exhibition of work by international artists using fiber in unexpected and unorthodox ways, Radical Lace & Subversive Knitting illuminates a field of creative practice that is fresh, surprising, and engaging. Featuring 27 artists from seven countries, this exhibition will exhibit work that ranges from Althea Merback's microknit garments (1:144 scale) to large-scale, site-specific installations. Artists employ a variety of media, from traditional yarns and laces, to found objects and video, and explore contemporary currents in art practice of socially engaged, participatory work.”

And notice the Museum’s mission statement: “The Museum of Arts & Design collects, displays, and interprets objects in ceramic, glass, fiber metal and wood that honor innovation in art, craft and design. The Museum embraces rapid changes in the decorative and design arts, celebrating design as the process through which materials are crafted into works that enhance our lives.”

Museum of Arts & Design
40 West 53rd Street
New York, NY 10019
212-956-35355

Artwork featured:
Freddie Robins, Craft Kills, 2002
Machine-knitted wool, knitting needles
8.7 x 26.8 x 15 in.
Photo: Douglas Atfield

More inspiration:
Check out the tag, knitting , at Technorati.

Creative Retreat: Artists' Communities

Need to revitalize your creative energy? Destination: Creative Retreat. Artists’ communities, AKA, artists’ colonies, retreats, or residencies are programs that support artists by providing time and space for the creation of new work.

“Artists have always needed patrons and that is what our artists’ communities have become—the least interfering, the least demanding, and the most nourishing patrons of artists.”
Robert MacNeil, Introduction to Artists Communities: A Directory of Residencies that Offer Time and Space for Creativity

According to the Alliance of Artists Communities –
• There are more than 250 artists’ communities in the U.S., and approximately 200 in another 40 countries worldwide.
• 66% of artists’ communities are multidisciplinary, bringing together all kinds of creative professionals, including visual and performing artists, composers and choreographers, playwrights and poets, creative and scholarly writers, architects and designers, historians, ecologists, scientists, and more.
• Each year creative communities serve approximately 12,000 artists and provide an estimated $36 million in direct support to artists (in the form of stipends, travel, materials, room/board, technical support, etc.).

Learn about the hundreds of residency opportunities available for artists of all kinds. Find out about locations, offerings, application procedures, and how to get the most out of the experience.

Here are two resources:
"Be Our Guest: Finding Creative Time and Space" -- This is a series of public information sessions on artists-in-residence programs, hosted at Rhode Island School of Design, presented in partnership with the Alliance of Artists Communities. Monday, April 30, 2007, 5:30-7:00 pm, RISD, Providence, RI
Be Our Guest

Alliance of Artists Communities
255 South Main St.
Providence, RI 02903
Phone: (401) 351-4320
Aliance of Artists Communities

Book Review: What Painting Is, By James Elkins

What serendipity is, that is what happened to me when by chance noticing the cover of the book titled, What Painting Is, on the desk of a fellow Rhode Island School of Design colleague, Marc Torick. Thanks to him for lending it to me.

It is a very special book indeed, as it gives voice to the painter’s inexact work process, lifework, and physical relationship with paint. Anyone who paints (or used to paint), especially with oil paint, and anyone who looks at paintings with serious intent and attention, would enjoy the comparisons James Elkins makes, that of painting and alchemy.

Below are two of my favorite excerpts from the book.

“It (painting) is a kind of immersion in substances, a wonder and a delight in their unexpected shapes and feels. When nothing much is know about the world, everything is possible, and painters watch their paints very closely to see exactly what they will do. Even though there is no contemporary language for that kind of experience, the alchemists already had names for it centuries ago. They knew several dozen varieties of the material prima, the place where the work starts, and their terms can help us understand there are different ways of beginning the work. They had names for their transmutations, and those can help give voice to the many metamorphoses painters try to make in paint.”

“Science has closed off almost every unsystematic encounter with the world. Alchemy and painting are two of the last remaining paths into the deliriously beautiful world of unnamed substances.”

James Elkins, a former painter, is a Professor of Art History, Theory and Criticism at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Additional titles by the same author:
The Object Stares Back
Why Are Our Picture’s Puzzles?
Our Beautiful, Dry, and Distant Texts
Why Art Can’t Be Taught: A Handbook for Art Students
What Happened to Art Criticism
Stories of Art

Look at the book:
What Painting Is

Below is a link that includes a beautiful mindmap drawing by Elkins.
Ideas for Dozens

Illustration Friday: Creative Community Forum for Artists

Illustration Friday is the art forum, the mission of which is to build a creative community for illustrators. IF features a weekly illustration challenge. A topic is posted every Friday. Participants have all week to come up with their own interpretation.

"It is a safe place to discuss creative issues, ask questions or just get feedback on your work. Want to find out how to get a certain texture? Ask. Want to find people in your area to start an illustration group? The art forum is a good place to start."
http://illustrationfriday.com