A Conversation with Sonia Romero
"Popular cultural icons bring people together, creating a feeling of community and commonality."
READ MOREPlease note, the galleries will be closed for Christmas on Thursday, December 24, and Friday, December 25; and Friday, January 1. The Museum is now open with updated hours, Wednesday through Sunday, 10 am to 5 pm, required free timed tickets to encourage social distancing, and increased health and safety procedures including required cloth masks. Learn more about these updates in this video or at ncartmuseum.org/covid19. Museum from Home programming continues, including the NCMA Virtual Exhibitions Subscription and virtual events.
Still Bucking the Tide
| Mar 8, 2016To celebrate the United Nations' International Women's Day, I asked our curatorial team to discuss some of their favorite artists in the collection (who just happen to be women). Here are their responses.
Mary Stevenson Cassatt, Portrait of Madame X Dressed for the Matinee, 1877–78, oil on canvas, 39 5/8 x 31 13/16 in., Gift of Charlotte Hanes in memory of her husband, R. Philip Hanes Jr., and gift of anonymous donors
DEPUTY DIRECTOR FOR ART JOHN COFFEY: Of the many American artists swayed by French impressionism, only Mary Cassatt was accepted as a peer by Degas, Monet, and Renoir. Recently the NCMA received the gift of a beautiful early portrait by Cassatt. Painted when the artist was in her mid-30s, Portrait of Madame X Dressed for the Matinée tells us much about this remarkable painter: her warm sympathy for her subjects, her openness to everyday experience, and her careful informality, all expressed with a disciplined exuberance.
Mickalene Thomas, Three Graces: Les Trois Femmes Noires, 2011, rhinestones, acrylic paint, and oil enamel on wood panel, 108 x 144 in., Purchased with funds from the North Carolina State Art Society (Robert F. Phifer Bequest)
“All of my muses possess a profound sense of inner confidence and individuality. They are all in tune with their own audacity and beauty.” —Mickalene Thomas
Elisabeth Louise Vigée-LeBrun, Self-Portrait, 1790, oil on canvas, 39 x 32 in.,Uffizi Gallery, Florence, Italy
Elisabeth Louise Vigée Lebrun, Ivan Ivanovich Shuvalov (1727–1797), circa 1795–97, oil on canvas, 33 x 24 in., Purchased with funds from the State of North Carolina
Vigée Lebrun recalled that Shuvalov “combined obliging politeness with great urbanity, and as he was also the most convivial of men, he was sought out by the best society.”
Elizabeth Murray, Pigeon, 1991, oil on canvas on laminated wood construction, 95 3/4 x 62 5/8 x 13 5/16 in., Purchased with funds from gifts by Mr. and Mrs. Samuel J. Levin and William R. Valentiner, by exchange
"Art is an epiphany in a coffee cup." —Elizabeth Murray
Iris Tutnauer, Spice Container, designed 1998, fabricated 2014, silver; hammered, brushed, L. 6 5/8 x H. 2 3/8 in., Gift of Merri and Marc Robinson in honor of their family
Hayv Kahraman, Kawliya 1, 2014, oil on linen, 96 x 48 in., Purchased with funds from the bequest of Fannie and Alan Leslie, by exchange
Jackie Nickerson, Elina 1, 2012, digital chromatic print, 48 x 38 1/2 in., Purchased with funds from the Friends of Photography
"It is about us in the landscape, how we change the world we inhabit at every moment of our being human, and how, for better and for worse, the habitus that we make, in turn, changes who we are.” —Jackie Nickerson
Camille Claudel, Bust of Rodin, modeled 1888–92, date of cast unknown, bronze, H. 15 3/4 x W. 9 1/4 x D. 11 in., Gift of the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Foundation
DAVID STEEL: Auguste Rodin’s student, mistress, muse, and collaborator, Camille Claudel pursued her own career as an artist after she broke away from the sculptor, later becoming obsessed with the idea that Rodin had sapped her artistic energies and fed on her genius. She became increasingly distraught and in 1913 was confined to an asylum, where she remained for the rest of her life. The NCMA’s Bust of Rodin, exhibited prominently at the Paris Salon of 1892, is the only sculpture she made of him. Hailed by critics of the day as “a marvel of powerful interpretation” and “a severe work, patient and reflective,” this sculpture was Rodin’s favorite likeness of himself.
iona rozeal brown, a³ blackface #62, acrylic on paper, 83 x 59 in., Purchased with funds from the North Carolina Museum of Art Foundation, Art Trust Fund
“I have to say that I find the ganguro obsession with blackness pretty weird, and a little offensive. My paintings [in this series] come out of trying to make sense of this appropriation.''—iona rozeal brown
Who are some of your favorite artists in the permanent collection at the NCMA? Feel free to share why you like them in the comment section below.
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