American 20th-21st Century Portraiture - Miscellaneous
Online information from sources other than Resource Library
with an emphasis on representational art
(above: Guy Pène du Bois,
The Confidence Man, c. 1919, oil on panel, 27.9 x 22.5 inches, Brooklyn
Museum. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons*)
American Art Today: Heads Only was a 2014 exhibit at the Patricia and Phillip Frost Art Museum at Florida International University. "In this exhibition of HEADS ONLY, the human head is captured in a wide range of styles; in painting, sculpture, photography, and installations. The heads may or not function as portraits, and if they do they are conceptual, satirical, humorous; not portraits in the traditional sense of recording the actual characteristics of a person's physiognomy. For the contemporary artist, the heads are fragmented parts of the human body capable of their own existence as a separate entity and worthy of exploration and exploitation." -- quote from catalog essay by Dr. Carol Damian, Visual Arts Department, Florida International University. Accessed 1/17
Ann Gale: Portraits is a 2016 exhibit at the Fralin Museum of Art, University of Virginia which says: "Largely composed of oil paintings, with a few preparatory sketches, this exhibition features portraits, painted from models in the studio, that reveal the often unseen interconnectedness between sitter, room, atmosphere and artist." Also see Ann Gale from Dolby Chadwick Gallery. Accessed 8/18
Anne Labovitz: Composite Portrait is an exhibit held June 4 - August 11, 2013 at the Tweed Museum of Art. Includes online videos. Accessed April, 2015.
Barbara Earl Thomas: The Illuminated Body is a 2023 exhibit at the Chrysler Museum of Art which says: "Layers of luminous, jewel-colored paper pulse with life behind cut black-paper portraits made by Barbara Earl Thomas." Accessed 4/23
Bearing Witness: Daniel Heyman, an exhibit held January 15 - March 13, 2011 at the Laband Art Gallery at Loyola Marymount University. Includes "portraits of individuals who have endured great personal hardship - former Abu Ghraib detainees, African American fathers who have been in and out of jail, and new immigrants to the United States." Accessed February, 2015
The Business of Bodies: Ellen Emmet Rand (1875-1941) is a 2018 exhibit at the William Benton Museum of Art which says: "Ellen Emmet Rand was one of the most important and prolific portrait painters in the United States in the first decades of the twentieth century. " Accessed 6/19
Catherine Opie: Portraits is a 2016 exhibit at the Hammer Museum, UCLA (Los Angeles) which says: "Opie's work draws as much from Renaissance painting as from the traditions of street photography, and her most recent body of work most directly engages with old master portraiture." Also see the entry on this artist in Wikipedia. Accessed 12/18
Diego Lasansky: A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man is a 2016 exhibit at the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art which says: "Lasansky's work is figurative, and, like his grandfather, tends to focus on subjects readily available to him -- such as family members -- and those of historical and personal significance, such as Goya, Rembrandt, and Martin Luther." Accessed 2/17
Face to Face was a 1988-89 exhibit at the Sheldon Museum of Art which says: "Among the various types of artistic expression, portraits are probably considered the most approachable by the greatest number of people. And yet, upon closer consideration, it is evident that no amount of scrutiny on the part of the artist, or the viewer, can deliver the portrait from a fundamental limbo resulting from its dual referential and aesthetic functions. The portrait partakes of a variety of truths, but never resides within anyone verity. The philosophical debate about the nature of likeness has raged since the time of Plato, and remains unresolved." Viewers may download the exhibition brochure. Accessed 1/17
Face to Face: Los Angeles Collects Portraiture is a 2017 exhibit at the California African American Museum which says: "Face to Face brings together contemporary portraiture from Southern California collections, in recognition of the vital role private collectors play in supporting institutions and artists from Los Angeles and beyond. This exhibition highlights in particular a new generation of collectors of color whose mission, in part, is to support artists already at the early stages of their career, often ahead of the mainstream." Accessed 9/17
Facing Survival / David Kassan is a 2019 exhibit at the Fisher Museum of Art which says: "Artist David Kassan's singular vision and extraordinary talent combine in the exhibition "Facing Survival" featuring Kassan's paintings and drawings of more than a dozen Holocaust survivors, created over a period of several years." Also see artist's website Accessed 5/20
Jamie Sloane: The Visiteur Series Presented by Jack and Angie Bourdelais is a 2018 exhibit at the Huntington Museum of Art which says: "A collection of portraits by Point Pleasant, West Virginia, artist Jamie Sloane illustrates the power that still resides in the artist's brush to represent the human figure." Also see press release and website for artist. Accessed 12/18
Jordan Casteel: Returning the Gaze is a 2019 exhibit at the Cantor Arts Center, Stanford University which says: "Featuring paintings made in the last five years, Casteel's large-scale portraits of Harlem community members are intimate portrayals of often overlooked members of society." Also see 10/8/19 article in Stanford Daily and artist's website. Accessed 5/20
KAWS: FAR FAR DOWN is a 2017 exhibit at the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis which says: "For FAR FAR DOWN, the artist creates a site-specific painting on CAM's 60-foot long Project Wall, the large-scale work serving as a backdrop for three new major paintings. In the Museum's courtyard, KAWS debuts the most recent permutation from his sculpture series, TOGETHER -- bronze painted figures in a consoling embrace. TOGETHER is immediately endearing, and at the same time evokes pathos and contemplation. The paintings on view on the Project Wall deliver a sustained visual display of clashing patterns and vibrant colors, with barely recognizable popular figures inlaid within the scenes as deceptively as camouflage. The title of the exhibition and the eponymous painting implies physical or emotional descent, although the status of the concealed forms within the work are open to conjecture." Accessed 6/17
Likeness of Being: Portraits by Phillip Burke, an exhibit held April 10 - September 13, 2015 at the Burchfield Penney Art Center. Includes essay by Scott Propeack, chief curator, Burchfield Penney Art Center. Accessed February, 2016.
Medea and Her Sisters: Leonard Baskin's Images of Women, an exhibit held June - September 2007 at the Smith College Museum of Art. Accessed April, 2015
Mel Leipzig and Friends is a 2023 exhibit at the Provincetown Art Association and Museum which says: "Mel Leipzig is a contemporary artist known for his portraits featuring American artists in their studios, including notable Cape Cod artists such as Carmen Cicero, Selina Trieff, Robert Henry, and Chip and Jean Fogg-Brock. His portraits are rendered with just four colors and black, resulting in rich and dramatic scenes. This exhibition will feature these portraits alongside the work of the subjects themselves to create an atmosphere of connection and intimacy" Accessed 9/23
National Portrait Gallery (US):
Accessed August, 2015.
Njideka Akunyili Crosby: Predecessors is a 2017 exhibit at the Tang Museum which says: "The paintings represent a fusion of her Nigerian upbringing, her immigration to America, and her subsequent marriage to a white Texan. Her artwork also plays with and subverts preconceived notions of Western art history by including portraits of her African family, material references to her Igbo tribe's customs, and images of Nigeria's British colonial past." Also see artist's website Accessed 12/17
Picturing Identity: The Allure of Portraiture, an exhibit held November 17, 2012 - February 17, 2013 at the Figge Art Museum. Includes image. Accessed August, 2015.
Resemblance: Figure and Portrait Paintings by Runcie Tatnall, an exhibit held March 29 - May 3, 2014 at the Texarkana Regional Arts Center. Accessed December, 2015.
Steven Kinder: 552,830 is a 2020 exhibit at the Brattleboro Museum & Art Center which says: "Although Kinder has many years of experience educating himself about homelessness as a supporter of the national organization The Coalition for The Homeless, he does not comment on the conditions that brought each portrait sitter here. Instead, he guides our experience as viewers." Accessed 12/20
The Singing Bird Room of Robert Lostutter, an exhibit held October 5, 2012 to January 6, 2013 at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art. The museum's website says: "In the early 1970s, a sojourn in Mexico and his love of nature led Robert Lostutter to seize upon a theme that came to define his mature style. A superb draftsman and watercolorist, he began making portraits of figures adorned with the plumage of tropical birds or the petals and leaves of orchids. Lostutter's mythic creatures are both disturbing and radiantly beautiful, fusions of animal and human, nature and culture." Accessed February, 2015
This Is a Portrait If I Say So: Identity in American Art, 1912 to Today was a 2016 exhibit held at Bowdoin College Museum of Art which says: "Featuring iconic American Artists such as Marsden Hartley, Alfred Stieglitz, Robert Rauschenberg, Yoko Ono, Roni Horn, Glenn Ligon, and others, this timely and groundbreaking exhibition includes more than 60 abstract, symbolic, and conceptual portraits across a wide range of media -- reexamining over a century of portraiture and inspiring new ways to see ourselves and others." The BCMA page includes links to the press release, checklist, images, labels, media articles, multimedia and more. Accessed 10/16.
Tough by Nature: Portraits of Cowgirls and Ranch Women of the American West, an exhibit of the art of Lynda Lanker, a Eugene, Oregon, based artist, held July 01, 2012 to September 09, 2012 at the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art at the University of Oregon. Accessed February, 2015
The WGBH/Boston
Forum Network is an audio and video streaming web site dedicated to
curating and serving live and on-demand lectures, including a number of
videos on Art and Architecture. Partners include a number of museums, colleges,
universities and other cultural organizations. See listings of related videos
in this catalogue indexed by partner name. Old
South Meeting House partnered with the WGBH Forum Network for Deaf
Artist: The World of John Brewster, Jr.,(32 minutes) a lecture by Harlan
Lane, psychologist, historian and distinguished professor at Northeastern
University, examines this extraordinary American portrait artist and how
his memberships within multiple worlds (Puritan, Federalist elite, Deaf
and Art) converged to leave an enduring legacy. [September 23, 2004]. Accessed
May, 2015.
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