A National Collection: Paintings Selected from the Collection of The National Academy Museum

National Academy Museum

and School of Fine Arts

A National Collection: Paintings Selected from the Collection of The National Academy Museum

July 2 - September 28, 1997

Nearly two centuries of American fine art are reflected in the special summer exhibition at one of New York's oldest cultural organizations, The National Academy, which is located on the city's famed "Museum Mile." A National Collection: Paintings from the Collection of The National Academy Museum is on view from July 2 through September and includes over 50 masterworks from The Academy's collection of approximately 2, 800 paintings. This thematically broad selection offers a revealing view of this cultural institution, which was founded in 1825, and continues today as a museum, school of fine arts, and dynamic association of artists.

Barrel of Fun, Reginald Marsh, 1943

Among the paintings featured in A National Collection are portraits, landscape paintings, still lifes, genre paintings, and abstract works. Among the earlier Academy members who represented in the show are Cecilia Beaux (1855-1942), William Merritt Chase (1849-1916), Frederic Edwin Church (1826-1900), George Inness NA (1855-1894), Jonathan Eastman Johnson (1824-1906), Francis Davis Millet (1846-1912), Edward Ludlow Mooney (1813-1887), and Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848-1933). Two works by Academy founder and prescient Samuel F. B. Morse (1791-1872) will be shown together.

The Bish Bash, John Frederick Kensett, 1855

With the constant growth of the collection to the present day, The Academy's impressive holdings include work by a wide range of artists working throughout the 20th century. A National Collection features work by painters Charles Burchfield, NA (1893-1967); Charles Cajori, NA (b. 1921); John Barnes Dobbs, NA (b. 1931); Richard Estes, NA (b. 1936); Reginald Marsh, NA (1898-1954); Aaron Shikler, NA (b. 1922); Morton Wayne Thiebaud, NA (b. 1920); George Clair Tooker, NA (b. 1920), Jane Wilson, PNA (b. 1924), among others. Works by four members of the renowned Wyeth family will be on view, self-portraits of James, Andrew, N. C. Wyeth, and Peter Hurd.

Self-Portrait, Cecilia Beaux, 1894

A National Collection also contains one painting, The Croquet Player, by the beloved American painter engraver Winslow Homer, NA (1836-1910), and visitors will find a show of his works on the second floor of the museum during the same time period this summer. Winslow Homer Wood Engravings from the Permanent Collection marks the debut of a major gift work by Homer that was given to The Academy in 1994-95 by Seymour Pearlstein.

Special Offer:

A wonderful publication for those interested in the history of art, An American Collection: Paintings and Sculpture from the National Academy of Design offers a captivating look at the rich and improtant holdings of The National Academy. The eighty-eight examples selected were chosen to demonstrate the range in date--from the early 19th-century to the present day--and character of this collection, as well as for their intrinsic quality.

An American Collection is is avaliable (in hardcover) at the special price of $10.00 from the Academy Bookstore throughout the run of the summer exhibition "A National Collection." For further information or to place an order, please call the bookstore at (212) 369 4880.

For further biographical information on selected artists cited above please see America's Distinguished Artists, a national registry of historic artists.

rev. 11/22/10

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