Enfilade

Press release (12 December 2013) from the Getty:

Timothy Potts, director of the J. Paul Getty Museum, announced today that Scott Schaefer, the Museum’s senior curator of Paintings since 1999, will retire on January 21, 2014. Schaefer joined the Museum in February 1999, following a distinguished career at Sotheby’s, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, the Fogg Museum at Harvard, and the Philadelphia Museum of Art, among others. Over the course of his career at the Getty, he contributed greatly to the growth of the Paintings collection, adding a total of 70 paintings and pastels, plus five sculptures during his four-year oversight of that department.

“Through his acquisitions, Scott has made an impact on every one of the Museum’s paintings galleries and, in particular, transformed our eighteenth-century French collection,” said Potts in announcing Schaefer’s retirement. “We will miss his discerning eye, keen intelligence
and above all his unswerving commitment to the Museum.”

Maison de la Reine au hameau, Versailles
Photo: Wikimedia Commons, 2011

◊  ◊  ◊  ◊  ◊

From The Art Newspaper:

Claudia Barbieri Childs, “Dior to Fund Versailles Makeover,” The Art Newspaper (14 November 2013).
Fashion house to help restore Marie Antoinette’s rustic hideaway, where the French queen enjoyed the simple things in life

The fashion house Dior is to sponsor the restoration of the Queen’s House in Versailles. The deal was announced last month by Catherine Pégard, the director of the Palace of Versailles. The house was Marie Antoinette’s rustic hideaway, where Louis XVI’s queen played out a fantasy life as a simple milkmaid until the revolution of 1789 imposed a sterner reality. The house was abandoned after the revolution. . .

The full article is available here»

Press release (4 November 2013) from The Frick:

Xavier F. Salomon has been appointed to the position of Peter Jay Sharp Chief Curator of The Frick Collection, taking up the post in January of 2014. Dr. Salomon―who has organized exhibitions and published most particularly in the areas of Italian and Spanish art of the sixteenth through eighteenth century―comes to The Frick Collection from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, where he is a curator of in the Department of European Paintings. Previously, he was the Arturo and Holly Melosi Chief Curator of Dulwich Picture Gallery, London. Salomon’s two overall fields of expertise are the painter Paolo Veronese (1528–1588) and the collecting and patronage of cardinals in Rome during the early seventeenth century. Born in Rome, and raised in Italy and the United Kingdom, Salomon received his Ph.D. from the Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London. A widely published author, essayist, and reviewer, Salomon sits on the Consultative Committee of The Burlington Magazine and is a member of the International Scientific Committee of Storia dell’Arte.

Comments Frick Director Ian Wardropper, “We are thrilled to welcome Salomon to the post of Peter Jay Sharp Chief Curator. He is a remarkable scholar of great breadth and vitality, evidenced by his résumé, on which you will find names as far ranging as Veronese, Titian, Carracci, Guido Reni, Van Dyck, Claude Lorrain, Poussin, Tiepolo, Lucian Freud, Cy Twombly, and David Hockney. At the same time, he brings to us significant depth in the schools of painting at the core of our Old Master holdings, and he will complement superbly the esteemed members of our curatorial team. Salomon has experience as a department head, and he has curated marvelous shows, among them a mutually rewarding collaboration with the Frick. He was a highly productive and inspiring participant in the Frick’s Andrew W. Mellon Curatorial Fellowship program, leaving his mark already on the institution through an acclaimed Veronese exhibition as well as various other projects of distinction. In Salomon’s work, collecting has remained a critical line of art historical inquiry since the defense of his dissertation on the patronage of Cardinal Pietro Aldobrandini [1571–1621]. This focus resonates beautifully with us, as the institution is widely known for the interpretation of our history, holdings, exhibitions, publications, programs, and the innovative activities of the Frick Art Reference Library’s Center for the History of Collecting.”

Xavier Salomon adds, “It is a great honor for me to be appointed the Peter Jay Sharp Chief Curator of The Frick Collection. I organized my first exhibition at the Frick as an Andrew W. Mellon Curatorial Fellow. It is therefore a huge pleasure for me to return to an institution to which I feel deeply indebted and that I greatly admire. The Frick has a unique collection of outstanding masterpieces, and its holdings in the fields of painting, sculpture, decorative arts, and drawings are of stupendous quality. It will be a pleasure to work with the staff of noted colleagues in the fields of curatorial, conservation, and education, all of whom are leading authorities in their areas of expertise. Over the years and under the guidance of my predecessors, Edgar Munhall and Colin B. Bailey, the Frick has led the way with inspirational programming and groundbreaking exhibitions. I look forward to working on the institution’s upcoming projects, sharing, as I do, the Frick’s belief in the fundamental importance of museum research as well as in presenting wide-ranging, vibrant, and engaging offerings to the broad public and scholarly community alike.”

A Superb Résumé of Acclaimed Exhibitions

Salomon’s recent exhibitions have focused on areas of the fine arts well represented at the Frick: Spanish, Italian, and Flemish sixteenth- through eighteenth-century painting. A sought-after Veronese scholar, he is curator of a forthcoming monographic exhibition on this artist at The National Gallery, London (2014). At The Metropolitan Museum of Art, he organized Velázquez’s Portrait of Duke Francesco I d’Este: A Masterpiece from the Galleria Estense, Modena (2013). At Dulwich, he curated Van Dyck in Sicily, 1624–25: Painting and the Plague (2012) and collaborated with Nicholas Cullinan on Twombly and Poussin: Arcadian Painters (2011). He co-curated, with Helen Langdon and Caterina Volpi, Salvator Rosa (1615–1673): Bandits, Wilderness, and Magic (which went to Dulwich and the Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Texas, 2010–11). Salomon and his predecessor at the Frick, Colin B. Bailey (since June, the Director of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco), organized Masterpieces of European Painting from Dulwich Picture Gallery, which was shown to critical acclaim at the Frick in 2010. His exhibition Paolo Veronese: The Petrobelli Altarpiece was shown at Dulwich, the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, and the Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, Texas (2009–10). Best of British. The Story of the British Collection at Dulwich Picture Gallery (2009) was preceded by The Agony and the Ecstasy: Guido Reni’s Saint Sebastians (co-curated with Piero Boccardo and featured first at the Musei di Strada Nuova, Palazzo Rosso, Genoa, followed by Dulwich, 2007–08). As the Frick’s Andrew W. Mellon Curatorial Fellow, he was praised for his exhibition Veronese’s Allegories: Virtue, Love, and Exploration in Renaissance Venice (2006). He also contributed to Masterpieces of European Painting from The Cleveland Museum of Art (2006–7), From Callot to Greuze: French Drawings from Weimar (2005), Gardens of Eternal Spring: Two Newly Conserved Mughal Carpets (2005), and Raphael’s Fornarina (2004–5).

A Prolific Scholar and Speaker

Much in demand as a writer, Salomon has contributed myriad essays and entries to publications produced by institutions internationally, including the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna; Palazzo Venezia, Rome; and the Royal Academy of Arts, London. Among the journals that have published his research are The Metropolitan Museum of Art Journal, Apollo, The Burlington Magazine, Master Drawings, The Medal, The Art Newspaper, and the Journal of the History of Collections. He is a frequent reviewer in The Burlington Magazine, with up to seven appearing annually. Salomon has delivered conference papers and lectures at the Musée du Louvre; The Metropolitan Museum of Art; The Frick Collection; the Morgan Library & Museum; the universities of Rome and Padua; the Musei di Strada Nuova, Genoa; Cambridge University; Dulwich Picture Gallery, and the National Gallery, London, among other institutions.

From the museum press release (1 November 2013) . . .

William Aikman, Portrait of Patie Birnie, the Fiddler of Kinghorn, ca. 1718 (Scottish National Portrait Gallery)

A rare, early portrait of a Scottish folk musician, the celebrated eighteenth-century fiddler Patie (or Peter) Birnie, has recently been acquired by the Scottish National Portrait Gallery in Edinburgh and is on public display for the first time.

This charming portrait by the Scot William Aikman (1682–1731), who portrayed many of the leading political and literary figures of his day, was probably painted in the period between 1715 and 1720. A memorable and welcome addition to the Gallery’s collection, it is a significant example of a portrait by a prominent Scottish artist in which the sitter, who is clearly identified, comes from the lower ranks of society, rather than the ruling élite. It complements other renowned portraits of musicians in the collection, such Sir Henry Raeburn’s portrayal of the fiddler Niel Gow, painted in 1787, and also provides a compelling contrast with the Gallery’s other portraits by Aikman, which are primarily of aristocratic subjects.

In the striking and unusual composition the famous musician is shown laughing, and is identified not only by the fiddle he holds, but also by a painted inscription which describes him as “The Facetious Peter Birnie / Fidler in Kinghorn.” Although the word facetious is generally used in a derogatory sense today, in the eighteenth century it meant “gay; chearful [sic]; lively; merry; witty” (Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary). Most of our information about Birnie comes from Allan Ramsay the Elder’s Elegy, published, presumably shortly after Birnie’s death, in 1721, which states that Birnie was present at the Battle of Bothwell Bridge in 1679. The Elegy was later used by the Rev. James Granger in his Biographical History (1769):
“Patie Birnie resided at Kinghorn, on the sea coast, about nine miles north of Edinburgh, where he supported himself by his consummate impudence. Not by honest labour, but by intruding upon every person who came to the public house… He then fell into the utmost familiarity… his… exploits [involved] showing a very particular comicalness in his looks and gestures; laughing and groaning at the same time. He played, sung, and broke in with some queer tale twice or thrice e’er he got through the tune; and his beard was no small addition to the diversion.”

In addition to performing in such a memorable manner, Birnie is reputed to be among the earliest composers of strathspeys (a type of dance in 4/4 time). His fame was such that a number of engravings after Aikman’s painting were made, an example of which is in the Gallery’s collection. The painting was formerly in the collection of the Earls of Rothes, at Leslie House, Fife (where it was recorded in 1839) and was acquired by the Gallery from the London dealer Philip Mould.

Speaking of the acquisition, Christopher Baker, Director of the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, said: “This is an especially attractive and endearing addition to our eighteenth-century collection: Birnie was a man renowned for his music and vivacious performances and Aikman commemorated him in a wonderfully appropriate, informal and engaging manner.”

Press release (29 October 2013) from the Worcester Art Museum:

The Worcester Art Museum (WAM) today announced the appointment of Jon Seydl as its new Director of Curatorial Affairs. In this position, he will direct the Curatorial department, as well as the Conservation, Registration, and Collections and Exhibition Services departments; he will also be the Museum’s curator of European art. Recognized for his specialty in 17th- to 19th-century Italian art, Seydl currently serves as the Paul J. and Edith Ingalls Vignos, Jr., Curator of European Paintings and Sculpture at the Cleveland Museum of Art. He will assume his new position in January 2014.

“We are excited for Jon to lead our talented, growing team of curators,” said WAM Director Matthias Waschek. “While his Old Master focus is in keeping with one of WAM’s traditional strengths, his proven track record of working innovatively outside his field of specialization will be crucial to us as we work to better engage audiences with our own collection. Cleveland’s impressive arms and armor collection will also inform his thinking and leadership role in our integration of the Higgins Collection into WAM’s encyclopedic holdings. Jon will provide an invaluable perspective as we continue toward our goal of accessibility for all audiences.”

Most recently coming from the Cleveland Museum of Art, Seydl’s previous positions include Program Specialist at the National Endowment for the Humanities Program, followed by Research Coordinator at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. He joined the J. Paul Getty Museum in 2002 as Assistant Curator of Paintings before becoming an Associate Curator of Paintings in 2006. He came to the Cleveland Museum of Art in 2007. Since then, he has reinstalled and thematically reinterpreted Cleveland’s entire collection of European Art as part of the Museum’s renovation and expansion project. Seydl’s acquisitions for the Cleveland Museum of Art include St Peter of Alcántara by Pedro de Mena and Julius Caesar by Mino da Fiesole, an Apollo Magazine 2009 Acquisition of the Year.

During his career, Seydl has curated and co-curated many major exhibitions, including Jacques-Louis David: Empire to Exile (2005), Tiepolo Oil Sketches (2005), From Caspar David Friedrich to Gerhard Richter: German Painting from Dresden (2006), Rembrandt in America (2011–12), and The Last Days of Pompeii: Decadence, Apocalypse, Resurrection (2012–13). Seydl wrote the catalogue for Tiepolo Oil Sketches (2005), which he curated at the Getty, and has co-edited two volumes of essays: Gerhard Richter: Early Work, 1951–1972 and Antiquity Recovered: The Legacy of Pompeii and Herculaneum. In 2013 the Association of Art Museum Curators awarded him the Outstanding Catalogue Essay prize for “The Last Days of Pompeii.”

Seydl completed his BA in art history at Yale University and received his MA and PhD in art history from the University of Pennsylvania. He specialized in 17th- and 18th-century Italian Art and wrote his dissertation on images of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in the 18th century.

“I am incredibly pleased to be joining the Worcester Art Museum,” Seydl said. “With the upcoming integration of the Higgins Armory and the recent reinstallation of the Museum’s European paintings in [remastered], this is an exciting time for the Museum. Matthias’ vision for the future is thoughtful and compelling, and I look forward to working with him and the rest of the WAM team on advancing the Museum’s goal of increased accessibility and engagement through the presentation and interpretation of a very great collection.”

Catherine Hess, the chief curator of European art at The Huntington, offers this posting at The Huntington’s blog Verso:

Catherine Hess, “How Do You Frame a Masterpiece?” Verso (24 October 2013).

This digital rendering shows the new frame as it will appear on The Blue Boy after installation in late November 2013.

In 1921, Henry and Arabella Huntington purchased what would become the most famous work of art in their collection: The Blue Boy (1770) by Thomas Gainsborough. Its celebrity rests on many factors, not least of which is the superb quality of the painting, with its brilliant brushwork and the frank earnestness of the boy’s gaze. Its price—at roughly $725,000—was the highest ever paid for a work of art up to that time. The scandal provoked by its departure from Britain also increased its notoriety. The fact that it was exhibited at the National Gallery, London, after the art dealer Joseph Duveen sold it to the Huntingtons further expanded its fame.

So The Blue Boy is a big deal. But what’s the story behind the famous painting’s frame?

When the painting arrived in San Marino, The Blue Boy’s frame was likely the same one in which it was displayed by the previous owner, Hugh Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster. By 1938, the Huntington’s curator of art collections, Maurice Block, was ready to respond to complaints about the painting’s “bulky 19th-century frame.” According to a memo written on May 6 of that year, “We have cut down one of our old frames to put the Blue Boy into it.”

The replacement frame appears to have been an extra supplied by Duveen and probably had been in storage for some time in the Huntington Art Gallery basement. This frame is of the so-called Carlo Maratta type, widely used in England from 1750 through the turn of the 20th century. . .

The Huntington recently began exploring ways to reframe The Blue Boy. We first approached Michael Gregory, frame specialist at Arnold Wiggins & Sons in London, a workshop specializing in the adaption and reproduction of antique frames. It supplies frames to the Royal Household and London’s National Portrait Gallery. . .

The full posting is available here»

Press release (23 October 2013) from The Getty:

From Johann Christoph Volkamer, Nürnbergische Hesperides (Nuremberg, 1708). The Getty Research Institute, 2885-927, donated by Tania Norris.

The Getty Research Institute (GRI) announced today the acquisition of The Tania Norris Collection of Rare Botanical Books, a gift from collector Tania Norris. Assembled over the last 30 years by Ms. Norris through individual acquisitions from booksellers in the US, Europe, and Australia, the collection consists of 41 rare books that provide unparalleled insight into the contributions of natural science to visual culture in Europe from the sixteenth through the nineteenth centuries.

Highlights of the collection include Crispin Van de Passe’s Hortus Floridus (1614), apparently the first illustrated book to apply the microscopy of magnifying lenses to botanical illustration; and Johann Christoph Volkamer’s Nürnbergische Hesperides (1708), documenting both the introduction of Italian citrus culture to Germany, and the revolution in urban planning which ensued from the parks designed for their cultivation and irrigation. Also found in the collection is a copy of Maria Sibylla Merian’s Derde en laatste deel der Rupsen Begin (1717), the first book to depict insect metamorphosis, reputedly hand-colored by her daughter.

“The Getty Research Institute is deeply honored to receive the donation of the Tania Norris Collection of Rare Botanical Books from one of the founding members of our GRI Council. This gift promises to open novel paths to explore the complex historical intersections between science and art,” said Marcia Reed chief curator at the Getty Research Institute. “Tania’s passionate interests and her collecting instincts have created a very generous gift which has also served to raise the profile of an important subject with strong relevance for researchers who use our special collections.”

David Brafman, curator of rare books at the GRI, said “The Norris Collection offers inestimable rewards for scholars researching global botanical trade and the ensuing stimulus of cultural exchange to the trend of collecting curiosities spawned in Renaissance and Baroque European culture. Other books in the collection document the codependent progress of technologies in the history of medicine, pharmacology, and the color and textile industries from the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries. No less important are the opportunities to study the complex artistic relationship between physiognomy and ‘naturalism’ in visual representation, as well as developments in urban planning and landscape architecture. Ms. Norris’ generous donation enhances significantly GRI’s existing collections in such subjects and promises to transform  the way art historians examine the past in the future.”

In particular, the unique hand-colored copy of Maria Sibylla Merian’s Der Rupsen Begin (Birth of the Butterfly) from the Norris Collection will find a companion in the GRI vaults: Merian’s stunning Metamorphosis of the Insects of Surinam (1719), the self-published book which documented the watercolors, drawings, and scientific studies she executed and conducted while exploring the wildlife of the South American jungles. The GRI copy was featured prominently in the Getty Museum’s exhibition, Merian and Daughters, which celebrated the extraordinary pioneering contributions of the artist-naturalist, the first European woman to travel to America expressly for artistic purposes.

The Norris Collection will also prove an invaluable complement for research in landscape- and still-life painting, as well as mention the insights it will provide to conservators and conservation scientists about recipes and global trade in color-pigments and other preparations in the decorative arts.

In addition to being a founding member of the Getty Research Institute Collections Council, Ms. Norris also serves on the J. Paul Getty Museum Disegno Drawing Council and Paintings Conservation Council.

“It was one of the proudest moments of my life when the Getty Research Institute accepted my books for their library. I never collected expecting anyone else to think my books of interest, “ said Ms. Norris. “But now at the GRI, anyone can view them; some have been or will soon be in exhibitions and programs. More importantly, they will be preserved for generations to come. You don’t need much money, just passion to collect, and you just never know what treasures you may have.”

Much of the collection has been on deposit at the GRI and available to researchers; the remaining materials will be cataloged and available by the end of year

From the press release (20 September 2013) . . .

Antoine Watteau, Two Studies of the Head and Shoulders of a Little Girl, ca. 1717, Red, black, and white chalk on buff paper; drawn over black chalk sketch of legs (New York: The Morgan Library & Museum)

The Morgan Library & Museum announced today that it will begin the digitization of its collection of master drawings, considered to be one of the greatest in the world. The initiative will result in a digital library of more than 10,000 images, representing drawings spanning the fourteenth to twenty-first centuries, available free of charge on the Morgan’s website. The project will begin in October and is expected to be completed within one year, contributing significantly to the Morgan’s commitment to advancing drawings scholarship.

The images will be accessible in two formats: one for general identification and another for detailed study with enhanced resolution. Scholarly information about each drawing will be linked to a corresponding Morgan catalogue record. Importantly, the project includes approximately 2,000 images of versos (reverse sides) of drawings that contain rarely seen sketches or inscriptions by the artist. The digital library will be available on an open-access basis, and can be downloaded for non-commercial uses such as classroom presentations, dissertations, and educational websites devoted to the fine arts.

“The Morgan’s drawing collection is indisputably one of the finest in the world, however, images of only a small part of our holdings have been available in digital form,” said William M. Griswold, director of the museum. “This project will provide access to the full range of the collection and is critical to our institutional goal of promoting drawings scholarship and reaching out to an ever larger audience.”

Future plans for the project involve digitization of the department’s print collection, including its celebrated group of Rembrandt prints, as well as artists’ sketchbooks, and expanded scholarly catalogue records. For nearly a century the Morgan has played a leading role in the collecting, scholarship, and exhibition of master drawings. All the major European schools are represented in the collection, with particular strengths in the field of Italian drawings, including works by Raphael and Michelangelo, Annibale Carracci, and Giambattista and Domenico Tiepolo; French drawings, especially of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries; British drawings, with an exceptional concentration of works by William Blake; and Dutch, Flemish, and German drawings, including numerous sheets by Dürer, Rubens, Rembrandt, and Friedrich, among many others. The collection also includes a growing number of modern and contemporary works on paper as well as drawings by American artists. The Morgan’s collection is thus unusual in that it represents, in increasing depth, continuity as well as innovation throughout the entire history of drawing.

Jennifer Tonkovich, Curator in the Department of Drawings and Prints, and Marilyn Palmeri, Imaging and Rights Manager, will lead the project team. This project is generously underwritten by the Joseph F. McCrindle Foundation and by the Samuel H. Kress Foundation.