Jax Stumpes: AKG Art Museum (1/26/2024)

Friday, January 26, 2024

It was raining when we arrived at the newly renovated Albright-Knox Art Gallery, now the Buffalo AKG Art Museum, so these photos are from the end of the afternoon:

Jeffrey E Gundlach Building (2019-2023, by
OMA/Shohei Shigematsu and Executive Architect
Cooper Robertson) is named for the lead patron
($65 million) of the capital campaign for the expansion

Robert and Elisabeth Wilmers Building (1900-1905,
by E B Green in Greek Revival style) rear façade;
financed by John J Albright and renamed for the
chairman of the capital campaign for the expansion

Left: Courtyard covered with artwork Common Sky
(2019, by Olafur Eliasson and Sebastian Behmann)
creating the Town Square; and right:
Seymour H Knox Building (1960-1962, by Gordon Bunshaft)

The Town Square and Knox Building have free admission. Our Tyler Arboretum reciprocity gained us free admission to the main galleries, and we paid one senior-rate to bring Paul (in other words, the admissions person applied one senior and one adult on the reciprocal tickets!). We did have to pay $10 for parking in the new underground lot, covered by the "Great Lawn."

We began in the Gundlach Building with the special exhibitions.

Others Will Know (2023, by Miriam Bäckström) is a
tapestry based on photographs of a tiny swatch of
fabric, which were then manipulated to create
the patterns for the weaving of the large-scale
work seen in the lower lobby and ramp

The first gallery contained works by artists with
connections to Clyfford Still, whether colleagues,
students, or contemporary artists who cite his influence (KSS)

When you first walk into the gallery,
it looks like a blank canvas, but actually has
acrylic paint lines on the side edges:
First Love 29 (1972, by Jules Olitski)

We liked this one better! Grey Side Bar (ochre line)
(1972, by Jo Baer)

Four rooms contained all of the 33 paintings in the
Buffalo AKG collection by Clyfford Still, the early
innovator of Abstract Expressionism (KSS)

PH-330 (September 1946) foreshadows the
Abstract Expressionism and includes his
characteristic vertical "lifeline" (KSS)

PH-102 (January 1948)

PH-264 (April 1962) was one of the first paintings Still
created after moving from New York City to a rural
area of Maryland and converting the barn into his studio

Clyfford Still had his first solo exhibition in an art museum at Albright-Knox Art Gallery in 1959, and had developed a relationship with Seymour Knox and the museum after they had purchased one of his paintings. Years later Still donated 31 of his paintings to Albright-Knox, bringing their collection to a total of 33 of his works. (The bulk of the artwork by Still now resides in the Clyfford Still Museum (2009-2011) in Denver, CO. The city was chosen by Still's wife when they responded to the stipulation in Still's will that his estate's entire collection be given to an American city willing to establish a permanent museum dedicated exclusively to the care and display of his art.

Spiral stairway in the Gundlach Building (KSS)

Contemporary Art on the second floor of the Gundlach Building:

Interior: Monet's Blue Foyer (2012, by Mickalene Thomas)
is based on a collage the artist made with photos of
Claude Monet's home in Giverny and images from
the 1970s publication The Practical Encyclopedia of
Good Decorating and Home Improvement

Junk (2003, by Tony Oursler) seemed pretty creepy
(see video clip below)

Bareroot (2007, by Alison Saar) begs the question:
how do a people consistently uprooted and denied
ownership of the land, relate to the land?

Life Magazine, April 19, 1968 (1995, by Alfredo Jaar)
takes a Gordon Park's photo of the funeral procession
of Dr Martin Luther King, Jr and marks the black
faces with black dots and the white faces with red

Niagara (1994-1995, by Frank Moore) shows bacterial,
fungal, and chemical molecules riding up in the mist
from the polluted water; note that the frame is copper
pipe with faucet handles depicting humankind's
domination over the natural wonder

Unititled (Double Portrait) (1991, by Felix Gonzalez-Torres)
is actually a pile of offset print on paper, from which you
may take a sheet home (a container of rubber bands by
the artwork's label alerted us to this opportunity!)

Untitled (1969, by Donald Judd),
another iconic stack of boxes on the wall

Blackened Word (2008, by Ursula von Rydingsvard),
a three-dimensional cedar sculpture on a template of
enlarged handwriting, where viewers can make their
own interpretation of the Polish scripted word;
however, the viewing platform on the third floor
was closed off to install a new exhibition,
yet the sculpture was fascinating nevertheless

The John J Albright Bridge connects the Gundlach Building
with the 1905 Wilmers Building (KSS)

A bust is seen from the bridge (KSS)

Laura (2012, by Jaume Plensa) mimics a
marble Roman column (KSS)

Tanktotem IV (1953, by David Smith) is
flanked by Tutti-Fruitti (1966, by Helen
Frankenthaler) and Orange and Yellow
(1956, by Mark Rothko)

Convergence (1952, by Jackson Pollock) whose artist,
in the aftermath of World War II, felt his generation
needed to find its own technique, began "drip painting"

Sky Cathedral (1958, by Louise Nevelson)
urban debris collection displayed in contained
spaces, and painted all in one color (KSS)

Numbers in Color (1958-1959, by Jasper Johns)
incorporated recognizable symbols
(i.e., numerals) with color and texture (KSS)

Child's Blue Wall (1962, by Jim Dine) shows the artist's
method of incorporating everyday objects in his work

100 Cans (1962, by Andy Warhol) was
created with stencils and handpainting,
before Warhol used silkscreening
for mass production

Helena (1966, by Tony Berlant) is a
metal collage attached with brads

Samuela II/Nana (c 1965, by Niki de
Saint Phalle) is one of several Nanas
created by the artist in the 1960s

Seaman's Belt (1945, by Jacob Lawrence) shows
us yet another aspect of the works of Lawrence

Always Fresh (2018, by Narsiso Martinez) is a
commentary on the value of agricultural labor, and is
the centerpiece of the special exhibition:
Narsisi Martinez: From These Hands

Always Fresh detail: Martinez uses the fruit boxes that he and his
fellow workers fill in their work to bring food to our tables (KSS)

Nature's Candy Picker (2023, by Narsiso
Martinez) uses the gold background of
older religious paintings to depict his
colleagues as deserving of reverence

Sculpture Court:

Reclining Figure (1935-1936, by Henry Moore),
this time made with elm wood

The Transparent Simulacrum of the Feigned Image (1938,
by Salvador Dalí) is classic Surrealism

Peasant Life (1925, by Marc Chagall),
although with scenes from Russia, is
dominated by "silken" blues showing the
influence of French landscape painting

Dynamism of a Dog on a Leash (1912, by Giacomo Bella)
is one of my personal favorites

Harvesting (1893, by Hans Olde) has us thinking
Pennsylvania Dutch, but it is real Deutsch (KSS)

The Hammerman (1885, by Constantin Meunier)
celebrates all industrialized workers

Farm at Montfoucault (1874, by Camille Pissarro); since we
were unable to find paintings by Pissarro in his native
St Thomas in the Virgin Islands, we must settle for this one

Prose on the Trans-Siberian Railway and
of Little Johanne of France (1913, by
Sonia Delauney and Blaise Cendrars)
is an accordion-fold book (KSS)

Prose on the Trans-Siberian Railway ... detail (KSS)

The Old Mill (1888, by Vincent van Gogh)
was painted when the artist moved to Arles

Since van Gogh believed color expressed
feeling, we have thickly painted seafoam
sky over lapis blue mountains

Cupid as Link Boy (1774, by Joshua Reynolds);
a link boy was a 18C child-worker paid to
light fires along the streets of London for
illumination, with wings blackened by soot

The Wolves (Balkan War) (1913, by Franz Marc) (KSS)

Peaceable Kingdom (c 1848, by Edward Hicks), this is one
of perhaps a hundred versions done by the Quaker minister;
in this version there is William Penn signing a treaty with
Shackamaxon of the Lenni-Lenape people - Hicks could
not have known that this treaty would later be broken

Common Sky (2019, by Olafur Eliasson and Sebastian
Behmann) covers what used to be the Knox Building
courtyard; note the snow caught in the base of the sculpture

Sans shoes and anything that could be
dropped (mobile phones are held on a lanyard),
two at a time could enter the Mirrored Room
(1966, by Lucas Samaras) with Tamiko & Paul