Category: january 2017

Crossword on a felt board

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Rivane Neuenschwander (1967)

Watchword, 2012

For this work the artist, who was born in Belo Horizonte but lives and works in London,  has embroidered words borrowed from the language of protest – take, back, justice, trade, war, corrupt, revolution, system, democracy, over – onto fabric tags similar to those used for clothing labels. Visitors were encouraged to take a tag, either to sew onto their clothes or to pin to the board. In both cases the migrating and accumulating words formed a poetic, global map of resistance.

I pinned ”Public” on top of ”Justice” on the board – my contribution to the resistance.

The Jewish Museum

January 8th, 2017

Her insatiable appetite for society

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John Singer Sargent, Elsie Meyer, 1908. Charcoal on paper.

Elsie Meyer (1885-1954), seen as a child in Sargent’s group portrait, became a fashionable young woman. In a 1903 letter to her brother Frank, her mother* described her ”insatiable appetite for society”, her gowns from Worth and Doucet in Paris, and the lavish preparations for her society debut. A few years later, Sargent depicted her in a simple cotton blouse.

*Lady Meyer demonstrated excellence in social skills herself: a society hostess known for her exuberant soirées, enchanting voice and support of the arts, but also a socially concerned philanthropist supporting working class women, underprivileged families, and women’s suffrage.

(Notes from The Jewish Museum’s website)

January 8th, 2017

The French touch

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Recently, the Jewish Museum presented the first U.S. exhibition on the work of French designer and architect Pierre Chareau (1883–1950). On show were mainly furniture and lighting fixtures, as well as designs for Maison de Verre, the glass house completed in Paris in 1932, in collaboration with Dutch architect Bernard Bijvoet (1889-1979) and craftsman metalworker Louis Dalbet.

Chareau’s designs were complemented by pieces from his personal art collection, since both he and his wife Dollie were active collectors.

But I only had eyes for these sleek, stylish pieces of furniture and fixtures created in the 1920s, yet so modern they could have come right out of a Manhattan penthouse overlooking Central Park.

Take your pick:

La Religieuse (the nun) floor lamp, ca. 1923. Mahogany and alabaster with metalwork by Louis Dalbet.
Sofa, 1923. Rosewood with fabric upholstery.
Telephone table, ca. 1924. Walnut and patinated iron. La Petite Religieuse (the little nun), table lamp ca. 1924. Walnut, alabaster and patinated iron, metalwork by Louis Dalbet.
La Religieuse (the nun) floor lamp, ca. 1923. Mahogany and alabaster with metalwork by Louis Dalbet.
Coat and hat rack designed for La Maison de Verre ca. 1931. – Metalwork by Louis Dalbet. Stool, ca. 1923. Mahogany and mahogany-veneered wood. – Bookcase with swivelling table, ca. 1930. Walnut and black patinated iron. – Ceiling lamp, ca. 1923. Patinated brass and alabaster.
From ”The grand salon de la Maison de Verre”. Corbeille (basket) sofa, 1923. Wood and velours, with tapestry upholstery by Jean Lurçat. – Telephone fan table, ca. 1924. Wood. – High backed chauffeuse (fireside armchair), ca. 1925.

Pierre Chareau: Modern Architecture and Design exhibition ran between November 2016 – March 2017. You can read and browse through more photos on The Jewish Museum website.

January 8th, 2017

50 UN Plaza

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An elegant addition to the City’s skyline by Foster + Partners; an architecture and design practice responsible for a number of innovative and groundbreaking structures around the world, such as the Gherkin and the Millennium Bridge in London or the marvelous Reichstag Dome in Berlin – not to mention Spaceport America in New Mexico or the Lunar Habitation on The Moon (albeit in a 3D printed version only; for now)!

January 6th, 2017

The elephant in the room

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Simon Starling: At Twilight (After W. B. Yeats’ Noh Reincarnation), is a multimedia project in which the artist explores the influence of Noh on Western Modernism. It was displayed in the Japan Society’s galleries starting with a dimly lit room where a modern interpretation of At the Hawk’s Well, W.B. Yeats’ one-act dance play was showing alongside masks created by Noh Mask maker, Yasuo Miichi. The play was inspired by Yeats’ close collaborator and friend, the poet Ezra Pound who at the time, was translating Japanese Noh plays.

The installation continued in the ”mirror room”, a place Noh performers would traditionally use to change into their characters and, finally, concluded with an exhibit of photographs, prints, masks and other archival material – all related to Mr Starling’s project.

Bronze portrait of the dancer Michio Ito, who performed as the Hawk in the original 1916 staging of ”At the Hawk’s Well”, conceived as a Noh mask and created in the mid-1920s, around the time when Ito was collaborating with New York-based choreographer Martha Graham. Isamu Noguchi, 1904-1988.
W.B. Yeats, 1913 by Alvin Langdon Coburn (1882-1966). Digital print.
The hawk costume seen in the film.
The elephant in the room.
The Bamboo Gallery was converted into a mirror room (kagami-no-ma), traditionally used by Noh performers to change into their characters. Costumes reproduced based on archival materials from Yeat’s original play were displayed here.
Rock Drill, 1913-14. Bronze by Jacob Epstein. One of the Modernist works that inspired the creation of the Noh masks…
… and the creator, Jacob Epbstein. Photogravure by Alvin Langdon Coburn, in 1914.
Kumasaka in the Misty Moonlight, undated. Polychrome woodblock print by Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (1839-1892).
Noh Mask, Edo period (1603-1868) by an unknown artist.
H.H. Asquith, 1914. Photogravure by Alvin Langdon Coburn (1882-1966). H.H. Asquith was Prime Minister of England between 1908 and 1916. Known for his indecisive leadership during the initial stages of WWI, he was a regular guest at the home of Lord and Lady Cunard and was among the intimate audience gathered at the premiere of ”At the Hawk’s Well”. Prior to this, Asquith met the Japanese dancer Michio Ito, who played the Hawk.

Ito later recalled: At supper, Lady Cunard, a refined, white-haired gentleman and I, all sat at a table together. The old man tried to carry on a conversation with me. However, it was in English, so I didn’t follow very well… I began to get frustrated, and interjected in halting English: ”If you allow me to speak in German I can answer a little more intelligently.” Hearing this, the old man let out a hearty laugh: ”I am an Englishman and can’t speak Japanese. You are Japanese and can’t speak English. If German mediates between us, then by all means let’s speak in German…” The person I had spoken to in German – the language of his enemy – had been the Prime Minister of England.”

Noh mask by an unknown artist. Edo period (1603-1868).
Nancy Cunard, 1916. Digital print by an unknown photographer.
Eeyore. Ten years after the first performance of ”At the Hawk’s Well”, the trees of Ashdown Forest that surrounded W.B. Yeats and Ezra Pound’s wartime retreat, Stone Cottage, were immortalized in Ernest Shepard’s illustrations for A.A. Milne’s Winnie-the-Pooh books. Milne based Pooh’s One Hundred Acre Wood on Ashdown Forest, where he lived and where, at the time Yeats and Pound were there, he was writing wartime propaganda articles for the MI7b. Eeyore is the pessimistic, old grey donkey from the story.

Pessimistic, downward facing Eeyore concludes the three-part series about Simon Starling’s project shown at the Japan Society. For more inspirational views connecting the pieces, please click here and here.

January 6th, 2017

“Whenever people see birds flying through the sky, it is said that they get the urge to go on a journey”

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”At the Hawk’s Well”, W.B. Yeats’ dance play premiered in 1916 with Michio Ito at the role of the hawk. In its 2016 re-incarnation, the dance was co-choreographed by Javier de Frutos.
Noh no Tenkai (The Evolution of Noh), 1954. By Jiro Nan’e (1902-1952).

Simon Starling: At Twilight
(After W.B. Yeats’ Noh Reincarnation)

A multimedia installation by Simon Starling to mark the centennial of W.B. Yeats’ staging of the Noh-inspired dance play ”At the Hawk’s Well”, in 1916. The project aimed to illustrate the influence of Noh on Western Modernism by pairing newly created masks, costumes and a video (from which the above stills) with Modernist works and archival material connected to Yeats and his circle.

It was on show at the Japan Society until mid January 2017.

*Title from Kino no Tabi – the Beautiful World anime series (2003)

January 6th, 2017