BGuthrie Photos: VA -- Richmond -- Virginia Museum of Fine Arts -- Exhibit: Ryan McGinness

VA -- Richmond -- Virginia Museum of Fine Arts -- Exhibit: Ryan McGinness:

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Description of Pictures: Ryan McGinness: Studio Visit
January 25, 2014 – October 19, 2014
Ryan McGinness: Studio Visit will explore this contemporary artist’s creative process for his 2009 painting Art History Is Not Linear (VMFA). Commissioned by VMFA, this 16-panel painting contains 200 icons inspired by works from the museum’s collection. A three-part exhibition, the first gallery will provide a glimpse of McGinness’s studio practice, the second will display a selection of the objects McGinness chose from the museum collection alongside his sketches and final image, and the last portion will show early works the artist made while growing up in Virginia Beach. The exhibition will engage a wide audience, and an exciting array of education programs will especially encourage young viewers to seek out their own favorite works in the collection and actively participate in their own process of exploration and interpretation.

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[1] VMFARM_140817_005.JPG	[2] VMFARM_140817_008.JPG	[3] VMFARM_140817_012.JPG	[4] VMFARM_140817_015.JPG
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[13] VMFARM_140817_044.JPG	[14] VMFARM_140817_046.JPG	[15] VMFARM_140817_048.JPG	[16] VMFARM_140817_051.JPG
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[29] VMFARM_140817_087.JPG	[30] VMFARM_140817_089.JPG	[31] VMFARM_140817_095.JPG	[32] VMFARM_140817_098.JPG
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[41] VMFARM_140817_126.JPG	[42] VMFARM_140817_132.JPG	[43] VMFARM_140817_136.JPG	[44] VMFARM_140817_143.JPG
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[57] VMFARM_140817_193.JPG	[58] VMFARM_140817_195.JPG	[59] VMFARM_140817_200.JPG	[60] VMFARM_140817_202.JPG
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Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
1. VMFARM_140817_015.JPG: Andrew Wyeth American, 1917-2009 The Country, 1965 Wyeth, who painted in rural Pennsylvania and coastal Maine, is best known for his regional landscapes and figure subjects, often using the exacting tempura medium. He established his reputation in the 1940s as a "magic realist," tempering his sober descriptive style with fantasy and mystery. This work depicts his wife, muse, and manager, Betsy James Wyeth, which may explain the painting's warmer, atypical mood. Wyeth's frequent inclusion of windows -- which McGinness emphasized in his icon -- suggests their art historical associations with memory and imagination.
2. VMFARM_140817_025.JPG: Conrad Felixmuller German, 1897-1977 Portrait of Ludwig Fischer, ca 1920 Felixmuller was a German Expressionist whose work was committed to political causes. This portrait shows the art collector Ludwig Fischer who began collecting art with his wife, Rosy, in 1905 after visiting an auction in Munich. Their collection later came to Richmond with their son Ernst and daughter-in-law Anne, and it eventually became part of the permanent collection at VMFA. McGinness's icon is based on the figure over Mr. Fischer's right shoulder.
3. VMFARM_140817_041.JPG: Clement Rousseau French, 1872-1950 Chair, ca 1925 Although examples of his work are rare, Clement Rousseau was one of the most prolific designers of the Art Deco period. His work was displayed regularly at exhibitions in Paris during the 1920s. The stylized flower petals, volutes, sunray patterns, and frames are of dyed-gereen and natural-gray shagreen (sharkskin), which was a very strong material and a favorite of Rousseau's and other Art Deco designers.
4. VMFARM_140817_051.JPG: William Blake English, 1757-1827 There were not found Women fair as the Daughters of Job in all the land, Plate 20 from Illustrations of the Book of Job, 1825 The twenty-two engraved prints illustrating the biblical story of Job are among Blake's greatest print works and were also a rare commercial and critical success. They were the last set of illustrations Blake completed; his illustrations of Dante's Divine Comedy were left unfinished upon his death. In this image, Job tells his story of sin, suffering, and redemption to his daughters. Some scholars interpret the series as personal statements about Blake's own tribulations and the spiritual peace he found late in life. McGinness's ethereal icon suggests a related sense of spiritual release.
5. VMFARM_140817_060.JPG: African, Luba culture (Democratic Republic of Congo) Stool, 19th century A stool with its seat supported by a female figure is one of the essential royal symbols for a Luba king. Reflecting the central role of women in politics, social organizations, and creation myths, the female figure is the primary subject matter of Luba art. Here the serene and beautifully detailed figure holds the seat effortless aloft in a sensitively balanced composition. McGinness's icon emphasizes the symmetry and patterning of the carving.
6. VMFARM_140817_069.JPG: Attributed to Nazzano Painter Etruscan Red-Figure Kalyx-Krater (Mixing Bowl), ca 370 BC Depictions of battles against Amazons, a mythical tribe of warrior women, were popular throughout the ancient world, but this scene is unusual. Here Amazons fight with satyrs: half-horse, half-human followers of the god Dionysos. The scene may refer to Dionysos's defeat of the Amazons during his conquest of India. Only ten vases are attributed to Nazzano Painter, who was one of the finest Etruscan vase painters. McGinness extracted a face and bird from the scene and reconfigured them in a new composition.
7. VMFARM_140817_079.JPG: Maya (Mexico or Guatemala) Miniature Mosaic Mask, AD 600-900 Many Pre-Columbian peoples considered jade to be sacred and used it to make objects indicative of royal status. The image below shows an 8th-century Maya king and his wife in a scene carved in a lintel above a temple doorway. Hanging from the king's necklace and his wife's pectoral are small jade masks similar to the example displayed here.
8. VMFARM_140817_087.JPG: Ernst Ludwig Kirchner German, 1880-1938 Portrait of Erna Kirchner, 1917 Kirshner was a German Expressionist painter and printmaker and one of the founders of Die Brucke or "The Bridge," an early 20th-century group whose radical art is well represented in VMFA's Fischer Collection. With the onset of World War I in 1914, Kirchner, like many German Expressionists, adopted a more sober style. This portrait of his longtime companion Erna Schilling (1884-1945), whom he met a year or two before making this painting, has a subtler palette and more naturalistic forms than his prior work. Although Ernst and Erna never married, Erna obtained the right to be known by the name Kirchner after the painter's death.
9. VMFARM_140817_098.JPG: Indian, Deccan, Maharashtra Illustrated Manuscript of the Jnaneshvari: Ganesha Receiving Homage from His Wives, 1763 This page is from a lavishly illustrated 18th-century copy of the Jnaneshvari, a 13th-century commentary on the great Sanskrit text the Bhagavad Gita (Song of the Divine One), which is part of the epic Mahabharata. The text explains a central Hindu doctrine about the goal of life: to escape rebirth and attain salvation by becoming one with Absolute Reality. This frontispiece image shows the elephant god Gasnesha seated in regal splendor receiving the worship of his two wives, whom McGinness's icon omits in favor of Ganesha's distinctive silhouette and royal attributes.
10. VMFARM_140817_108.JPG: Tibetan or Nepalese Serpent King (Nagaraja), 15th-16th century This powerful serpent king was originally an adoring attendant figure on the pedestal of a Buddha image. Cobra hoods emerge from his head and ornaments adorn his richly gilded body. An inspired statement of ecstatic rapture and dynamic energy, this image is one of the finest nagarajas in Nepalese art. McGinness's icon suggests that he interpreted the graceful and delicate figure as female.
11. VMFARM_140817_126.JPG: Ryan McGinness Untitled (VMFA cyanotypes #1-12), 2010 McGinness made these twelve prints using the same collection of icons that he created for the commissioned painting. Cyanotypes result not from a camera but from a photographic process in which an image is produced by exposing light-sensitized paper to ultraviolet rays, such as those from the sun. This process creates white silhouettes against an indigo or Prussian blue ground wherever a mask of the icon was placed. Each of the twelve prints was made in an edition of ten plus two artist's proofs, but no two prints are the same given the vagaries of the developing process.
12. VMFARM_140817_136.JPG: Ryan McGinness Untitled [Art History is Not Linear (VMFA), 2], 2010 In addition to the twenty paintings on wood panel, McGinness made two paintings on canvas at a somewhat larger size, this and the one opposite. He then destroyed the screens (except for those preserved for this exhibition) and produced no other VMFA-related paintings.
13. VMFARM_140817_160.JPG: Ryan McGinness Art History is Not Linear (VMFA), 2009 McGinness crated twenty panels, each measuring four-by-four feet, for the commissioned painting installed in the museum's entry concourse behind you. In the end, only sixteen panels were needed for an overall dimension that is eight feet high and thirty-two feet wide; the artist retained the other four panels, shown here.
14. VMFARM_140817_172.JPG: Ryan McGinness Untitled [Art History Is Not Linear (VMFA), 1], 2010 In addition to the twenty paintings on wood panel, McGinness made two paintings on canvas at a somewhat larger size, this and the one opposite. He then destroyed the screens (except for those preserved for this exhibition) and produced no other VMFA-related paintings.
15. VMFARM_140817_174.JPG: Early Work: McGinness's childhood art shows his early interest in drawing and printmaking and in creating simple, legible forms that -- like his current work -- communicate humor, imagination, and keen observation of his environment. The following works are from the artist's collection.
16. VMFARM_140817_195.JPG: VMFA Icons: This enlarged grid of two hundred images features the finished icons that McGinness created in response to objects in VMFA's collection. Each icon was made into a print screen -- or sometimes several of varying sizes. He then screen-printed and layered images to create the vibrant multipart painting that hangs behind this wall on the opposite side of the main entry concourse.
17. VMFARM_140817_219.JPG: Ryan McGinness: Studio Visit: "Art history is not linear, although it is often taught as such. Culture is a multidimensional network that feeds and builds upon itself in a mash-up that transcends time." -- Ryan McGinness Born and raised in Virginia Beach and now based in New York, McGinness (born 1972) is known for his lively marriage of abstraction and figuration. His early interest in design, illustration, and popular culture led to a flat, clean-edged style of bold logo-like images that he calls icons, a nod to his interest in merging corporate culture and fine art. VMFA commissioned McGinness to create a new work for its reopening in 2010. The colorful painting -- Art History is Not Linear (VMFA) -- hangs in a permanent location, behind you in the entry concourse of VMFA's McGlothlin Wing. The painting's two hundred icons represent works in VMFA's collection, which McGinness studied over several years through direct observation books, and the museum's website. McGinness reinterpreted the works through a process of hand drawing and computer design. With intuition as his guide, he then layered the images on sixteen panels using the screen-printing process. The vibrant, densely layered work serves as an introduction to the museum's holdings. This exhibition explores the creative process behind the making of the commissioned painting.
18. VMFARM_140817_233.JPG: Ryan McGinness VMFA Process Sketches, 2011 VMFA Process Sketches translated into etching a selection of McGinness's hand drawings made during the process of creating the two hundred icons from objects in VMFA's collection.
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