BGuthrie Photos: TN -- Knoxville -- Knoxville Museum of Art -- Exhibit: Higher Ground: A Century of Visual Arts in East Tennessee

TN -- Knoxville -- Knoxville Museum of Art -- Exhibit: Higher Ground: A Century of Visual Arts in East Tennessee:

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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. KMAHG_170601_003.JPG: Jered Sprecher A Type of Magic, 2008
2. KMAHG_170601_012.JPG: Higher Ground: A Century of the Visual Arts in East Tennessee
3. KMAHG_170601_016.JPG: Catherine Wiley Untitled (Woman and Child in a Meadow), 1913
4. KMAHG_170601_024.JPG: Introduction: Higher Ground is the first permanent exhibition devoted to East Tennessee's artistic achievements. It includes objects from the KMA collection supplemented by important works borrowed from public and private collections. Many of the featured artists spent their entire lives and careers in the area, while some moved away to follow their creative ambitions. Others were drawn to the region by its natural beauty, as the wealth of landscape imagery in this exhibition attests. Together, these artists' works form the basis of a visual arts legacy in East Tennessee that is both compelling and largely unheralded. Higher Ground allows viewers to follow the history of artistic activity in the region over roughly a century of development and learn about the many exceptionally gifted individuals who have helped shape the area's visual arts tradition.
5. KMAHG_170601_026.JPG: Grand Ambitions While East Tennessee's earliest inhabitants produced works of art for millennia, it was during the late nineteenth century that the area's community of professional artists -- both trained and untrained -- reached a critical mass. This development reflected the prosperity fueled by booming local industries such as marble quarrying, mineral mining, and lumbering. Railroads linking East Tennessee to other urban centers sparked further growth. Knoxville became the hub of economic and artistic activity within the region. Born in Scotland, James Cameron was one of the first professional painters in East Tennessee, earning a reputation for detailed portraits, and panoramic landscapes reflecting nature's beauty invaded by settlement. Lloyd Branson returned from studies in Europe in 1878 and became a guiding force for art in Knoxville, both as teacher and artist. After studying with Branson, Catherine Wiley mastered impressionism while studying art in New York and introduced the style to artists and patrons in Knoxville. Often portraying the domestic world of women and children, Wiley's luminous canvases became increasingly bold and expressive until her career was cut short by mental illness in 1926. Charles Krutch, dubbed the "Corot of the South" for his soft, atmospheric style, was among the earliest local artists to train his brush on the Smokies. From the 1890s until the last years of his life, he traveled deep into the mountains and captured their ever-changing character in scores of oil and watercolor paintings. Branson, Wiley, and Krutch banded together with other local artists and patrons to form the Nicholson Art League (1906-1923), and organized large-scale art exhibitions for three major cultural expositions held at Knoxville's Chilhowee Park: the Appalachian Expositions of 1910 and 1911, and the National Conservation Exposition of 1913. Each of these exhibitions included important regional artists' works along with those by dozens of internationally-known American artists.
6. KMAHG_170601_030.JPG: James Cameron Belle Isle from Lyons View, 1859
7. KMAHG_170601_036.JPG: C. Mortimer Thompson Haying, 1907
8. KMAHG_170601_041.JPG: Adelia Lutz Untitled, 1890
9. KMAHG_170601_050.JPG: William Gilbert Gaul Untitled (At the Blacksmith's Shop), c 1875
10. KMAHG_170601_061.JPG: Lloyd Branson Landscape with Stream, 1906
11. KMAHG_170601_065.JPG: James W. Wallace East Tennessee Landscape, 1907
12. KMAHG_170601_076.JPG: Albert Milani Column capital, c 1930 Head of a Ram, c 1930
13. KMAHG_170601_085.JPG: Thomas Campbell Untitled, c 1900
14. KMAHG_170601_094.JPG: Catherine Wiley Farmstead, 1918 or 1919
15. KMAHG_170601_101.JPG: Catherine Wiley The Pea Shellers, c 1915
16. KMAHG_170601_106.JPG: Catherine Wiley Mother and Daughter in Garden, c 1913
17. KMAHG_170601_112.JPG: Catherine Wiley Mother and Child, c 1925
18. KMAHG_170601_119.JPG: Catherine Wiley Morning, 1921
19. KMAHG_170601_127.JPG: William Posey Silva Magic Pool, c 1924
20. KMAHG_170601_133.JPG: William Posey Silva Georgia Pines, c 1924
21. KMAHG_170601_140.JPG: Hugh Tyler Moonlight Seashore, 1923
22. KMAHG_170601_148.JPG: Rudolph Ingerle The Passing Show, c 1925
23. KMAHG_170601_154.JPG: Rudolph Ingerle Smoky Mountains, c 1925
24. KMAHG_170601_159.JPG: Eliot Porter Great Smoky Mountains National Park, 1968
25. KMAHG_170601_164.JPG: Louis E. Jones Early Autumn, c 1930s
26. KMAHG_170601_172.JPG: Will Henry Stevens #320 Untitled, 1945
27. KMAHG_170601_177.JPG: Charles Krutch Untitled (Chimney Tops), late 1920s
28. KMAHG_170601_182.JPG: Lure of the Smokies Many artists from outside East Tennessee came to the area between 1920 and 1950 in order to capture the wild beauty of the Smoky Mountains. The Smokies had long been inaccessible to all but the most intrepid, but intensive logging and the post-World War I development of mountainside resorts opened roads and trails for visitors. This period of artistic interest in the Smokies coincides with efforts to preserve this unique wilderness area, which culminated in the creation of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in 1934. Ansel Adams, best known for his epic images of Yosemite and other western landmarks, visited the Smokies in 1948 and produced black and white photographs that capture the area's lush terrain. Twenty years later, color photography pioneer Eliot Porter's dye transfer prints of the park generated widespread attention after being featured in the acclaimed monograph Appalachian Wilderness. Rudolph Ingerle, Louis Jones, and other landscape painters from around the country often spent summers in East Tennessee, journeying deep into the Smokies to make sketches. Jones, a native of Pennsylvania, was so entranced by the area that he permanently settled in Gatlinburg and continued to paint mountain scenes until his death in 1958. Louisiana artist Will Henry Stevens made extended pilgrimages to the Smoky Mountains throughout his career and captured every nuance of the area's natural beauty in delicately abstracted works.
29. KMAHG_170601_186.JPG: Charles Krutch Sunset, c 1920
30. KMAHG_170601_192.JPG: Charles Krutch Study in Oils of the Mountains of East Tennessee, c 1916-1918
31. KMAHG_170601_198.JPG: Charles Krutch Untitled, c 1930-1934
32. KMAHG_170601_204.JPG: Charles Krutch Untitled (Chimney Tops), late 1920s
33. KMAHG_170601_209.JPG: Ansel Adams Mt. LeConte, Autumn, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Tennessee, 1948
34. KMAHG_170601_218.JPG: Changing Fortunes, Changing Scenes By the mid 1920s, Knoxville's once thriving art scene had begun to stagnate as the city's economic potential failed to materialize and local attitudes grew more conservative. Furthermore, Lloyd Branson's death in 1925 and Catherine Wiley's institutionalization in 1926 led to a void in artistic leadership. Other young artists concluded that their best chance for artistic success was to relocate permanently to major art centers. Brothers Beauford Delaney and Joseph Delaney, facing the additional hurdle of racism, left Knoxville in the mid 1920s to pursue their art careers in larger arenas, but followed very different artistic paths. After studying in Boston, Beauford chose New York and later Paris as the ideal settings for his experiments with expressive abstraction. Joseph headed for Chicago before settling in New York, and remained devoted to urban realism. He returned to Knoxville to visit his family over the years and eventually moved back to his hometown in 1986. Charles Griffin Farr grew up in Knoxville, but left for New York by 1931 and eventually settled in San Francisco. There, he enjoyed a long career as an influential art instructor and devoted realist painter during an era in which abstraction dominated the art world. A young Charles Rain left Knoxville for Nebraska with his mother after his parents divorced and never returned. He studied in Europe before moving to New York, where he established himself as a magic realist painter of extraordinary skill and vision. Knoxville native Edward Hurst was an art prodigy who pursued art training with George Luks at New York's renowned Art Students League even before graduating from high school. Although Hurst returned to Knoxville frequently to display his elegant society portraits and precisely-crafted still lifes, he spent much of his life mingling with wealthy clientele near his studios in New York and London.
35. KMAHG_170601_223.JPG: Edward Hurst, Jr. Cabbage, 1962
36. KMAHG_170601_228.JPG: Charles Rain Eclipse
37. KMAHG_170601_236.JPG: Charles Griffin Birds, People, Palace of Fine Arts, San Francisco, c 1948-1954
38. KMAHG_170601_240.JPG: Charles Griffin Farr The Cocktail Hour, 1990
39. KMAHG_170601_245.JPG: Charles Griffin Farr Street in Knoxville, 1947
40. KMAHG_170601_251.JPG: Joseph Delaney Marble Collegiate Church, 1974-75
41. KMAHG_170601_265.JPG: Joseph Delaney Untitled (Saguenay, Quebec), late 1930s
42. KMAHG_170601_271.JPG: Ted Burnett Three Chieftains, c 1955
43. KMAHG_170601_278.JPG: Post-War Revival By the late 1940s, a rebellious generation of young artists devised a bold new approach to painting -- abstract expressionism -- that became the leading international style. The highly spontaneous method fulfilled artists' desire to express the human condition beyond the visible world in a visual language that was intuitive and unhindered. The style took hold in East Tennessee during the early 1950s shortly after the arrival of C. Kermit "Buck" Ewing as the first head of the University of Tennessee's art department. He recruited a group of progressive artists -- most notably Carl Sublett, Walter Stevens, Robert Birdwell -- who exhibited actively in Knoxville as well as other cities throughout the Southeast. They proved highly influential as artists as well as teachers. While Sublett and Stevens shared an exclusive interest in the landscape as a point of reference for their abstractions, Birdwell and Ewing often found inspiration in urban settings and the human figure. Sometimes they exhibited as a foursome and other times as the "The Knoxville 7" with fellow artists Joanne Higgs Ross, Richard Clarke, and Philip Nichols. Each artist maintained an individual style and utilized varying degrees of abstraction. Together, they produced what are likely the first abstract paintings in Tennessee and helped establish a foothold for modern art in the region. This period of cultural renewal accelerated as Knoxville gained a more secure economic footing. In 1961 the Knoxville Museum of Art's predecessor, the Dulin Gallery of Art, opened on Kingston Pike as the area's dedicated venue for the display and collection of fine art.
44. KMAHG_170601_281.JPG: C. Kermit "Buck" Ewing Fahrenheit, 1959
45. KMAHG_170601_287.JPG: Joanna Higgs Ross Black Cat, c 1957
46. KMAHG_170601_290.JPG: Robert Birdwell A View of the City (Gay Street), 1962
47. KMAHG_170601_295.JPG: Philip Nichols Form in Steel, 1963
48. KMAHG_170601_301.JPG: Carl Sublett Cliffscape II, 1958
49. KMAHG_170601_305.JPG: Walter Stevens Stone Evening, c 1958
50. KMAHG_170601_310.JPG: Julie (Warren Martin) Conn Warlord, 1993
51. KMAHG_170601_315.JPG: Marion Greenwood, The History of Tennessee During a career that spanned forty years, New York artist Marion Greenwood created paintings, drawings, and prints that championed the lives of indigenous people she encountered during travels to Haiti, India, Africa, Mexico, and other far-flung locales. In 1954, she came to Knoxville when the University of Tennessee commissioned her to create a mural for the new Carolyn P. Brown University Center ballroom. The resulting work, The History of Tennessee, stands as East Tennessee's largest, most important, and most controversial figural mural painting. Painted on a continuous 30-foot length of canvas, Greenwood's composition illustrates the distinctive music of the state's main divisions -- the delta blues of West Tennessee, country music of Middle Tennessee, and religious music of East Tennessee.
52. KMAHG_170601_352.JPG: Marion Greenwood History of Tennessee, 1954-55
Wikipedia Description: Knoxville Museum of Art
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Knoxville Museum of Art (KMA), located at 1050 World's Fair Park in Knoxville, Tennessee, presents the rich visual legacy of East Tennessee and new art from the region and beyond. According to its mission statement, the museum "celebrates the art and artists of East Tennessee, presents new art and new ideas, educates and serves a diverse community, enhances Knoxville’s quality of life, and operates ethically, responsibly, and transparently as a public trust."

History

The museum opened in 1961 as the Dulin Gallery of Art, which was housed in the H.L. Dulin House on Kingston Pike. The Dulin House was designed in 1915 by prominent architect John Russell Pope in the Neoclassical Revival style. The house had limited space, however, and the lack of security and climate control prevented the museum's accreditation by the American Association of Museums. In 1984, the Board of Trustees voted to build a new state-of-the-art facility at the site of 1982 World's Fair in downtown Knoxville. The name was changed to "Knoxville Museum of Art" in 1987. The new 53,200-square-foot (4,940 m2) facility, designed by noted architect Edward Larrabee Barnes, opened on March 25, 1990.

Building

The Edward Larrabee Barnes-designed modern building is named in honor of Jim Clayton, the largest single contributor to its construction. The exterior of the four-story steel and concrete building is sheathed in locally quarried pink Tennessee marble. The museum includes five galleries and two large outdoor garden areas. In 2013 and 2014, the museum underwent a comprehensive, top-to-bottom restoration and renovation at a cost of nearly $6 million. The building’s Tennessee marble cladding was cleaned and restored, and the entry plaza and third floor terrace were rebuilt and repaved with pink and gray Vermont granite. The North Garden was also redesigned and planted with native trees and shrubs.
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