With Compliments
My team and I are thankful for the outpouring of support and appreciative level of engagement these past six weeks. Beginning on April 22, 2020, the gallery gave away fifty copies of an artist or exhibition catalogue each week, in hopes that it will bring joy and respite in a time of uncertainty. Through this, we aspired to hold on to the high-touch interactions so integral to arts and culture, even as we navigate the no-touch world in which we currently operate.
I would like to thank the curators, scholars and artists who have contributed and my two teenaged children who have affixed labels, completed customs forms and stuffed envelopes. By the end of this week, we will have gifted nearly four hundred books to friends and colleagues around the world.
We sense that many people, ourselves included, need to experience art in real life. And we look forward to sharing such experiences with each of you.
Week 6: Leonora Carrington: The Story of the Last Egg
May 28, 2020
For the final week of “With Compliments,” we are giving Leonora Carrington: The Story of the Last Egg, the accompanying catalogue to the gallery’s 2019 offsite exhibition.
The exhibition showcased iconic oils, sculptures, and works on paper from 1940-1976, taking a close look at the philosophical and ecological undercurrents of Leonora’s artistic practice. We placed three of the works reproduced in the book in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
In addition to the show, the gallery hosted a two-day symposium on the artist. The symposium began with a dramatic reading of Leonora's play, titled Opus Siniestrus: The Story of the Last Egg. Never before performed, the play, written in 1970, is as miraculous, devastating, and surreal as Leonora’s artworks; a thoughtful Director’s Note from the reading’s director, Jean Randich, is included in the catalogue. The second day of the symposium included three presentations of fresh scholarly research on Leonora by Carlos Martín García, Susan L. Aberth and Tere Arcq, and Natasha Boas. These three essays are included in the catalogue as well.
Week 5: Wolfgang Paalen: Philosopher of the Possible
May 21, 2020
This week, we are giving Wolfgang Paalen: Philosopher of the Possible, the accompanying catalogue to the gallery’s 2014 exhibition.
The exhibition brought together some of Paalen’s most exquisite sculptures, oils, and works on paper to showcase both the depth of his oeuvre and his influential art theories. Paalen rejected the “isms” that populated modern art during the mid-twentieth century which not only rendered his work as pioneering, but cemented him as a leading theoretical voice in the American artworld. Amy H. Winter, in a thought-provoking essay, explores how Paalen’s theories inspired and influenced the New York School of artists, including Jackson Pollock, Robert Motherwell, and Barnett Newman, among numerous others.
Week 4: Ana Teresa Fernández: Of Bodies and Borders
May 13, 2020
This week, we are giving Ana Teresa Fernández: Of Bodies and Borders, an exhibition catalogue published by the Grunwald Gallery of Art at Indiana University last year.
The exhibition, Of Bodies and Borders, was first shown at the gallery’s offsite exhibition in Miami, Florida in November of 2018, before traveling in full to the Grunwald Gallery of Art in 2019. The exhibition catalogue features an introduction by Betsy Stirratt, Founding Director of the Grunwald Gallery of Art, and a thoughtful essay on Fernández' work at the intersection of activism, performance and painting, by María Elena Ortiz, Associate Curator at the Pérez Art Museum, Miami.
The exhibition and its accompanying catalogue explored the body of work Fernández produced on the subject of the world's deadliest border-- the Mediterranean Sea. Building on an artistic practice that has long addressed the social politics of the U.S./Mexico border, in 2015 Fernández turned her attention to the Mediterranean Sea and the influx of migrants escaping war and poverty in the Middle East and Africa and attempting to make the treacherous journey into Southern Europe. All the works stem from Fernández’s performance in the depths of the sea. In the performance documentation she dons her signature little black dress and heels, weighted down with 13-pound weights. While submerged, she wrestles with a bed sheet for hours, exemplifying an enduring physical and psychological performance--an homage to the migrant crisis. The subsequent paintings, drawings and sculpture revisit and meditate upon the performative experience. The work as a whole highlights human resilience and the power of hope in the face of impossible circumstances.
Week 3: Dorothea Tanning: Unknown but Knowable States
May 6, 2020
This week, we gifted Dorothea Tanning: Unknown but Knowable States, an 80-page exhibition catalogue from the gallery’s 2013 exhibition. This exhibition was the first solo show for Dorothea Tanning following the great artist’s death in 2012. In 2018-2019 the Museo Reina Sofia and Tate Modern presented a retrospective for Tanning which included many of the works from our 2013 exhibition. This publication features a refreshingly insightful and accessible essay by Dr. Catriona McAra, University Curator at Leeds Arts University who has written extensively on Surrealism and on Dorothea Tanning in particular.
Week 2: Val Britton: Reverberations
April 29, 2020
This week, we gifted Val Britton: Reverberations, a 79-page hard-bound catalogue including an essay by writer and curator, Jens Hoffmann, as well as an interview by renowned artist, geographer and author, Trevor Paglen. The book explores Britton’s practice from 2008-2016, and the artist’s very personal studio process.
“When I was in graduate school,” Britton remarks, “Intuition and beauty were not emphasized, nor was the idea of visual pleasure. It may sound artificial, but I need to make things. It’s how I stay sane. The things that I make connect me to people, so by making these things and putting them out into the world I can build those connections.”
Week 1: Science in Surrealism
April 22, 2020
During our first week, we gifted Science in Surrealism, our 58-page hardbound catalogue from the gallery's 2015 exhibition. The exhibition included works by Victor Brauner, Max Ernst, Frantisek Janousek, Marcel Jean, Roberto Matta, Gordon Onslow Ford, Wolfgang Paalen, Kurt Seligmann and Remedios Varo. The book features an essay written by Gavin Parkinson, Senior Lecturer at The Courtauld and one of the world's leading (and most innovative) scholars on Surrealism. The book reflects on scientific discovery in the midst of the world wars and how artists responded to --and corresponded with-- the leading scientists of the time.