Lectures on American Art

Collector's Roundtable: Art and the Law

December 9, 2008

Joshua Kaufman Who'd have thought that spending an hour and a half with a lawyer could be so entertaining? Local attorney Joshua Kaufman of Venable LLP enlighted the audience at American Art the other night on the legal issues of...

Collector's Roundtable: Lewis Nerman at Smithsonian American Art on October 28

October 27, 2008

Lewis Nerman Lewis Nerman is a passionate collector of contemporary art. In 2007, he and his family opened the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art in Overland Park, Kansas. A major contemporary gallery in the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art is also...

Collector's Roundtable: Round One

September 30, 2008

Alex Katz's Black Scarf Eric Widing, head of the American Paintings and Sculpture Department for Christie's since 1998, kicked off the 2008 Collector's Roundtable series with his talk, "Buying at Auction," offering us a capsule of his years in the...

Zen and the Art of Video with Bill Viola

September 15, 2008

Bill Viola, Three Women, 2008, color high-definition video on plasma display mounted on wall; performers: Anika, Cornelia, Helena Ballent, Photo: Kira Perov Bill Viola kicked off the 2008 Clarice Smith Distinguished Lectures in American Art series last week to a...

Fencing with Christo and Jeanne-Claude

September 11, 2008

Christo and Jeanne-Claude, Running Fence, Sonoma and Marin Counties, California, 1972–76, © Christo, 1976, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum Purchase, Photo by Wolfgang Volz Christo and Jeanne-Claude, partners in art and in life, were on hand at SAAM Saturday afternoon...

Up and Running with Christo and Jeanne-Claude

September 3, 2008

Christo and Jeanne-Claude, Running Fence, Sonoma and Marin Counties, California, 1972–76, © Christo, 1976, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum Purchase, Photo by Wolfgang Volz In the mid 1970s, Christo and Jeanne-Claude, whose outdoor sculptural works of art have captivated us...

Sam Gilliam: Thinking Outside the Frame

August 21, 2008

Sam Gilliam's Swing Sam Gilliam is represented in the current exhibition, Local Color, but there's another painting of his on display nearby. Swing is representative of the artist's canvases that were not stretched, but draped and suspended from the ceiling...

Bill Viola: Life, Death, and Everything in Between

July 15, 2008

Bill Viola; The Passing; 1991; In memory of Wynne Lee Viola; Videotape, black-and-white, mono sound; 54 minutes Photo: Kira Perov Bill Viola's The Passing is fifty-four minutes of visual comment on the themes of birth, life, and death. At times...

Anna Deavere Smith: The We of Me

June 12, 2008

Anna Deavere Smith Anna Deavere Smith gave the final talk in the American Pictures Distinguished Lecture Series. Smith spoke about a Ruth Orkin photo, Member of the Wedding, Opening Night, Ethel Waters, Carson McCullers, and Julie Harris, New York City,...

Scan the Man: Scanimation Book Event on June 14

June 10, 2008

Gallop! A Scanimation Picture Book by Rufus Butler Seder Gallop! A Scanimation Picture Book is one of those books I bought for a child in my life, but was reluctant to hand it over when the fateful day came. The...