MAY 31-JUNE 6

NEW YORK

Courtesy of Show Hamptons LLC.

Hamptons Contemporary Design + Decor Fair, Southampton Elks Fairgrounds, Southampton, NY
June 2-3, 2016
The inaugural Hamptons Contemporary Design + Decor Fair will take place in a magnificent, 40,000-square-foot pavilion at the Southampton Elks Fairgrounds. Launched by Rick Friedman, founder of the Hamptons Expo Group, the show will feature over 160 exhibitors offering a range of design and lifestyle-driven luxury goods, including bespoke furniture and lighting, fine and decorative arts, fabrics, fixtures, flooring, and much more. Hamptons Contemporary will open with a VIP preview benefiting the Animal Rescue Fund of the Hamptons (ARF) on Friday, June 3. The stylish event is hosted by Architectural Digest, ARF board president Lisa McCarthy, and a bevvy of design world luminaries, including ARF board member Alex Papachristidis, Jonathan Adler and Simon Doonan, Chesie Breen, Thom Filicia, Alexa Hampton, Celerie Kemble, Scott Nelson, Ann and John Pyne, Elizabeth Pyne, and Vicente Wolf. Click here to continue reading.

Alex Katz at the Met, installation view. Copyright The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Alex Katz at the Met, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
On view through June 26, 2016
This small yet mighty exhibition presents eight works by the painter Alex Katz. The show is a celebration of gifts both donated and promised to the Met by such benefactors as Leonard A. Lauder, Glenn Fuhrman, and the artist himself. The works on view span Katz’s lengthy career and include paintings, drawings, and prints. Katz, who is best known for his flat yet bold figurative works, continues to paint today, at the age of 88. In addition to some of Katz’s most recognizable works, including portraits of his wife and longtime muse, Ada, the exhibition features less familiar pieces such as an eery landscape and early cutouts. Click here to continue reading.  

Roberto Burle Marx painting a tablecloth in the loggia of his home, 1980s; the azulejo tile walls and chandelier composed of fruit and flowers on a metal armature are his work. Photograph © Tyba.

Roberto Burle Marx: Brazilian Modernist, Jewish Museum, New York, NY
On view through September 18, 2016
This exhibition at the Jewish Museum hopes to bring to light the work of the Modernist landscape architect Roberto Burle Marx. While he is not well known outside of his native Brazil, Burle Marx was one of the most influential landscape architects of the twentieth century. In addition to his lush, geometric gardens that helped usher in a new era of landscape design, Burle Marx dabbled in painting, sculpture, textile design, jewelry, stained glass, set design, and much more. The exhibition includes Burle Marx’s bold and beautiful drawings for his groundbreaking gardens, abstract paintings, and an 87-foot-long tapestry designed for Brazil’s Santo André Civic Center. Click here to continue reading.

Shade: Clyfford Still/Mark Bradford, Albright-Knox Gallery, Buffalo, NY
On view through October 2, 2016
The Albright-Knox Gallery is pairing paintings by the late, great Abstract Expressionist Clyfford Still with works by the celebrated contemporary artist Mark Bradford. Bradford, who is best known for his large-scale abstractions, has long been influenced by Still’s work, most notably, the artist’s use of color. For Shade, Bradford selected over twenty paintings from the Albright-Knox’s incendiary Still collection. Bradford’s works, created specifically for this exhibition, are on view in a neighboring gallery. Click here to continue reading.

James Abbott McNeill Whistler (1834-1903), The Giudecca; Note in Flesh Colour, 1879-1880. Pastel on gray wove paper, 6 1/4 x 10 in (15.9 x 25.4 cm). Mead Art Museum, Amherst College, Amherst, Massachusetts. Gift of George D. Pratt (Class of 1893) P.1933.14.

The Perfection of Harmony: The Art of James Abbott McNeill Whistler, Fenimore Art Museum, Cooperstown, NY
On view through October 2, 2016
It’s no secret that James Abbott McNeill Whistler left an indelible mark on American and European artists of the late-nineteenth century. Whistler, who abided by the “Art for Art’s Sake” philosophy, was part of the seismic shift away from sentimentality and moral allusion in painting. Whistler began his career as a draughtsman for the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, where he honed his drawing and etching skills—disciplines that he would continue to explore throughout his career. The Perfection of Harmony focuses on this magnificent aspect of Whistler’s career. The exhibition, which is anchored by lithographs from the Speed Art Museum’s Steven L. Block Collection, includes etchings and drawings from the Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute and paintings from a number of private and public collections. Click here to continue reading.   

Saucer and tea bowl, Meissen porcelain, ca. 1720. Decorated outside the factory, ca. 1745. Saucer, D: 5 1/8 inches; Tea Bowl, H: 1 ¾ inches. Private Collection, Photo: Michael Bodycomb.

Porcelain, No Simple Matter: Arlene Shechet and the Arnhold Collection, Frick Collection, New York, NY
On view through April 2, 2017
This innovative show breaks the mold when it comes to porcelain exhibitions. Featuring approximately 100 pieces produced by the legendary Royal Meissen manufactory, the show delves deep into the history of porcelain, exploring not just its making, but how it is collected and displayed. Most of the works on view, which date back to the eighteenth century, were selected by the contemporary sculptor Arlene Schechet from the promised gift of Henry H. Arnhold. No Simple Matter also includes twelve works created by Shechet during a series of residencies at the Meissen manufactory in Germany. Click here to continue reading.

 MICHIGAN

Childe Hassam (American, 1859–1935) Summer Sea, 1906. Oil on canvas, 19 ½ x 29 ½ inches. Grand Rapids Art Museum, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Hyman J. Bylan, 1964.1.6.

The Collection in Context, Grand Rapids Art Museum, Grand Rapids, MI
On view through August 14, 2016
The Grand Rapids Art Museum has brought together highlights from its own holdings, works from the Whitney Museum of American Art, and a number of private collections to create an exhibition that provides new ways of looking at art from different periods, styles, and media. The exhibition features some of the Grand Rapids Art Museum’s most beloved pieces, including works Alexander Calder, Mary Cassatt, William Merritt Chase, Childe Hassam, and Paul Gauguin, alongside recent acquisitions.  The show is divided into four sections—the Evolving Landscape, which explores humankind’s relationship to the natural world; Faith and Its Symbols, which includes works that feature religious iconography; Nature-based Abstraction; and Representing Women, which features works that explore society’s changing attitudes toward women over the past two centuries. Click here to continue reading.

TEXAS

Le Nain, Portraits in an Interior, 1647. Oil on copper, 11 x 15 in. (28 x 38 cm). Musée du Louvre, Paris.

The Brothers Le Nain: Painters of Seventeenth-Century France, Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, TX
On view through September 11, 2016
This exhibition is the first major show in the United States dedicated to the three Le Nain brothers—Antoine, Louis, and Mathieu. Best known for their depictions of peasant life in seventeenth century France, the Le Nain brothers also created large-scale religious works for altarpieces, devotional paintings, and portraits. The Kimbell Art Museum is exhibiting over forty of the Le Nain brothers’ finest paintings from public and private collections in Europe and North America, including the Louvre and the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris. The exhibition debuts new research concerning the authorship, dating, and meaning of the Le Nain brothers work and is accompanied by the results of a major study by the conservation departments of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco and the Kimbell Art Museum in cooperation with the Musée du Louvre. Click here to continue reading.

LIVERPOOL

Francis Bacon (1909-1992), Seated Figure, 1961. Oil paint on canvas, 1651 x 1422 mm. © Estate of Francis Bacon.

Francis Bacon: Invisible Rooms, Tate Liverpool, Liverpool
On view through September 18, 2016
Tate Liverpool is currently hosting the largest Francis Bacon exhibition ever staged in the north of England. Known for his haunting and highly expressive paintings, Bacon is widely considered one of Britain’s finest modern artists. The exhibition features more than thirty paintings as well as a group of rarely seen drawings and documents. The show’s title, Invisible Rooms, is a reference to the ghost-like frames or structures that Bacon often created around his subjects—a device used to highlight and intensify their emotional state. Click here to continue reading.