Friday, April 30, 2021 – The beauty of Venice and the wonderful Murano Glass in one exhibit

By admin

FRIDAY,  APRIL 30,  2021

The

351st  Edition

From Our Archives

Sargent, Whistler,
Venetian Glass: American
Artists
and the
Magic of Murano 

The Smithsonian Museums are open again or opening very soon.  Now you can visit in person the artworks that we have featured the last year.

Most of the artworks in the is issue will be featured in the upcoming exhibition.

Pack your bags, get the Amtrak ticket and off to D.C.

OCTOBER 8, 2021 — MAY 8, 2022

Smithsonian American Art Museum (8th and G Streets, NW)

Experience the spectacle of Venice and its rich history as a glassmaking capital through Sargent, Whistler, and Venetian Glass: American Artists and the Magic of Murano. The exhibition is the first comprehensive examination of the American Grand Tour to Venice in the late nineteenth century, revealing the glass furnaces and their new creative boom as a vibrant facet of the city’s allure.

Though the Venetian island of Murano has been a leading center of glass-making since the middle ages, today’s thriving industry stems from a burst in production between 1860 and 1915. In this era, Murano glassmakers began specializing in delicate and complex hand-blown vessels, dazzling the world with brilliant colors and virtuoso sculptural flourishes. This glass revival coincided with a surge in Venice’s popularity as a destination for tourists, leading to frequent depictions of Italian glassmakers and glass objects by artists from abroad. American painters and their patrons visited the glass furnaces, and many collected ornate goblets and vases decorated with flowers, dragons, and sea creatures. Venetian glass vessels, and also glass mosaics, quickly became more than souvenirs—these were esteemed as museum-quality works of fine art.

Moreover, the inventions of Murano’s master glassmakers established Venice as a center for artistic experimentation. Sojourns in Venice were turning points for John Singer Sargent, James McNeill Whistler, and scores of artists who followed in their footsteps, often referencing the glass industry in their works. Featuring more than 150 objects, this exhibition presents a choice selection of glass vessels in conversation with paintings, watercolors, and prints by the many talented American artists who found inspiration in Venice. This juxtaposition reveals the impact of Italian glass on American art, literature, design theory, and science education, as well as ideas at the time about gender, labor, and class relations.

In addition to works by Sargent and Whistler, the exhibition features paintings and prints by Frank Duveneck, Thomas Moran, William Merritt Chase, Maurice Prendergast, Maxfield Parrish, Louise Cox, and Ellen Day Hale. These are featured alongside rarely seen Venetian glass mosaic portraits and glass cups, vases, and urns by the leading glassmakers of Murano, including members of the legendary Seguso, Barovier, and Moretti families. Remarkable works from the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s collection join loans from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Art Institute of Chicago, and dozens of other distinguished public and private collections.

For Sargent, Whistler, and many of their patrons, Venetian glassware was irresistibly beautiful, and collecting these exquisite vessels expressed respect for both history and innovation. By recreating their transatlantic journey—from the furnaces of Murano to American parlors and museums—this exhibition and catalogue will bring to life the creative energy that beckoned nineteenth-century tourists and artists to Venice. This spirit spawned the renowned Venice Biennale contemporary art festival, and it lives on in Venetian glassmakers’ continued commitment to excellence.

The exhibition is organized by Crawford Alexander Mann III, curator of prints and drawings at the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Unidentified, Unidentified (Murano, Venice, Italy), Goblet with Striped Bowl, 1890s-1910s, blown, enameled, and applied hot-worked glass, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of John Gellatly, 1929.8.469.8

Robert Frederick Blum, Canal in Venice, San Trovaso Quarter, ca. 1885, oil on canvas, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of William T. Evans, 1909.7.7

In this piece, Robert Blum positioned the viewer as though he were looking down a narrow Venetian canal from a boat on the water. The view shows the Rio Ogni Santi (River of All Saints), in the San Trovaso Quarter, where Blum lived for a time. He spent many summers and winters in Venice, and his sketches, pastels, and paintings capture the city’s bright colors and hodgepodge of buildings. In the center of the waterway a man steers a sandolo, which is a smaller, lighter version of a gondola.

Miner Kilbourne Kellogg, Venice, 1843, ink and watercolor on paper, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Bequest of Martha F. Butler, 1991.56.130

Everett Warner, Venice, 1904, oil on canvas, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Mrs. James M. Fetherolf, 1966.10.2

Cass Gilbert, Venice, 1933, watercolor and pencil on paper, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Bequest of Emily Finch Gilbert through Julia Post Bastedo, executor, 1962.13.71

Mabel Pugh, St. Mark’s, Venice, ca. 1923-1926, linoleum cut on paper, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Transfer from the North Carolina Museum of Art (Gift of the artist, 1977), 2020.4.12

VASE WITH DOLPHINS AND FLOWERS

americanart.si.edu/artwork/vase-dolphins-and-flowers-31068
ca. 1880s-1890s, blown and applied hot-worked glass, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of John Gellatly, 1929.8.469.

FRIDAY PHOTOS OF THE DAY

SEND YOUR SUBMISSION TO:
ROOSEVELTISLANDHISTORY@GMAIL.COM

THURSDAY  PHOTO  OF THE DAY

Unveiled in July 2018, Spot the Dog is a 38-foot-tall statue of a Dalmatian puppy balancing a real New York City yellow cab precariously on its nose. The dog has a playful grin and golden toenails (Spot is a she). The taxi cab is wired so that its headlights illuminate Spot when it gets dark. When it rains, the cab’s wipers turn on.

Spot’s artist, Donald Lipski, wanted to create a playful sculpture because it stands at the entrance to a children’s hospital, and the hospital’s principal donors are the Hassenfeld family, who founded the Hasbro toy company. Also, Lipski lives in the neighborhood, so he wanted to make an artwork that he’d be happy to see every day.

Lipski has assured everyone that despite appearances, the front license plate of the taxi is securely attached to Spot’s nose.

ED LITCHER, CLARA BELLA, NINA LUBLIN, ALEXIS VILLEFANE, JAYJACOBSON,
VERN HARWOOD, VICKI FEINMEL AND LUAR HUSSEY GOT IT RIGHT.

OUR NEXT RIHS/NYPL ZOOM PROGRAM

Tuesday, May 18
“Saving America’s Cities” Author and Harvard History Professor Lizabeth Cohen provides an eye-opening look at her award-winning book’s subtitle: Ed Logue and the Struggle to Renew Urban America in the Suburban Age. Tracing Logue’s career from the development of Roosevelt Island in the ‘70s, to the redevelopment of New Haven in the ‘50s, Boston in the’60s and the South Bronx from 1978–85, she focuses on Logue’s vision to revitalize post-war cities, the rise of the Urban Development Corporation, and the world of city planning.   Watch this site for registration information.

Text by Judith Berdy
Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS
Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website
Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff

SMITHSONIAN AMERICAN ART MUSEUM

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