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ArtNovember 2012 Exhibition note On "Paul Klee—Philosophical Vision: From Nature to Art," which opened at the McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College on September 1 and remains on view until December 9, 2012. Paul Klee (1879–1940) may have protested that “we are much too concerned with biography in art,” but this revealing exhibition shows that even the most imaginative artist can’t escape the influence of his own life and times. The show is organized into eight thematic sections, tracing “the artist’s dialogue with nature,” “the drama of existence,” and “movement, flight, and the balance of forces,” as Klee explored them over the decades. In the satirical etching Comedian (1904), a rumpled-faced actor in a plumed helmet sports a mask that looks much like his own face. Klee, an accomplished violinist and music critic, was also an avid operagoer who considered opera the highest form of theater. This grotesque buffo character presents a maddeningly inconclusive image, but we can still delight in its expressionism and the energy of its pul ... This article is available to subscribers and for individual purchaseSubscribe to TNC (Print and Online editions) Subscribe to TNC (Online only) This article originally appeared in The New Criterion, Volume 31 November 2012, on page 46 Copyright © 2013 The New Criterion | www.newcriterion.com http://www.newcriterion.com/articles.cfm/Exhibition-note-7478
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On Clyfford Still, his work, and the recently-opened Clyfford Still Museum. On "New Formations: Czech Avant-Garde Art & Modern Glass from the Roy and Mary Cullen Collection” at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. On "Kurt Schwitters: Color & Collage" at Houston's Menil Collection. by Karen Wilkin On “Impressionism, Fashion, and Modernity” at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. On "Man Ray: Portraits” at the National Portrait Gallery, London. by Mario Naves On "The New Spirit: American Art in the Armory Show, 1913” at the Montclair Art Museum, Montclair, NJ.
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