Making up for the lost Covid years takes stamina. I was lucky to squeeze in these three exhibits before they were gone, or going soon.
There are few things that I love more than spending hours wandering through art museums and galleries – and finding the shows satisfying.
These three exhibits fit that bill exponentially. The International Center of Photography (ICP) continues to host photographer/artist William Klein’s Yes, a fantastic retrospective, for another week or so. Poster House, a new museum that I found while walking past it, housed the excellent The Utopian Avant-Garde: Soviet Film Posters of the 1920s. (I can only guess that I missed it since the museum opened its doors in the before times, june 2019, and well, you know the rest.) Up north, while spending a weekend in the Berkshires, I was introduced to the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Amherst, MA, where I saw the wondrous I Could Do That: The Picture Book Art of Ed Emberley. We were a match made in heaven.
I shot a lot of images, below are some of the many highlights of each exhibit. Enjoy!
William Klein’s prolific work covers so many categories of photography, art and design that it’s impossible to include all here. ICP appropriately gives over its entire space for his retrospective. Organized by cities and media, it’s clear that Klein had many influences that led to his groundbreaking work.
Born in New York, Klein was anxious to go to Europe. He left the city for Paris to study at the Sorbonne in 1948 (and calls Paris home). Klein worked briefly under Fernand Léger at that time. Léger's influence is apparent in his earlier graphic work.
Klein brings energy, inventiveness and innovation to each medium he works in. His fashion photography changed the industry’s advertising and editorial representation. His portraits are iconic. His eye pinpoints the beats of each city and its people – those images could only be from Rome, Paris, Moscow or Tokyo. Throughout all of Klein’s work, there appears to be a genuine connection to his subjects, a wish to reveal their humanity and dignity, and to capture them in a specific place and time.
As for his films, I’ve only seen Qui êtes-vous, Polly Maggoo? (Who Are You, Polly Maggoo?) which really has to be seen. A seething satire of the fashion industry of the 1960s, the film follows American fashion model Polly Maggoo throughout Paris as a documentary crew captures her on the runways and beyond. The character of the editor is a veiled Diana Vreeland and is equally as outrageous as the original on whom she is based. Interesting for Klein to choose this subject as his debut film – kind of like biting the hand that fed him.
William Klein Yes is ending soon. Highly recommended, I encourage anyone in the area to see it before it’s gone.
The mission of Poster House is “…dedicated to presenting the impact, culture, and design of posters, both as historical documents and methods of contemporary visual communication.” This is a young museum, still finding its feet, but if the three exhibits that I saw there are an indication of its future – Poster House could become a great creative resource for presenting the art and history of the poster in many its contexts.
As a huge fan of the work of Alexander Rodchenko and the Stenberg brothers, this exhibition was a feast for the eyes with its range of 1920s posters and artists. It focuses on the golden age of Soviet graphic design from its origins to its eventual end.
With Russia in a state of political flux during the Bolshevik Revolution and the Russian Civil War, Vladimir Lenin emerged as the head of Soviet Russia. He recognized the importance of film, particularly as a means of propaganda. With a group of talented young artists ready to invent a new Soviet culture, the government embraced their talents post revolution.
Designers created experimental, dynamic, revolutionary and ultimately enduring posters, in spite of, and regardless of their original purpose. Combining Constructivist forms, often with cinematic stills or illustrations, and drenched in state colors, these montages and highly graphic posters remain iconic a century after their creation and are studied to this day.
By about 1932, a central body for Soviet film production was created and immediately ended all independent artists' work. Importing films ceased. All Soviet films and their promotion fell under total governmental control.
This exhibit ended in August, but read more about it here. When Poster House reopens after a short construction pause, have a wander in. It’s well worth it and you’ll be supporting a new-ish museum in the city.
What’s more exciting than finding an illustrator whom you never knew?
Ed Emberley (b.1931) is best known for his children's books – particularly instructional drawing books – filled with color, imaginative forms and characters with easy-to-follow instructions to help kids learn to create and communicate.
Emberley never thought of himself as an illustrator. He considers himself a bookmaker. I consider him a master storyteller – through words, pictures and delivery. It’s my fantasy career – writing children’s books, creating the visual language AND making the damn books, exhibits, etc!
In addition to Emberley’s creative concepts, he makes his books using innovative techniques. From traditional book structure to flip books and beyond, the artist works with paper, stickers, stencils, die cuts, optical illusions and clip art. Emberley’s visual styles vary as well – from technically precise drawings to playful thumbprints or freehand line art to complex pen-and-ink drawings – carefully matching style to story. It’s a beautiful thing.
Emberley has illustrated or contributed to over 50 books, many published between the 1960s and 1980s. This exhibition covered nearly 20 of those titles. Most pieces are original artwork such as the never-before-seen sketches and studies for Picture Pie (1984), which were amazing pieces of art and truly inspirational. Book dummies, letterpress prints and color separations also provided insights into a highly creative mind.
Another standout group of drawings was Emberley’s illustrative work for Suppose You Met a Witch in 1973. According to the exhibition notes, “Ed Emberley worked harder on …[Witch] than perhaps any of his other books. He made multiple trips to England to sketch the scenery for an authentic English setting. In fact, he took so long to create the illustrations that his publisher became impatient, and Emberley had to give them another book in the meantime.” That interim book sold millions. In 1973, when Suppose You Met a Witch was finally published, “it did not sell well and quickly went out of print, despite being one of Emberley's masterpieces.” So true – the original pen-and-ink drawings are beautifully infused with the narrative and they are stunning.
Working into his 80s, Emberley's most recent title, The Red Hen, was published in 2010. The artist is 91 years old.
This exhibit at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Amherst, MA, ended earlier in the summer, but read (and see) more about it here.
What exhibits or art did you discover over the summer?
Top illustration and all photos: © 2022 Janet Giampietro.
