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Modern Masters
Modern Masters - Chagall Miro Picasso Dali -HELD OVER
Pablo Picasso
May 12, 2010 - June 6, 2010
6:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.

   Being a curator for an installation and being an art dealer assembling an exhibit are two different beasts.

A curator even in the most nominal position is an expert as a subject specialist in whatever is being presented where historical significance and intellect are generally evident.

As an art dealer assembling an exhibit the path is much wider and more forgiving from a critical perspective where the outcome is collector based and sales are a key ingredient. However, there is on occasion a crossover of intellect and presentation from a gallery exhibit to that of a museum.

The term Modern Masters is fairly expansive and includes artists over the past 100 years from 1900 - 2000. Revolutionary art movements such as Surrealism, Cubism, Expressionism, Abstraction and Pop were the most expansive movements in art history to ever take place during a relatively short period of time.

Pablo Picasso's genius and influence in art history was the critical birth of these artistic movements by pushing the limits of painting away from the belief that art was meant to preserve old traditions and not create new ones. Whether he was globally responsible for such a departure in painting or the time was just serendipitous with other painters making the same leap at that period is still left to debate, but the art world would never be the same after 1900 and Picasso's emergence as a Modern Master.

Names such as Picasso, Chagall, Miro and Dali are the linked most commonly to the term Modern Masters and while there are many other important and critically acclaimed artists spanning the past hundred years, these are the most significant and commonly known.

In creating an exhibit of this kind, it isn't as easy as meeting with an artist in representation and discussing the next exhibit's direction. Modern Master works are not readily available, they're rare, not available from one source and often expensive which can create a variety of challenges when assembling an exhibit with such variables.

Over the past 25 years as an art dealer, I have had the pleasure of selling a variety of works including Picasso, Chagall, Miro and Dali and wanted to assemble a small collection by these important artists for sale in our new Bellevue location.

Two particular works to be exhibited share historical similarities as well as juxtaposed iconography by two different Spanish artists. The first by Pablo Picasso is from 1922 and is a lovely dry point etching "Femme au Miroir" or "Woman looking onto a Mirror". Sitting nude, but reserved (much different than later works by Picasso also on display) a woman holds a mirror and gazes into it daydreaming of beauty, fashion and the future. Picasso said, "The hidden harmony is better than the obvious" as evident in this jewel of a print.

The other is a lithograph is by renowned surrealist, Joan Miro titled "Fashion Frenzy" from 1969. In this much later image, the figure becomes abstracted and movement is integral and not static or posed. The frenzy of fashion, color, design, movement and energy are all captured here with broad strokes, delicate lines and interpretive suggestion. Miro said, "My characters have undergone the same process of simplification as the colors. Now that they have been simplified, they appear more human and alive than if they had been represented in all their detail."  

Additional work on display by Pablo Picasso, Joan Miro, Marc Chagall and Salvador Dali.      
Pablo Picasso
Exposition de Vallauris - 1962
30 x 25 Inches  Limited Edition Original Print - Linocut
 Sold
Pablo Picasso
Femme au Miroir - 1922
7 x 5 Inches  Dry Point Etching
 Sold
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