Eugen Batz. Exercise for color-theory course taught by Vasily Kandinsky. 1929–30. Tempera over pencil on black paper. Bauhaus-Archiv Berlin

The exhibition Bauhaus 1919–1933: Workshops for Modernity finally comes to an end next week. As a final event of the various public programs we have offered in conjunction with the exhibition, we will present a symposium this Friday, January 22, entitled Before and After 1933: The International Legacy of the Bauhaus. The event will bring together a vast array of international scholars to talk about the remarkable diaspora of Bauhaus intellectuals that, following the school’s closing in 1933, spread throughout various parts of Europe, the Americas, and even Africa, contributing to the establishment of a modern design style and branching out into various pedagogical models and practices that to this day lie at the core of the curricula of art and design schools worldwide.

Here at MoMA—both among staff members and those who came to the related public programs and workshops—we are also left with plenty of food for thought regarding the enduring legacy of that famous school. Read more

Pablo Picasso. Vallauris Exposition 1955 (1955 Exposition de Vallauris). 1955. Linoleum cut, 26 x 21 1/8" (66 x 53.7 cm), sheet: 35 1/4 x 23 3/8" (89.5 x 59.4 cm). Printer: Arnéra. Publisher: Arnéra. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. The Mr. and Mrs. Charles Kramer Collection, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Kramer. © 2010 Estate of Pablo Picasso / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

A few months back I was perusing The New York Times when I was stopped in my tracks by a picture of Barack Obama in his office at the University of Chicago. Being a former Second City citizen, I immediately felt a sense of kinship of place, but I was even more astonished to see hanging in his office the exact same Picasso print—a black and white devil-like image, a poster for 1955 Exposition de Vallauris—that  hangs on the wall of my living room. I always look around people’s homes and offices for signs of who they are and what choices they make, but when I saw that Picasso work, I knew that Barack and I clearly had affinities! Not everyone makes the same choices or likes the same things—but we chose the same image to look at day in and day out. What did that say about us?

I had bought that print, probably not a “real” print, when I was seventeen years old. Pablo Picasso was perhaps my first real love. Growing up in Niagara Falls, Canada, where there is a wax museum literally on every corner (no wonder I ended up in this line of work!), I first met Picasso at the public library. The art section of the Dewey Decimal system was like my private zip code. I remember finding book about Picasso and Gertrude Stein and falling into a deep, deep swoon. I imagined myself living the salon life, with every conversation, morsel of food, or flirtation the catalyst for a painting or poem. My paintings, made late in the night, the only time an artist can work (teen or not), were inflected with Picasso’s lines, colors, and passions. Picasso sustained me through my teenage years. However, as I was indoctrinated into the art world of the mid-1970s during art school, I quickly came to realize that not only was my Picasso-influenced work not cool, but that he didn’t wear very well. I secretly pined in front of Guernica for my lost love during the obligatory visit to MoMA with my fellow students and professors. Read more

Andreas Gursky. New Year's Day Swimmers. 1988

As we ring in the new year, we’d like to wish you a very happy and healthy 2010 and thank you for all of your support, interest, and encouragement since we started this blog two months ago. We hope you enjoy this series of blog posts featuring winter- and New Year’s–themed works from MoMA’s collection.

As we prepare to ring in the new year, we’d like to wish you a very happy and healthy 2010 and thank you for all of your support, interest, and encouragement since we started this blog two months ago. We hope you enjoy this series of blog posts featuring winter- and New Year’s–themed works from MoMA’s collection.

Tod Papageorge. New Year's Eve at Studio 54. 1978

Wes Wilson (Robert Wesley Wilson). New Year Bash. 1966

As we prepare to ring in the new year, we’d like to wish you a very happy and healthy 2010 and thank you for all of your support, interest, and encouragement since we started this blog two months ago. We hope you enjoy this series of blog posts featuring winter- and New Year’s–themed works from MoMA’s collection.

As we prepare to ring in the new year, we’d like to wish you a very happy and healthy 2010 and thank you for all of your support, interest, and encouragement since we started this blog two months ago. We hope you enjoy this series of blog posts featuring winter– and New Year’s–themed works from MoMA’s collection.

The Magnificent Ambersons. 1942. USA. Directed by Orson Welles. Shown: Tim Holt (as George) and Anne Baxter (as Lucy). RKO Radio Pictures, Inc. Image ©1942 RKO Radio Pictures, Inc.

As we prepare to ring in the new year, we’d like to wish you a very happy and healthy 2010 and thank you for all of your support, interest, and encouragement since we started this blog two months ago. We hope you enjoy this series of blog posts featuring winter- and New Year’s–themed works from MoMA’s collection.

Marcel Duchamp. In Advance of the Broken Arm. 1964 (fourth version, after lost original of November 1915)

As we prepare to ring in the new year, we’d like to wish you a very happy and healthy 2010 and thank you for all of your support, interest, and encouragement since we started this blog two months ago. We hope you enjoy this series of blog posts featuring winter- and New Year’s–themed works from MoMA’s collection.

Wilson A. Bentley. Snowflake. 1905

Alfred H.Barr Jr.'s experimental interpretative installations for Picasso: Forty Years of His Art (1940) and Cubism and Abstract Art (1936) at MoMA

My last blog post pondered whether a museum could be a place to foster your own creativity rather than simply appreciating that of the “masters.”

In her book Museum Legs: Fatigue and Hope in the Face of Art, Amy Whitaker makes the case that “teaching people to make art can also be politically disruptive because it teaches people to have their own opinion, giving them a say.”

Marcel Duchamp was definitive on the point of viewers having a say: ”All in all, the creative act is not performed by the artist alone; the spectator brings the work in contact with the external world by deciphering and interpreting its inner qualifications and thus adds his contribution to the creative act.”

Duchamp’s view defies traditional assumptions about art and viewers, often considered the art museum “dance”—the museum leads, the viewer follows.

Often people think they need extensive amounts of information from experts to fully appreciate art, but all that’s really needed is the confidence and opportunity to share your thoughts and opinions, and perhaps a bit of context as a framework—a kind of a personal trainer to help guide the way, but not do the “creative work” of interpretation. Read more