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Posts tagged ‘Ben Shahn’
Modern Art through Contemporary Eyes: Correspondence from MoMA’s International Program
From left: Alexander Calder. The Big Gong. 1952. IC/IP, I.A.56. The Museum of Modern Art Archives; Installation view of Calder's The Big Gong (top) in Twelve Modern American Painters and Sculptors, Musée National d’Art Modern, Paris, 1953. IC/IP, I.A.64. The Museum of Modern Art Archives

From left: Alexander Calder. The Big Gong. 1952. IC/IP, I.A.56. The Museum of Modern Art Archives; Installation view of Calder’s The Big Gong (top) in Twelve Modern American Painters and Sculptors, Musée National d’Art Modern, Paris, 1953. IC/IP, I.A.64. The Museum of Modern Art Archives

This past year the MoMA Archives processed and opened to the public the full record history of MoMA’s International Council and International Program, a collection so large that it required the work of three staff members to complete it in one year. One benefit of processing a large collection as a team was the opportunity to share our most interesting discoveries with one another.

April 29, 2011  |  Collection & Exhibitions
Off the Shelf: Our Poetry Muses

The Off the Shelf series explores unique MoMA publications from the Museum Archives.

Right: Cover of A Partridge in a Pear Tree, illustrated by Ben Shahn. Second ed. New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 1951. Left: Frontispiece from 12 Fables of Aesop, illustrated by Antonio Frasconi; narrated by Glenway Wescott. New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 1954.

April is National Poetry Month! To celebrate the final days we thought we’d look at MoMA poetry books. MoMA has published a number of books of poetry, from the lyrically illustrated and hand-lettered A Partridge in a Pear Tree (1951), by Ben Shahn, to 12 Fables of Aesop (1954), illustrated by Antonio Frasconi and narrated by Glenway Wescott. One of my favorites is Three Young Rats and Other Rhymes, the delightfully illustrated book of 83 nursery rhymes selected by former MoMA curator James Johnson Sweeney and illustrated by Alexander Calder.

December 4, 2009  |  MoMA Stores
MoMA’s Holiday Card Program
Robert Indiana. LOVE. 1967

A holiday card created by Robert Indiana (from his LOVE screenprint) was popular in the late 1960s.

Every year since 1954, we have introduced a new line of holiday cards created by artists and designers from around the world. MoMA’s holiday card program was initiated by the Museum’s Junior Council affiliate group, which was founded five years earlier as a way to “bring together a group of younger people who have…a desire to see the [arts] fostered soundly and liberally.” (The Junior Council subsequently evolved into MoMA’s Contemporary Arts Council.)