MEDIA RELEASE September 4, 2014
Media Contact: Julianna Verboort, 253.272.4258 x3011 or JVerboort@TacomaArtMuseum.org
CHANGES INSIDE AND OUT: NEW ART AND EVENTS AMID CONSTRUCTION PROGRESS AT TAM
(Tacoma, WA) – Tacoma Art Museum’s new entry portal on Pacific Avenue opened on August 20, with tall bronze-framed glass doors leading museum-goers into the expanded, airy lobby. Windows on both sides fill the space with light, framing Tacoma’s outdoor landmarks like works of art. The new Visitor’s Services desk, topped in the TAM’s signature bright red, is a clear first stop for visitors. Construction of the new wing is in the final stages and the grand opening is set for November 15. Meanwhile, the museum continues to build enticing art experiences amidst the action.
The exhibition Northwest in the West: Exploring Our Roots has been reconfigured with 27 works of art freshly curated from the museum’s collection. The exhibition runs through the autumn of 2015, and periodic artwork rotations are planned to encourage new insights into Western influences on the Northwest’s artistic identity. New works on view include Andy Warhol’s Little Red Book #135: Native American Artifacts, 1969−1970, a gift of the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts; Thomas Haukaas’s More Time Expected, delicately rendered in hand-made ink and pencil on antique ledger paper; Kyo Koike’s petite gelatin silver print Between Clouds; Margaret Camfferman’s early modernist 1935 untitled landscape in oil on board; Rick Bartow’s A Mask For My Brother’s Worry, composed of copper, aluminum, brass, leather, cedar, and dried grass. Sherry Markovitz’s Eternal Vigilance remains on view; the large sculpted paper mache and fiberglass moose head is finished in oil paint, acrylic paint, beads and sparkling sequins, and generates a lot of visitor interest.
Margaret Bullock, Curator of Collections and Special Exhibitions, spoke about Camferrman’s landscape from the museum’s Northwest art collection as related to landscapes in the new Haub Family Collection of Western American Art. “An important theme in the art of both the West and Northwest is the landscape and the ways the land changed as it became more settled. Landscape particularly fascinated modernist artists who were reshaping ideas about how art was defined in the early 20th century. Working with this classic art subject, landscapes of the western regions of the country presented great scale and variety allowing for endless variation based on shared concepts. A good example of this is the paintings by Margaret Camfferman and Maynard Dixon. Both artists use modernist simplification to show the landscapes as large colorful forms and masses, but Camferrman paints a scene of farmlands and rolling hills and Dixon a stark desert. Both modernist western landscapes, but very different in look and feel.” Dixon’s A Desert Valley will be on view beginning November 15, as part of the grand opening exhibition of the Haub Family Collection.
TAM fans familiar with the museum’s collection of nearly 600 works in glass will be excited to see an elegant new display of glass on view in the Kreielsheimer Foundation cases, tracing the studio art glass movement from the early 1970s to today. The works highlight generations of internationally renowned artists including Paul Marioni, who taught at Pilchuck Glass Studio from 1974 to 1988 and developed an ingenious technique for creating detailed images on molten glass (patented in 1977); William Morris, recognized for his innovative treatments of surface textures and glass works exploring nature, myth and ritual; rare early works from Tacoma native and art-glass legend Dale Chihuly; and Polish-born Seattle-based artist Anna Skibska, who has also taught at Pilchuck. Skibska visited TAM to watch the installation of her 1996 sculpture Two Sunbeams, an organically shaped network of clear glass cells parted around bold gleaming yellow streaks. The sculpture was a gift to the museum from Lloyd Herman, founding director of the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s Renwick Gallery in Washington, D.C.
Visit TAM today and you can also see Matika Wilbur’s Project 562, closing soon on October 5; Ink This! Contemporary Print Arts in the Northwest, through October 19; an exhibition of 36 winning photographs by young artists from the Washington State High School Photography Competition winners, on view through September 28 in the third floor Community Art Space; and more glass art with Dale Chihuly at Tacoma Art Museum. Opening October 18, Protective Ornament: Contemporary Amulets to Armor, coinciding with Tacoma’s Metalurge; November 2 marks the 10th anniversary of the museum’s Dia De Los Muertos community festival; and opening November 15, the inaugural exhibition of the Haub Family Collection. Listen to lectures and learn about art and artists in our community and participate in art-making through TAM’s programs; visit www.TacomaArtMuseum.org and view the Workshops page under the Calendar and Events tab for full details.
For more information and images, contact Julianna Verboort at 253.272.4258 x3011 or JVerboort@TacomaArtMuseum.org.
Image credits, from top left:
Margaret Camfferman, Untitled (Landscape), 1935. Oil on artist’s board, 25â…› x 29 ½ inches. Tacoma Art Museum, Gift of Maureen Duryee.
Maynard Dixon, A Desert Valley, 1922. Oil on board, 22 x 22 inches. Tacoma Art Museum, Haub Family Collection, Promised gift of Erivan and Helga Haub.
Thomas Haukaas, More Time Expected, 2002. Hand-made ink and pencil on antique ledger paper, 16 ½ x 27 ½ inches. Tacoma Art Museum, Gift of Greg Kucera and Larry Yocom in honor of Rock Hushka.
Kyo Koike, Between Clouds, date unknown. Gelatin silver print, 97/8 x 7 ¾ inches. Tacoma Art Museum, Museum purchase with funds from a gift of Jared FitzGerald.
Artist Anna Skibska at TAM for a recent visit, holding a section of her glass sculpture Two Sunbeams, circa 1996. Lampworked glass. Tacoma Art Museum, Gift of Lloyd Herman. In the background, Dale Chihuly’s Ma Chihuly’s Floats installed in TAM’s courtyard, on view through September.
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