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Frankfurt, Germany
Frankfurter KunstSven Johneverein
Notions of the Artist
Dates: 11 Nov 09 - 17 Jan 10
Categories: Contemporary (1970-present)
Address: Steinernes Haus am Römerberg, Markt 44 Frankfurt D-60311
Tel: +49 (0)69 219 3140 Website
Galerie Bärbel Grässlin
Heimo Zobernig
Dates: 17 Oct 09 - 21 Nov 09
Categories: Contemporary (1970-present)
Address: Schäfergasse 46 B Frankfurt 60313
Tel: +49 69 299 246 70 Website
Liebieghaus Skulpturensammlung
Jean-Antoine Houdon: Sculpture and Sensibility
Dates: 29 Oct 09 - 28 Feb 10
Categories: 1800-1900 (Impressionism, etc)
Address: Schaumainkai 71 Frankfurt D-60596
Tel: +49 (0) 69 60 50 98 234 Website
Museum der Weltkulturen (Museum of World Cultures)
Focus on Bali: Three Balinese Photographers 1930-2009
Dates: 22 Aug 09 - 28 Feb 10
Categories: Photography
Post-War (1945-70)
Contemporary (1970-present)
Modern (1900-1945)
Address: Amt 45G, Schaumainkai 29-37 Frankfurt D-60594
Tel: (0)69 212 359 13 Website
Being Object, Being Art: Masterpieces from the Collections of the Museum of World Cultures
Dates: 31 Oct 09 - 31 Oct 10
Categories: Archaeology & Ancient art
African
Address: Amt 45G, Schaumainkai 29-37 Frankfurt D-60594
Tel: (0)69 212 359 13 Website
Constantin Brâncusi.: the Sculptor as Photographer
Dates: 24 Oct 09 - 3 Jan 10
Categories: Modern (1900-1945)
Address: Amt 45G, Schaumainkai 29-37 Frankfurt D-60594
Tel: (0)69 212 359 13 Website
Museum für Angewandte Kunst
Sit in China
Dates: 8 Oct 09 - 31 Jan 10
Categories: Decorative
Far East
Address: Schaumainkai 17 Frankfurt D-60594
Tel: +49 (0)69 212 34037 Website
The Good Form: Carpenters Create Their Journeyman Pieces
Dates: 8 Oct 09 - 24 Jan 10
Categories: Decorative
Contemporary (1970-present)
Address: Schaumainkai 17 Frankfurt D-60594
Tel: +49 (0)69 212 34037 Website
The Secret of the Green Box: Paintings and X-ray Photographs by Birgit Fischötter
Dates: 8 Oct 09 - 31 Jan 10
Categories: Photography
Contemporary (1970-present)
Address: Schaumainkai 17 Frankfurt D-60594
Tel: +49 (0)69 212 34037 Website
Tokyo Art Directors Club Award 2009
Dates: 8 Oct 09 - 14 Feb 10
Categories: Decorative
Contemporary (1970-present)
Address: Schaumainkai 17 Frankfurt D-60594
Tel: +49 (0)69 212 34037 Website
André-Charles Boulle (1642-1732): a New Style for Europe
Dates: 30 Oct 09 - 31 Jan 10
Categories: Old Master
Decorative
Address: Schaumainkai 17 Frankfurt D-60594
Tel: +49 (0)69 212 34037 Website
The influence on European furniture culture of the renowned sculptor and cabinet maker to Louis XIV André Charles Boulle is explored in this major show of about 150 pieces of furniture, bronzes, clocks, tapestries, paintings and drawings selected by art historians Jean Nérée Ronfort and Jean Dominique Augarde with Ulrich Schneider, director of the Museum für Angewandte Kunst.
Boulle found success early, being invited by Louis XIV into his workshops at the Palais du Louvre before the age of 30, and his designs soon became symbols of prosperity and success, a position they still hold, with his designs featuring in the world’s leading museums and private collections. The king of Spain and the electors of Saxony and Bavaria were drawn to his elaborate works that combined such materials as gilt bronze, exotic woods, tortoiseshell and brass to create elaborate ornaments and floral marquetry.
Objects have been loaned by 44 institutions, including the Hermitage, St Petersburg, Le Mobilier National, Paris, and the Royal Collection of Sweden, signifying Boulle’s widespread and lasting international influence. The show is under the patronage of Nicolas Sarkozy, President of France, and Horst Köhler, President of Germany.
Sphinx, 17th century.
Museum für Moderne Kunst
Jack Goldstein
Dates: 3 Oct 09 - 10 Jan 10
Categories: Contemporary (1970-present)
Address: Domstrasse, 10 Frankfurt D-60311
Tel: +49 (0)69 21 23 0447 Website
Schirn Kunsthalle
László Moholy-Nagy: Retrospective
Dates: 8 Oct 09 - 7 Feb 10
Categories: Modern (1900-1945)
Address: Römerberg Frankfurt D-60311
Tel: +49 (0)69 29 98 820 Website
Art for the Millions: 100 Sculptures from the Mao Era
Dates: 24 Sep 09 - 3 Jan 10
Categories: Far East
Address: Römerberg Frankfurt D-60311
Tel: +49 (0)69 29 98 820 Website
Städel Museum
Constellations V
Dates: 5 Sep 09 - 7 Mar 10
Categories: Contemporary (1970-present)
Address: Städelsches Kunstinstitut und Städtische Galerie, Durerstrasse 2 Frankfurt D-60596
Tel: +49 (0)69 605 09 80 Website
Botticelli
Dates: 13 Nov 09 - 28 Feb 10
Categories: Old Master
Address: Städelsches Kunstinstitut und Städtische Galerie, Durerstrasse 2 Frankfurt D-60596
Tel: +49 (0)69 605 09 80 Website
It is a commonplace that some artists reach in their old age a “late style” characterised by loose, free expression and a distillation of experience (for example, Michelangelo and Titian) while others wither and decay (for example, Pontormo and Domenichino). Botticelli is reckoned, however, to have taken a different trajectory by turning, in his old age, from a mature style and content to the manner and concerns of his youth.
The life and work of Sandro Botticelli is, like Caesar’s Gaul, divided in partes tres: his Florentine early training and career, from his birth in 1444/45 to around 1478, covering the years of his apprenticeship under Fra Filippo Lippi and in which he produced works such as St Sebastian, 1473-74, and a number of frescoes in Florence and Pisa, most of which are now lost. During the years of his maturity, around 1478 to 1490, he painted most of the works for which he is famous: frescoes in Florence and Rome, altarpieces, portraits, allegories and mythological narratives. Here he perfected his personal style, perhaps best described as a combination of International Gothic and classical prototypes, an assimilation of the stile nuovo and antico, in which figures are presented in supple contours, contrapposto, graceful proportions, most memorably exemplified in the Primavera, around 1478, and The Birth of Venus, 1482-86. This high courtly style also informed his religious paintings (shown, The Virgin Adoring the Sleeping Christ Child, about 1490), which may have incurred the censure of the charismatic Dominican reformer, Girolamo Savonarola, who, it is believed, came to influence Botticelli as, from the 1490s until his death, the artist turned back to the simplicity and affective expression of his early work. This maniera devota, inspired by moral and religious sentiment, resulted in works such as the Mystic Nativity, around 1500, and the illuminations for a luxurious, unfinished manuscript edition of The Divine Comedy, 1490s.
Following his death, Botticelli fell from favour and it was not until 19th-century art historians began to resurrect and elevate Florentine artists that he came again into favour. This process was initiated mainly by German art historians and collectors: the Berlin museum acquired the St Sebastian and the Bardi altarpiece in the 1820s; Walter Ullmann produced the first Botticelli monograph in 1893 and Aby Warburg produced his influential dissertation in the same year. Thus it comes as something of a surprise that this is the first Botticelli show to take place in the German-speaking world (pace the exhibition of the Divine Comedy illuminations in Berlin in 2000-01). The exhibition is curated by Andreas Schumacher, the director of the pre-1800 Italian, French and Spanish paintings collections, and is the first in line to celebrate the quincentenary of the artist’s death (1510). The show, like Botticelli’s life, is in three parts: his portraits and allegorical paintings, the mythologies and, finally, his religious œuvre. Although many of the works have recently been seen in the shows at the Palais de Luxembourg (2003-04) and at the Palazzo Strozzi (2004)—the fragility, the renown and the limited number of his works make it impossible to transport many of them—this exhibition includes workshop pieces and drawings from private lenders never seen before in public. Special attention is given to the unrequited love Botticelli bore for the celebrated beauty Simonetta Vespucci (around 1453-76), wife of a Florentine nobleman, who is thought have been his model for his Venuses (and with whom he was buried), and to his works commissioned by the Medici. In addition to the 40 Botticelli paintings, there are 40 by Verrocchio, Antonio del Pollaiuolo and Filippino to put Botticelli’s work into a historical context. The show is sponsored by the Commerzbank-Stiftung with support from Alnatura Produktions- und Handels, the Italian National Tourist Board, Weleda and Ikarus design. The catalogue is edited by Dr Schumacher and published by Hatje Cantz (€49.80).
The Virgin Adoring the Sleeping Christ Child, about 1490
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