AMERICAN ART FROM THE THYSSEN COLLECTION ALBERS / AVERY / BEARDEN / BELLOWS / BENTON / BIERSTADT / BLUEMNER / BODMER / BRADFORD / BRICHER / BRUCE / BURCHFIELD / CARR / CATLIN / CHASE / CHURCH / CLONNEY / COLE / COPLEY / CORNELL / CRAWFORD / CROPSEY / DAVIS / DEMUTH / DOVE / DURAND / ESTES / GIFFORD / GORKY / HARNETT / HART / HARTLEY / HASSAM / HEADE / HILL / HOFMANN / HOMER / HOPPER / INNESS / JOHNSON / KENSETT / DE KOONING / KRASNER / LACROIX / LANE / LEWIS / LICHTENSTEIN / LINDNER / LOUIS / MARIN / MORAN / O’KEEFFE / OSSORIO / PEALE /PETO / POLLOCK / PRENDERGAST / RAUSCHENBERG / REMINGTON / ROBINSON / ROSENQUIST / ROTHKO / SALMON / SARGENT / SHAHN / SHARP / SHEELER / SILVA / SLOAN / SONNTAG / SOYER / STELLA / STILL / THIEME / TOBEY / WEBER / WESSELMANN / WHITTREDGE / WIMAR / WYETH
AMERICAN ART FROM THE THYSSEN COLLECTION
Digital publication with the collaboration of
MUSEO NACIONAL THYSSEN-BORNEMISZA 14 . 12 . 21 /26 . 06 . 22
6—7
8 — 131
Introduction
AMERICAN ART FROM THE THYSSEN COLLECTION
8 — 49
1/NATURE
SUBLIME AMERICA / EARTH RHYTHMS / HUMAN IMPACT 50 —83
2/CULTURE CROSSINGS SETTINGS / HEMISPHERE / INTERACTIONS
Exhibition itinerary
84 — 111
3/URBAN SPACE
MODERN SUBJECT / THE CITY / URBAN LEISURE AND CULTURE 112 — 131
4/MATERIAL CULTURE RITUALS / VOLUPTAS / TEMPUS FUGIT
132— 135
HISTORICAL MAP OF THE UNITED STATES
136 — 143
THREE DECADES OF COLLECTING AMERICAN ART
144 — 157 158— 159
Initiatives related to the exhibition Additional information
Timeline
Introduction
American Art in the Thyssen Collection is the result of a research project funded by the Terra Foundation for American Art to study and reinterpret the collection of American art assembled by Baron Hans Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza (1921−2002) over the course of more than three decades. The show is part of the events designed to celebrate the centenary of his birth. As a result of this line of collecting, the museum owns an extensive selection of American painting, especially from the nineteenth century, and has become an essential point of reference in Europe. Divided into four themed sections, it sets out to rethink the collection of American Art from a crosscutting approach using categories such as history, politics, science, the environment, material culture and urban life, and considering aspects such as gender, ethnic group, class and language, among others, to provide a deeper understanding of the complexities of American art and culture. The exhibition, which is on view in rooms 55 to 46 on the first floor of the museum, features a selection of 140 works belonging to the permanent collection and the Carmen Thyssen Collection or loaned by the Thyssen family. 6/7
1/NATURE
Albert Bierstadt
Solingen, Germany 1830–1902 New York
Evening on the Prairie c. 1870 Oil on canvas, 81.3 × 123 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 468 (1981.56) [ detail ]
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NATURE / SUBLIME AMERICA “When autumn fires light up the landscape you will see Nature’s palette set with her most precious colors.” Frederic Church, 1874
The concept of “nature” was essential in the creation of the United States. At the start of the 19th century, artists became aware of the greatness of the country and symbolized it through the sublime, in landscapes subjected to overwhelming forces, or the picturesque, in uniquely beautiful scenery. While any representation of a landscape is a cultural construct, in America the mythification of nature became a means of asserting the national spirit. The first landscape artists, who were born or trained in Europe, adapted sublime Romanticism to the exuberance of the New World, infusing it with a religious and patriotic sentiment. They appealed to the imagination to convey a transcendental experience and a timeless sense of belonging. The tradition of the sublime continued in 20thcentury American painting through abstraction. The sensuous properties of the picture surface and the impression of emptiness elicit in the spectator emotions similar to those triggered by the dramatic effects of nature.
10 / 11
Thomas Cole
Bolton-le-Moors, United Kingdom 1801–1848 Catskill
Expulsion. Moon and Firelight c. 1828 Oil on canvas, 91.4 × 122 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 95 (1980.14)
Cole, the father of the American landscape tradition, created a style imbued with moral reflection. The transcendental feeling his paintings convey is reflected in this expulsion from Paradise, an allegorical and religious landscape. The primary elements according to the rules of the aesthetic of the sublime – moonlight, volcanic fire, and cascading water – seem to plunge the viewer into a dark abyss.
Nature / Sublime America
12 / 13
Frederic Edwin Church Hartford 1826–1900 New York
Cross in the Wilderness 1857 Oil on canvas, 41.3 × 61.5 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 508 (1981.12)
This desolate landscape is inspired by Church’s travels around Ecuador and Colombia. The artist, who had close ties to the Puritan tradition, depicts a Christless cross in the foreground, adorned with garlands of flowers, as a symbol of death. The picture was commissioned by William Harmon Brown in memory of a deceased son.
Nature / Sublime America
14 / 15
Willem de Kooning
Rotterdam, Netherlands 1904–1997 New York
Abstraction 1949–50 Oil and oleoresin on cardboard, 41 × 49 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 630 (1974.55)
De Kooning, one of the founders of American Abstract Expressionism, presents here an image of life and death, which contrasts with the idyllic world of Eden. The gestural, transcendental, and moral composition explores bodily distortion and introduces the symbols of the crucifixion by violently dissecting the symbolic attributes of Golgotha: the nails of the cross, the ladder, and the skull.
Nature / Sublime America
16 / 17
Georgia O’Keeffe
Sun Prairie 1887–1986 Santa Fe
From the Plains II 1954 Oil on canvas, 122 × 183 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 696 (1977.36)
O’Keeffe, who displays the formal and symbolic influence of the Romantic tradition, arouses in the spectator unfathomable feelings comparable to those inspired by the contemplation of nature. This composition, with its unmistakable style of almost invisible brushstrokes and vivid hues, captures the painter’s fascination with cattle herded across the vast plains of Texas, kicking up dust and causing a deafening din.
Nature / Sublime America
18 / 19
George Inness
Newburgh 1825–1894 Bridge of Allan, United Kingdom
Morning c. 1878 Oil on canvas mounted on cardboard, 76.2 × 114.3 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 600 (1983.4)
During his mature years, under the influence of the Christian mystic ideas of Emanuel Swedenborg, Inness developed an interest in metaphysical questions, seeking to arouse emotions through evocative images of dawn or dusk. This extremely visionary and poetic painting stems from his conviction that “a work of Art does not appeal to the intellect. It does not appeal to the moral sense. Its aim is not to instruct but to awaken an emotion.”
Nature / Sublime America
20 / 21
Frederic Edwin Church Hartford 1826–1900 New York
Abandoned Skiff 1850 Oil on cardboard, 28 × 43.2 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 509 (1982.40)
Church painted this small boat with monumental proportions on Mount Desert. Poet William Cullen Bryant stated of this island off the Atlantic coast of Maine: “It is a rare pleasure to sit on the rocky headlands […] on a day when the fog and sun contend for supremacy, and watch the pictures that the fog makes and unmakes.”
Nature / Sublime America
22 / 23
Mark Rothko
Daugavpils, Latvia 1903–1970 New York
Untitled (Green on Maroon) 1961 Mixed media on canvas, 258 × 229 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 729 (1982.50)
Like other artists of the New York School, Rothko remained linked to the tradition of the sublime through abstraction. This huge canvas of great dramatic and spiritual intensity draws the viewer into it with an overwhelming force. The subtle, expansive light, which expresses universal emotions, stimulates an atmosphere of inner withdrawal and appears all the more beautiful when viewed unhurriedly.
Nature / Sublime America
24 / 25
Charles Burchfield
Ashtabula Harbor 1893–1967 West Seneca
Orion in Winter 1962 Watercolor on paper, 122 × 137 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 482 (1977.6)
The huge watercolors of Burchfield, a long-misunderstood artist who defies classification, represent the deepest mysteries of nature and can be considered part of the American Romantic tradition. His characteristic style of short, dynamic brushstrokes disturbs the calm stillness of the place and conveys a feeling of unease. The work is a nostalgic criticism of the unstoppable industrialization of the modern age.
Nature / Sublime America
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NATURE / EARTH RHYTHMS “I am nature” Jackson Pollock, 1999
Second-generation landscape artists with a growing scientific interest in the natural environment, such as Durand, Inness, and Kensett, began to work outdoors only and came close to the ideals of naturalism. Their desire to capture the constant transformation of nature, the changing effects of light, and the seasons of the year, and to preserve nature in its purest state are in a sense the germ of today’s environmental awareness. Interest in reflecting nature’s metamorphosis continued in the 20th century through abstraction. Dove and Hofmann adopted biomorphic languages, while the paintings of Pollock, Tobey, and Louis captured the essence of the inner forces of nature.
28 / 29
Asher B. Durand Maplewood 1796–1886
A Creek in the Woods 1865 Oil on canvas, 101.6 × 81.9 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 533 (1980.79)
This painting exemplifies the style of Durand and his personal portrayal of the inside of a forest. An advocate of painting from life, he conveys the exuberance of the woodlands of New England, with towering beech trees in the foreground, their monumentality further emphasized by the vertical format, and an almost scientific realism in the rendering of the moss-covered rocks and the sun’s reflection on the bark of the trees.
Nature / Earth Rhythms
30 / 31
Jasper Francis Cropsey
Rossville 1823–1900 Hastings-on-Hudson
Greenwood Lake 1870 Oil on canvas, 97 × 174 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 496 (1983.39)
In this late work, Cropsey, dubbed “America’s painter of autumn,” combines a sweeping view of the lake, amid the explosion of color of the Indian summer that precedes the advent of winter, with a detailed rendering of the vegetation. The panoramic format, deliberately enlarged horizontally, lends greater prominence to the play of the light from the sky and its reflection on the broad horizon with its golden sunset.
Nature / Earth Rhythms
32 / 33
Thomas Moran
Bolton, United Kingdom 1837–1926 Santa Barbara
Hot Springs of Yellowstone Lake 1873 Watercolor on paper, 24.2 × 36.8 cm Thyssen-Bornemisza Collections, inv. 1982.25
In 1871, Moran joined Ferdinand V. Hayden’s geological expedition to the northwest region of Wyoming and Yellowstone. The many sketches he made during the trip express the immensity of the striking scenery. The tiny figures in the center and background of the composition represent the indigenous population of this region, whose lives were disrupted by the arrival of the expeditions.
Nature / Earth Rhythms
34 / 35
William Merritt Chase Nineveh 1849–1916 New York
Shinnecock Hills 1893–97 Oil on panel, 44.4 × 54.6 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 502 (1979.30)
At his school on Long Island, Chase encouraged pupils to work outdoors, coming face to face with nature. This helped spread Impressionism in America. This brightly lit landscape shows the area surrounding his home. The artist turns his back on the ocean and concentrates on depicting the vegetation-covered dunes that separated the dry land from the seashore and the effects of the light in the sky.
Nature / Earth Rhythms
36 / 37
Jackson Pollock
Cody, 1912–The Springs, 1956
Untitled c. 1945 Pastel, brush and enamel, and sgraffito on paper 65 × 52 cm Thyssen-Bornemisza Collections, inv. 1978.18
The lights and shadows, winding gestural movements, and contrasts between smooth and rough surfaces in this work hint at the rhythms of nature and herald the artist’s characteristic drip paintings. Using this technique of spilling paint onto the support, in the late 1940s Pollock avoided bodily contact with the canvas placed on the floor, emulating, as he put it, “the method of the Indian sand painters of the West.”
Nature / Earth Rhythms
38 / 39
Morris Louis
Baltimore 1912–1962 Washington
Pillars of Hercules 1960 Acrylic on canvas, 231.1 × 267.3 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 653 (1983.18)
Louis refrained from intervening in a painting’s execution process, acting instead as a mere “facilitator” by allowing the colors to run over the surface, driven by the force of gravity present in nature. In accordance with his refined technique of pouring on thin glazes, the Magna acrylic paint, greatly diluted with turpentine, very quickly soaked into the canvas, staining it and irreversibly becoming part of it.
Nature / Earth Rhythms
40 / 41
NATURE / HUMAN IMPACT
Human activity has had a huge impact on nature and still does. When the first settlers arrived in the New World, that vast territory was completely covered in trees. Colonial expansion and the growth of cities and ports led to a considerable loss of natural heritage. The first American landscape painters perceived the human impact on nature, in tune with the incipient conservationist moment. This realization is highly relevant to the present age of environmental awareness. Artists often reacted by denouncing the excesses of exploitation. At other times they turned their backs on civilization to exalt lost wildernesses or to show humankind’s unequal struggle with the forces of nature.
42 / 43
Fitz Henry Lane Gloucester 1804–1865
The Fort and Ten Pound Island, Gloucester, Massachusetts 1847 Oil on canvas, 50.8 × 76.2 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 635 (1982.43)
This bustling scene depicts the activity at the colonial port of Gloucester, the oldest in the United States, with Ten Pound Island in the background. The realism of the narrative elements in the foreground, where several fishermen go about their everyday tasks, is combined with an interest in exploring the passage of time in painting through human activity.
Nature / Human Impact
44 / 45
Francis Silva New York 1835–1886
Kingston Point, Hudson River c. 1873 Oil on canvas, 51 × 91 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 760 (1985.10)
This place had been a farming settlement of the Algonquin people before the first Dutch explorers arrived. Beginning in the 18th century, Kingston became one of the most important trading centers along the Hudson River. In this somewhat magical view of the village, Luminist painter Silva deliberately avoids showing the industrialization of the area, possibly to make a statement about the loss of unspoiled nature.
Nature / Human Impact
46 / 47
Winslow Homer
Boston 1836–1910 Prouts Neck
Deer in the Adirondacks 1889 Watercolor on paper, 35.5 × 50.7 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 590 (1981.43)
Homer often depicted humans’ struggle against the forces of nature and their invasive presence in uncolonized lands. This watercolor masterfully reflects the silent calm of the Adirondack Mountains disturbed only by a dog chasing a deer. This hunting technique, now banned on account of its cruelty, involved the dog driving the deer into the water, where the hunter awaited it.
Nature / Human Impact
48 / 49
2/CULTURE CROSSINGS
Martin Johnson Heade Lumberville 1819–1904 St. Augustine
Singing Beach, Manchester 1862 Oil on canvas, 63.5 × 127 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 577 (1985.9) [ detail ]
50 / 51
CULTURE CROSSINGS/ SETTINGS “He liked this beautiful shore more than any other part of our coast. It went well with his character. It’s simple without being monotonous and varied without being rough or wild. The calm and refinement, as well as the good climate, the few pleasant people to be found and the interest he applied to his studies all combined to calm him and benefit him mentally and physically.”
The land is both a physical element and a cultural symbol. It also has a political dimension. From the time Europe came into contact with America, the settlers seized land from the native peoples and ran plantations with slave labor; these were the two cornerstones of the colonial order. Some communities appear in 19th-century American landscape paintings, though others remained invisible to artists. Many of those works are appealing idealizations of the places depicted in them.
Sanford Robinson Gifford, 1965
52 / 53
William Louis Sonntag East Liberty 1822–1900 New York
Fishermen in the Adirondacks c. 1860–70 Oil on canvas, 91.4 × 142.2 cm Carmen Thyssen Collection, inv. ctb.1981.21
The Adirondacks in upstate New York were a symbol of the national spirit until the American Civil War. Sonntag captures the fog, a leafy forest, and crystalline waters in this sublime mountain scene. Instead of Native Americans, he depicts white fishermen and a log cabin with a smoking chimney in the background – an allusion to the taming of the landscape.
Culture Crossings / Settings
54 / 55
Sanford Robinson Gifford Greenfield 1823–1880 New York
Manchester Beach 1865 Oil on canvas, 27.9 × 48.9 cm Thyssen-Bornemisza Collections, inv. 1980.21
Gifford, who served as a volunteer in the Civil War, painted scenery deeply imbued with emotion. The impact of the armed conflict on the environment and human lives influenced landscape painting. The nature represented in these pictures hinders the spectator’s view of what lies beyond through obstacles such as the sea and mountains. The rock formations, in turn, point to the interest there was in explaining the history of such a young country through geology.
Culture Crossings / Settings
56 / 57
Charles Willson Peale
Queen Anne’s County 1741–1827 Philadelphia
The Stewart Children c. 1773–74 Oil on canvas, 94 × 124 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 315 (1980.36)
Isabella and John, the children of Scottish merchant and landowner Anthony Stewart, pose as Adam and Eve in a nature setting. They hold peaches from the family plantation – a fruit that originated from China, where it is a symbol of longevity. Peale learned from his master John Singleton Copley to represent sitters dressed in anachronistic courtly attire. The children were British subjects, as indicated by the colors of their clothes, replicating those of the flag.
Culture Crossings / Settings
58 / 59
CULTURE CROSSINGS/ HEMISPHERE “a view of such unparalleled magnificence [...] that I must pronounce it one of the great wonders of Nature [...] My ideal of the Cordilleras is realized.” Frederic Edwin Church crossed the border into Ecuador from Colombia on 25 August 1853 and summed up the landscape before his eyes in these words.
The territory of the United States has been expanding ever since it was founded in 1776. In 1823, President James Monroe ennunciated the famous “Monroe Doctrine.” This doctrine opposed foreign interference in the Western Hemisphere and established the United States as the leader of the American continent at a time when it was becoming free from European control. The lands of Latin America were soon viewed as magical and mysterious places in the US imaginary. When the American explorers set foot in those regions to exploit them economically, the artists accompanying them painted attractive unspoiled landscapes for spectators to traverse in their mind’s eye. These works do not show the large plantations, trading ports, or railroad lines that helped the United States spread its influence throughout the Americas.
60 / 61
Frederic Edwin Church Hartford 1826–1900 New York
Tropical Landscape c. 1855 Oil on canvas, 28 × 41.3 cm Carmen Thyssen Collection, inv. ctb.1990.5
Church visited Latin America in 1853, following the trails blazed by US explorers. Influenced by the ideas of geographer Alexander von Humboldt, the artist depicted harmonious landscapes that catered to the taste of his North American patrons with economic interests in the region.This view, with a prominent palm tree, lush vegetation, several soaring birds, and a slightly hazy appearance, is a generic representation of an equatorial tropical landscape. The figures in the canoe add a picturesque touch to the scene.
Culture Crossings / Hemisphere
62 / 63
George Catlin
Wilkes-Barre 1796–1872 Jersey City
The Falls of Saint Anthony 1871 Oil on cardboard, 46 × 63.5 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 487 (1981.54)
Owámniomni ( turbulent waters ), the ancestral land of the Dakota people, was renamed Saint Anthony by a missionary. French, English, and Spanish settlers vied for it until 1820, when the United States built Fort Snelling using slave labor to defend it. Catlin visited the region in 1835 and painted landscapes and scenes with native peoples. This composition is part of a set of copies made in 1871, which he attempted to sell to Congress.
Culture Crossings / Hemisphere
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CULTURE CROSSINGS/ INTERACTIONS I
This section analyzes the complex differences and interests of various communities living in the United States. The British settlers and their descendants asserted their role as civilizers, though it threatened the native way of life. At the same time, they were fascinated by the native culture and regretted its tragic fate. This situation prompted the indigenous peoples to take a stance, either siding with the invaders or opposing them. Concurrently, African Americans developed complex cultures that have often been misinterpreted and distorted over time.
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Karl Bodmer
Zurich, Switzerland 1809–1893 Barbizon, France
The Travellers meeting with Minatarre Indians near Fort Clark 1832–34 Hand-colored print, 27 × 36.3 cm Carmen Thyssen Collection
Bodmer visited many indigenous villages from 1832 to 1834 while employed by German explorer, ethnographer, and naturalist Prince Maximilian of Wied-Neuwied to illustrate his expedition around the Great Plains region. On returning to Europe, the pair published a book containing Maximilian’s observations on the indigenous fauna, flora, and artifacts and Bodmer’s drawings. The artist did not hesitate to select, mix, and add elements in his illustrations to fascinate Western viewers. Both
Culture Crossings / Interactions I
men are portrayed on the right of The Travellers meeting with Minatarre Indians near Fort Clark. The prints show typical features of Indian culture, such as male body decoration commemorating feats of war ; hats and medals of peace – Western objects that were regarded as prestigious by the indigenous people and were exchanged by white traders for animal pelts or military protection ; and handicrafts created by women, who were in charge of domestic life in nations such as the Mandan.
68 / 69
Anthony Thieme
Rotterdam, The Netherlands 1888–1954 Greenwich
Cabins near Saint Augustine, Florida c. 1947–48 Oil on canvas, 63.5 × 76.5 cm Carmen Thyssen Collection, inv. ctb.1999.113
Florida, a Spanish possession until 1818, became one of the United States in the mid-19th century. Its main activity was sugar and cotton plantations employing slave labor. Here Thieme, a painter of rural areas, depicts himself sitting beside one of the cabins. The bright colors contrast powerfully with the squalid dwelling conditions of the African American community, who lived on the edge of a swamp.
Culture Crossings / Interactions I
70 / 71
James Goodwyn Clonney
Liverpool, United Kingdom 1812–1867 Binghamton
Fishing Party on Long Island Sound off New Rochelle 1847 Oil on canvas, 66 × 92.7 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 91 (1981.28)
Here Clonney, who specialized in painting genre scenes, depicts a hostile situation with a comical slant. The gaze of the black-hatted man contrasts with the peaceful expression of the boy who is fishing. The reclining figure rests his hand on a hoe, threatening to use it if he is bothered. The clouds on the right of the canvas add drama to the composition.
Culture Crossings / Interactions I
72 / 73
Frederic Remington Canton 1861–1909 Ridgefield
Apache Fire Signal c. 1904 Oil on canvas, 102 × 68.5 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 722 (1981.57)
After visiting the American West, Remington portrayed the life and customs of the indigenous communities, such as the San Carlos Reservation ( Arizona ), from which he drew inspiration for this work. An Apache Indian is doing the night watch. The rider’s hunched back and the tree trunk hindering the horse’s path suggest the impossibility of progressing in the modern turn-of-the century world. The narrow range of colors lends the picture an air of mystery.
Culture Crossings / Interactions I
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CULTURE CROSSINGS/ INTERACTIONS II “It is not my aim to paint about the Negro in terms of propaganda… [but] the life of my people as I know it… My intention is to reveal through pictorial complexity the life I know.”
The distinguishing features and differences between the many communities that populate the United States were particularly evident in urban settings. The taste for the exotic, especially Asian and Italian culture after the American Civil War, coexisted in the city alongside Jewish pride and workers’ movements. Another group, women, was notable for its pioneering role in the fields of the arts and humanities. And a large portion of the African American population of the South moved to the cities of the Northeast and West Coast in search of equal opportunities during the Great Migration of the 20th century.
Romare Bearden, 1969
76 / 77
Romare Bearden
Charlotte 1911–1988 New York
Sunday after Sermon 1969 Collage on cardboard, 101.6 × 127 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 462 (1978.8)
Bearden, an African American activist and multifaceted artist, depicts a social gathering in the street – possibly in the rural South from which his family fled, escaping from racism. The figures have different skin tones in order to counteract stereotypes and express the diversity of African American people. Although apparently simple, the picture combines historical allusions with references to folk culture, such as 17th-century Dutch paintings of indoor scenes and patchwork fabrics.
Culture Crossings / Interactions II
78 / 79
John Singer Sargent
Florence, Italy 1856–1925 London, United Kingdom
Venetian Onion Seller c. 1880–82 Oil on canvas, 95 × 70 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 731 (1979.56)
Sargent, a cosmopolitan American, achieved international fame for his bold painted portraits of members of high society. In this painting, however, the glistening onions and the girl’s humble clothing underline her working-class status. The picture provides a visual contrast between the young woman framed by a drab indoor space, which functions as a negative image, and the gleaming city seen through the window.
Culture Crossings / Interactions II
80 / 81
Ben Shahn
Kaunas, Lithuania 1898–1969 New York
French Workers 1942 Tempera on cardboard, 101.6 × 144.8 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 753 (1975.34)
Ben Shahn, a Jewish emigrant who fled the Czarist regime, shows a group of French workers protesting against the official decree of Vichy, which forced the French proletariat to collaborate with the Nazi regime. At a time when fascination with technology was predominant in America, Shahn’s attention to the workers ’ hands signals, humanizes, and empowers the working class.
Culture Crossings / Interactions II
82 / 83
3/URBAN SPACE
Raphael Soyer
Borisoglebsk, Russia 1899–1987 New York
Girl with Red Hat c. 1940 Oil on canvas, 76.8 × 43.2 cm Carmen Thyssen Collection, inv. ctb.1980.81 [ detail ]
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URBAN SPACE / MODERN SUBJECT “[my art is] always self-portraiture, always autobiographic […] your work is what you are. You look at the world through yourself” Raphael Soyer
From the 19th century onward, American cities attracted millions of people. Besides the mass migration of African Americans who fled from the southern states, European immigrants entered the country via New York. As a result, the great metropolises became the most evident showcase of the country’s extraordinary diversity. Many artists were attracted to individuals among the urban crowd and captured with their brushes the vicissitudes, hopes, and misfortunes of the new modern subject. Their works reflect the contradictions of life in the city – a place of promises and opportunities but also of great inequality, solitude, and alienation.
86 / 87
Winslow Homer
Boston 1836–1910 Prouts Neck
Portrait of Helena de Kay c. 1872 Oil on panel, 31 × 47 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 591 (1983.25)
Following the American Civil War, Homer, one of its main illustrators, painted a series of contemplative female figures. Helena de Kay, an artist and cultural promoter, sat for him when they both had studios on Tenth Street in New York. The similarities with Whistler’s Mother, painted by Whistler in 1871, point to a possible source of inspiration.
Urban Space / Modern Subject
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Charles Demuth Lancaster 1883–1935
Love, Love, Love. Homage to Gertrude Stein 1928 Oil on panel, 51 × 53 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 521 (1973.56)
Demuth was one of the first avantgarde American artists. In this work, part of a series of symbolic portraits of painters and authors, writer Gertrude Stein’s facial features have been replaced by emblems. The meaning of the mask is indecipherable, though the numbers and the appearance of the word “love” three times seem to be a reference to the sitter’s fondness for the number three.
Urban Space / Modern Subject
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Edward Hopper
Nyack 1882–1967 New York
Hotel Room 1931 Oil on canvas, 152.4 × 165.7 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 594 (1977.110)
The solitude of modern cities was one of the central themes of Hopper’s work. In this large canvas, the first of his series set in hotels, a young woman in her underclothing stares at a piece of paper – a train timetable, we are told by the artist’s wife. The engrossed figure contrasts with the depersonalized room where a powerful overhead light illuminates intense color planes.
Urban Space / Modern Subject
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URBAN SPACE / THE CITY
Beginning in the late 19th century, New York’s landscape continually changed and expanded. Its skyscrapers, industrial development, and transport networks made it the modern city par excellence and a muse and world capital of art after World War II. The works in this section survey the new manners of exploring and perceiving urban space: Max Weber and John Marin, pioneers of the American avant-garde, capture its dynamism and overwhelmingly huge size; others, such as Charles Sheeler, are fascinated by its layout and geometry, and its promise of order and progress. And the new realist movements of the 1960s reflect its excesses and its shiny surfaces full of stimuli, making it a backdrop to anonymous encounters where lack of communication prevails.
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Richard Estes Kewanee 1932
Telephone Booths 1967 Acrylic on Masonite, 122 × 175.3 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 539 (1977.93)
Richard Estes was one of the foremost practitioners of 1960s Photorealism. Telephone Booths contains all the visual information a camera can capture. The geometric and orderly appearance of the street furniture contrasts with the confusion reflected in the metal and glass and the vaguely visible forms inside the booths.
Urban Space / The City
96 / 97
Charles Sheeler
Philadelphia 1883–1965 Dobbs Ferry
Canyons 1951 Oil on canvas, 63.5 × 56 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 757 (1973.6)
Sheeler captured his view of the city in photographs, movies, and paintings in a style known as Precisionism. Here the artist reduces the imposing architecture to superimposed outlines and shadows using a language close to Cubism. As the title indicates, this urban view is likened to the geological formations found all over the United States, and the spaces between the skyscrapers recall large canyons.
Urban Space / The City
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URBAN SPACE/ URBAN LEISURE AND CULTURE
The modern concept of leisure arose as a consequence of better organized working hours and city dwellers’ need for new escape mechanisms. In the mid-19th century, the local authorities promoted resting and recreation areas in public parks to provide green spaces as an outlet to cope with increased crowding. Rural and coastal areas too became reachable destinations for all the social classes following the extension of the train and subway networks. Cultural expressions spread rapidly and became accessible to everyone thanks to the radio, movies, and illustrations. The early avant-garde artists turned to music in their pursuit of an alternative to representational art. The frenzied rhythm of jazz was given visual form in compositions where artists shunned European models and sought a national identity of their own.
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John Sloan
Lock Haven, 1871–1951 Hanover
Throbbing Fountain, Madison Square 1907 Oil on canvas, 66 × 81.5 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 761 (1979.2)
At the beginning of the 20th century, social realist Sloan challenged academic tastes and portrayed the ups and downs of urban life in America. His strolls around New York often took him to Madison Square in Lower Manhattan. He noted in his diary that the fountain there attracted “men and women and children watching it and in many cases feeling its sensuous charm.”
Urban Space / Urban Leisure and Culture
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Stuart Davis
Philadelphia 1892–1964 New York
Pochade 1956–58 Oil on canvas, 132.1 × 152.4 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 514 (1977.38)
Davis wished to create an equivalent to jazz in painting by capturing in his pictures the joy, speed, and rhythm of this music. His working method also resembled that of a musician, as he produced variations on elements used in earlier compositions. Visible on the left side of the canvas are a vertically positioned grand piano and the letters “s” and “cat,” a reference to scats ( vocal improvisations ) in a jam session.
Urban Space / Urban Leisure and Culture
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Arthur Dove
Canandaigua 1880–1946 Huntington
Orange Grove in California, by Irving Berlin 1927 Oil on cardboard, 51 × 38 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 531 (1975.52)
Dove is considered a pioneer in abstraction in the United States. Fascinated by jazz, in 1927 he produced six works inspired by several pieces of popular American music. The winding lines that cross the composition, executed while he listened to Irving Berlin’s Orange Grove in California over and over again on his phonograph, reflect the syncopated rhythms of this melody.
Urban Space / Urban Leisure and Culture
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Ben Shahn
Kaunas, Lithuania 1898–1969 New York
Carnival 1946 Tempera on Masonite, 56 × 75.5 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 756 (1979.71)
Shahn was one of the leading figures of American social realism. A painter and photographer, he immortalized in his photographs the effects of the Great Depression and later based a few paintings on them, such as Carnival. However, by eliminating all superfluous details from the composition, he lends the scene a surreal appearance and turns it into a reflection on the human condition.
Urban Space / Urban Leisure and Culture
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Frank Stella Malden, 1936
Untitled 1966 Acrylic on canvas, 91.5 × 91.5 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 765 (1983.31)
Frank Stella and the other artists belonging to the minimalist movement took their rejection of illusionism to an extreme. As he himself stated: “My painting is based on the fact that only what can be seen there is there. It really is an object. Any painting is an object and anyone who gets involved in this finally has to face up to the objectness of whatever it is that he’s doing. He is making a thing.”
Urban Space / Urban Leisure and Culture
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4/MATERIAL CULTURE
Roy Lichtenstein New York 1923–1997
Woman in Bath 1963 Oil and Magna on canvas, 173.3 × 173.3 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 648 (1978.92) [ detail]
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MATERIAL CULTURE / TEMPUS FUGIT
Tempus fugit is a Latin expression that conveys the inevitability of death. This concept is present in still-life paintings, where an array of somber elements insistently reminds spectators of their mortality: tobacco smoke, a biscuit with a bite taken out of it, the tang of a lemon, a stuffed bird, or shards of glass. Death is also connected to the other two sections in this room. It links up with Rituals, where war weapons and burial sites are shown, and also with Voluptas, which regards bodies and fruits as a stage in the same life cycle.
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William Michael Harnett Clonakilty, Ireland 1848–1892 New York
Materials for a Leisure Hour 1879 Oil on canvas, 38 × 51.5 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 574 (1979.69)
The combination of differently textured surfaces (metal, paper, wood) and pipe smoke is an invitation to contemplation, a longed-for activity after the end of the American Civil War, when tobacco consumption skyrocketed in the country. Harnett specialized in painting still-life arrangements in which consumed objects or a dated newspaper hint at the fleetingness of life.
Material Culture / Tempus Fugit
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Joseph Cornell
Nyack 1903–1972 Flushing
Blue Soap Bubble 1949–50 Construction, 24.5 × 30.5 × 9.6 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 492 (1978.11)
Cornell’s work was clearly influenced by a few Surrealist artists who fled to New York following the outbreak of World War II. This solitary artist composed his magical artifacts from found objects – as in this box, which contains childhood memories and is a reflection on the meaning of life: the sea ( the blue box), the planets ( the silver balls ), the family ( the glasses and cylinders ), and a soap bubble ( the metal ring ).
Material Culture / Tempus Fugit
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MATERIAL CULTURE / VOLUPTAS
Sensual enjoyment plays an essential role in these “living” still-life paintings. The scent of flowers, women’s curves, the taste of fruit, the fizzing sound of cider bubbles, and the feel of a sponge lend the canvas a more corporeal dimension. Time seems to stand still in them. The different formal approaches to still life attest to its importance in the history of Western art.
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James Rosenquist
Grand Forks 1933–2017 New York
Smoked Glass 1962 Oil on canvas, 61 × 81.5 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, inv. 728 (1977.20)
Pinup girls became icons in the 1940s. Their appearance in Pop Art twenty years later revived male fantasies of the period. In three juxtaposed sequences, Rosenquist connects motoring and tobacco with a pair of sensuously parted lips exhaling smoke. The image invites the viewer to dream of a pleasure trip with their owner.
Material Culture / Voluptas
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Lee Krasner
New York 1908–1984
Red, White, Blue, Yellow, Black 1939 Collage and oil on paper, 63.5 × 48.6 cm Thyssen-Bornemisza Collections, inv. 1978.9
Krasner learned from Hans Hofmann to produce series, simplifying objects to the extent of reducing them to schematic patches, and to use contrasting cold and warm colors. Here she employs abstract forms in the three primary colors: yellow, red, and blue.
Material Culture / Voluptas
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Paul Lacroix
[France] 1827–1869 New York
The Abundance of Summer n.d. Oil on canvas, 64 × 76.5 cm Carmen Thyssen Collection, inv. ctb.1991.9
The image highlights the fertility of American soil and its produce. The sensuality of the gloss and the rounded and curling forms echo the fizzing of the cider in the glass. Corn was the most common crop grown by the Native American peoples, who showed the settlers how to sow it. Watermelons, in contrast, came from Africa, the continent that supplied European traders with slaves, as well as various products for the New World.
Material Culture / Voluptas
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MATERIAL CULTURE/ RITUALS
The complex universe of indigenous culture is expressed in a broad variety of forms ranging from dance, beading, and jewelry to pottery, basketry, and painting. Thanks to Karl Bodmer’s prints, we are familiar with a few native objects and rituals. Two are inventories of artifacts designed for war or play belonging to different communities. The scenes of worship are highly lyrical images of deities and burial places that illustrate the connection between elements of nature and living beings. The buffalo found in some drawings was venerated by indigenous peoples on account of everything they obtained from it: food from its flesh, clothing from its pelts, tools from its bones, and ropes from its tendons; even buffalo skulls were used for protection.
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Karl Bodmer
Zurich, Switzerland 1809–1893 Barbizon, 1893
Offering of the Mandan Indians 1832–34 Hand-colored print, 43 × 60 cm Carmen Thyssen Collection
The Mandan were semisedentarian: they cultivated their fields and hunted for buffalo, whose meat they ate and pelts they employed to dress among other uses. The Mandan held yearround rituals to attract and secure buffalo. The importance of this animal is highlighted in the engraving, which shows how buffalo skulls were utilized to protect the burial sites containing their ancestors’ remains and ritual offerings.
Material Culture / Rituals
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HISTORICAL MAP OF THE UNITED STATES
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CANADA Mi
1846
Occupied by the United States and Great Britain
sso
Vice ro 18 19 y a l t y o f S and 182 1 pa in bo rd , late er be r Me x ic an t w e e n terr it ory
WYOMING 1890
Yosemite National Park
CALIFORNIA 1850
SOUTH DAKOTA 1889
Denver
UTAH 1896
Annexed during the Mexican−American War
WISCONSIN Oshkosh 1848
Fort Snelling
Louisiana Purchase ss Mi ri
KANSAS 1861
R i ver
Purchased from Mexico
1845
Indigenous nations Dakota Algonquin Assiniboin
Texas annexation
Dividing line between the Union States and Confederate States in the Civil War, 1861−65
Cincinnati
v
ME
SOUTH CAROLINA
MISSISSIPPI 1817
VE
Adirondack Mountains
GEORGIA
ALABAMA 1819
Lake George NY Hudson River
St. Augustine
LOUISIANA 1812
White Mountains
1819
Prouts Neck
NH
Gloucester Singing Beach
MA The Berkshires
Catskill Mountains
CT
Spanish cession
Cape Cod
RI
Nantucket
Long Island Sound PA FLORIDA 1845
Greenwood Shinnecock Hills Lake NJ
Toms River
100 KM
Other US territories Dakota, Hidatsa, Lakota and Mandan
Sac and Fox
Mohican Johnston Atoll (1858) Kingman Reef (1922)
Alaska
Midway Atoll (1867) Hawaii
Palmyra Atoll (1900) Jarvis Island (1857)
500 KM
Atlantic Ocean
MEXICO
Sioux
Cheyenne
VIRGINIA
NORTH CAROLINA
Gulf of Mexico Crow
DELAWARE
KENTUCKY 1792
TEXAS 1845
Mohawk
Baltimore
Washington D.C. WEST VIRGINIA
ARKANSAS 1836
Fort Worth
New York Philadelphia NEW JERSEY
MARYLAND
TENNESSEE 1796
i p pi River
OKLAHOMA 1907 NEW MEXICO 1912
OHIO 1803
Miss is s
1853
500 KM
Blackfoot
ARIZONA 1912
i oR Ohi
St. Louis
MISSOURI 1821
Los Angeles
1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hid algo border
Detroit
PENNSYLVANIA
INDIANA 1816
ILLINOIS 1818
Boston
MASSACHUSETTS Providence Hartford RHODE ISLAND CONNECTICUT Montclair
Chicago
IOWA 1846
1803
NEW HAMPSHIRE
NEW YORK MICHIGAN 1837
COLORADO 1876
1848
1776
Territory of the original thirteen States
Minneapolis
MAINE 1820
VERMONT 1791
Year of entry
New colonies
ou
Pacific Ocean
MINNESOTA 1858
NEBRASKA 1867
NEVADA 1864
1783
Mississip
Little Big Horn Yellowstone National Park
IDAHO 1890
STATE
British cession NORTH DAKOTA 1889
MONTANA 1889
Expedition of Prince Maximilian of Wied−Neuwied with Karl Bodmer (1832−34)
OREGON 1859
1818
u ri R iv e r
er
WASHINGTON 1889
Riv pi er
This map shows the changing appearance of the American territory and its inhabitants, from the ancestral lands of various indigenous peoples to the territorial expansion of the United States from 1776 to the present day. The main cities, geographical features, and historical processes alluded to in the exhibition are identified on the map.
Baker and Howland Islands American Samoa (1899) (1857)
US Virgin Islands (1917) Puerto Rico (1898) Navassa Island (1857)
Northern Mariana Islands (1947) Wake Island (1899) Guam (1898)
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THREE DECADES OF COLLECTING AMERICAN ART. CHRONOLOGY
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1950
1963
1973
Hans Heinrich ThyssenBornemisza purchases a series of prints by Swiss artist Karl Bodmer showing indigenous life in the United States.
The baron acquires his first American artwork: Brown and Silver I by Jackson Pollock.
He buys 5 works from the collection of American gallerist Edith Gregor Halpert and a further 3 twentieth-century pieces, including Love, Love, Love. Homage to Gertrude Stein by Charles Demuth.
1976
The United States celebrates the bicentennial of its founding and the baron attends many of the commemorative exhibitions. The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York stages a show that features nineteenthand twentieth-century works and asserts the modernity of the American landscape tradition.
1977
1979
A busy year for collecting: 30 more American paintings join the Thyssen Collection, including the first nineteenth-century work: Gallow’s Island, Bermuda by Winslow Homer.
The baron begins loaning works from his American art collection to the country’s embassies through the “Art in Embassies” program promoted by the US government: he sends 3 pictures to Moscow, one of them Georgia O’Keeffe’s From the Plains II; and another to Mexico, Charles Sheeler’s Wind, Sea and Sail. Over the next 10 years he lends works to the US embassies in Paris, London, and Budapest and to the Swiss embassy in Washington.
Catalog of one of the US bicentennial exhibitions, The Natural Paradise: Painting in America 1800–1950 (MoMA, 1976)
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19791980
The first touring exhibition of the collection, America & Europe: A Century of Modern Masters from the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection, travels around Australia and New Zealand.
Catalog of the exhibition America & Europe: A Century of Modern Masters from the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection
1980
1982
19821983
19831988
The baron acquires 45 American artworks, among them the costliest piece in that collection, Signal of Distress by Winslow Homer, and the first eighteenthcentury work, The Stewart Children by Charles Willson Peale.
A further 2 paintings are loaned to the US embassy in Paris: Cicada Woods by Charles Burchfield and Red, White, Blue, Yellow, Black by Lee Krasner.
The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston stages the exhibition NineteenthCentury American Landscape Painting: Selections from the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection.
Start of the international touring exhibition American Masters: The Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection, which travels to the Vatican Museums in Rome, the Baltimore Museum of Art, the Detroit Institute of Arts, the Denver Art Museum, the Marion Koogler McNay Art Institute in San Antonio, the IBM Gallery of Science and Art in New York, the San Diego Museum of Art, the Society of the Four Arts in Palm Beach, the Centro Nacional de Exposiciones in Madrid, and the Palau de la Virreina in Barcelona.
Catalog of the exhibition Nineteenth-Century American Landscape Painting: Selections from the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection → Opening of the show American Masters: The ThyssenBornemisza Collection at the Vatican Museums, Rome, 1983
1985
Significant diplomatic collaboration at the first summit between Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev at the Fleur d’Eau palace in Geneva, through the loan of several works. Singing Beach, Manchester by Martin Johnson Heade is hung in pride of place in the meeting room.
↑ Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev at the Geneva summit in 1985
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1986
19861987
1990
1992
Baron Thyssen lends 7 nineteenth-century paintings to the US embassy in Budapest, the capital of a Soviet Union satellite state. One of the works is George Inness’s In the Berkshires.
Publication of the catalogues raisonnés of nineteenth- and twentieth-century American art in the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection.
The baron acquires Boats Moored on a Pond, painted around 1890−1902 by John Henry Twachtman. By now, his collection contains nearly 300 pieces of American art.
The exhibition Two Hundred Years of American Paintings from the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection tours Japan. It is shown at the Hyogo Prefectural Museum of Art, the Nagoya City Art Museum, the Bunkamura Museum of Art, and the Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art.
19921993
In 1992, the ThyssenBornemisza Collection is moved to its current venue in Madrid, and the following year Baron Thyssen sells 775 works of art from his collection to the Spanish state, among them 188 American artworks.
19932021 Since then, the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza has continued to hold exhibitions of American Art: Exploring Eden: Nineteenth-Century American Landscape Painting ( 2000–01 ), Richard Estes ( 2007 ), Hopper ( 2012 ), Hyperrealism, 1967–2012 ( 2013 ), Pop Art Myths ( 2014 ), American Impressionism ( 2014−15 ), Wyeth: Andrew and Jamie in the Studio ( 2016 ), and Georgia O’Keeffe ( 2021 ).
Baron Hans Heinrich ThyssenBornemisza during the transfer of the works from his collection to Madrid, 1992 → Catalogues raisonnés: Nineteenth-Century American Painting (1986) by Barbara Novak and Twentieth-Century American painting (1987) by Gail Levin
Catalog of the exhibition that toured Japan Two Hundred Years of American Paintings from the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection
→ Catalog of the exhibition of American art held at the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza: Exploring Eden: NineteenthCentury American Landscape Painting (2000)
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INITIATIVES RELATED TO THE EXHIBITION The online exhibition, activities, publications, additional contents... The Museo Nacional ThyssenBornemisza has organised a variety of initiatives to promote a wider appreciation of the subject of the temporary exhibition.
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The online exhibition
Explanatory video American Art from the Thyssen Collection With Alba Campo Rosillo Alba Campo Rosillo, the Terra Foundation for American Art fellow, offers visitors a deeper insight into the complexities of American art and culture.
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The online exhibition
Podcast American Art from the Thyssen Collection
Music on Spotify American Art from the Thyssen Collection
In this podcast the exhibition curator Alba Campo Rosillo talks about the research project funded by the Terra Foundation for American Art to study and re-envision the museum’s collection of American art.
The museum has compiled a playlist of songs by Ella Fitzgerald, Nina Simone, Billie Holiday, Lauryn Hill and others to add another dimension to the exhibition.
Running time: 32 min 32 s
Listen on en iVoox Listen on Spotify
Listen on Spotify
Listen on Apple Podcasts
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The online exhibition
Watch on Instagram The exhibition curator Alba Campo Rosillo discusses the painter John Singleton Copley
Live on social media American Art from the Thyssen Collection
John Singleton Copley, Portrait of Mrs. Joshua Henshaw II (Catherine Hill), c. 1772
Watch on Instagram
Watch on Instagram
Alba Campo Rosillo, the exhibition curator, introduces the temporary exhibition American Art from the Thyssen Collection
Alba Campo Rosillo, the exhibition curator, introduces the portrait of Isabella and John Stewart
Albert Bierstadt, Evening on the Prairie, c. 1870
Charles Willson Peale, The Stewart Children, c. 1773–74
Watch on Instagram
The exhibition curator Alba Campo Rosillo presents Autumn, 1875, by Frederic Edwin Church
Frederic Edwin Church, Autumn, 1875
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The online exhibition
Watch on Instagram
Live on social media American Art from the Thyssen Collection
Clara Marcellán, the museum’s modern painting curator, invites us to discover the painter Georgia O’Keeffe Georgia O’Keeffe, New York Street with Moon, 1925
Watch on Instagram
Watch on Instagram
Alba Campo Rosillo, the exhibition curator, invites us to discover the painter John Singer Sargent
Marta Ruiz del Árbol, the museum’s modern painting curator, invites us to discover the painter Georgia O’Keeffe
John Singer Sargent, Portrait of Millicent, Duchess of Sutherland, 1904
Georgia O’Keeffe, Shell and Old Shingle V, 1926
Watch on Instagram The exhibition curator Alba Campo Rosillo introduces Sunday after Sermon, 1969, by Romare Bearden
Romare Bearden, Sunday after Sermon, 1969
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Activities Museo Nacional Thyssen Bornemisza has designed a variety of initiatives to provide audiences of all kinds with a richer experience of the temporary exhibition.
Lecture series and international symposium American Art from the Thyssen Collection In late January and February the Modern Painting department will organise a series of lectures by the museum’s artistic director, Guillermo Solana, and team of curators. There will also be an international symposium. More information
A Work in Depth American Art from the Thyssen Collection Guided tours for adults Friends of the Museum In-person activity where Friends of the Museum can experience a work from the collection in a more direct, meaningful and interactive way. Standing in front of the selected painting, they will be able to share their thoughts, ideas and interpretations, ultimately creating a richer appreciation of the painting. On each occasion, a curator from the museum’s old and modern painting departments will facilitate the conversation between the participants. More information
Jasper Francis Cropsey, Greenwood Lake, 1870
Henry Lewis, Falls of Saint Anthony, Upper Mississippi, 1847
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Publication
American Art from the Thyssen Collection Catalogue with texts by the curators Paloma Alarcó and Alba Campo Rosillo; the museum's modern painting curators Clara Marcellán and Marta Ruiz del Árbol; and the American art experts Wendy Bellion, Kirsten Pai Buick, David Peters Corbett, Catherine Craft, Karl Kusserow, Michael Lobel and Verónica Uribe Hanabergh.
Additional contents
Clara Marcellán “New Sources for the Study of A Grandmother ” Open Windows 6 ( December 2014 ), pp. 15–18
Read online George Bellows, A Grandmother, 1914
Available for purchase online
AMERICAN ART FROM THE THYSSEN COLLECTION
Marta Ruiz del Árbol “An Exception in European Collecting: Baron ThyssenBornemisza and Ninteenthcentury American Painting” Open Windows 7 ( May 2016 ), pp. 2–6
Read online Jackson Pollock, Brown and Silver I, c. 1951
Discover other resources, activities and publications on the exhibition microsite: www.museothyssen.org/en/exhibitions/american-art-thyssencollection
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Additional information
Exhibition fact sheet
Practical information
Title American Art from the Thyssen Collection
Address Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza Paseo del Prado, 8 28014 Madrid
Organised by Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza In association with The Terra Foundation for American Art Sponsored by Comunidad de Madrid Venue and dates Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, 14 December 2021–26 June 2022 Curators Paloma Alarcó, head of modern painting at Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, and Alba Campo Rosillo, the Terra Foundation for American Art fellow Number of artworks 140 Publication Catalogue with texts by the curators Paloma Alarcó and Alba Campo Rosillo; the museum’s modern painting curators Clara Marcellán and Marta Ruiz del Árbol; and the American art experts Wendy Bellion, Kirsten Pai Buick, David Peters Corbett, Catherine Craft, Karl Kusserow, Michael Lobel and Verónica Uribe Hanabergh
Dates 14 December 2021–26 June 2022 Opening times Monday, 12.00–16.00 (free admission). Tuesday to Friday and Sunday, 10.00–19.00 Place Rooms 55–46 on the first floor Ticket prices Single ticket: Permanent collection and temporary exhibitions. Free on Monday • General : 13 € • Reduced : 9 €. For senior citizens ( 65+), pensioners and students on presentation of proof. • Groups ( minimum of 7 ): 11 € • Free : Children and young people under 18, unemployed persons, disabled persons, large families ( 3 or more children ), practising teachers, and youth card holders ( Spanish or European ). Advance ticket sales • Museum ticket office • www.museothyssen.org • Tel. 91 791 13 70
Shop Ground floor. Exhibition catalogue available Cafe-restaurant Ground floor Transport • Bike. BiciMAD 29, Calle del Marqués de Cubas, 25 • Buses. Lines 1, 2, 5, 9, 10, 14, 15, 20, 27, 34, 37, 41, 51, 52, 53, 74, 146 and 150 • Metro. Line 2, Banco de España • Train. Atocha, Sol and Recoletos More information mtb@museothyssen.org www.museothyssen.org/en/exhibitions/ american-art-thyssen-collection www.museothyssen.org
Credits Modern Painting, Education, Publications, and Web and New Media departments of Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza Design Sonia Sánchez Studio Map Artur Galocha Credits and disclaimer © Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid. The following list of credits refers to the works with copyright protection. Irrespective of any terms and conditions established by Fundación Colección ThyssenBornemisza, permission to use these images must be sought from the author of the work or from the manager of their rights. © of the publication: Fundación Colección ThyssenBornemisza, 2021. © of the texts: their authors.
Copyrights © 2021 Burchfield Penney Art Center. © 2021 James Rosenquist Foundation/Licensed by Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. © [2021] The Pollock-Krasner Foundation, VEGAP, Madrid. © Ben Shahn; Frank Stella; John Sloan; Lee Krasner; Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko; Morris Louis; Stuart Davis, VEGAP, Madrid, 2021. © Estate of Raphael Soyer. © Estate of Roy Lichtenstein/VEGAP/2021. © Richard Estes, cortesía de Marlborough Gallery, Nueva York. © Romare Bearden Foundation. © The Joseph and Robert Cornell Memorial Foundation/VAGA, NY/ VEGAP. © The Willem de Kooning Foundation, New York
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The Terra Foundation for American Art is dedicated to fostering exploration, understanding and enjoyment of the visual arts of the United States for national and international audiences. In recognition of the importance of experiencing original artworks, the foundation offers scholarly engagement opportunities, beginning with the presentation
and growth of its own art collection in Chicago. To encourage cross-cultural dialogues about American art, the foundation supports and takes part in innovative exhibitions, research and academic programmes. An implicit part of these activities is the firm belief that art has the potential both to distinguish cultures and to unite them.
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