Image Machine: Andy Warhol and Photography
Light Years: Jack Whitten, 1971-1973
Omer Fast: 5000 Feet Is the Best
Collection in Focus: Al Loving
Minimal and More: 60s and 70s Sculpture from the Collection
Opening: Tuesday, September 17, 5–8pm
Programs
Artist talk: Omer Fast, September 17, 4pm
Symposium: Jack Whitten / Painting, Politics, Technology; Saturday, October 5, 2pm
With Jack Whitten, Katy Siegel, Mark Bradford, Michelle Kuo, Mingus Mapps and Howard Singerman
Lecture: Reva Wolf on Andy Warhol March 19 at 5pm
Curator talk: Joseph Ketner on Andy Warhol, Sunday, November 3, 1pm
Rose Art Museum
Brandeis University
415 South Street MS 069
Waltham MA 02453
T 781 736 3434
The Rose Art Museum opens five new exhibitions on Tuesday, September 17. “This suite of shows draws together a number of important programmatic threads that will drive the Rose’s schedule of exhibitions in the coming years,” commented Christopher Bedford, Henry and Lois Foster Director. “As our new Curator at Large, Katy Siegel’s work on Jack Whitten demonstrates our commitment to innovative, rigorous scholarship in exhibition making. Minimal and More, Image Machine and two works by Al Loving emphasize the depth of the Rose’s collection. And Rose Video, a program being inaugurated this fall, announces a focused commitment to the moving image.”
Light Years: Jack Whitten, 1971-1973features never-before exhibited, monumental canvases by this pioneering abstract artist. 1970 marked what Whitten calls a “time of reckoning,” when he began experiments with paint that literally expanded the possibilities of the medium. He constructed a developing tool that pulled acrylic paint across canvas in a single gesture. Incorporating the speed and look of mechanical reproduction with painting’s unpredictable materiality, these works create new forms of light and space.
Omer Fast: 5000 Feet Is the Best addresses one of the most pressing issues of today—drone surveillance and warfare. In 2010, Fast interviewed a former drone operator, who reflected on the psychological effects of live-fire missions in Pakistan and Afghanistan. The resulting 30-minute video intermingles documentary footage of the operator, fictionalized versions of the interviews, and staged vignettes.
Image Machine: Andy Warhol and Photography is devoted to Andy Warhol’s use of photography as source material. Drawing heavily on the Rose’s collection, this innovative exhibition examines the critical role of photography in Warhol’s work across media.
Minimal and More: 60s and 70s Sculpture from the Collection explores Minimalism and gender politics. In tribute to the 1996 Rose exhibition More Than Minimal: Feminism and Abstraction in the ’70s, this show brings together three works by female artists—Jackie Ferrara, Mary Miss, and Jackie Winsor—and presents them alongside sculptures by four male artists active in the 1960s: Carl Andre, Anthony Caro, Donald Judd, and Robert Morris.
Collection in Focus: Al Loving features two works that represent Loving’s move away from hard-edged geometric paintings. As he explained later, he wanted to discover “whether there is black art and what it looks like.” Loving stained torn strips of canvas with paint then sewed them together to explore a range of vernacular traditions, from his mother’s quilting to recycled materials to African ceremonial clothing.
Press inquiries: Nina Berger, [email protected] / T 617 543 1595
Image Machine: Andy Warhol and Photography is co-organized by the Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati and the Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University.
These exhibitions and associated programs are made possible through funding from the Lois Foster Endowed Exhibition Fund, Rose Art Museum Endowed Fund, Museum Art Conservation Fund, Francesca Seulitrinic Art Education Fund, Student Committee for the Rose Art Museum, Brandeis Arts Council, Fine Arts Department and Office of the Provost, Brandeis University.
