New

slet

ter

sUMMer/FAll 2014

whAt’s INsIde:3 Notes from the director5 tammy renée Brackett: Deer Dear7 On the road with the traveling exhibition Program

exhIBItION/edUcAtION/cOllectION suart.syr.edus y ra c u s e U n i v e rs i t y A r t G a l l e r i e s / s h a f fe r A r t B u i l d i n g / s y ra c u s e N e w Yo r k 1 3 2 4 4

SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY

ART GALLERIES

10 The Real Thing: samuel Gorovitz12 Dancing Atoms: The Photographs of Barbara Morgan13 remembering dr. Alfred collette

MArGAret BOUrke-whIteMOMeNts IN hIstOrY 1930-1945

2

FeAtUred/exhIBItION

MArGAret BOUrke-whIteMOMeNts IN hIstOrY 1930-1945

The Syracuse University Art Galleries is pleased to present

Margaret Bourke-White: Moments in History 1930-1945, an

exhibition of over 180 vintage photographs taken in the Soviet

Union, Czechoslovakia, Germany, England and Italy in the

1930s and 40s. Also featured are original Life and Fortune

magazines and correspondence related to Bourke-White’s

photography and projects. A complement to the exhibition,

Context: Reading the Photography of Margaret Bourke-White will

be presented at the Special Collections Research Center, also

opening August 19th.

This exhibition is a co-production of the Hague Museum

of Photography, La Fábrica (Spain), Martin-Gropius-Bau

(Germany), Preus-Museum (Norway), and Syracuse University

Libraries (United States). The Syracuse University Art Galleries

is the closing venue for this monumental exhibition that has

toured throughout Europe for the past two years.

August 19 – October 19, 2014

GAllerY recePtIONthursday, september 4, 5:00 - 7:00 p.m.

Margaret Bourke-White, [Women working in the field, Kostolná, (Slovakia), Czechoslovakia, 1938]. Special Collections Research Center, Syracuse University Libraries© Estate of Margaret Bourke-White/Licensed by VAGA, New York, NY

Art during the 20th century experienced unprecedented growth. This

took place not only in Europe and America, but also around the globe.

Early in the century artists experimented with color, forms, the reality of a

2-dimensional canvas, emotions, varied subject matter, and all sorts of other

issues that were considered inappropriate or irrelevant during early periods.

Post-industrialized countries had better educated populations, there was a

wider distribution of income, and leisure activities included theater, music

and art appreciation.

Women were an important part of this development. They

often led the way tearing down boundaries and opening

new avenues of opportunities. It was not an easy task, the

challenges were great- still are- but the prospects of having

an impact on the history and evolution of art were reward

enough. This year, the SUArt Galleries is celebrating the role of

women in 20th century art. You may remember we presented

the exhibition Mithila Painting: The Evolution of an Art Form

last winter that investigated contemporary trends in an art

form created by Indian women. Through their paintings these

women were documenting traditions, commenting on injustices

in their society, and promoting a more active role for women in

the arts. The 20th century is replete with examples of women in

Europe and America accepting similar challenges.

We begin the year with Margaret Bourke-White: Moments

in History, an examination of art by one of America’s most

important photographers. Oliva Mariá Rubio, artistic director of

the Madrid, Spain museum La Fabrica, curated the exhibition.

The photographs, mostly from Syracuse University’s Special

Collections at Bird Library, were on tour at four European

museums over the last 18 months, including the Martin-

Gropius-Bau in Berlin, Germany and the Preus Museum in

Horten, Norway. Ms. Rubio selected the work according

NOtes FrOM the dIrectOr

to specific themes she found intriguing, America 1930-51,

Germany 1930-32, Soviet Union 1930-32, Czechoslovakia, Soviet

Union 1941, and World War II. In her introductory essay to

the exhibition Ms. Rubio commented that Margaret Bourke-

White had been recognized for a series of achievements and

important activities- “She was the first woman to photograph

the steel mills; the first to belong to the team of photographers

for Fortune and Life magazines; the first foreigner to photograph

the Soviet Union in 1930; the first female photographer to work

for the U.S. Air Force; the only foreign photographer—man or

woman—present in Moscow when the first German bombs

fell on the city on July 19, 1941, right after the war between

Russia and Germany began; and the first woman to go along

on a bombing mission, in 1943, at a time when women were

not allowed in combat zones.” These ‘firsts’ would have been

significant, not only because of gender, but because these were

important moments in 20th century history. I can only imagine

that anyone traveling as a spectator on a bombing mission in

1943 would have stood out from the crowd.

As with all our exhibitions, there will be a series of lectures

open to the public, many of them during the lunch hour for the

convenience of our University friends and anyone visiting the

campus at that hour. Other lectures will be offered during the

cover: Margaret Bourke-White, [Man tightening the large nuts on the turbine shell of the Dneprostroi Hydroelectric Plant near Zaporizhia, Soviet Union, (now Ukraine)], 1930Special Collections Research Center, Syracuse University LibrariesTime & Life Pictures/Getty Images

Domenic Iacono, Director

3

Margaret Bourke-White[Aluminum rods, Aluminum Company of America, ca. 1930]. Special Collections Research Center, Syracuse University Libraries© Estate of Margaret Bourke-White/Licensed by VAGA, New York, NY

run of the exhibition that will illuminate the career and work of

Margaret Bourke-White and place her within the context of 20th

century photography.

We will also be presenting an exhibition of work by Tammy Renée

Brackett who is a faculty member at Alfred State, SUNY College

of Technology. Ms. Brackett’s work was shown at the Galleries

in 2012 as part of the ToNY (The other New York) exhibition when

she showed her two-channel video, Field Guide. That work

developed an immersive experience using fragments of pages from

Peterson’s Field Guide to Birds of North America, and the journal The

Philosophy of Science to create a virtual walk through a woods. She

will be presenting new work for this exhibition.

During the academic year we will also be presenting the

work of another important woman artist in our Photography

Study Room. Barbara Morgan was a founding member of the

Aperture Foundation and earned a reputation as a Modernist

photographer. Much of her work involves dance, photomontage,

and a desire to capture motion. She often would design her

images so that the figure was shown against neutral or blank

backgrounds that heightened the energy of the motion.

The photographs in Dancing Atoms: Photographs by Barbara

Morgan are from the permanent collection and were directed

to Syracuse University through the generosity of the Diane and

Martin Ackerman Foundation and Robert Menschel. They are

responsible for helping us build our collection of 20th century

American photographs that include the work of Berenice Abbott,

Phillipe Halsman, Leopold Hugo and Todd Webb.

In our Print Study Room we will present Making Their Mark: The

Rise of the American Printworkshop, displaying the work from

several important printmaking workshops that each happened

to be founded by women in the 1950s and 1960s. Tatyana

Grosman began Universal Limited Art Editions in 1957 and

helped begin a revolution in art lithography that continues to

this day. Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, Larry Rivers and

Helen Frankenthaler are just a few of the artists that worked at

ULAE. June Wayne founded Tamarind Lithography Workshop

in Los Angeles in 1960 when she received a grant from the Ford

Foundation to help develop a studio where professional artists

could make prints with the aid of a master printer. Richard

Diebenkorn, Karl Schrag and Louise Nevelson were a few of the

artists who were invited to work at Tamarind. Kathan Brown’s

Crown Point Press helped to transform printmaking in the San

Francisco Bay area opening its doors in 1962. Richard Tuttle,

Chuck Close, and Sol LeWitt (‘49) are among the artists who

worked with Brown and her master printmakers.

Samuel Gorovitz, Professor of Philosophy and former Dean of

the College of Arts and Sciences at Syracuse University, has

contributed an article to this newsletter on the importance of

seeing an original object. The idea came to him after a visit

to the Page Museum at the La Brea Tar Pits last August. At

the Art Galleries we are drawn to original objects and often

people seek our help determining originals versus fakes

or reproductions. In the art world there are many types

of reproductions, for instance, multiple copies of a bronze

sculpture, or impressions from the same copper plate, all

considered originals; but there are also reproductions such

as posters after paintings or inexpensive bronze copies

made ‘after’ originals. Dr. Gorovitz effectively states how our

experiences can be enhanced when viewing important objects

in a museum environment or in their native settings. I think

you will enjoy his observations.

4

June Wayne, Barcelona Wave, 1973. Gift of Robin and Bob Park.

FeAtUred/exhIBItION

Time based artist Tammy Renée Brackett’s comment echoes

what many hunters know: that deer, which are everywhere

during the spring and summer, seemingly disappear towards

the end of September when hunting season begins. Brackett

became interested in the subject after moving to a home 2000

feet up on the side of a hill just outside of Alfred, NY. Having

been raised on a farm, Brackett found this exposed location

more extreme and a fascinating area to explore.

Her desire to investigate her surroundings coupled with the

(unasked for) acquisition of a 16 gauge, single shot break

action shotgun began her career as a hunter. Brackett took a

doe in her second season and learned from a neighbor how

to stretch and tan the hide. She then designed small light

silhouettes that replicated running deer. Using computer

software, Brackett multiplied the silhouettes into virtual herds,

running in place on the tanned deer skin. Because every hide

is shaped differently, the artist developed a digital outline of

each one to insure the light silhouettes would fall inside the

First you have to find a deer.asymmetrical border. Other works in the exhibition include

prints using digitally shaped hides as a visual frame. Placed

inside are still images from related videos.

An accompanying audio soundtrack describes the many man-

made sounds heard by wildlife in the woods. The variably

pitched whir of a next door windmill’s blades combines

with the regular creaking from its mechanical housing. Also

audible is a steady drip, drip, drip of maple sap dripping into

several buckets set out by the artist to make syrup. Brackett’s

exhibition raises the question of who, humans or deer, has the

larger impact on the other.

tammy renée Brackett:

deer deAr AUGUST 19 – OCTOBER 19, 2014GALLERY RECEPTION Thursday, September 4, 5:00 – 7:00 P.M.

Left: Tammy Renée Brackett, Walking, 2014. Right: Brackett in her studio stretching deer hides, photograph courtesy of David Prince

5

6

the PAlItZ GAllerY/NYc exhIBItION

kArl schrAG:MeMOrIes ANd PreMONItIONsAUGUst 26 – OctOBer 30, 2014The Palitz Gallery, Syracuse University Lubin House

11 East 61st Street, New York City

suinnyc.syr.edu

Karl Schrag, Vanishing Day (Second Version), c1990. Loan courtesy of Karl Schrag LLC.

This exhibition is a selection from the larger retrospective presented at Syracuse University Art Galleries in 2012, which was the first

major examination of Karl Schrag’s work since his death in 1995. Reflective of his masterful handling of the figure, landscape, still-life

scenes, and the evocative power of his vision, this exhibition includes Schrag’s paintings, prints, and drawings. Most importantly, the

selected works convey the artist’s ability to see the landscape as if for the first time, the surprise of that special view, the recognition of

his ability to feel wonder when looking at nature or figure, and the reward associated with seeing the world through his eyes. The fully

illustrated exhibition catalog Karl Schrag: Memories and Premonitions will be available for purchase in both soft and hard cover formats.

ON the rOAd/trAVex

An American in Venice: James McNeill whistler and his legacyFORT SMITH REGIONAL ART MUSEUM, FORT SMITH, AR

OCTOBER 2, 2014 - JANUARY 4, 2015

Art in the detail: 20th century Masters of Photography TExAS A&M UNIVERSITY GALLERIES, COLLEGE STATION, Tx

AUGUST 14 - OCTOBER 12, 2014

winslow homer and the American Pictorial PressMUSEUM OF THE SOUTHWEST, MIDLAND, Tx

SEPTEMBER 5 - NOVEMBER 30, 2014

Pulled, Pressed and screened: Important American PrintsLEIGH YAWKEY WOODSON ART MUSEUM, WAUSAU, WI

JUNE 21 - AUGUST 17, 2014

PIEDMONT ARTS ASSOCIATION, MARTINSVILLE, VA

SEPTEMBER 12 - NOVEMBER 8, 2014

Pure Photography: Pictorial and Modern Photographs from the syracuse University Art collection FOUNDRY ART CENTRE, ST. CHARLES, MO

MAY 2 - AUGUST 1, 2014

SOUTH EAST MUSEUM OF PHOTOGRAPHY, DAYTONA, FL

SEPTEMBER 13 - DECEMBER 14, 2014

Georges rouault: cirque de l’etoile FilanteHUNTSVILLE MUSEUM OF ART, HUNSTVILLE, AL

NOVEMBER 8, 2014 - JANUARY 11, 2015

7

Want to learn more about the exhibitions available?

Visit us online at

travex.syr.edu

cAleNdAr/exhIBItION

AUGUST 19 – OCTOBER 19, 2014Main Gallery

MArGAret BOUrke-whIte: MOMeNts IN hIstOrY 1930-1945

The Photography Study Room

dANcING AtOMsPhotographs by Barbara Morgan

The Print Study Room

MAkING theIr MArk the rise of the American Print workshop

8

ALSO ON VIEW

tammy renée Brackett:deAr deer

The Reception Gallery

collection spotlight:Perspectives

Karl Schrag, The Song of the Elements, 1995. Gift of Katherine Schrag Wangh.

NOVEMBER 6, 2014 – JANUARY 18, 2015Main Gallery

FAcUltY exhIBItIONOPENING RECEPTIONThursday, November 135:00 – 7:00 P.M.

OPENING RECEPTIONthUrsdAY, sePteMBer 45:00 - 7:00 P.M.

the PAlItZ GAllerYsyracuse University lubin houseNew York city

AUGUST 26 – OCTOBER 30, 2014

kArl schrAG: Memories and Premonitions

NOVEMBER 6, 2014 – JANUARY 29, 2015

FAcUltY exhIBItION

Margaret Bourke-White, [Boy with a hammer, Magnitogorsk, Soviet Union, 1931]. Special Collections Research Center, Syracuse University Libraries© Estate of Margaret Bourke-White/Licensed by VAGA, New York, NY

cAleNdAr/edUcAtION

lUNchtIMe lectUres

select wedNesdAYs At 12:15For a complete list of scheduled lectures, visit suart.syr.edu

september 10Gallery talk: dear deerwith David Prince, Associate Director and Curator of Collections

september 24Gallery talk: collection spotlightwith Domenic Iacono, Director

November 12Gallery talk: Faculty exhibitionwith Andrew Saluti, Assistant Director

November 19Gallery talk:Barbara Morgan Photographswith Emily Dittman, Collections and Exhibitions Coordinator

9

October 4 - 5, 20142:00 P.M.Printmaking workshop

November 15, 20142:00 P.M.Making Musical Instrumentswith Zeke leonard

lectUreAn evening with tammy renée Bracketttuesday, september 16 6:30 P.M.

Shemin Auditorium, Shaffer Art Building

Sponsored as a part of the Visiting Artist Lecture Series

College of Visual and Performing Arts

sYMPOsIUMPresented by Syracuse University Libraries in concert with Margaret

Bourke-White: Moments in History 1930–1945 (SUArt) and Context:

Reading the Photographs of Margaret Bourke-White (SU Libraries)

October 1 – 2, 2014CRITICAL CONNECTIONS Lecture and Mini-Seminar

with Alexander Nemerov

Lightness: In the Air with William Faulkner

and Margaret Bourke-White

These lectures are free and open to the public. Preregistration

is required for the mini-seminars and workshops.

Visit library.syr.edu/find/scrc/programs for more information.

PAreNts weekeNdOctober 31, 20142:00 P.M.

BehINd the sceNes At the sUArt GAllerIeswith Assistant Director Andrew Saluti

Special sneak-peek gallery tour

sPecIAl eVeNtsOrANGe ceNtrAlOctober 10, 2014at the sUArt Galleries

10:00 A.M.Art ON cAMPUs tOUrwith Syracuse University Art Galleries

Assistant Director Andrew Saluti

2:00 P.M.sPecIAl GAllerY tOUr Margaret Bourke-White: Moments in History 1930–1945

with Lucy D. Mulroney

Interim Senior Director of Special Collections,

Syracuse University Libraries

visit syr.edu/alumni/events/orangecentral

for more information.

Special programming designed specifically to engage

children and families with the exhibitions and

collections at the SUArt Galleries

the reAl thING/edUcAtION

10

BY SAMUEL GOROVITz

When and why does it matter to have a real object on display in a museum, rather than some representation of it—electronic or otherwise?

The eminent Shakespeare scholar Stephen Greenblatt, in his Pulitzer Prize winning book The Swerve, writes that “... art always penetrates the fissures in one’s psychic life.” How we are struck by a painting, a piece of music, or an object in an exhibition will depend, unpredictably, on who we are, what we know, and what will trigger an emotional reaction that transcends intellectual engagement with that art. We can be completely startled by this phenomenon.

David O’Hara described such a moment vividly, recounting his first viewing of Guernica:

I had no idea. This museum apparently was not a locked space for storing images; it was a classroom in which I could watch Picasso labor over this painting....I took a breath, and walked briskly into the room, intending to keep my jaw firm, my spine straight, my knees steady. I turned and looked.

And then I fell down.....

When I turned that corner and saw “Guernica” I had the feeling I was standing in front of something holy....Picasso knocked me to my knees...1

I read that en route to Los Angeles to visit the Page Museum at the La Brea Tar Pits in August 2013, and knew just what O’Hara meant. Some years ago, I had seen the Darwin exhibition at the American Museum of Natural History. Although no expert, I knew a lot about Darwin and his work. I’d read biographies, traced his steps in the Galapagos, extolled the literary virtues of his Voyage of the Beagle, seen the Darwin exhibition in London. Little information in the AMNH exhibition was new to me. Then, suddenly, I was inches away from his magnifying glass–not a replica, but the real thing. He had held it, peered through it at specimens, relied on it in his monumental, tenacious effort to figure out how things work. To my amazement, there were tears streaming down my cheeks. I had the feeling I was standing in front of something holy.

Had the magnifying glass been a flawless facsimile–indistinguishable from the original but not misrepresented–it might have been worth seeing. But that powerful sense of proximity to Darwin would have been missing. It was crucial that this was the real thing. Yet sometimes a facsimile is fine. How can we understand the difference?

In a compelling account of art forger Mark Landis, Alec Wilkinson reports that:

He believes that if something is beautiful, it doesn’t matter whether it is genuine; rather, the impression it engenders is what counts. He thinks that he has given work to small museums that couldn’t afford it, so that people who wouldn’t usually encounter such pieces can see them and be broadened. This attitude accords with the earlier philosophies of American museums, which often presented facsimiles of European sculpture in the form of plaster casts. At one point the Museum of Fine Art in Boston had the third-largest collection of plaster casts in the world. “Initially there wasn’t the mission among our museums that you needed to have original works of art,” Henry Adams [professor of art, Case Western Reserve] told me. 2

What counted for me in seeing Darwin’s magnifying glass, however, was not that he used one exactly like this, but that he had used this. The power of the perception depended on the provenance of the object, not on its observable physical properties.

Anne Fadiman, in Marrying Libraries (Chapter One of Ex Libris, a book I’ve savored a dozen times), addresses similar issues, recalling how she and her husband deliberated about which of two copies of a book to keep. (If an unsigned, unmarked copy was given to me by the author, does that have more value than an identical copy I had already bought?)

Seeing the real thing can matter for reasons of scale and context. Whatever one has read, seen in photographs, or even experienced in IMAx-scale documentaries, nothing approximates the impact of the golden dome in Jerusalem reflecting the magical light of the setting sun. Standing at the foot of the massive temple at Abu Simbel conveys a sense of scale and grandeur for which there can be no facsimile. (This is true, also, for natural wonders: the Grand Canyon can be seen only at the Grand Canyon; the falls at Iguazu, seen and heard and felt through the mist can have no replica.)

Sometimes, the impact of authenticity has to do with specificity of place. Walking among the ruins in Athens, one realizes that the ancient thinkers walked here, breathed this air under this sky. When I looked into the cell on Robben Island that held Mandela for so many years, my hands gripping the bars, it was not just a sense of his history that gave the moment such impact. It was a sense of place—of seeing, and being, where he had been. 3

Museums sometimes provide such encounters with immovable sights and sites when they sponsor trips, typically with docents as extensions of the museum–although too often a lockstep pace denies anyone the freedom to linger, reflect, and enter these portals to reverie.

Some objects, immovable, can be seen only in situ—be they works of architecture (such as Frank Gehry’s Guggenheim-Bilbao, as seen from the nearby bridge, arising like a great gleaming flower above the multicolored boxcars in the railroad yard) or the Diego Rivera frescoes in the Detroit Institute of Art. The only option is to go to them.

Wooly mammoth skeleton, Page Museum, La Brea Tar Pits. Photograph courtesy of Samuel Gorovitz.

11

Samuel Gorovitz is Professor of Philosophy and former Dean of The College of Arts and Sciences at Syracuse University. Above: Barbara Hepworth, Biolith, 1948-49. Yale Center for British Art, Gift of Virginia Vogel Mattern in memory of her husband, W. Gray Mattern, Class of 1946

Other artistically important objects can be moved only at great cost in money, time, and effort. The bronze doors by Ghiberti from the Battistero di San Giovanni in Florence—called The Gates of Paradise by Michelangelo and 21 years in the making—are among the glories of Florence. My Syracuse colleague Gary Radke spent five years, in collaboration with the High Museum of Atlanta, arranging to bring them to the United States following their restoration. I’d marveled at them long ago in Florence, but seeing them at the Seattle Art Museum, viewing them closely from front and back, provided a sense of intimacy that was an enduring privilege. So the distinction between movable and immovable objects is malleable. Sometimes the mountain does come to Mohammed. The new halls of Islamic Art at the Metropolitan Museum exemplify this, with rooms transported entirely from their original locations.

In principle, even Rembrandt’s The Night Watch could travel from its home in Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum. But when renowned treasures travel, viewers often wait in crowded lines for measured glimpses–as I once waited in London four hours to see Tutankhamun’s mask. Seeing The Night Watch means lingering before it, searching for the sources of light within it, attending to the shadows, the clothing, the markers of status or station–looking at it and into it over and over again, slowly. That’s rarely how we can see the real thing when it comes to visit.

And as Radke has called to my attention, even when we visit an artistic object in its original place, its context has changed over time. He notes: “the light and the surface condition…will usually have aged to something unrecognizable to original viewers.” Regarding The Gates of Paradise, he adds “Intimate viewing is the primary experience…but so is the sense of seeing ‘the forbidden,’ what in this case the artist hid behind the reliefs and never intended us to see.”

Setting aside such outlier examples, however, we can clarify when the real thing matters essentially. It is when the viewer’s knowing that the object is authentic induces an emotional response to that very fact–a sense of immediacy and connection that the object can prompt precisely because it relates its own history to that part of the viewer’s history that triggers the emotional response and a cascade of associative thinking.

MIT Professor Nancy Hopkins sought more office space, but was denied repeatedly. She began to study who had how much space, and documented that male scientists were supported far more generously. Her findings led to a report that catalyzed corrective measures at MIT and nationally. That’s unfinished business. But the story, told in the MIT Museum’s EXHIBITION150, is represented by one iconic object–the modest tape measure Hopkins used in documenting the inequities. Any tape measure can measure an office or lab. Only this one is the one she used, and therein lies its special impact–its ability, in light of all it represents, to prompt the calm, accomplished, well-established scientist to realize that the tape measure seems suddenly blurry, seen through teary eyes. 4

At the Page Museum, almost everything is real. There’s a diorama or two, but the millions of fossils on display and in storage

there—some as old as 50,000 years, were all found on site at La Brea, where current digs continue the ongoing discoveries. A tiny toe bone from a Paleolithic mouse may intrigue or amuse; looking up at the entire skeletons of megafauna that once were looking for lunch right here inspires awe. So it is also with the 5-foot head of Sue, the Field Museum’s Tyrannosaurus rex, from 65-67 million years ago. If these were replicas, there could always be some small uncertainty (or comfort) in wondering whether the real thing is quite so scary. And the knowledge that one is seeing a replica intrudes a layer of distance between the viewer and the history of the object. A replica of the head of Sue had no ferocious roar, did not terrify prey, did not die in circumstances we would love to understand but will never know.

In September 2012, huge crowds waited in Syracuse to see Lincoln’s handwritten draft of the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation. This priceless original document, from the collection of the New York State Library, was shown in collaboration with the Onondaga Historical Association and the New York State Museum in Albany. Reluctant to turn viewers away, an exhausted staff voluntarily stayed on for hours after the official closing time of the one-day exhibition, aware of the emotional power of an encounter between a viewer and the hand of Lincoln–not the equal of shaking his massive, world-changing hand, but as close to that as we can get. A replica could have the same text and appearance. It could not have the same emotional power.

Sometimes what we seek in looking at an artistic artifact, a fossil, or a document is just information–about a text, structure, or design. A facsimile then can serve us well. But the stakes are higher, and the impact deeper, when we have a sense of immediacy and personal connection with an important part of our own past, or of a part of the world we want to understand much better. Whether we are open to such an experience depends on us. When we are, only the real thing will do.

the power of the perception depends on the provenance of the object, not on its observable physical properties.

NOTES1 David O’Hara, “The Day Picasso Made Me Fall Down”, Chronicle of Higher Education, 8/16/2013, Accessed July 17, 2014. http://chronicle.com/article/The-Day-Picasso-Made-Me-Fall/140915/2 Alec Wilkinson, “The Giveaway”, The New Yorker, August 26, 2013. p. 283 http://blog.syracuse.com/opinion/2013/12/we_have_lost_mandela_but_we_ne.html4 http://museum.mit.edu/150/71

dANcING AtOMs/cOllectION

Born in Kansas in 1900, Barbara Morgan (American 1900- 1970)

moved with her family to a peach farm in Southern California

where she would spend her youth. Noticing an early inclination

towards dance and movement, Morgan’s father suggested that

the five-year old “think of everything in the world as dancing

atoms.” Since that young age, Morgan examined the world and

her artwork with this scientific curiosity.

Morgan attended UCLA and studied painting and art history,

drawn in particular to the Chinese Six Canons of Painting-

which focused on rhythmic vitality, reinforcing her father’s

early suggestion on how to observe her surroundings. In 1925,

she married Willard D. Morgan, a writer who recognized the

importance of photography as a tool for photojournalism. Her

husband was an early proponent of the craft and soon after their

marriage swayed Morgan, reluctantly, into exploring photography

as an additional creative outlet.

During the 1930s, the couple moved to New York City and started

a family. Morgan set up a photography studio on East 23rd Street,

and was introduced to the Martha Graham Dance Company.

Inspiration struck as she observed the movements of the dancers.

She also was impressed by the courage of dancers in the 1930s

to continue with their craft, one that was financially unstable, in

a time of social and financial distress in America. From the mid-

1930s until the 1940s, Morgan photographed the dance company,

capturing the beauty and science of their movements for her

book project Martha Graham: Sixteen Dances in Photographs.

This series stands as Morgan’s most famous and well regarded

project in her art career.

However, dance was not the only form of energy that Morgan

observed throughout her photographic career. She also was an

early proponent of photomontage, an art movement which, at

that time, was more prevalent in Europe than America. Morgan’s

interest in the European avant-garde technique was most likely

as a result of her friendship with László Moholy-Nagy, who

introduced her to the method of using light and objects as props

to create light drawings. Always connected in some way to her

dance project, this new exploration in photomontages allowed

her to “feel the pervasive, vibratory character of light energy as a

partner of the physical and spiritual energy of the dance, and as

the prime mover of the photographic process.”

As proven in Morgan’s photographs, the exploration of movement

is a theme that countless photographers have been drawn to

in the past. Capturing the beauty and effort of kinetic energy

on film takes not only a keen photographic eye, but, more

importantly, an understanding of the science that creates such

action. Barbara Morgan was one such photographer. Her

legacy of observing life in relation to “dancing atoms” is forever

preserved on film and on paper, providing a glimpse into her

world of photography, painting, light and modern dance.

Barbara Morgan Photographs in the syracuse University Art collection

12

Barbara Morgan, Martha Graham, El Penitente, 1940 (Solo - Erick Hawkins - El Flagellante), 1940. Gift of Robert B. Menschel

13

IN MeMOrIAM/reMeMBerING dr. AlFred t. cOllettedirector emeritus of the University Art collection

Dr. Alfred T. Collette served as the Director of the Syracuse University Art Collection for thirty-one years. At the time of his appointment in 1974, he was Chair of the Science Teaching Department in the College of Arts and Sciences, a department he founded and was among the earliest in the country. One of his principal responsibilities upon being named Director of the Art Collection was developing a central repository for and completing the first comprehensive inventory of the collection’s more than 8000 objects. Over his tenure the collection grew to more than 30,000 objects and became an active educational resource used by faculty from multiple disciplines.

Education defined Dr. Collette’s career. Al served in World War II as a weatherman in the Pacific and then returned to Syracuse University and completed a Doctorate in Genetics in 1952. After joining the faculty Collette served, at various

times, as chair of the Department of Bacteriology and Botany and the Department of zoology. He was a faculty member in the Graduate Program in Museology after its founding in 1976, teaching for many years the class Collections Management.

Dr. Collette was also a passionate art collector with a particular interest in prints, a focus that still guides the collection today. While Rembrandt and Picasso were among the artists who attracted especial attention, Collette’s interests were broad ranging. He acquired a diverse collection of two and three dimensional objects from Cinquecento Italian paintings to 20th century American graphics. Other collecting interests included Japanese Shin Hanga prints and Chinese ceramics.

Dr. Collette passed away in January.

1922 – 2014

Art ON cAMPUs/cOllectION

14

MALVINA HOFFMAN (American 1885-1966)

Elemental Man, 1936White/MacNaughton Patio

Malvina Hoffman’s most comprehensive project of her long

career involved modeling more than 100 ethnic portraits for the

Hall of Man at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago.

Elemental Man appears to have much of the same strength

and power that characterized her Field Museum series. The

male figure struggles to free himself from solid rock in an effort

that portrays man’s strength to conquer his surroundings. The

sculpture was first exhibited at the New York World’s Fair of

1939 where it received worldwide attention.

After studying with Rodin, Hoffman traveled to Yugoslavia

in the 1920s to study with Ivan Mestrovic. She was one of

the principal individuals who convinced the Yugoslavian

government to release Mestrovic from prison and allow him

to finish his commissions at the Vatican. Hoffman also played

an important role with Syracuse University Chancellor William

Tolley and his decision to offer Mestrovic a faculty position

after the war ended.

LUISE MEYERS KAISH (American 1925–2013)

Saltine Warrior, 1951Shaw Quadrangle, Carnegie Library

Luise Kaish designed this version of the original mascot for

Syracuse University athletic teams in the early 1950s. The

Saltine Warrior embodies those qualities that students, alumni,

and fans have come to expect from their athletic teams-

strength, endurance, and agility.

A 1946 alumna of Syracuse, Kaish was also a distinguished

pupil of Ivan Mestrovic. She was commissioned to make the

sculpture after winning a School of Art competition.

While exploring the Syracuse University campus, one can’t

help but be stricken by the dynamic and important works of art

located in our buildings and grounds. What is also distinctive

is that many of the monumental bronzes have been created by

some of the most regarded female sculptors of the 20th century.

take the Art on campus tour using your smartphone or mobile device atartoncampus.syr.edu

15

MAkING theIr MArk/cOllectION

The mid-twentieth century brought pivotal change to the art

of the print in the United States. The headway made in graphic

arts due to the backing of the WPA gave way to a world at war.

The rise of Abstract Expressionism–the American art movement

guided by the principles of immediacy and direct interaction

with the canvas opposed to the toil and time that the print

process imbued–pushed some away from medium. The energy

of S.W. Hayter’s New York incarnation of his experimental

printmaking studio Atelier 17 was in decline after his return to

Paris in 1950. But thanks to the industry and resolve of a few

pioneering women, a revival would ignite that introduced the

artists who would shape 20th century art-making.

In 1957 Russian emigree Tatyana Grosman longed to bring the

European traditions of the livres d’artiste (the artist’s book) to

the United States. After she and her husband, a struggling artist

and printmaker, relocated from their Manhattan apartment to

a summer cottage in West Islip, Long Island, they found two

lithography stones in the front yard. They purchased a press

from a neighbor and invited artist Larry Rivers to collaborate

with poet Frank O’Hara on what would become the portfolio

Stones, aptly named for the two original stones that initiated

what would become Universal Limited Art Editions. Through

Rivers, ULAE published editions by Jasper Johns, Robert

Rauschenberg and Helen Frankenthaler, and dozens of other

artists that read as a veritable who’s who of American art.

Like Grosman, artist June Wayne was frustrated at the lack

of facilities in the United States for artists to collaborate with

master printers. Trained as a painter and designer, Wayne

traveled to Paris in the 1950s to work with French master

printmaker Marcel Durassier. There, Wayne created an artist’s

book illustrating the work of English poet John Donne. This

publication caught the attention of W. McNeil Lowry, arts

director of the Ford Foundation. With his support, Wayne

established the Tamarind School of Lithography in 1960.

Together with artist Clinton Adams and master printmaker

Garo Antreasian, Tamarind would become the foremost center

for lithography in the United States, collaborating with artists

including Sam Francis, Joseph Albers, Louise Nevelson and

Karl Schrag. The school would also train some of the most

influential printmakers, including Judith Solodkin and Ken

Tyler (Gemeni G.E.L.). June Wayne moved Tamarind to the

University of New Mexcio in 1970, where it continues to publish

works and train master printmakers in the art of lithography.

Kathan Brown also found inspiration in the European print

tradition. Brown studied etching in London at the Central

School of Arts and Crafts. While on holiday in Edinburgh, she

happened upon an abandoned etching press. Shipping the

press from Scotland to San Francisco, Brown established

Crown Point Press, known for progressive work with the

intaglio processes. Richard Deibenkorn, Wayne Thiebaud and

Sol LeWitt are but a few of the artists who have collaborated

with Brown at Crown Point Press.

Thanks to the diligence of these pioneers, the American print

renaissance blossomed. The establishment of these workshops

solidified the relevance of the print in contemporary art by

fostering a collaborative relationship between artist and master

printer and unveiled new possibilities and experimentation in

the process of our most regarded contemporary artists.

the women behind the printmaking workshops that sparked a print revivalin America.

Above left: June Wayne at Tamarind in the 1960s. Photograph by Helen Miljakovich. Lower left: Kathan Brown at Crown Point Press. Right: Tatyana Grosman in 1977 watches poet Andrei Voznesensky work on his lithograph Darkness Mother at Universal Limited Art Editions. Photograph by Bob Petersen.

ArttheOF GIVING

suart.syr.edu/give-now/

Go to suart.syr.edu/give-now to support the Galleries today.

Once at the secure giving page, you can let us know exactly

how you want your gift to be used. The SUArt Galleries also

accepts tax deductible donations of artwork and ethnographic

objects. Contact us at suart@syr.edu or (315) 443-4097 for

more information.

Be a part of the Arts at sU. support sUArt today.

The purchase of all SUArt Galleries catalogs, posters, and prints

DIRECTLY SUPPORT the dynamic exhibitions and engaging

programs and events that strive to enrich the Syracuse Arts

community. Shop online at suart.syr.edu/shop

the syracuse University Art Galleries is pleased to present our first limited edition print

The Artist’s Proof

Created by acclaimed illustrator and longtime faculty member

Roger De Muth, this relief print depicts a studio assistant

working on the artist’s cherished Albion printing press in

his Cazenovia, NY studio. Hand signed by the artist, each

impression comes in a hand-printed and embossed folio.

Published by the SUArt Galleries in 2013 in an edition of 200.

Available now exclusively at the SUArt Gallery Shop.