The Akron Art Museum

The Whitney Museum of American Art has often been referred to a citadel of American Art, partially due to the museums façade, a striking granite building (Figure 1), designed by Bauhaus trained architect Marcel Breuer. The museum perpetuates this reference through its biennial review of contemporary American Art, which the Whitney has become most famous for. The biennial has become since its inception a measure of the state of contemporary art in America today.

My Humanities Art Experience took place at the Columbus, GA Museum, located on Wynnton Road. I really enjoyed my experience at the museum. It was my first time visiting an American museum. I saw many pieces of fine art, some of which I will list below.

The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond at a glance is a modern metropolitan building that displays a vibrant exhibition of Byzantine art found in the Medieval and Byzantine wing. They are grouped together because they share a progression of time occurring in the heart of Europe roughly from the 1300s until the fall of Constantinople in 1453. The exhibit begins with displays of medieval art of Western Europe. It further progresses to Byzantine art arranged in broad categories ranging from pre-Christian art, liturgical material, secular material and a display of coptic textiles. Although small scale, a few art pieces prominently featuring the human figure stood out in particular.

For this project, I chose the Tampa Museum of Art. My daughter Annabelle, who is eleven, accompanied me. She is an aspiring young artist who loves to paint and assemble collages. This paper will describe our trip, the museum’s activities, and what was on exhibit. After which, I will choose two works of art and preform an analysis on them. I will employ the formal elements and the principles of design to engage the first piece, “The Great Journey”. With my second choice “A Group of Cubans who left Manzanillo are Rescued at Sea”, I will discuss how applying an alternative contextual analysis would help in understanding the meaning behind the painting more.

On November 7, 1883, an exhibition organized by “May Wright Sewell, her husband Theodore, and a small group of art-minded citizens” (History, 2017) began what would one day become the establishment now known as the Indianapolis Museum of Art. Since that first exhibition, the IMA has gone through several identity changes. They were first named, the Art Association of Indianapolis. Their next identity was as the John Herron Art Institute, which opened a whole new chapter, as they became “a campus featuring both a museum and an art school.” (History, 2017) Today, the IMA is one of the largest encyclopedic art museums in the nation. The IMA has had various leadership and staff over the years that have lent to how the museum operates today.

The North Carolina Museum of Art (NCMA) holds many works of art from all types of cultures from around the world. The Torso of an Emperor in the Guise of Jupiter from Roman culture and the Torso of Aphrodite from Greek culture, are but two of them. It is unknown who the artist was for either of them, but the work has lived on for centuries. During the time period the gods were known for their perfection- like body and extraordinary looks. Since the sculptures highlight only the torso of the body it represents that only image matters and the brain does not.

As Edgar Degas once said, “ Art is not what you see, but what others make you see”. The St. Louis Art Museum is a place for artist to display their art and give spectators the option to see art from a new perspective. This was the case for me. As we walked up to the beautifully structured building that stood so tall and wide, my expectations were extremely high. At first glance I notice the bronze statue of King Louis IX of France riding high on his horse. From this statue alone, my expectations of the art museum grew stronger. I have never been to an art museum before, so I wasn’t sure of what to expect. My first expectation was to see huge detailed sculptures right as I walked through the door. That expectation didn’t come true.

Cleveland has been fortunate enough to have become home several popular museums, including The Cleveland Museum of Art. The museum is filled with impressive masterpieces from the beginning of human documented time to today’s world. This free exhibit offers an exciting, enjoyable experience to those of all ages and those of all backgrounds. From the interactive futuristic portions of the building, to the delicate works of the past, there is something at this museum to please each person’s artistic mindset.

The Carnegie Museum of Art was a museum created to focus on the art of tomorrow rather than already popular art and artists of today. A necessary part for that dream of Andrew Carnegie to become a reality is having a place to house these art pieces. While of course he could have just found an empty warehouse and placed all the art there that would neither have given the pieces of art justice nor would anyone want there personal collection to be placed on display there. Instead, in order to have a successful art museum you have to house the art in a place that does it justice. Museums heavily rely on their architecture to accurately portray and supplement the showpieces within the museum. Carnegie’s art museum

The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts is an art museum in Richmond, Virginia and was built on March 27, 1934. The Virginia Fine Arts Museum is one of the top art museums in the United States. They have a vast collection of exhibits including American, African, East Asian, Ancient, 21st century and many more. My favorite exhibit is The McGlothlin Collection of American Art. This exhibit caught my eye as soon as I walked in the door. There were many astonishing paintings that had a lot of emotion, but one stood out from all the others. The artist, Beauford Delaney, painted Marian Anderson.

In Greenville, Illinois, the local college campus holds a hidden gem: the Richard W. Bock Sculpture Museum. The museum holds hundreds of pieces of work by Bock and those associated with him, including architectural drawings by Frank Lloyd Wright. The house itself is historical, as it is the home of the founder of Almira College, the predecessor (precursor?) of Greenville College (GC). Built in the mid-1850s, it went through a major renovation in 2005 in which efforts were made to remain true to the original design and decor of the home. One room of the home has been set aside to house artifacts from the founders along with items from the beginning years of the school.

The building at 111 South Michigan Avenue, home of the Art Institute of Chicago, was opened in 1893 as the World’s Congress Auxiliary Building for the World’s Columbian Exposition. The building was passed on to the Art Institute after the end of the exposition. Designed in the Beax-Arts style by Boston firm Shepley, Rutan, and Coolidge, building has become an icon for chicagoans an tourists alike. The Modern Wing, the Art Institute’s latest and largest addition to date, opened on May 16, 2009, and was designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Renzo Piano. The 264,000 square foot addition now houses the museum’s collections of modern European painting and sculpture, contemporary art, architecture and design, and photography. The new

Perhaps illness so influenced the artistic style of Van Gogh, but the picture turned out completely different to all that the artist wrote so far. This is not a Van Gogh, who was known. In the canvas, there is tension, anxiety, dense colors and warm shades of olive-mustard. On the contrary, here there is some kind of lightness, airiness, and transparent weightlessness. On the manner of execution, the pattern resembles Japanese prints: iris field full of peace, a lightness, and transparency. "Irises" are simple and unique, they are striking in their serenity and the ability to remove the internal stress of everyone who saw at least reproduction. Painting simply breathes watercolor, translucency and make to look at it more than one hour.

The Wadsworth Athenaeum of Art has been in existence since 1842. Located in Hartford, Connecticut, it is the nation’s oldest public art museum. The founder, Daniel Wadsworth, was a world-renowned art patron who acquired many famous works that would put his museum at the forefront of all its competitors. The museum has a impeccable reputation as a leader for innovation and experimentation due to its previous Director, A. Everett “Chick” Austin, Jr. Austin always pushed the envelop by continuing to feature new styles of art and different mediums of art. Currently, the museum is home to almost 50,000 pieces that vary from paintings to historical artifacts. The collection features pieces from over 5,000 years and is a big piece of not only Connecticut’s, but also a part of American history.

At first, I didn’t want to go to the museum. That day, I was exhausted after finishing school, so going all the way to San Francisco wasn’t exactly my idea of relaxing. Thankfully, my mom insisted we go that day, since it was my dad’s day off. I felt frustrated that we had to go right then, but my mom forced us.