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"The Menil Collection: A Selection from the Paleolithic to the Modern Era presents works of art from the extraordinary private collection of Dominique and John de Menil, which was assembled over the last forty years. This book, and the new museum built to house the collection in Houston, Texas, for the first time make available to the public the content of The Menil Collection. The nearly 250 works shown here in color reproductions are, of course, only a fraction of the collection's 10,000 items that include paintings, drawings, prints and photographs, rare books, sculpture, and precious objects." "The Collection has particular concentration in four areas: antiquities from the European, Medi...
An insightful look at the role of silence in modern and contemporary visual art
Reading Art and Activism is similar to visiting Houston's breathtaking Menil Collection with the collectors, curators, and artists as guides. Illustrated with many rare archival photographs of the de Menils among their collection and behind the scenes, the book is a visual and textual treasure. Readers come to understand the unique story of the de Menils' philanthropic, artistic, and political life through a substantial set of essays, written by the likes of architect Renzo Piano (whose first US commission was the Menil Collection) and artist Dorothea Tanning, as well as scholars, activists, and family members. The book includes a large section of previously unpublished private correspondenc...
"The Menil Collection: A Selection from the Paleolithic to the Modern Era presents works of art from the extraordinary private collection of Dominique and John de Menil, which was assembled over the last forty years. This book, and the new museum built to house the collection in Houston, Texas, for the first time make available to the public the content of The Menil Collection. The nearly 250 works shown here in color reproductions are, of course, only a fraction of the collection's 10,000 items that include paintings, drawings, prints and photographs, rare books, sculpture, and precious objects." "The Collection has particular concentration in four areas: antiquities from the European, Medi...
Working in the tradition of trompe l'oeil, Steve Wolf creates replicas of classic books, worn album covers, and vinyl records. This book focuses on Wolfes works on paper, including drawings and pieces that combine drawing with painting, collage, and printmaking.
A beautiful presentation of a new suite of works made for the Menil Collection by Allora & Calzadilla The Puerto Rico-based collaborative duo Allora & Calzadilla created Specters of Noon as a group of seven large-scale works specifically for the Menil Collection. The ensemble is orchestrated around the idea of solar noon, a notion derived from Surrealist texts by Caillois, Césaire, and others that probe the transcultural mythology of noon--a time when shadows vanish and delirious visions momentarily reign. The works include light projections, guano, ship engines, live vocal performance, and coal. Using the Menil's Surrealist holdings as a point of departure, Specters of Noon is infused throughout with a Caribbean perspective that addresses the instability of environmental and colonial politics; one work is a power transformer damaged in Hurricane Maria that is half-sheathed in bronze. Filled with stunning installation photography and insightful texts both commissioned and reprinted, this volume captures the spirit of Jennifer Allora (b. 1974) and Guillermo Calzadilla's (b. 1971) deeply researched and multifaceted work.
Bamana masks and headdresses, Lega ivories, Dogon sculpture, and Benue bronzes are among the many exquisite African artifacts found in the renowned Menil Collection. This stunning book--the first comprehensive catalogue on the de Menils' collection of African art--features 115 of the museum's finest pieces. Dating primarily from the 19th and 20th centuries, these works come from North Africa and the Sahel, Coastal West Africa, and Central and East Africa. An essay by scholar Kristina Van Dyke discusses the formation of the collection, which was inspired in part by its relationship to modernist works and by the couple's interest in human rights. This insightful text also explains how the de Menils' visionary spirit was influenced by African art and places those objects within the context of the whole of the de Menils' collection, in which works from ancient, Byzantine, medieval, modern, Oceanic, and Native American cultures speak to the universal struggle for human understanding. Entries for the selected works were written by leading scholars in the field and are grouped into sections based on regions. Distributed for The Menil Collection
From the first idea to the opening day, the project is followed step-by-step through a long picture-report. Some sketches have been made especially for this book. The aim is to transmit the sense of gradual discovery that is experienced when entering the museum.
**NAMED ONE OF THE BEST ART BOOKS OF THE DECADE BY ARTNEWS** The first and definitive biography of the celebrated collectors Dominique and John de Menil, who became one of the greatest cultural forces of the twentieth century through groundbreaking exhibits of art, artistic scholarship, the creation of innovative galleries and museums, and work with civil rights. Dominique and John de Menil created an oasis of culture in their Philip Johnson-designed house with everyone from Marlene Dietrich and René Magritte to Andy Warhol and Jasper Johns. In Houston, they built the Menil Collection, the Rothko Chapel, the Byzantine Fresco Chapel, the Cy Twombly Gallery, and underwrote the Contemporary Ar...
Renowned as one of the most significant museums built by private collectors, the Menil Collection in Houston, Texas, seeks to engage viewers in an acutely aesthetic, rather than pedagogical, experience of works of art. The Menil's emphasis on being moved by art, rather than being taught art history, comes from its founders' conviction that art offers a way to reintegrate the sacred and the secular worlds. Inspired by the French Catholic revivalism of the interwar years that recast Catholic tradition as the avant-garde, Dominique and John de Menil shared with other Catholic intellectuals a desire to reorder a world in crisis by imbuing modern cultural forms with religious faith, binding the s...