 |
| |
 |
|
|
|
|
|
SPOTLIGHT
ON THE ARTS - November 2005 by Deanna Mascle The Jewel of the Queen City
The Cincinnati Wing presents the story of Cincinnati’s art history spanning nearly 200 years of art in the Queen city. The objects in The Cincinnati Wing recount the founding of Cincinnati and the city’s rapid growth as an important commercial center. The Cincinnati Wing showcases nearly 400 objects that represent art made for Cincinnati, in Cincinnati or by Cincinnatians, including many works by American masters. They are arranged both chronologically and thematically, enabling visitors to understand the history of visual arts in Cincinnati from several perspectives. The exhibition represents five humanities themes, all of which portray the many significant contributions that the arts made to the city’s development as an urban center, the complex relationship between the arts and industry, the importance of patronage by individuals and institutions, and the many ways in which the arts reflect the identities of various groups, such as German immigrants, women and African-Americans. “It may come as a surprise to those unfamiliar with art history how many of the country’s most accomplished artists came from Cincinnati,” says Anita Ellis, director of curatorial affairs at the Museum. The artists in The Cincinnati Wing include Frank Duveneck, a painter of international reputation; Hiram Powers, one of the nation’s finest sculptors; John H. Twachtman, regarded as the finest American Impressionist; Thomas Worthington Whittredge, a leading American landscape painter of the 19th century; and Lilly Martin Spencer, the most celebrated female painter of her time. The Cincinnati Art Museum was ranked as the top art museum for families by Parenting magazine and Zagat Survey in 2004, but that comes as no surprise to the 90,000 people who participated in education programs last year, including 18,000 participating in youth and family programs. Free Family Fun Tours are available every Saturday. The themes change weekly and focus on special exhibitions or on selected areas of the museum’s permanent collection. The Cincinnati Art Museum was founded in 1881 and is one of the country’s oldest visual arts institutions. The first general art museum west of the Alleghenies to be established in its own building, the Cincinnati Art Museum opened to world acclaim in May 1886 and was heralded as “The Art Palace of the West.” An extensive two-year, $13 million renovation project, completed in January 1993, restored the grandeur of the museum’s interior architecture and uncovered long-hidden architectural details in addition to creating new gallery space and improving lighting and climate control. A prominent element of the building’s original design, the Great Hall, was restored and now includes a newly designed double staircase. The original 1886 entrance columns and stone arch and other architectural details were uncovered after more than 40 years. Other notable features include the original Indiana limestone walls and polished black granite columns with ornately carved capitals. In addition to the art of ancient Egypt, Greece and Rome, there are extensive galleries of Near and Far Eastern art, Native American and African art and in the future there will be extensive galleries of furniture, glass, ceramics, silver, costumes and folk art. The painting collection includes works by European old masters such as Titian, Van Dyck, Hals, Rubens and Gainsborough, as well as 20th-century works by Picasso, Braque, Modigliani, Miró and Chagall. The American collection holds works by Copley, Cole, Harnett, Wyeth, Wood, Hopper, Diebenkorn and Rothko, as well as major artists from the 1970s and 1980s. Areas of special strength include the only collection of ancient Nabataean art outside of Jordan, the renowned Herbert Greer French collection of old master prints, and a fine collection of European and American portrait miniatures. The Museum holds and displays many paintings from Cincinnati’s “Golden Age” (1830-1900) as well as Cincinnati’s own Rookwood pottery and over 40 pieces of Cincinnati-carved furniture. Deanna Mascle is a
staff writer for The Lane Report. |
|
|
|
|
Copyright 1996-2005, by Kentucky Business Online. All rights reserved. Editorial content is copyright 2005,
Lane Communications Group The Lane Report is a trademark of Lane Communications Group. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. |
In the Spring of 2003, following a $10 million renovation of 18,000 square feet of gallery space, the Cincinnati Art Museum opened The Cincinnati Wing: the Story of Art in the Queen City and became the first art museum in the country to dedicate permanent gallery space to celebrate the art history of a city. 
With the completion of the renovation, 88 galleries provide for the display of Cincinnati’s widely recognized permanent collection, which numbers over 80,000 works of art. The museum’s temporary exhibition space was expanded to approximately 10,000 square feet to enable the museum to accommodate major temporary exhibitions or several smaller ones.