CitiesandCulture

 

The Gift - CAM

February 2007

 

Cultural News
Cultural Germany: What’s Happening In 2007
The Cultural Arts Calendar

 

Cultural News

Tenth International Snow And Symphony In St. Moritz Opens March 23
St. Moritz’s annual Snow and Symphony festival opens March 23 and concludes April 1 this year. The concerts include performances by the Camerata Salzburg and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra; chamber music groups including the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano and the Kremerata Quartett; and the choir of Coro Sinfonico di Milano Giuseppe Verdi. Guest conductors include Vladimir Ashkenazy, James Galway and Dennis Russell Davies. For full details, visit www.stmoritzfestival.ch.

Don’t Miss The Fifth Annual Orchid Show At New York Botanical Garden
The Orchid Show at The New York Botanical Garden is distinguished as the only curated and designed, museum-quality orchid exhibition. This year this highly anticipated show for the winter weary will open to the public for six weeks from February 24 to April 8.
The centerpiece of the Botanical Garden-wide orchid experience is the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory. Under the dome of this jewel-like, Victorian-style glasshouse, water will cascade over dark volcanic rocks past glittering orchids into a tropical pool. The graceful fronds of stately palms will frame beds of colorful orchids reflected in the tranquil water. In the Lowland Tropical Rain Forest Gallery, exotic trees arch overhead to invite discovery of orchids as they would grow in nature: clinging to branches and twining around massive trunks. Visitors will encounter fragrant pansy and golden dancing ladies orchids, delicate laelias, and extravagantly ruffled corsage orchids.
During the Orchid Show, the terrarium in the Conservatory's Upland Tropical Rain Forest Gallery will showcase beautiful and often strange miniature orchids, allowing close-up views of these plants, which have tiny flowers ranging from two to four millimeters wide and feature colors that span the spectrum. Upon passing a moss-covered waterfall, one will enter the American and African desert galleries, where spiny golden barrel cactus, blue-leaved agaves, flowering aloes, and tiny "living stones" are on view en route to an elegant orchid garden just ahead in the Conservatory's Seasonal Exhibition Galleries.
In the two Seasonal Exhibition Galleries, the main showcase galleries of the exhibition, An Orchid Collector's Garden, will be depicted. A central pavilion will be draped with orchids of every description, while formal planting beds will overflow with thousands of orchid plants and tens of thousands of blooms. Blue and purple vandas, green and yellow cymbidiums, maroon slipper orchids, tall nun's cap orchids, delicate pink and white moth orchids, and more will all compete for attention in this imaginary garden, where all of the flowers are orchids, sheltered by tall palms and surrounded by colorful tropical leaves. Philip Baloun of Philip Baloun Designs, New York City, is The Orchid Show designer.
Tickets: Adults $18, Seniors/Students $16, Children $5. Advance purchase of tickets advised. Visit www.Ticketmaster.com or call 1.212.220.0503.

11th Annual Virginia Arts Festival To Honor America’s 400th Birthday
This year the Virginia Arts Festival will showcase performing artists and companies from around the world, presenting more than 50 performances, events and education programs including a world premiere of an opera and other events celebrating America’s 400th anniversary.
The festival held in different venues in Norfolk and eight other eastern Virginia cities opens April 17 and concludes June 3.Performances at the six week event include the only North American appearance of the Birmingham Royal Ballet, the world premier of a new opera based on the story of Pocahontas who played a pivotal role in the survival of the earliest settlers in Jamestown,, and the largest tattoo in the US—a military drum and drill tradition dating back to the 17th century—the Virginia International Tattoo. In addition, classical, orchestral and chamber music will be featured including performances by American concert organist David Hurd, the Eroica Trio. violinist Itzhak Perlman and Britain’s notable Academy of Ancient Music performing 17th – and 18th-century music. There’s lot more scheduled, so visit the festival website www.virginiaartsfest.com to learn more.

Lorin Maazel To Conduct Wagner At Metropolitan Opera In 2008
After an absence of 4 and a half decades, Lorin Maazel is returning to the Metropolitan Opera to conduct five performances of Richard Wagner’s Die Walkure between January 7 and February 9, 2008. Currently the Music Director of the New York Philharmonic, Maazel last conducted at the Met during the 1962-63 season when he directed the orchestra in performances of Mozart’s Don Giovanni and Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier.
Website: www.metoperafamily.org

36th New Directors/New Films Festival Opens March 21 In New York
Films from Belgium, Italy, France, China, Britain, Argentina, Iran, Ireland, the US, and other countries will be among the attractions when the Museum of Modern Art’s Film Department and the Film Society of Lincoln Center showcase new and emerging talent at this annual festival in New York. Screenings will be held at the Titus 1 Theater at MoMA and at the Walter Reade Theater at Lincoln Center.
The opening films in the festival, which will be shown at MoMA, are “The Inner Life of Martin Front,” directed by novelist Paul Auster, about an exhausted writer escaping his past; and “Glue” by Argentine director Alexis Dos Santos, about how family dysfunction and sexual experimentation shape the lives of three youths in a remote town in Patagonia. The festival runs from March 21 to April 1, 2007.

Titanic Exhibition To Open at the Ontario Science Centre in June 2007
RMS Titanic, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Premier Exhibitions, Inc. has entered into an agreement to produce at the Ontario Science Centre in Toronto, Canada. The show is scheduled to open to the public in June 2007.
Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition is an amazing and inspirational voyage telling the story poignantly and passionately through the artifacts, and giving visitors a very personal perspective on the legendary ship," said Lesley Lewis, CEO of the Ontario Science Centre. "This exhibition is a natural extension of our recent transformation. By reaching out to wider audiences and offering more varied experiences, the Science Centre provides an opportunity for visitors to better understand the world around them, in this instance through diverse subjects such as shipbuilding history, deep-sea recovery and the science of conservation."
RMS Titanic, Inc. is the only company permitted by law to recover objects from the wreck of the Titanic. The Company was granted Salvor-in-Possession rights to the wreck of Titanic by a United States federal court in 1994 and has conducted seven research and recovery expeditions to the Titanic and recovered approximately 5,500 artifacts.

 

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Germany: What’s Happening in 2007

The year 2007 heralds a cultural year filled with new museum openings designed by some of the world’s most important contemporary architects as well a brilliant array of art and cultural events sure to delight the visitor.
With thousands of art galleries, concerts and museums to choose from, connoisseurs visiting Germany face a tantalizing dilemma: where to begin? With over 5,000 art and exhibit houses there is something for everyone; Berlin's Museum Island is just one outstanding spot amongst many others. There’s classical music in stunning locations; follow in the footsteps of Goethe in Weimar, Bach in Leipzig and Luther the reformer in Eisenach. Or, tour one of Germany's many scenic routes, enjoy one of the many concerts and festivals, or visit one of the country's internationally acclaimed museums
Below is a sampling of major cultural events this year:
Bayreuth
This annual musical celebration is devoted to the works of Richard Wagner. This year, the 96th Bayreuth Festival will open July 25 with a brand new production of Die Meistersinger von Nurenberg (The Mastersingers of Nuremberg), directed by 28-year-old Katharina, daughter of festival director Wolfgang Wagner and the composer's great-granddaughter. Tickets are usually sold out in advance of the annual festspiel. More information at http://www.bayreuther-festspiele.de.
Berlin
Berlin is certainly Germany’s cultural capital and offers visitors an almost inexhaustible variety of possible activities and nightlife. Everyone associates something different with the city: the famed Museum Island, for example, is a unique ensemble of museum buildings which illustrates the evolution of modern museum design over more than a century.
The capital is looking forward to the re-opening of the Vitra Design Museum (www.design-museum.de) while an astonishing 130 French impressionist paintings from MoMA will be hung in Mies van der Rohe’s New National Gallery from June 1 to October 7 (www.neue-nationalgalerie.de ) (German only)
Berlin’s 45 Christmas markets feature prominently on Germany’s calendar of yuletide events. The market around the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church, amidst the bustle of shoppers on the high street between the Kurfüstendamm and Tauenzien, is perhaps the most beloved for locals and tourists alike. Dates: November 27 to December 23. More information at  www.berlin-tourist-information.de 
Cologne
Founded by the Romans, Cologne is the oldest of the major German cities and is still characterized by its 2000 years of history and its famous cathedral. The collection of the Museum Ludwig comprises one of the most important collections of pop-art outside of the U.S. including Roy Lichtenstein’s Maybe, Andy Warhol’s Brillo Boxes and George Segal’s Restaurant Window (www.museenkoeln.de ).
Cologne will be hosting ART Cologne in its spring debut from April 18 to 22.  (www.artcologne.com ). Starting April 27, Cologne will also host the MusikTriennale, an every three year eclectic music festival with musicians from around the world.  (www.musiktriennalekoeln.de ).
Six Christmas markets in Cologne ensure a festive atmosphere during the season of Advent. Wherever you look, there are festive, pleasurable and contemplative things to discover. Of course, at all markets there are mulled wine and roasted almonds, but each market has its own special flair. Held from November 23 to December 23. Website:  www.stadt-koeln.de 
Hamburg
Of special interest to the 42.5 million Americans of German heritage, the new emigration center, Ballinstadt, will be opening in Hamburg on July 4th with a gala event. There, German Americans can research their roots as a special feature is the integration of the research project ‘Link to your roots’, a database that displays all passenger lists between 1850 and 1934. Website:  www.ballinstadt.de 
Heidelberg
The Heidelberger Spring Festival was started in 1996 and has become one of the main festivals in the Rhine Neckar Area over the last few years. Supported by the Council of Heidelberg and sponsored by well-known regional companies, the 'Heidelberger Frühling' is well established in the city. March 17 - April 27. Website:
http://www.heidelberger-fruehling.de/content/
Leipzig
Every year, the Bach Festival in Leipzig presents the immortal music of the great erstwhile cantor of St. Thomas' Church in locations where he lived and worked. Concerts by the famous St. Thomas Church’s boys' choir are a truly memorable experience. Listen and enjoy the music of Johann Sebastian Bach, the great cantor of St Thomas School, in historical settings at the Bach Festival in Leipzig. Leipzig is unique among cities in the world having combined the musical tradition of Bach with its own typical flair for more than 100 years. There is also a museum dedicated to Bach adjacent to the Thomaskirche. This year the festival—From Monteverdi to Bach—takes place June 7 to June 17. Bilingual website: www.bach-leipzig.de
Munich
In Munich, teams of workers are getting ready for the opening of the new and enlarged BMW Museum  (www.bmw-welt.com ) as well as the new Jewish Museum on Jakobsplatz  (www.muenchen.de ).
Kassel
Kassel is readying for documenta12, a contemporary art show held every five years, which will take place from June 16 to September 23, and is considered a seismograph of the contemporary art world (www.documenta12.de ).
Muenster
Not far away from Kassel, Muenster is preparing for 35 sculptors around the world who will install their contemporary creations for the Muenster Sculpture Show in and around the city from June 17 to September 30 (www.skulptur-projekte.de ).
Munich
Munich,the capital of Bavaria, is regarded as one of the most beautiful and charming cities of Europe. The city’s Alte Pinakothek is one of the world’s oldest museums housing more than 800 masterpieces by European artists from the Middle Ages to the end of the Rococo period. Outstanding works of European art and sculpture from the late 18th to the beginning of the 20th century are in the spotlight of the Neue Pinakothek while the Pinakothek der Moderne focuses on contemporary and modern art (www.muenchen.de).
The new BMW World museum, situated in Munich between the BMW Tower and Olympic Park, will open in 2007. BMW customers can come here to collect their vehicles, while visitors can learn all about the fascinating BMW marque and enjoy a range of cultural events. Website: www.bmw-welt.com
Numerous Christmas markets take place in Munich between the last Sunday in November and December 24. The most famous one is located on the Marienplatz.
Saarland
The Voelklinger Iron Works, a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Saarland, will present a large exhibition of Duane Hanson’s life-like sculptures of every day people from October 20 to March 30, 2008.  Website: www.voelklinger-huette.org 
Stuttgart
The new Porsche Museum currently being built in the Zuffenhausen suburb of Stuttgart is set to bring the history of Porsche to life more vividly than ever before. The old museum will remain open until the new museum opens, presently scheduled for 2007. With around 20 legendary vehicles on display, it gives visitors an insight into more than 100 years of Porsche history. You can see some of these magnificent sports cars in action at races or classic car rallies. Website: www.glaesernemanufaktur.de
Wartburg
One of the most famous women from the Middle Age in Europe, St. Elizabeth of Thuringia, will be honored from July 7 to November 19 on the occasion of the 800th anniversary of her death. St. Elizabeth, daughter of King Andrew of Hungary, dedicated her life to works of charity and died between the poorest in a hospital she built. Her former home, the Wartburg castle, will host the exhibit (www.wartburg-eisenach.de ).
Trier
Trier, the only Roman imperial residence in Germany, is preparing for its statewide exhibit, Constantine the Great, from June 2d to November 4h. The exhibition examines Constantine’s pivotal role in Europe. Website:  www.konstantin-ausstellung.de  
Wurzburg
Würzburg's Residenz Palace, a UNESCO world cultural heritage site, is one of Germany's greatest architectural treasures. Every year, the splendid baroque palace and gardens come alive for a festival in celebration of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. June 8 to July 7. Website: http://www.mozartfest.de 

All of the above openings are taking place in a landscape already rich with art and architecture and hundreds of arts festivals. In the past, Germany has germinated many now-famous art movements, including the Jugendstil, Bauhaus and Expressionism. Today the country is still a hotbed of creativity in the fields of art, architecture, design and fashion. One only need visit the Leipzig New School, the galleries of Berlin and Cologne, fashion designers in Hamburg and Hombroich Island in Neuss to get a sense of the creativity and initiative that are at work and play around the country.
A listing of 2007 cultural events in Germany can be found at http://www.cometogermany.com/ENU/culture_and_events/germany_culture.htm.
For information on travel to and in Germany, visit the German National Tourist Office website www.cometogermany.com.

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                                                Cultural Arts Calendar

Cities featured this month are Atlanta, Berlin, Boston, Brussels, Buenos Aires, Charleston, Chicago, Copenhagen, Dresden, Las Vegas, London, Madrid, Miami, Milan, Montreal, Moscow, New York, Paris, Philadelphia, Rome, San Francisco, Singapore,  Stuttgart, Sydney NSW, Toronto, Washington, D.C. and Zurich.

Atlanta

High Museum of Art
Website: www.high.org   
Louvre Atlanta: Kings as Collectors
To September 2, 2007
Kings as Collectors highlights some of the most magnificent paintings and sculptures acquired by Louis XIV (the Sun King) and Louis XVI (the last King of France). The French royal collections are the heart of the Louvre's present day holdings.
Decorative Arts of the Kings
March 3 to September 2, 2007
An exhibition exploring the legendary opulence, tastes, and lifestyles of French kings Louis XIV, Louis XV and Louis XVI, will showcase tapestries, silver, porcelain and furniture commissioned by the royals for their personal use. The 53 masterworks in the exhibition, drawn from the collections of the Musée du Louvre in Paris, have never traveled to the United States.
The exhibition includes examples of furniture, tapestry, ceramics and silver by manufacturers such as Les Gobelins and Sèvres and by artists such as Germain and Auguste, whose influence can still be seen today. These works—many of which were created for the Palace of Versailles—demonstrate the excellence of the French artisans in the royal factories, which were largely subsidized by the kings. Exhibition highlights include, a 1784 Sèvres porcelain tureen and platter made for Queen Marie-Antoinette, wife of Louis XVI; an inlaid wooden medals cabinet made in 1660 by Dutch cabinetmaker Pierre Gole for Louis XIV, who collected medals and objets d’art as well as paintings and sculpture; a secretary decorated with pietra dura paneled murals designed by Martin Carlin for the court of Louis XVI in 1780; and a nécessaire including silver objects used to prepare tea or chocolate, made for Louis XV’s wife, Queen Marie Leczinska upon the birth of the couple’s first son in 1729.
The High Museum is located is located at 1280 Peachtree Street between 15th and 16th Streets in Midtown Atlanta. Open Tuesday through Sundays.

Atlanta Civic Center
Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition to Open in Atlanta, Georgia
Opens November 11, 2006
The Exhibition is a chronological journey through life on board the Titanic and compassionately tells Titanic's personal stories through recovered artifacts and dramatic room recreations. Each visitor becomes a passenger and feels the excitement of that April day as they step into authentically recreated first and third class accommodations, view the Ship's cargo hold and stand on the Captain's Bridge. In the Memorial Room, visitors will learn about the aftermath of the disaster, the relief funds and the efforts to discover who actually survived. Visitors will then feel the temperature drop, learn details of the sinking, touch an iceberg and understand the theories of this tragic tale.

 

Berlin

Jewish Museum
Website:  www.juedisches-museum-berlin.de    
Home and Exile
To April 9, 2007
The Jewish Museum Berlin is dedicating its biggest special exhibition to the Jewish Germans who were driven from their homeland by the National Socialists. Between 1933 and 1945 the refuges found shelter in over eighty countries and five continents. The exhibition traces the refugees’ routes into exile and includes many items lent from private possessions and are now being shown publicly for the first time. A vivid impression of the time is conveyed through documentary and feature film sequences, video interviews, music clips and excerpts from radio programs.
Jewish Museum Berlin is located at Lindenstraße 9-14, 10969 Berlin.
Open: Monday from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Tuesday-Sunday from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Admittance will be granted until 7 p.m. Tuesdays-Sundays, 9 p.m. on Mondays.
Admission: Adults: 5 euros; Students and Seniors: 2.50 euros; Children under the age of six: free of charge; Family ticket (2 adults and up to 4 children):10 euros
Transportation: U1, U6 Hallesches Tor; U6 Kochstraße
Bus M29, M41, 265

Kennedy Museum
Ongoing
The Kennedy Museum, honoring the life and political career of President John F. Kennedy, will display a private collection of artifacts once belonging to the Kennedys, including more than 1,000 photographs, historical documents, books and films. A major focus will be JFK's visit to Berlin in June 1963, scene of his famous Ich bin ein Berliner speech. For information, e-mail info@thekennedys.de.
Located on Pariser Platz close to the Brandenburg Gate and the Reichstag,

 

Boston

Museum of Fine Arts
Website: www.mfa.org  
The Romance of Modernism: Paintings and Sculpture from Scott M. Black Collection
To May 6, 2007

Paul Signac painted what he called a "portrait of a cloud" in Antibes, on the southern coast of France, in the years of the First World War. In Antibes, the Pink Cloud (1916), a French sailboat is at center under the glorious sky, but at right is a group of German gunboats, which the painter called a black squadron.
The Romance of Modernism features selections from the private collection of Scott M. Black, including impressionist paintings by Cézanne, Degas, Monet, Pisarro, and Renoir; post-impressionist paintings by Bernard, Denis, Luce, van Rysselbergh, and Signac; modern paintings by Magritte, Matisse, Miró, and Picasso; and sculpture by Rodin, Maillol, and Lipchitz. Scott M. Black is the founder and CEO of Delphi Management Company, a prominent investment management firm based in Boston and a longtime supporter of the MFA.
Donatello to Giambologna: Italian Renaissance Sculpture
January 24 to July 9, 2007
This fascinating collection has never been shown as a whole and remains virtually unknown to the general public and to scholars alike. Several of the masterpieces on display were only recently rediscovered after being long hidden away in storage—like St. John the Baptist, a completely unknown early-sixteenth-century glazed terracotta recently attributed to the Florentine sculptor Giovanni Francesco Rustici, an associate of Leonardo da Vinci. Because many of the objects have been in storage and need extensive work to stabilize, clean, and restore them to their best possible state, the exhibition explores some of the challenges and issues involved in the care and preservation of such a deep and old collection by showing some objects mid-way through conservation. Also included in the exhibition is Donatello's beloved marble relief of Madonna of the Clouds, and what is considered to be one of the finest versions in the world of the bronze statuette representing Architecture, signed by Giambologna.
Through Six Generations: The Weng Collection of Chinese Painting and Calligraphy
March 10 to August 1, 2007
Assembled primarily during the nineteenth century, the Weng Collection has survived the tumult of the last one hundred years of dynastic changes and warfare; remarkably, it remains unscathed and in the care of the original family. Weng Tonghe (1830–1904), the family patriarch who formed the collection, was a preeminent figure in nineteenth-century China. Weng held some of the highest positions at the imperial court, including tutor to two of the last emperors of the Qing dynasty. The Weng collection was passed down through the generations, finally coming to his great-great-grandson Wan-go Weng—the current owner—who brought the collection to the United States for safe keeping in 1948, months before the founding of the People's Republic of China.
This exhibition presents thirty rarely seen masterworks of Chinese painting and calligraphy from the Weng Collection, many of which have never been exhibited. 
Material Journeys: Collecting African and Oceanic Art, 1945–2000. Selections from the Geneviève McMillan Collection
March 20 to September 2, 2007
For over sixty years, Geneviève McMillan, a Cambridge, Massachusetts resident, has collected African and Oceanic art, a lifelong passion that began when she was student in Paris during World War II. The more than one hundred objects in this exhibition, range from sculptures to textiles to musical instruments. This exhibition highlights not only the beauty and function of these works, but also traces their voyages and focuses on the social, political, and commercial forces that accompanied collecting in the second half of the twentieth century.
The Fine Arts Museum is located at 465 Huntington Avenue and easily accessible by the Green Line "E" train to the "Museum of Fine Arts" stop, or the Orange Line train to the "Ruggles" stop or by the 39 bus to the "Museum of Fine Arts" stop, or the 8, 47, or CT2 buses to the "Ruggles" stop. Open daily.

 

Brussels

Palais des Beaux-Arts
http://www.bozar.be 
The Forbidden Empire: Visions of the World from Chinese and Flemish Masters
To May 6, 2007
This exhibition compares the art of China with that of the southern Low Countries, the result of a collaboration between Luc Tuymans, one of Belgium's most famous contemporary artists, and Yu Hui, director of the Palace Museum in Beijing. The exhibition compares compare artistic traditions to explore each region’s techniques, such as how artists depict movement, depth and shadow, or whether they incorporate narrative into their work. The artists on display include Van Eyck, Brueghel, Rubens and Van Dyck shown beside works from the Ming and Qing dynasties and the early days of the republic. After Brussels, the exhibition will travel to Beijing to be shown at the Palace Museum.
Palais des Beaux-Arts, Rue Ravensteinstraat 23, 1000 Brussels. Open: Tue-Sun 10am-6pm (till 9pm on Thu). Tel: +32 (0)2 507 82 00.

 

Buenos Aires

Centro Cultural Borges
Website: http://www.ccborges.org.ar    
Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera: Drawings and Photographs
Ongoing
To celebrate the 100th anniversary of Frida Kahlo’s birth, the Centro Cultural Borges has compiled a modest collection of works by both Kahlo and Diego Rivera, her husband. The exhibit’s showpiece is a large pencil study by Rivera for a mural; the other images on display are more modest, consisting mainly of Rivera’s renderings of Aztec rituals. The show’s most notable works by Kahlo are intensely personal: a detailed lithograph of a pregnant female body, created after she suffered a miscarriage, and a jarring depiction of a road accident she survived, but which left her with health problems for the rest of her life. Photographs of the artists, particularly one of a hulking Rivera towering over Kahlo as she paints a self-portrait, are nearly as appealing as the drawings themselves.
The Borges Cultural Center is located inside Galerías Pacífico, entrance at the corner of Viamonte and San Martín, Centre. Tel: +54 (0) 11 5555-5359. Open: Mon-Sat 10am-9pm; Sun noon-9pm.

Charleston

Spoleto Festival USA
May 25 - June 10, 2007
Originating from a festival celebrated annually in Italy, the Spoleto Festival begins Memorial Day weekend and runs for 17 days.  Historic Charleston hosts the festival with an array of international artistic performances. Opera, Jazz, theatre, orchestral, chamber, contemporary music, literary and visual arts fill the area theatres and halls during this special two weeks. For more information, call 843-722-2764 or visit www.spoletousa.org.  

 

 Chicago

Art Institute of Chicago
Website: http://www.artic.edu/aic
The Silk Road and Beyond
Until October 2007
Silk Road Chicago is a year-long celebration of the art and culture that have flourished along the historic route from China to Asia Minor. The program is the brainchild of several leading city institutions, including the Art Institute of Chicago, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and, most importantly, the Silk Road Project, a foundation started by Yo-Yo Ma, a cellist and educator. “The Silk Road and Beyond” at the Art Institute comprises the visual part of the festival. The main exhibition, Travel, Trade and Transformation, features work that captures the region's vibrant cross-cultural fertilization. Smaller exhibitions include “Stories of the Silk Road”, with original illustrations of some of the route's most famous explorers
Cezanne to Picasso: Ambroise Vollard, Patron of the Avant-Garde
February 17 to May 12, 2007
After a smash success in New York’s Metropolitan Museum, the show travels to AIC.
In 1887 Ambroise Vollard (1866–1939) arrived in Paris with few contacts and no credentials to pursue a career as an art dealer. He began representing artists that were undervalued, exhibiting them at a time when many galleries were not willing to take the risk. In 1895, Vollard hosted Cézanne’s first solo exhibition, and in doing so he made the artist’s reputation as well as his own. By the early 20th century, Vollard had become the principal dealer of artists such as Paul Cézanne, Paul Gauguin, and a number of Fauve artists, and lent early support to artists who are well known today—Pierre Bonnard, Aristide Maillol, Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, and Édouard Vuillard—as well as many who remain relatively unknown. His shrewd mind for business and artistic sense made him the leading contemporary art dealer of his generation.
The museum is located at 111 South Michigan Avenue, at the intersection of Michigan Avenue and Adams Street, on the eastern edge of Chicago’s famous downtown Loop. Open weekdays at 10:30 am and at 10 am on Saturdays and Sundays until 5 pm.

 

Copenhagen
www.visitcopenhagen.com
National Museum of Denmark
http://www.nationalmuseet.dk/sw20379.asp
Tyco Brahe’s World
To April 9, 2007
The astronomer with the silver nose, noble scientist and man of the world, Tycho Brahe’s (1546-1601) checkered life reveals many aspects of living during the 1500s.
The National Museum (The Prince's Palace) traverses the cultural history of Denmark. It includes the Children’s Museum, Ethnographical Collection, The Royal Coin Collection and Classical and Near Eastern Antiquities.
The National Museum is located at Ny Vestergade 10. Open Tuesday-Sunday 10am-5pm. Mondays closed. Free admission

Louisiana Museum of Modern Art
 http://www.louisiana.dk/
Cindy Sherman: 30 Years of Staged Photography
To May 20, 2007
Throughout the thirty years Cindy Sherman (born 1954 in Glen Ridge, New Jersey) has worked as an artist, she has almost exclusively used herself as a model for her works. Sherman stages, directs and photographs herself in constantly changing disguises which are not, however, self-portraits. Each picture reflects a new identity taken from the mass media's stereotyped views of women. She always works in series and never gives her works titles. Instead they are given a number. In the exhibition Sherman's works are presented in large chronologically ordered series, each of which is held together by a theme.
Lousiana Museum Louisiana is situated 35 km north of Copenhagen along the motorway E47 / E55, or the coast road Strandvejen along the Sound. By train (ask for Kystbanen) 36 minutes from Copenhagen and a 10-minute walk from Humlebæk/Louisiana Station.
It houses a collection of modern art by international artists such as Arp, Francis Bacon, Calder, Dubuffet, Max Ernst, Sam Francis, Giacometti, Kiefer, Henry Moore, Picasso, Rauschenberg and Warhol. Open daily. Admission

Royal Danish Ballet
http://www.kglteater.dk/Forestillinger/Ballet.aspx
2006/2007 Season
Copenhagen, home of the world-renowned Royal Danish Ballet, has long been a global ballet capital. The Royal Danish Ballet 2006-2007 season  includes “Trio Extravaganza,” three modern highlights choreographed by Finland’s Jorma Uotinen; France’s Angeline Preljocaj and China’s Yuan Yuan Wang. Other productions in the repertoire include premieres of “Schumann’s 2nd Symphony Etudes, Dance Mozart!, Stravinsky’s Le Sacre du Printemps and the modern American Mixture and Ailey & Zuska, plus revivals of Requiem, choreographed by Tim Rushton and Bournonville’s La Sylphide and Napoli among others.
Det Kongliege Teater (Royal Danish Theater) is located at Kongens Nytorv in the center of Copenhagen since 1748. Tickets can be purchased online at http://www.kglteater.dk/Billetter.aspx .

 

Dresden, Germany

Royal Palace
www.dresden-tourist.de  or  www.skd-dresden.de  
The Historic Green Vault
Created by August the Strong (1670 - 1733), the historic Green Vault was restored its ten rooms to its original splendor. Nearly 3,000 masterpieces crafted by jewelers and goldsmiths, precious objects made of amber and ivory, vessels made of precious stones, exquisite bronze statuettes and objects made of exotic materials like coral and shells from the South Seas are displayed. 

 

Las Vegas

Guggenheim Hermitage Museum
Website: http://www.guggenheimlasvegas.org /
Treasures from the Guggenheim and Hermitage Collections
The Guggenheim Hermitage is located at The Venetian, 3355 Las Vegas Blvd South
Open daily from 9:30 am to 7:30 pm. Admission.

 

London

Courtauld Institute of Art Gallery
Cuercino: Mind to Paper
February 22 to May 13, 2007
Guercino is regarded as one of the most significant Italian artists of the Baroque period. This display of drawings celebrates the freedom and spontaneity of Guercino's draughtsmanship.
The Courtauld Institute of Art is located in Somerset House

Docklands Museum
Journey to the New World: London 1606 to Virginia 1607
To May 13, 2007.
The new exhibition at the Museum in Docklands marks the 400th anniversary of the first permanent English settlement in Jamestown, Virginia. The exhibition tells the story of hope and despair, conflict and failure, tragedy and triumph, and shows how ordinary and extraordinary men, women and children helped to create an emerging nation—a New World for the English and the American Indians. Admission is free.

Imperial War Museum
Website: http://www.iwm.org.uk   
The museum is located on Lambeth Road. Near the Thames Path (http://www.thamespathlondon.co.uk ). Open daily (except 24, 25 and 26 December) 10.00am - 6.00pm. Entrance fee is £7 for adults and £5 for concessions.

National Gallery of Art
http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk
Renoir Landscapes 1865 to 1883
February 21 to May 20, 2007
This is the first exhibition to examine this vital aspect of Renoir's achievement, and brings together some 70 landscapes.
Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841-1919) painted landscapes throughout his life. However, during the first two decades of his long career they constituted an especially important area of experimentation for the artist where he explored composition, paint handling and pictorial structure in innovative new ways.
It begins with works of the 1860s, when the young artist was meeting and working beside the painters who would become his fellow Impressionists. These works show his remarkable ability to emulate technical and stylistic innovations and then turn them to his own uses.
In the 1870s Renoir defined his distinctive quick, silvery brushstrokes and began to explore color and structure in order to gain an audacious painterly freedom.
In the early 1880s he traveled to the South of France, Italy and North Africa, where new intensities of sunlight and color had a profound impact on his landscape art.
The exhibition ends in 1883 with the vibrant oils he executed on a visit to Guernsey.
Dutch Portraits: The Age of Rembrandt and Frans Hals
June 27 to September 16, 2007
Following its independence from Spain in the 17th century, the Dutch Republic experienced an era of unprecedented wealth, the so-called Golden Age. Thanks to the successful activities of its merchants and entrepreneurs - and in sharp distinction to the rest of Europe, new middle-class elite emerged. Its members became the dominant force in local government and civic institutions, and as a result became the new principal patrons of the arts. Portraits were especially suitable to express their newly found self-confidence and desire for representation, and artists responded by developing new types of portraits to meet the demands of this clientele. 
The exhibition will include some 60 works, all painted between 1600 and 1680.
The National Gallery is located at Trafalgar Square, London WC2. Tel: +44 (0) 20 7747 2885. Open: daily 10am-6pm (until 9pm Wed and Sat). Entry: £12. Tube: Charing Cross, Leicester Square.

Royal Academy of Arts
Website: http://www.royalacademy.org.uk 
Citizens and Kings:  Portraits In The Age Of Revolution, 1760-1830
To April 20, 2007
The exhibition will give an in-depth view, through sculptured and painted portraits, of an era characterized by sweeping political and social changes. The exhibition will consist of 145 works drawn from some of the finest collections in the world, depicting not only kings and queens but also the new revolutionary heroes and rising bourgeoise, and enlightenment thinkers, writer and artists.
Royal Academy of Arts, Burlington House, Piccadilly, W1. Tel: +44 (0)20 7300 8000. Open: daily, 10am-6pm (until 10pm on Fridays).  Entrance costs £10, £7 for students, £3 for 12-18 year olds, £2 for 8-11 year olds and under 7s go free

Tate Modern 
Website: http://www.tate.org.uk/modern
The Unilever Series: Carsten Höller
To April 9, 2007
Carsten Höller is the seventh artist to undertake the challenge of creating an artwork to fill Tate Modern’s vast Turbine Hall. Höller is used to working on a grand scale and previous pieces include a series of electronic sliding doors with mirrored surfaces, which gallery visitors pass through on a seemingly endless and puzzling journey, as well as an installation of gigantic mushrooms which hang, suspended from the ceiling by their stalks and rotate in a mesmerizing fashion. Entitled Test Site, the work will comprise of five giant spiraling slides which descend from different levels of the gallery into the Turbine Hall. Two will run from Level 2, one will run from Level 3, a further slide will go from Level 4 and there will be a final one from Level 5. Visitors are invited to take part, thus completing the art work through their involvement.
Gilbert & George: Major Exhibition
February 15 to May 7, 2007
This long-awaited exhibition is the largest ever to explore the remarkable art of Gilbert & George. Gilbert & George have created art together since meeting at St Martin's School of Art in 1967. Their impact on the international art world was immediate, radical and subversive with the declaration that sculpture need not be confined to the production of three-dimensional objects and that their own lives could be classed as living sculptures. Since then, their joint existence has been one long art journey which has led to major exhibitions in five continents, including pioneering shows in Russia and China.
The exhibition begins with a documentation of the legendary Living Sculptures together with the idyllic Nature Pieces which include the rarely seen Charcoal on Paper Sculptures. This is followed by pictures of increasingly powerful social engagement including the Drinking Pieces and Human Bondage and culminating in the infamous, black white and red Dirty Words Pictures of 1977.
The 1980s and 1990s saw an explosion of color in their art through which Gilbert & George continued to confront fundamental human issues. Among the comprehensive selection of works from this compelling period are the Tate's own vast quadripartite Death Hope Life Fear, the phantasmagorical Life without End, the scandalous Naked Shit Pictures and the instinctive Fundamental and New Testamental Pictures featuring the artists' own blood, tears, spunk, piss, shit and sweat. The final section of the exhibition explores Gilbert & George's visionary twenty-first-century art. Beginning with the promiscuous New Horny Pictures and mesmerizing lice-infested East One Pictures, followed by the Gingko Pictures of Venice Biennale fame, these works continue to ask provocative questions about sexuality, identity and religion. The show ends with the controversial Sonofagod Pictures including the epic Was Jesus Heterosexual? which led to accusations of blasphemy. Gilbert & George have also created completely new pictures for this exhibition.

Tate Britain
Website: http://www.tate.org.uk/britain  
Hogarth
To April 29, 2007
Witty, satirical, subversive and hugely talented, William Hogarth remains one of the most fascinating and innovative artists from the eighteenth century. This superb exhibition is the most comprehensive showing of the artist’s work in living memory and incorporates the full range of Hogarth’s work.
Tate Britain is located at Millbank in London’s southwest end. Open Daily, 10.00 am to 5:50 pm. More information at email: visiting.britain@tate.org.uk

Victoria and Albert Museum
Website: www.vam.ac.uk  
Kylie: The Exhibition
To June 10, 2007
This exhibition will look at Kylie Minogue as a popular style icon and international performer and will feature performance costumes, accessories, photographs, music and videos exploring Kylie's career and changing image.
Victoria and Albert Museum is located on Cromwell Road, London SW7. Tel:
+44 (0)20 7942 2000. 
Getting there:  London Underground: South Kensington; Buses: C1, 14, 74 and 414 stop outside the Cromwell Road entrance.

Royal Albert Hall
Website: http://www.bbc.co.uk/proms     
Royal Albert Hall, Kensington Gore, SW7. Tube: South Kensington.

 

Madrid

Museo del Prado
www.museoprado.mcu.es
 Tintoretto: Retrospective
To May 13, 2007
Madrid’s Museo del Prado will present a major retrospective of one of the most renowned names in the history of painting beginning January 30. Tintoretto will showcase about 60 works from more than 20 leading European and American museums – the first such comprehensive show in 70 years—and the first exhibition in Spain to be devoted solely to the artist. One of the great Renaissance painters, Venetian-born Jacobo Tintoretto (1518 -1594) was regarded as a daring and prolific painter during his lifetime, being cited in the early 17th century as one of the three great masters of Venetian painting along with Titian and Paolo Veronese. Tintoretto shared their use of a new language characterized by the bravura of the brushstroke and a pronounced chiaroscuro, both deployed in a new style of narrative painting. He went further, creating a style that fused the Tuscan with the Venetian, combining Titian’s loose handling with Michelangelo’s skilled draftsmanship. And Tintoretto also perfected a highly efficient painting method allowing him to produce a large body of work.
Revealing Tintoretto’s range, the exhibition’s 49 paintings, 13 drawings and three sculptures also show his interest in all the major artistic genres. His religious narratives will be a main focus of the exhibition. For the first time in 400 years, art lovers will be able to see side by side his two masterpieces painted for the church of San Marcuola: The Last Supper (from the church in Venice) and Christ Washing the Disciples’ Feet (Museo del Prado). The exhibition will bring together some of his most important mythological paintings Venus, Volcan and Mars (Alt Pinakothek, Munich) and The Origins of the Milky Way (National Gallery, London) as well as examples of his work as a portraitist, including self-portraits from the Philadelphia Museum of Art (Philadelphia) and the Musée du Louvre (Paris), and the Portrait of Lorenzo Soranzo from the Kunsthistorisches Museum (Vienna).
The Prado Museum is located on Paseo del Prado in Madrid, call: 011-34-91-330-28-00, e-mail: museo.nacional@prado.mcu.es or go to.  The museum is open daily except Mondays from 9 AM to 8 PM and closed January 1, May 1, Easter Friday and Christmas Day.  General admission is about $7.80 (6 euros), except Sundays, when it is free.  Visitors under 18 and over 65 and students from the EU are admitted free of charge.  Other students pay about $3.90 (3 euros). For further information about Spain, contact the Tourist Office of Spain in New York (212-265-8822); Miami (305-358-1992); Chicago (312-642-1992) or Los Angeles (323-658-7188) or go to www.spain.info

Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum
Website: www.museothyssen.org  
The Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum is located at Paseo del Prado, 8 and is open Tuesdays through Sundays from 10 AM to 7 PM and during July and August the temporary exhibitions will remain open until 11 PM Tuesdays to Saturdays.  (Closed Mondays.)  Admission to the temporary exhibition is about $5.14 and about $3.85 for students and seniors. Combined tickets for the temporary and context exhibitions and permanent collection range from $9 to $14.50 ($6.40 to $10.30 for students and seniors).  

 

Mexico City

Old College of San Ildefonso
Revelations: Art in Latin America 1492-1820
February 21 to -June 24, 2007
This massive, illuminating exhibition of 250 works spans the history of Latin America under Spanish rule, from Columbus’s arrival to Simón Bolívar’s revolutions, when the colonial power began breathing its last gasps. The paintings, objects and sculptures from diverse collections do well to illustrate the artistic evolution of this period. Most captivating, perhaps, is the palpable tension between conqueror and conquered in much of the region’s art.
Old College of San Ildefonso is located at Justo Sierra 16, Centro. Tel: +52 (55) 5702-3254. Open: Tue-Sun 10am-5.30pm.Admission: 35 pesos.

 

Miami

Miami Art Museum
Website: www.miamiartmuseum.org 
Andy Warhol: Moving Pictures
March 2 to April 1, 2007
Miami Art Museum is located at 101 West Flagler Street. Open daily except Mondays.

 

Milan
Castello Sforzesco
Website: http://www.milanocastello.it  
Castello Sforzesco, Piazza Castello, 3. Open: Tues-Sun, 9am-1pm, 2pm-5.30pm.

International Center For Photography
Website: http://www.formafoto.it
International Centre for Photography is located at Piazza Tito Lucrezio Caro, 1. Tel: +39 (0)2 5811 8067. Open: Tues-Sun 11am-9pm (Thurs until 11pm). Admission: €6.50.

Palazzo della Permanente
Palazzo della Permanente, Via Turati 34 and Fondazione Stelline, Corso Magenta 61. Tel: +39 (0)2 655 1445. Open: Tue-Sun 10am-8pm (Thursday until 10pm). Entry: €8.

 

 

Montreal

Montreal High Lights Festival
February 22 to March 4, 2007
The 8th edition of the Montreal High Lights Festival Montreal High Light Festival’s cultural segment, sponsored by the Sun Life Financial Performing Arts, announces its impressive event program, which is sure to take the bite out of winter.  From Thursday, February 22, to Sunday, March 4, 2007, the 8th edition of the urban winter festival will send temperatures soaring with performances by all manner of artists from here and abroad. Local Montrealers and tourists alike will have the privilege of discovering, or perhaps rediscovering, some of the world’s most talented performing artists. 
This winter’s festival will also feature sports and family activities with the Montreal Downtown & Underground Event, gastronomic delights with the Air France Wine and Dine Experience presented by American Express and festive events with the Hydro-Québec Celebration of Light and the Montreal All-Nighter, whose respective programs will be made public next January.
For information, please call 1-888-477-9955 or visit www.montrealhighlights.com .

Biodôme de Montreal (Botanical Garden)
www.museumsnature.ca
jardin_botanique@ville.montreal.qc.ca
Montréal Botanical Gardenis located at 4101 Sherbrooke Street East. Open: Tuesday to Sunday. 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Closed on December 24 and 25. Information:  (514) 872-1400 (Telephone)

Les Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal
www.grandsballets.com
info@grandsballets.com
Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier, Place des Arts at 175 Sainte-Catherine Street West.
Tickets: (CAN) $29 to $95; Group Rate available; telephone: (514) 842-2112 / 1 866 842-2112 (Toll Free)

Montreal Symphony
http://www.osm.ca  or http://www.osm.ca/index_en.cfm
Place des Armes

Museum of Fine Arts (Jean-Noël Desmarais Pavilion)
Website: http://www.mbam.qc.ca 
The Museum is located at 1380 Sherbrooke Street West. Open Tuesdays through Sundays.

Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal
www.macm.org
Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal is at 185 Sainte-Catherine Street West. Open Tuesday
to Sunday, 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Wednesday, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Admission: (Can)$8; group rate available.  Free admission for all every Wednesday evening, 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. Open holiday Mondays. Information:  (514) 847-6226 (Telephone) or info@macm.org

 

 

Moscow

Bakhrushin Theatre Museum
Bakhrushin Theater Museum is located at 31/12 Ulitsa Bakhrushina. Metro Paveletskaya. Tel: +7 (095) 953-4470.

 

New York

Mark your calendars in the month of February for two important art shows taking place in New York.
The Art Show
February 22 to 26, 2007
The show presents 70 of the nation's most prominent art dealers who will exhibit paintings, sculpture, drawings, prints, and photographs by artists of all periods at the nineteenth annual The Art Show. Organized by the Art Dealers Association of America (ADAA), the exhibition will run from February 22 through February 26, 2007,
The show is presented at the Seventh Regiment Armory, Park Avenue at 67th Street. All proceeds from the regular show admissions benefit Henry Street Settlement, one of New York City's oldest and most comprehensive social service agencies.
Running concurrently with The Art Show is The Armory Show otherwise know as the International Fair of New Art devoted exclusively to contemporary art. In its ninth annual exhibition, The Armory Show 2007 will present 148 international galleries, including many of the most important contemporary dealers showcasing new art from around the world.
 Located in the well-known Passenger Terminal Pier Complex on the west side of Manhattan on 12th Avenue and 55th Streets. More information at www.thearmoryshow.com

A Sleepover At AMNH Offered To Children And Adults
The American Museum of Natural History officially launched its sleepover program, called A Night at the Museum, to the public last month.  The overnight expeditions will last from 5:45 p.m. until 8:00 a.m. the next morning, and are open to children, ages 8–12, and their accompanying parents or guardians. The young explorers will experience the wonder and magic of the Museum’s most famous displays after dark, including a 65-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex in the famed fossil halls, a herd of wild bison in the Hall of North American Mammals, and the Space Show in the Hayden Planetarium at the Rose Center for Earth and Space before settling down to sleep under the Blue Whale. 
Sleepover participants are asked to bring along their own sleeping bags, toothbrushes, toothpaste, comfy clothes for exploring and sleeping, pillows, and a flashlight with extra batteries (teddy bears and other stuffed creatures are optional).  Sleeping cots will be provided for everyone.
Sleepover Program Fees
Individual fees (for both children and adults) are $79.00 per person.  Members are $70.00 each.  Group admission is $75.00.  For more information call 212-769-5565 or check the Museum Web site at www.amnh.org/sleepovers. To register for a sleepover, call 212-769-5200. But hurry, tickets are going fast!
 
                                               
American Museum of Natural History
Website: www.amnh.org    
Gold
To August 19, 2007
Showcasing a vast array of extraordinary objects gleaned from the geology and cultural anthropology holdings of major museums and private collections around the world, Gold will present the fascinating scientific and cultural story of this rare and prized element. The influence of gold throughout history will be examined through the currency of ancient civilizations, displays on the Gold Rush that shaped the American West, and contemporary pop culture items. Historical exhibition highlights will include enormous nuggets of gold such as the famous Latrobe Nugget, a specimen of rare natural crystallized gold; gold bars; rare doubloons retrieved from sunken Spanish galleons; the first gold coins minted in ancient Lydia (now Turkey); gold textiles; and gleaming pre-Columbian jewelry and other objects from the Museum's own collection.
Visitors will experience firsthand the alluring splendor of the finest gold specimens on Earth and learn how gold is located, mined, processed, and turned into both beautiful and useful objects. Among the treasures on display is a reproduction of a 3,000-year-old map–the Turin Papyrus found in Egypt–that pinpoints the location of regional gold deposits. Compelling modern objects that may include Olympic medals, Academy Awards Oscar statuettes, and best-selling gold records, will illustrate the powerful hold that gold continues to have on our imagination. And visitors will discover that gold has amazing physical properties such as extreme malleability, reflectivity, and conductivity that make it invaluable for technological uses from telephones and televisions to satellite circuitry and astronauts' visors.
Throughout the exhibition, there will be numerous opportunities for visitors to explore the unique properties of gold. They can walk through a room completely covered in a single ounce of gold flattened to exquisite thinness, and guess the amount of gold ore found in a boulder.
Hall of Human Origins
Permanent
See the remarkable history of human evolution, from earth’s earliest ancestors to modern man. The new exhibit combines the most up to date discoveries in the fossil record with the latest in genomic science to explore the most profound mysteries of humankind—who we are, where we came from, and what is in store for the future of man. The new 10,000 square foot Spitzer Hall of Human Origins offers the most comprehensive evidence of hum an evolution ever assembled with over 200 casts of the rarest hominid fossils and artifacts documenting how modern humans evolved over millions of years from earlier species and showing how new DNA evidence reveals how closely related we are to each other and to our primate ancestors. There is an educational center within the Spitzer Hall where hands-on experiments are conducted.
The Butterfly Conservatory
To May 28, 2007
Now in its ninth year, the Butterfly Conservatory within the museum houses tropical and subtropical butterflies. A wonderful learning experience.
The American Museum of Natural History is located at Central Park West and between West 77 and 79 Streets.

Asia Society
Website: www.asiasociety.org/arts    
Asia Society and Museum is located at 725 Park Avenue at 68th Street. Open Tuesday - Sunday, 11:00 am - 6:00 pm, with extended evening hours Fridays until 9:00 pm. Closed on Mondays and major holidays.  Admission fee.

Frick Museum
Website: www.frick.org  
George Stubbs (1724 – 1806): A Celebration
February 14 through May 27, 2007
The exhibition of approximately twenty paintings by the celebrated artist, comes in early 2007 to The Frick Collection, its only North American venue. The exhibition marks the bicentenary of Stubbs’s death by presenting some of his greatest contributions to the tradition of British eighteenth-century painting, all notable for their originality and beauty. The exhibition exclusively draws upon British-owned examples, some of which have never crossed the Atlantic Ocean, and thus offers an important viewing opportunity in this country. Stubbs is renowned for the precise and noble treatment of animals in a style ordinarily reserved for the human figure, and he spent many years studying and documenting the anatomy of horses, dogs, and wild animals. His understanding of the physical structure of these animals provided him with the exceptional ability to convey accurately their beauty, strength, and dignity. The Frick showing devotes much attention to animal paintings and also features quintessential English landscape and genre scenes, representing nearly the full range of work in oil that Stubbs produced over the course of his career.  
The Frick is located at 1 East 70 Street.

Guggenheim Museum of Art
Website: www.guggenheim.org

Spanish Painting from El Greco to Picasso: Time, Truth, and History
To March 28, 2007
The exhibition presents a panoramic overview of the history of five centuries of Spanish art. Approximately 140 paintings by Spanish masters, including El Greco, Diego Velázquez, Francisco de Zurbarán, José de Ribera, Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, Francisco de Goya, Juan Gris, Joan Miró, Salvador Dalí, and Pablo Picasso, have been culled from private and public collections throughout Spain, Europe, and the US, in this first historical overview of Spanish painting to be seen in New York.
Unlike other overviews that display paintings in a strictly chronological order, Spanish Painting from El Greco to Picasso: Time, Truth, and History is presented in fifteen distinct sections, each based on a theme running through the past five centuries of Spanish culture. These thematic axes reveal the connections and affinities between the old masters and the modern era through a series of carefully chosen, content-based clusters, each based on a theme running through the past five centuries of Spanish culture. Accordingly, within each section of the exhibition works from different periods appear side by side, offering often radical juxtapositions that cut across time to reveal the overwhelming coherence of the Spanish tradition. As viewers move through the exhibition, these sections not only articulate the dominant trends of the Spanish School but reveal the Spanishness of great twentieth-century artists who lived abroad—Picasso, Gris, Miró, and Dalí.
The origins of each of the exhibition’s themes lie in the culture of sixteenth-century Spain, which was itself heavily influenced by the Counter-Reformation. This religious impulse sets the tone for many of the works in the exhibition, even in a genre as apparently worldly as the still life, which are featured in the largest section of the exhibition, Bodegones. A uniquely Spanish term for still life, bodegón refers to the pantries, or bodegas, where the pictured objects were kept. Early examples by artists like Juan Sánchez Cotán and Francisco de Zurbarán feature humble objects inscribed with transcendental values but depicted with the utmost naturalism against an inky black background that alludes to the void beyond worldly concerns. The fruits, vegetables, and other perishables in many of these paintings evoke a sense of transience even as they are precisely arranged along rigid sills, implying the timelessness of mathematical law. Over 300 years later, this “mineral” quality would serve as an important precedent for the Cubists, in particular the fragmented style of Juan Gris. In his canvases, as in much of Picasso’s early work, the transcendent geometries of the seventeenth century take on a modern, wholly unreligious character, updated to a new cultural moment but still constituting an inescapable historical model.
In the section titled “Childhood” the exhibition examines typical representations of children over the past five centuries.

Juan Pantoja de la Cruz    Pablo Picasso
Until the late eighteenth century, Spanish society distanced itself intellectually and emotionally from the notion of childhood, due largely to the high rate of infant mortality and prejudicial views that childhood was dangerously close to original sin and brute nature. Thus, when portraying children, usually for heraldic reasons, painters tended to exaggerate potential adult features to the point of caricature. The first painter to break free from this rigid, theatrical stance was Velázquez, who revealed childhood as an essentially fragile state every bit as interesting as any other stage of life. His contemporary Bartolomé Esteban Murillo did much to formalize this humanizing approach through a remarkable series of genre paintings, but it was Goya who first matched Velázquez’s skill at handling this subject. Operating under Enlightenment ideas, Goya presented from an existential perspective, as a moment of purity or innocence. Nearly a century later Picasso would pick up this thread, painting his own offspring with perceptive grace as he explored the dignity of childhood.
This exhibition was organized by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation and the State Corporation for Spanish Cultural Action Abroad (SEACEX).
The Guggenheim is located at1071 Fifth Ave. at 89th St., 212-423-3500.

Metropolitan Museum Of Art
Website: www.metmuseum.org  
Barcelona and Modernity: Gaudí to Dalí
March 7, 2007–June 3, 2007
The first comprehensive survey of its type ever mounted in America, this exhibition will explore the diverse and innovative work of Barcelona's artists, architects, and designers in the years between the Barcelona Universal Exposition of 1888 and the imposition of the Fascist regime of Francisco Franco in 1939. The exhibition will feature some 300 works, including paintings, sculpture, drawings, prints, posters, decorative objects, furniture, architectural models, and designs. Barcelona and Modernity will offer new insights into the art movements that advanced the city's quest for modernity and confirmed it as the primary center of radical intellectual, political, and cultural activities in Spain.
Venice and the Islamic World, 828–1797
March 27–July 8, 2007
This exhibition will examine the relationship between Venice and the Islamic world over a thousand-year period, focusing on artistic and cultural ideas that originated in the Near East and were channeled, absorbed, and elaborated in Venice, a city that represented a commercial, political, and diplomatic magnet on the shores of the Mediterranean. The underlying theme of the exhibition will focus on the reasons why a large number of Venetian paintings, drawings, printed books, and especially decorative artworks were influenced by and drew inspiration from the Islamic world and from its art. "Orientalism" in Venice was based on direct contact with the Islamic world, which brought about new technological, artistic, and intellectual information. A continuous thread throughout the exhibition deals with the works of Islamic art that entered Venetian collections in historical times and explores the nature of the artistic relationship between Venice and the Mamluks in Egypt, the Ottomans in Turkey, and the Safavids in Iran.
A symposium will be held on Sunday, April 22, 2007, in conjunction with this exhibition. The symposium is free with Museum admission and does not require tickets or reservations. For more information, please contact lectures@metmuseum.org
The Metropolitan Museum is located at 1000 Fifth Avenue at East 82 Street. Museum is open daily except Mondays from 9:30 am to 5:30 pm; Fridays and Saturdays it remains open to 9 pm. Parking facilities available.

The Cloisters at Fort Tryon Park (An extension of the Met Museum)
The Abbey At Saint-Guilhem-Le-Désert
Ongoing
The Abbey located near Montpellier, France, was a regular stop on the medieval pilgrimage route to Santiago de Compostela in Spain. The 140 architectural elements from Saint-Guilhem that were used to reconstruct the 12th-century cloister in New York were acquired by George Grey Barnard around 1900 and purchased for The Metropolitan Museum of Art by John D. Rockefeller, Jr. The stone has recently been cleaned by Museum conservators, the plaster walls have been resurfaced, and a new lighting system has been put into place to supplement the natural light, creating the sense of an outdoor cloister as the Museum’s original designer intended.
The Cloisters opened as a branch of The Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1938 devoted to the art and architecture of medieval Europe. 
Recorded Information: 212-923-3700. To get to the Cloisters, take the M4 public bus a block east from the Met Museum at Madison Avenue and 93rd Street to the bus’s last stop (Fort Tryon Park–The Cloisters).

Museum of Modern Art (MoMA)
Website: www.moma.org
Armando Reverón
February 11–April 16, 2007
This retrospective exhibition introduces the work of the celebrated Venezuelan artist Armando Reverón (1889–1954) to international audiences. The exhibition is divided into sections of figurative and landscape painting, and also includes the life-sized dolls and many of the imitation practical objects that Reverón and his partner Juanita Ríos created to fill their secluded home in the small Caribbean village of Macuto. Early in his artistic career, Reverón painted coastal landscapes with monochromatic palettes imitative of the bright white light of the seashore. These highly tactile paintings are unique in early modernism, and seem to anticipate later monochromatic abstract art. Later, Reverón began to paint depictions of industrial activity in a nearby port. Reverón’s figurative works seem to replicate the perceptual experience of puzzling out forms in shadowy interiors. Surprisingly, the subjects of these figure paintings were, increasingly, not human figures but Reverón’s life-sized dolls. The exhibition will be accompanied by an illustrated catalogue, the first major publication on Reverón in English. 
Jeff Wall
February 25–May 14, 2007
Jeff Wall (Canadian, b. 1946) is widely recognized as one of the most adventurous and inventive artists of his generation. This retrospective surveys his career from the late 1970s to the present through some forty works. The exhibition features his major lightbox photographs and trace the evolution of his principal themes and pictorial strategies.
Following the New York showing the exhibition travels to The Art Institute of Chicago, and concludes its tour at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in the fall of 2007.
MoMA is located at 11 W. 53rd Street.

Neue Galerie New York
Van Gogh and Expressionism
Website: www.neuegalerie.org        
Neue Galerie is located at 1048 Fifth Avenue & East 86 Street.

The New York Botanical Garden
Website www.nybg.org  
The Fifth Annual Orchid Show
February 24 to April 8, 2007
The Orchid Show at The New York Botanical Garden is distinguished as the only curated and designed, museum-quality orchid exhibition. The centerpiece of the Botanical Garden-wide orchid experience is the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory where thousands of orchid plants Visitors are exposed to these coveted plants in ingenious ways. The colors, shapes, sizes, and textures of the orchids as well as the rich information provided about them are a feast for the eyes and nourishment for the intellect.
Exhibition tours, home gardening demonstrations, expert Q&A sessions and presentations, Continuing Education classes, and children's programming round out The Orchid Show experience and whet appetites to return to The New York Botanical Garden multiple times during the run of the show. Tickets: Adults $18, Seniors/Students $16, Children $5. Advance purchase of tickets advised. Visit Ticketmaster.com or call 1.212.220.0503
For more information, call 718.817.8700.
Open year round Tuesdays through Sundays, the NY Botanical Garden is located at 200th St. and Kazimiroff Blvd. in the Bronx. Transportation to the Garden is available via the MetroNorth rail line from Grand Central Station in Manhattan. Parking also available.

New York Historical Society
www.nyhistory.org
The New York History Society has published its Programs & Exhibitions booklet for Winter/Spring 2007 and is available at the website above. The institution offers historical lectures, art exhibits, musical explorations and much more centering on both the city and the state’s rich heritage.
Located at 170 Central Park West at77 Street. Open Tuesdays to Sundays 10 am to 6pm.

The Whitney Museum of American Art
Website: http://www.whitney.org/noflash.html  
Terence Koh
To May 2007
For his first solo museum show in the United States, Terence Koh is creating a new installation for the Whitney's Lobby Gallery. In Koh's immersive, typically monochromatic environments in which minimalist and baroque aspects of his sensibility vie for dominance, a seemingly unknown ritual is about to take place, where a sense of loss simultaneously suggests regeneration. From drifting powder silencing rooms, and constellations of cryptically linked objects that move from literally disjunctive realms (upstairs/downstairs, inside/outside, dark/light) as well as more conceptual ones, to pristine, perfectly crafted containers that become coffins for shattered glass and mirror, the glitter of black beads, burnt objects, residing within, Koh's gestures evoke isolation and secrecy, but also protection and ecstasy.     
Gordon Matta Clark
February 22, 2007-June 7, 2007
During the brief but highly productive ten years that he worked as an artist, and even more so since his death, Gordon Matta-Clark (1943-1978) has exerted a powerful influence on artists and architects who know his work. This retrospective will bring together the breadth of his practice to reveal the unique beauty and radical nature of his punnings, plans, performances, and interventions evident in the many media in which he worked: the sculptural objects (most notably from building cuts), drawings, fims, photographs, notebooks, and documentary material.
Lorna Simpson
March 1 to May 6, 2007
One of the leading artists of her generation, Lorna Simpson is well known for her photographic and film works, which often examine racial and gender identity. In works such as Call Waiting (1997), she depicts people of color engaging in intimate yet incomplete onversations that elude easy interpretation but seem to plumb the mysteries of identity and desire. Organized by the American Federation of Arts, this comprehensive first mid-career survey will feature her image and text works, serigraphs on felt, film installations, and a selection of recent work.
The Whitney Museum is located at 945 Madison Avenue between 74th and 75th streets.
Open Wednesday–Thursday 11 am–6 pm; Friday 1–9 pm (6–9 pm pay-what-you-wish admission); Saturday–Sunday 11 am–6 pm. Closed Mondays and Tuesdays.
The Museum is open Tuesdays for prearranged school programs. For more information, please contact the Education Department at schoolvisits@whitney.org, (212) 570-7721 or fax (212) 570-7711.

 

Paris

Musée de l’Orangerie
Website: http://www.musee-orangerie.fr
Monet’s Water Lilies
Ongoing
Monet’s water lilies artworks languished for decades in a gloomy netherworld in the Orangerie after a botched museum renovation in the 1960s. However, a major revamp of the museum, which reopened on May 17th after eight years, has changed all that.
The eight works, painted between 1914 and 1926, were donated by the artist and hung at the Orangerie in 1927, a year after his death. Impressive in size—each is two meters high; and one is 17 meters long—the paintings help illustrate Monet's influence on nudging art towards abstraction. Some even capture the mysterious sunset light at Giverny, an effect that could woo even jaded anti-Impressionists. The museum also houses the Jean Walter and Paul Guillaume collection of Impressionist and post-Impressionist works by Cézanne, Renoir, Soutine, Picasso, Modigliani and others..
Musée de l’Orangerie, Jardin des Tuileries. Tel: +33 (0)1 44 77 80 07. Métro: Concorde. Open: Weds-Mon, 12.30pm-7pm (until 9pm on Fridays)

Jeu de Paume
Website: http://www.jeudepaume.org
Jeu de Paume, 1, place de la Concorde. Open daily except Mondays.

Musée de Quai Branly
Website: http://www.quaibranly.fr  
The museum’s permanent collections area presents the great geographical regions in which the Musée de quai Branly’s remarkable collections originated: Oceania, Asia, Africa and the Americas. The visitor makes his way fluidly across them, taking in the major crossroads between civilizations and cultures: Asia-Oceania, Insulindia, and Mashreck-Maghreb. The 3,500 artifacts are presented so as to highlight the historical depth of the cultures that produced them, and the many different meanings that the works themselves possess. The museography encourages the visitor to take the time to inform himself on major thematic areas: masks and tapa in Oceania, costume in Asia, and African musical instruments and textiles form the subjects of a series of fascinating video presentations.
The museum is located at 27, 37, 51 quai Branly 206, 218 rue de l'Université 75007 Paris. Phone: 01 56 61 70 00. Open Tuesday to Sunday, from 10 a.m. to 6.30 p.m.
Admission fee.

National Museum of Natural History
Muséum Nationale de l’Histoire Naturelle, Grande Galerie de l’Evolution, 36, rue Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, 5th arrondissement. Métro: Jussieu or Gare d’Austerlitz. Open: Sun-Fri 10am-6pm, Sat 10am-8pm. Tel: +33 (0)1 40 79 30 00.

 

Philadelphia

Philadelphia Museum of Fine Art
Website: www.philamuseum.org  
 Thomas Chimes: Adventures in 'Pataphysics
February 27, to May 6, 2007
This retrospective exhibition celebrates the life and work of Thomas Chimes, arguably one of the most important artists to emerge on the Philadelphia art scene since World War II. It includes approximately one hundred paintings and works on paper, many previously unseen, along with extensive biographical and archival material.
Ike Taiga and Tokuyama Gyokuran: Japanese Masters of the Brush
May 1 to July 22, 2007
This exhibition marks the first time an exhibition in the United States focuses on the eighteenth-century Japanese master of ink painting Ike Taiga (1723–1776) and his wife Tokuyama Gyokuran (1727–1784), with 200 exceptional and rarely seen works of art.
The museum is located at 26th Street and the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. Open Tuesdays through Sundays.

University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology & Anthropology
Website: http://www.museum.upenn.edu  
Amarna, Ancient Egypt's Place in the Sun
Through October, 2007
Tutankhamun, ancient Egypt's famous boy pharaoh, grew up 3,300 years ago in the royal court at Amarna, the ancient city of Akhetaten, whose name meant the "Horizon of the Aten." This extraordinary royal city grew, flourished - and vanished - in hardly more than a generation's time. A new exhibition offers a rare look at the meteoric rise and fall of this unique royal city during one of Egypt's most intriguing times. Talks, tours, Saturday rash courses on ancient Egypt, theater in the galleries, family workshops, even a "Hollywood on the Nile" film series, are all part of the Year of Egypt.
The exhibit will feature more than 100 ancient artifacts, some never before on display - including statuary of gods, goddesses and royalty, monumental reliefs, golden jewelry, as well as personal items from the royal family, and artists' materials from the royal workshops of Amarna. Most of the show's artifacts date to the time of and the Amarna Period, including many objects excavated almost a century ago from this short-lived royal city. With background information about the childhood home and unique times in which Tutankhamun lived, Amarna is a complementary exhibition to the nationally traveled, blockbuster exhibition from Egypt, Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs. Penn Museum is partnering locally with The Franklin Institute (website: http://www2.fi.edu) which will host the blockbuster Tutankhamun show opening February 3, 2007.
Penn Museum's renowned Upper and Lower Egyptian galleries, recently refurbished, offer visitors a rich opportunity to view a wide variety of ancient Egyptian artifacts from several millennia. Materials range from monumental architecture to sculptures, pottery, jewelry, tomb goods, and mummies.
- The University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, located at 3260 South Street in Philadelphia. Tel: (215) 898-4000. Museum hours are Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.; Sunday, 1 to 5 p.m. Closed Mondays, holidays and summer Sundays, Memorial Day through Labor Day weekends. Admission
- The Franklin Institute Science Museum is located at 222 North 20th Street in Center City Philadelphia, at the intersection of 20th Street and the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. Open daily. Admission

 

Rome

National Gallery of Modern Art/ Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna
www.gnam.arti.beniculturali.it
Grande antologica di Arturo Martini
To May 13, 2007
Mambor:  Separè. Oggetti scultorei
To April 29, 2007

 

San Francisco

San Francisco Symphony
Website: http://www.sfsymphony.org  
September 2006 to June 14, 2007 season
For its 95th season, the San Francisco Symphony under Music Director Michael Tilson Thomas has prepared a rich program that reaffirms its mission: to give fresh interpretations of canonical works and highlight the best music of today. Expect concerts of the usual suspects—Beethoven, Mozart and Brahms—but also look out for some young stars, such as Joshua Bell, Midori and Sarah Chang, all violinists. The program includes the world premiere of John Adams’s “A Flowering Tree”, a one-act opera (March 1st-3rd).
San Francisco Symphony performs at Davies Symphony Hall, 201 Van Ness Ave. Tel: +1 (415) 864-6000.

 

Stuttgart

Le Corbusier House/The Weissenhof Museum
Website: www.weissenhof.de   
Ongoing  
The Weissenhof Settlement has opened its museum in the Le Corbusier House. When it was founded in 1927, the Weissenhof Settlement was considered the most progressive architectural initiative of its time. In 33 houses with 63 apartments, a total of 17 architects from Germany, France, Holland, Belgium and Austria implemented their ideas of "functionalism." Among the architects, all of whom were under 45 years of age, were Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Walter Gropius, Le Corbusier, Hans Scharoun and others. 

Mercedes Benz Museum
www.stuttgart-tourist.de
A prominent local landmark for car lovers of all ages since its opening earlier this year.  Nearby is the Gottlieb Daimler Memorial Sight, where one can visit Daimler’s former workshop in his garden house where he and Wilhelm Maybach secretly invented the world’s first sprinting motor in 1883. 

 

Singapore

Asian Civilisations Museum
http://www.nationalmuseum.sg/
Mystery Men: Finds from China’s Lost Age
January 16 to April 15, 2007
The accidental discovery in the 1980s of a sacrificial burial pit in China's Sichuan province yielded a beautiful collection of artifacts ranging from masks to bronze heads. Experts, some of whom consider the haul superior to the Terracotta Warriors in Xian, have dated the pieces to before 1,000BC. Over 100 of them will be displayed at the museum, marking their first trip to Southeast Asia.
Asian Civilisations Museum, 1 Empress Place, Singapore 179555. Tel: +65 6332 7791. Entry: S$8. MRT: Raffles Place.

 

Stuttgart

Art Museum Stuttgart
www.kunstmuseum-stuttgart
CROSS-BORDER: Photography and Video Art from the MUMOK Vienna
March 24 to June 17, 2007
Whether it is a street barrier or a club membership card, an academic title or waiting for your number to be called at the employment office –one is surrounded by visible and invisible boundaries. The current exhibition deals with this extremely complex subject. In order to point out gaps in the museum’s photography and video art collection, the search beyond Germany’s borders has turned up some successful findings in the Vienna Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig (MUMOK). The resulting photography and video art show in Stuttgart examines about 200 works by internationally renowned artists such as David Goldblatt, Nan Goldin, Gelatin, Louise Lawler, Thomas Ruff, The Atlas Group, and Anna and Bernhard Blume, focusing on the subject of crossing borders.
 

 

 

Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

Art Gallery of New South Wales
Website: http://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au   
Gifted
To April 15, 2007
This magnificent exhibition is showing 100 works by some of Australia's leading aboriginal artists. The art has been chosen from a collection of more than 300 works owned by the Art Gallery of New South Wales, bought with funds donated by Mollie Gowing, the widow of Jim Gowing, a member of an old Sydney department store family. Mrs. Gowing began donating money to the gallery in the early 1990s, when aboriginal art was gaining popularity. Since then, a fund in her name has underwritten one of Australia's most significant indigenous art collections. There are pieces on display here by artists such as Gloria Petyarre, Emily Kame Kngwarreye, Ginger Riley and Judy Watson.
Art Gallery is located on Art Gallery Rd, The Domain, Sydney. Tel: +61 (0)2 9225 1744. Admission: A$10. Open: daily, 10am-5pm.

 

Toronto

Ontario Science Centre
http://www.ontariosciencecentre.ca
The Marvel® Super Heroes™ Science Exhibition
To March 25, 2007
Ever wanted to live like a superhero? Then step into the incredible Marvel universe at the Ontario Science Centre and experience the powerful real-life science behind the comics.
Step into a suit of armor to lift a Mazda CX-7! Hang from a super-strong spider web! Go bionic... and create your own comics! There are more than 30 action stations to explore. Tickets required.
Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition
Opens June 2007
Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition is an amazing and inspirational voyage telling the story poignantly and passionately through the artifacts, giving visitors a personal perspective on the vessel. RMS Titanic, Inc. is the only company permitted by law to recover objects from the wreck of the Titanic. The Company was granted Salvor-in-Possession rights to the wreck of Titanic by a United States federal court in 1994 and has conducted seven research and recovery expeditions to the Titanic and recovered approximately 5,500 artifacts.
Open seven days a week except December 25, the center is located at 770 Don Mills Road (at the corner of Don Mills Road and Eglinton Avenue East) in Toronto. Admission: CAN$17 (adults) / $12.50 (youth / seniors) / $10 (children) Tel:

 

Washington, D.C.

National Gallery of Art
Website: www.nga.gov  
States and Variations: Prints by Jasper Johns
March 11 to October 28 , 2007
East Building, Upper Level, North West
The focus of this exhibition is 1st Etchings, 2nd State, a portfolio of 13 prints by Jasper Johns that was published in 1969. It includes a title page and two versions each of six motifs: Ale Cans, Paint Brushes, Flag, Light Bulb, Flash Light, and 0 through 9, the latter being a configuration of overlapping numerals. Also featured in the exhibition are prints and two sculpture reliefs, made before and after the 1969 portfolio, presenting variations on the six motifs. In addition, annotated working proofs and trial proofs selected from the National Gallery of Art's recent and ongoing acquisition of Johns' personal collection are on view throughout the show.
Eugène Boudin at the National Gallery of Art
March 25 to August 5, 2007
West Building, Main Floor, Galleries 74, 75, and 79
honor of the centennial of Gallery benefactor Paul Mellon's birth, a special exhibition of 40 paintings and works on paper by French impressionist Eugène Boudin (1824–1898) has been organized, based on the Gallery's extensive collection of works by the artist, one of the largest and most distinguished in this country, acquired largely through gifts from Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon. Small-scale paintings of tourists at fashionable Normandy resorts, a suite of six 1858 graphite drawings of the rural Brittany coastal region, carefully worked studies of terrain devoted to shipping and agrarian pursuits, and images of peasant laborers and port workers from Normandy and Brittany are among the works presented.
Fabulous Journeys and Faraway Places: Travels on Paper 1450–1700
May 6–September 16, 2007
West Building, Ground Floor, West Outer Tier
Approximately 75 works of art on paper, nearly all from the National Gallery of Art's own collection, will lead viewers along an adventurous route through European perceptions of foreign realms from the 15th to the early 18th century. Most Europeans rarely ventured far from home during this period; others were curious and endured great discomforts to reach faraway places. Travel for religious purposes, especially pilgrimages, gradually gave way to the economic purposes of trade and was then joined by the intellectual excitement of exploration. To record their experiences and to satisfy demand for pictorial information about other countries, artists created delightful drawings and printed images. The objects on view are splendid works of art that also yield insights into Europeans' conceptions about the world beyond their borders.
Private Treasures: Four Centuries of European Master Drawings
May 6 to September 16, 2007
West Building, Ground Floor, East Outer Tier
The National Gallery is located on the National Mall between 3rd and 7th Streets at Constitution Avenue NW. Open: Monday through Saturday from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. and Sunday from 11:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.  Free admission.

The Phillips Collection
http://www.phillipscollection.org  /
Moving Pictures: American Art and Early Film
February 17–May 20, 2007
This exhibition will present American realist painting from the late 19th and early 20th centuries side-by-side with the earliest experiments in film. Approximately 100 works, including nearly 60 short films (a few minutes long) by Thomas Edison, the Lumière Brothers, and the Cinématheque Française, along with works by American masters such as George Bellows, William Merritt Chase, Thomas Eakins, Maurice Prendergast, and John Sloan, will provide a new context for looking at the artists’ choice and presentation of subject matter. For the first time, film will be fully integrated into the history of American art. Moving Pictures is organized by the Williams College Museum of Art.
The Phillips Collection is located at 1600 21st Street, NW. Open daily except Mondays with extended hours Thursday and Sundays. Admission

Smithsonian Museum
Website: www.smithsonian.org
African Vision: The Walt Disney-Tishman African Art Collection
To September  7, 2008
Featured are 88 pieces representing 20 African countries, 75 peoples, and 5 centuries of African art presented in the National Museum of African Art Museum. The show includes most major styles ranging from a highly abstract Cameroon mask to a naturalistic carved wooden male figure from Madagascar. Many of the works inspired such 20th-century artists as Picasso and Juan Gris.
East of Eden: Gardens in Asian Art
February 24 to May 13, 2007
Some 65 works of art reveal the garden traditions throughout Asia are on display in the Sackler Gallery.
The Smithsonian Information Center in the institution's first building, popularly known as the Castle, which is open daily 8:30 am-5:30 pm. The Center serves as the focal point for information about the Institution's 17 museums and National Zoo in Washington, D.C., and 2 museums in New York City. This distinctive red, sandstone building is centrally located on the National Mall, and may be entered from either Jefferson Drive on the north or through the Enid A. Haupt Garden on the south. Admission free at most of the museums.

 

Zurich

Kunsthaus Zurich
http://www.kunsthaus.ch/
Auguste Rodin: Retrospective
To May 13, 2007
In the late 19th century Auguste Rodin (1840–1917) revolutionized sculpture. The retrospective of his work includes 160 bronzes, works in plaster, and drawings – including world-renowned works such as The Kiss and The Thinker, as well as rarities such as the marble sculpture The Earth and the Moon. The earliest works in the exhibition date back to the early 1880s when Rodin’s work was first recognized by a circle of writers and artists; the selection concludes with his ground-breaking designs for public monuments and memorials. The exhibition was organized with the Musée Rodin in Paris and London’s Royal Academy of Arts. The formidable Gates of Hell, which has adorned the exterior of the Kunsthaus since 1948, was extensively restored for this show.
Kunsthaus Zurich is located at Heimplatz 1, 8001 Zurich. Open: Tue-Thu 10am-9pm; Fri-Sun 10am-5pm. Tel: +41 (0)44 253 8484. Tickets: SFr16.

 

 

 

January 2007

Cities & Culture presents a sampling of cultural events and holiday happenings around the world. Cities featured this month are Atlanta, Berlin, Boston Buenos Aires, Charleston, Chicago, Copenhagen, Dresden, Las Vegas, London, Madrid, Miami, Milan, Montreal, New York, Paris, Philadelphia, Rome, San Francisco,  Stuttgart, Sydney, NSW, Washington, D.C. and Zurich.

 

Atlanta

High Museum of Art
Website: www.high.org   
Louvre Atlanta: Kings as Collectors
To September 2, 2007
Kings as Collectors highlights some of the most magnificent paintings and sculptures acquired by Louis XIV (the Sun King) and Louis XVI (the last King of France). The French royal collections are the heart of the Louvre's present day holdings.
Decorative Arts of the Kings
March 3 to September 2, 2007
An exhibition exploring the legendary opulence, tastes, and lifestyles of French kings Louis XIV, Louis XV and Louis XVI, will showcase tapestries, silver, porcelain and furniture commissioned by the royals for their personal use. The 53 masterworks in the exhibition, drawn from the collections of the Musée du Louvre in Paris, have never traveled to the United States.
The exhibition includes examples of furniture, tapestry, ceramics and silver by manufacturers such as Les Gobelins and Sèvres and by artists such as Germain and Auguste, whose influence can still be seen today. These works—many of which were created for the Palace of Versailles—demonstrate the excellence of the French artisans in the royal factories, which were largely subsidized by the kings. Exhibition highlights include, a 1784 Sèvres porcelain tureen and platter made for Queen Marie-Antoinette, wife of Louis XVI; an inlaid wooden medals cabinet made in 1660 by Dutch cabinetmaker Pierre Gole for Louis XIV, who collected medals and objets d’art as well as paintings and sculpture; a secretary decorated with pietra dura paneled murals designed by Martin Carlin for the court of Louis XVI in 1780; and a nécessaire including silver objects used to prepare tea or chocolate, made for Louis XV’s wife, Queen Marie Leczinska upon the birth of the couple’s first son in 1729.
The High Museum is located is located at 1280 Peachtree Street between 15th and 16th Streets in Midtown Atlanta. Open Tuesday through Sundays.

Atlanta Civic Center
Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition to Open in Atlanta, Georgia
Opens November 11, 2006
The Exhibition is a chronological journey through life on board the Titanic and compassionately tells Titanic's personal stories through recovered artifacts and dramatic room recreations. Each visitor becomes a passenger and feels the excitement of that April day as they step into authentically recreated first and third class accommodations, view the Ship's cargo hold and stand on the Captain's Bridge. In the Memorial Room, visitors will learn about the aftermath of the disaster, the relief funds and the efforts to discover who actually survived. Visitors will then feel the temperature drop, learn details of the sinking, touch an iceberg and understand the theories of this tragic tale.

 

Berlin

Berlin International Film Festival
February 18 to 28, 2007
Featuring a juried international competition, a market and a very large number of screenings arranged under various categories, the Berlin International Film Festival is the biggest movie event in Germany and one of the most important film festivals in Europe.
Founded in 1951 on an American-led Cold War initiative, the festival has outgrown its original remit to become one of the region's leading film events. It has long hosted world-class filmmakers; Ingmar Bergman, Satyajit Ray, Michelangelo Antonioni, Roman Polanski and the leading directors of the French Nouvelle Vogue - Jean-Luc Godard, François Truffaut and Claude Chabrol - have all enjoyed notable triumphs in Berlin.
As well as its competition and main screenings, the festival also hosts an annual competition of "shooting stars"—18 filmmakers who have made their names in their respective countries - as well as the increasingly popular Forum of Young Cinema and the children's film festival.
The festival will be held at the Berlinale Palast at Marlene-Dietrich Platz, located at the southern end of Potsdamer Platz in Berlin Tiergarten.
Public Transport: By U-Bahn: U2 to Potsdamer Platz. By S-Bahn: S1, S2, S25 to Potsdamer Platz. By Bus: lines 129, 148, 200, 248, 348. 
Tel: +49 (0) 30 25 92 00 or  +49 (0) 30 254 89100 (tickets)
Fax +49 (0) 30 25 92 0299
Email info@berlinale.de 

Jewish Museum
Website:  www.juedisches-museum-berlin.de    
Home and Exile
To April 9, 2007
The Jewish Museum Berlin is dedicating its biggest special exhibition to the Jewish Germans who were driven from their homeland by the National Socialists. Between 1933 and 1945 the refuges found shelter in over eighty countries and five continents. The exhibition traces the refugees’ routes into exile and includes many items lent from private possessions and are now being shown publicly for the first time. A vivid impression of the time is conveyed through documentary and feature film sequences, video interviews, music clips and excerpts from radio programs.
Jewish Museum Berlin is located at Lindenstraße 9-14, 10969 Berlin.
Open: Monday from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Tuesday-Sunday from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Admittance will be granted until 7 p.m. Tuesdays-Sundays, 9 p.m. on Mondays.
Admission: Adults: 5 euros; Students and Seniors: 2.50 euros; Children under the age of six: free of charge; Family ticket (2 adults and up to 4 children):10 euros
Transportation: U1, U6 Hallesches Tor; U6 Kochstraße
Bus M29, M41, 265

Kennedy Museum
The Kennedy Museum, honoring the life and political career of President John F. Kennedy, will display a private collection of artifacts once belonging to the Kennedys, including more than 1,000 photographs, historical documents, books and films. A major focus will be JFK's visit to Berlin in June 1963, scene of his famous Ich bin ein Berliner speech. For information, e-mail info@thekennedys.de.
Located on Pariser Platz close to the Brandenburg Gate and the Reichstag,

 

Boston

Museum of Fine Art
Website: www.mfa.org  
The Romance of Modernism: Paintings and Sculpture from Scott M. Black Collection
To May 6, 2007

Paul Signac painted what he called a "portrait of a cloud" in Antibes, on the southern coast of France, in the years of the First World War. In Antibes, the Pink Cloud (1916), a French sailboat is at center under the glorious sky, but at right is a group of German gunboats, which the painter called a black squadron.
The Romance of Modernism features selections from the private collection of Scott M. Black, including impressionist paintings by Cézanne, Degas, Monet, Pisarro, and Renoir; post-impressionist paintings by Bernard, Denis, Luce, van Rysselbergh, and Signac; modern paintings by Magritte, Matisse, Miró, and Picasso; and sculpture by Rodin, Maillol, and Lipchitz. Scott M. Black is the founder and CEO of Delphi Management Company, a prominent investment management firm based in Boston and a longtime supporter of the MFA.
Donatello to Giambologna: Italian Renaissance Sculpture
January 24 to July 9, 2007
This fascinating collection has never been shown as a whole and remains virtually unknown to the general public and to scholars alike. Several of the masterpieces on display were only recently rediscovered after being long hidden away in storage—like St. John the Baptist, a completely unknown early-sixteenth-century glazed terracotta recently attributed to the Florentine sculptor Giovanni Francesco Rustici, an associate of Leonardo da Vinci. Because many of the objects have been in storage and need extensive work to stabilize, clean, and restore them to their best possible state, the exhibition explores some of the challenges and issues involved in the care and preservation of such a deep and old collection by showing some objects mid-way through conservation. Also included in the exhibition is Donatello's beloved marble relief of Madonna of the Clouds, and what is considered to be one of the finest versions in the world of the bronze statuette representing Architecture, signed by Giambologna.
The Fine Art Museum is located at 465 Huntington Avenue and easily accessible by the Green Line "E" train to the "Museum of Fine Arts" stop, or the Orange Line train to the "Ruggles" stop or by the 39 bus to the "Museum of Fine Arts" stop, or the 8, 47, or CT2 buses to the "Ruggles" stop. Open daily.

 

Buenos Aires

Centro Cultural Borges
Website: http://www.ccborges.org.ar    
Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera: Drawings and Photographs
Ongoing
To celebrate the 100th anniversary of Frida Kahlo’s birth, the Centro Cultural Borges has compiled a modest collection of works by both Kahlo and Diego Rivera, her husband. The exhibit’s showpiece is a large pencil study by Rivera for a mural; the other images on display are more modest, consisting mainly of Rivera’s renderings of Aztec rituals. The show’s most notable works by Kahlo are intensely personal: a detailed lithograph of a pregnant female body, created after she suffered a miscarriage, and a jarring depiction of a road accident she survived, but which left her with health problems for the rest of her life. Photographs of the artists, particularly one of a hulking Rivera towering over Kahlo as she paints a self-portrait, are nearly as appealing as the drawings themselves.
The Borges Cultural Center is located inside Galerías Pacífico, entrance at the corner of Viamonte and San Martín, Centre. Tel: +54 (0) 11 5555-5359. Open: Mon-Sat 10am-9pm; Sun noon-9pm.

Charleston

Spoleto Festival USA
May 25 - June 10, 2007
Originating from a festival celebrated annually in Italy, the Spoleto Festival begins Memorial Day weekend and runs for 17 days.  Historic Charleston hosts the festival with an array of international artistic performances. Opera, Jazz, theatre, orchestral, chamber, contemporary music, literary and visual arts fill the area theatres and halls during this special two weeks. For more information, call 843-722-2764 or visit www.spoletousa.org.  

 

Chicago

Art Institute of Chicago
Website: http://www.artic.edu/aic
The Silk Road and Beyond
Until October 2007
Silk Road Chicago is a year-long celebration of the art and culture that have flourished along the historic route from China to Asia Minor. The program is the brainchild of several leading city institutions, including the Art Institute of Chicago, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and, most importantly, the Silk Road Project, a foundation started by Yo-Yo Ma, a cellist and educator. “The Silk Road and Beyond” at the Art Institute comprises the visual part of the festival. The main exhibition, Travel, Trade and Transformation, features work that captures the region's vibrant cross-cultural fertilization. Smaller exhibitions include “Stories of the Silk Road”, with original illustrations of some of the route's most famous explorers
Cezanne to Picasso: Ambroise Vollard, Patron of the Avant-Garde
February 17 to May 12, 2007
After a smash success in New York’s Metropolitan Museum, the show travels to AIC.
In 1887 Ambroise Vollard (1866–1939) arrived in Paris with few contacts and no credentials to pursue a career as an art dealer. He began representing artists that were undervalued, exhibiting them at a time when many galleries were not willing to take the risk. In 1895, Vollard hosted Cézanne’s first solo exhibition, and in doing so he made the artist’s reputation as well as his own. By the early 20th century, Vollard had become the principal dealer of artists such as Paul Cézanne, Paul Gauguin, and a number of Fauve artists, and lent early support to artists who are well known today—Pierre Bonnard, Aristide Maillol, Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, and Édouard Vuillard—as well as many who remain relatively unknown. His shrewd mind for business and artistic sense made him the leading contemporary art dealer of his generation.
The museum is located at 111 South Michigan Avenue, at the intersection of Michigan Avenue and Adams Street, on the eastern edge of Chicago’s famous downtown Loop. Open weekdays at 10:30 am and at 10 am on Saturdays and Sundays until 5 pm.

 

Copenhagen
www.visitcopenhagen.com
National Museum of Denmark
http://www.nationalmuseet.dk/sw20379.asp
Tyco Brahe’s World
To April 9, 2007
The astronomer with the silver nose, noble scientist and man of the world, Tycho Brahe’s (1546-1601) checkered life reveals many aspects of living during the 1500s.
The National Museum (The Prince's Palace) traverses the cultural history of Denmark. It includes the Children’s Museum, Ethnographical Collection, The Royal Coin Collection and Classical and Near Eastern Antiquities.
The National Museum is located at Ny Vestergade 10. Open Tuesday-Sunday 10am-5pm. Mondays closed. Free admission

Louisiana Museum of Modern Art
 http://www.louisiana.dk/
Cindy Sherman: 30 Years of Staged Photography
February 16 to May 20, 2007
Throughout the thirty years Cindy Sherman (born 1954 in Glen Ridge, New Jersey) has worked as an artist, she has almost exclusively used herself as a model for her works. Sherman stages, directs and photographs herself in constantly changing disguises which are not, however, self-portraits. Each picture reflects a new identity taken from the mass media's stereotyped views of women. She always works in series and never gives her works titles. Instead they are given a number. In the exhibition Sherman's works are presented in large chronologically ordered series, each of which is held together by a theme.
Lousiana Museum Louisiana is situated 35 km north of Copenhagen along the motorway E47 / E55, or the coast road Strandvejen along the Sound. By train (ask for Kystbanen) 36 minutes from Copenhagen and a 10-minute walk from Humlebæk/Louisiana Station.
It houses a collection of modern art by international artists such as Arp, Francis Bacon, Calder, Dubuffet, Max Ernst, Sam Francis, Giacometti, Kiefer, Henry Moore, Picasso, Rauschenberg and Warhol. Open daily. Admission

Royal Danish Ballet
http://www.kglteater.dk/Forestillinger/Ballet.aspx
2006/2007 Season
Copenhagen, home of the world-renowned Royal Danish Ballet, has long been a global ballet capital. The Royal Danish Ballet 2006-2007 season  includes “Trio Extravaganza,” three modern highlights choreographed by Finland’s Jorma Uotinen; France’s Angeline Preljocaj and China’s Yuan Yuan Wang. Other productions in the repertoire include premieres of “Schumann’s 2nd Symphony Etudes, Dance Mozart!, Stravinsky’s Le Sacre du Printemps and the modern American Mixture and Ailey & Zuska, plus revivals of Requiem, choreographed by Tim Rushton and Bournonville’s La Sylphide and Napoli among others.
Det Kongliege Teater (Royal Danish Theater) is located at Kongens Nytorv in the center of Copenhagen since 1748. Tickets can be purchased online at http://www.kglteater.dk/Billetter.aspx .

Dresden, Germany

Royal Palace
www.dresden-tourist.de  or  www.skd-dresden.de  
The Historic Green Vault
Created by August the Strong (1670 - 1733), the historic Green Vault was restored its ten rooms to its original splendor. Nearly 3,000 masterpieces crafted by jewelers and goldsmiths, precious objects made of amber and ivory, vessels made of precious stones, exquisite bronze statuettes and objects made of exotic materials like coral and shells from the South Seas are displayed. 

 

Las Vegas

Guggenheim Hermitage Museum
Website: http://www.guggenheimlasvegas.org /
Robert Mapplethorpe and the Classical Tradition
Through February 2007
In celebration of the museum's fifth anniversary, this exhibition will explore the relationship between the photography of Robert Mapplethorpe and classical art, in particular through 16th-century Flemish Mannerist. The latest in a series of collaborations between the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, and the State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, this exhibition premiered at the Deutsche Guggenheim in Berlin before traveling to the Hermitage, the Moscow House of Photography and the Guggenheim Museum in New York. Robert Mapplethorpe and the Classical Tradition was organized by Germano Celant, Senior Curator of Contemporary Art at the Guggenheim and Arkady Ippolitov, Curator of Italian Prints at the Hermitage.
The exhibition will exemplify Mapplethorpe's rapport with the elongated and elaborate forms of Mannerist art, namely the study of the human body, highlighting the underlying classicism evident in the clarity and potency of all Mapplethorpe's subjects as well as their explosive energy. The classical ideal was not only a poetic inspiration but also an ethical model, and in his creative quest Mapplethorpe described photography as "the perfect way to make a sculpture." The potency of love and Eros, which electrifies many of the Mannerist works in the exhibition, is articulated again in the work of Mapplethorpe. A selection of classical and modern art historical references, together with an unattributed marble sculpture from Mapplethorpe's collection, illustrates the artist's interest in and passion for the human figure.
The Guggenheim Hermitage is located at The Venetian, 3355 Las Vegas Blvd South
Open daily from 9:30 am to 7:30 pm. Admission.

 

London

Courtauld Institute of Art Gallery
Cuercino: Mind to Paper
February 22 to May 13, 2007
Guercino is regarded as one of the most significant Italian artists of the Baroque period. This display of drawings celebrates the freedom and spontaneity of Guercino's draughtsmanship.
The Courtauld Institute of Art is located in Somerset House

Docklands Museum
Journey to the New World: London 1606 to Virginia 1607
To May 13, 2007.
The new exhibition at the Museum in Docklands marks the 400th anniversary of the first permanent English settlement in Jamestown, Virginia. The exhibition tells the story of hope and despair, conflict and failure, tragedy and triumph, and shows how ordinary and extraordinary men, women and children helped to create an emerging nation—a New World for the English and the American Indians. Admission is free.

Imperial War Museum
Website: http://www.iwm.org.uk   
Henry Moore: War and Utility
To February 25, 2007
To mark the twentieth anniversary of Henry Moore's death, the Imperial War Museum London is hosting Henry Moore: War and Utility, a major retrospective exhibition that comprises over 160 works produced between 1938 and 1954 that demonstrate the richness and fertility of Moore's artistic practice during this period.
The museum is located on Lambeth Road. Near the Thames Path (http://www.thamespathlondon.co.uk ). Open daily (except 24, 25 and 26 December) 10.00am - 6.00pm. Entrance fee is £7 for adults and £5 for concessions.

National Gallery of Art
http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk
Renoir Landscapes 1865 to 1883
February 21 to May 20, 2007
This is the first exhibition to examine this vital aspect of Renoir's achievement, and brings together some 70 landscapes.
Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841-1919) painted landscapes throughout his life. However, during the first two decades of his long career they constituted an especially important area of experimentation for the artist where he explored composition, paint handling and pictorial structure in innovative new ways.
It begins with works of the 1860s, when the young artist was meeting and working beside the painters who would become his fellow Impressionists. These works show his remarkable ability to emulate technical and stylistic innovations and then turn them to his own uses.
In the 1870s Renoir defined his distinctive quick, silvery brushstrokes and began to explore color and structure in order to gain an audacious painterly freedom.
In the early 1880s he traveled to the South of France, Italy and North Africa, where new intensities of sunlight and color had a profound impact on his landscape art.
The exhibition ends in 1883 with the vibrant oils he executed on a visit to Guernsey.
Dutch Portraits: The Age of Rembrandt and Frans Hals
June 27 to September 16, 2007
Following its independence from Spain in the 17th century, the Dutch Republic experienced an era of unprecedented wealth, the so-called Golden Age. Thanks to the successful activities of its merchants and entrepreneurs - and in sharp distinction to the rest of Europe, a new middle-class elite emerged. Its members became the dominant force in local government and civic institutions, and as a result became the new principal patrons of the arts. Portraits were especially suitable to express their newly found self-confidence and desire for representation, and artists responded by developing new types of portraits to meet the demands of this clientele. 
The exhibition will include some 60 works, all painted between 1600 and 1680.
The National Gallery is located at Trafalgar Square, London WC2. Tel: +44 (0) 20 7747 2885. Open: daily 10am-6pm (until 9pm Wed and Sat). Entry: £12. Tube: Charing Cross, Leicester Square.

Royal Academy of Arts
Website: http://www.royalacademy.org.uk 
Citizens and Kings:  Portraits in the age of revolution, 1760-1830
February 3 to April 20, 2007
The exhibition will give an in-depth view, through sculptured and painted portraits, of an era characterized by sweeping political and social changes. The exhibition will consist of 145 works drawn from some of the finest collections in the world, depicting not only kings and queens but also the new revolutionary heroes and rising bourgeoise, and enlightenment thinkers, writer and artists..
Royal Academy of Arts, Burlington House, Piccadilly, W1. Tel: +44 (0)20 7300 8000. Open: daily, 10am-6pm (until 10pm on Fridays).  Entrance costs £10, £7 for students, £3 for 12-18 year olds, £2 for 8-11 year olds and under 7s go free

Tate Modern 
Website: http://www.tate.org.uk/modern
The Unilever Series: Carsten Höller
To April 9, 2007
Carsten Höller is the seventh artist to undertake the challenge of creating an artwork to fill Tate Modern’s vast Turbine Hall. Höller is used to working on a grand scale and previous pieces include a series of electronic sliding doors with mirrored surfaces, which gallery visitors pass through on a seemingly endless and puzzling journey, as well as an installation of gigantic mushrooms which hang, suspended from the ceiling by their stalks and rotate in a mesmerizing fashion. Entitled Test Site, the work will comprise of five giant spiraling slides which descend from different levels of the gallery into the Turbine Hall. Two will run from Level 2, one will run from Level 3, a further slide will go from Level 4 and there will be a final one from Level 5. Visitors are invited to take part, thus completing the art work through their involvement.
Gilbert & George: Major Exhibition
February 15 to May 7, 2007
This long-awaited exhibition is the largest ever to explore the remarkable art of Gilbert & George. Gilbert & George have created art together since meeting at St Martin's School of Art in 1967. Their impact on the international art world was immediate, radical and subversive with the declaration that sculpture need not be confined to the production of three-dimensional objects and that their own lives could be classed as living sculptures. Since then, their joint existence has been one long art journey which has led to major exhibitions in five continents, including pioneering shows in Russia and China.
The exhibition begins with a documentation of the legendary Living Sculptures together with the idyllic Nature Pieces which include the rarely seen Charcoal on Paper Sculptures. This is followed by pictures of increasingly powerful social engagement including the Drinking Pieces and Human Bondage and culminating in the infamous, black white and red Dirty Words Pictures of 1977.
The 1980s and 1990s saw an explosion of color in their art through which Gilbert & George continued to confront fundamental human issues. Among the comprehensive selection of works from this compelling period are the Tate's own vast quadripartite Death Hope Life Fear, the phantasmagorical Life Without End, the scandalous Naked Shit Pictures and the instinctive Fundamental and New Testamental Pictures featuring the artists' own blood, tears, spunk, piss, shit and sweat. The final section of the exhibition explores Gilbert & George's visionary twenty-first-century art. Beginning with the promiscuous New Horny Pictures and mesmerizing lice-infested East One Pictures, followed by the Gingko Pictures of Venice Biennale fame, these works continue to ask provocative questions about sexuality, identity and religion. The show ends with the controversial Sonofagod Pictures including the epic Was Jesus Heterosexual? which led to accusations of blasphemy. Gilbert & George have also created completely new pictures for this exhibition.

Tate Britain
Website: http://www.tate.org.uk/britain  
Hogarth
February 7 to April 29, 2007
Witty, satirical, subversive and hugely talented, William Hogarth remains one of the most fascinating and innovative artists from the eighteenth century. This superb exhibition is the most comprehensive showing of the artist’s work in living memory and incorporates the full range of Hogarth’s work.
Tate Britain is located at Millbank in London’s southwest end. Open Daily, 10.00 am to 5:50 pm. More information at email: visiting.britain@tate.org.uk

Victoria and Albert Museum
Website: www.vam.ac.uk  
Kylie: The Exhibition
February 8 to June 10, 2007
This exhibition will look at Kylie Minogue as a popular style icon and international performer and will feature performance costumes, accessories, photographs, music and videos exploring Kylie's career and changing image.
Victoria and Albert Museum is located on Cromwell Road, London SW7. Tel:
+44 (0)20 7942 2000. 
Getting there:  London Underground: South Kensington; Buses: C1, 14, 74 and 414 stop outside the Cromwell Road entrance.

Royal Albert Hall
Website: http://www.bbc.co.uk/proms     
Royal Albert Hall, Kensington Gore, SW7. Tube: South Kensington.

 

Madrid

Museo del Prado
www.museoprado.mcu.es
 Tintoretto: Retrospective
January 30 to May 13, 2007
Madrid’s Museo del Prado will present a major retrospective of one of the most renowned names in the history of painting beginning January 30.“Tintoretto will showcase about 60 works from more than 20 leading European and American museums – the first such comprehensive show in 70 years—and the first exhibition in Spain to be devoted solely to the artist. One of the great Renaissance painters, Venetian-born Jacobo Tintoretto (1518 -1594) was regarded as a daring and prolific painter during his lifetime, being cited in the early 17th century as one of the three great masters of Venetian painting along with Titian and Paolo Veronese. Tintoretto shared their use of a new language characterized by the bravura of the brushstroke and a pronounced chiaroscuro, both deployed in a new style of narrative painting. He went further, creating a style that fused the Tuscan with the Venetian, combining Titian’s loose handling with Michelangelo’s skilled draftsmanship. And Tintoretto also perfected a highly efficient painting method allowing him to produce a large body of work.
Revealing Tintoretto’s range, the exhibition’s 49 paintings, 13 drawings and three sculptures also show his interest in all the major artistic genres. His religious narratives  will be a main focus of the exhibition. For the first time in 400 years, art lovers will be able to see side by side his two masterpieces painted for the church of San Marcuola: The Last Supper (from the church in Venice) and Christ Washing the Disciples’ Feet (Museo del Prado). The exhibition will bring together some of his most important mythological paintings Venus, Volcan and Mars (Alt Pinakothek, Munich) and The Origins of the Milky Way (National Gallery, London) as well as examples of his work as a portraitist, including self-portraits from the Philadelphia Museum of Art (Philadelphia) and the Musée du Louvre (Paris), and the Portrait of Lorenzo Soranzo from the Kunsthistorisches Museum (Vienna).
The Prado Museum is located on Paseo del Prado in Madrid, call: 011-34-91-330-28-00, e-mail: museo.nacional@prado.mcu.es or go to.  The museum is open daily except Mondays from 9 AM to 8 PM and closed January 1, May 1, Easter Friday and Christmas Day.  General admission is about $7.80 (6 euros), except Sundays, when it is free.  Visitors under 18 and over 65 and students from the EU are admitted free of charge.  Other students pay about $3.90 (3 euros). For further information about Spain, contact the Tourist Office of Spain in New York (212-265-8822); Miami (305-358-1992); Chicago (312-642-1992) or Los Angeles (323-658-7188) or go to www.spain.info

Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum
Website: www.museothyssen.org  
The Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum is located at Paseo del Prado, 8 and is open Tuesdays through Sundays from 10 AM to 7 PM and during July and August the temporary exhibitions will remain open until 11 PM Tuesdays to Saturdays.  (Closed Mondays.)  Admission to the temporary exhibition is about $5.14 and about $3.85 for students and seniors. Combined tickets for the temporary and context exhibitions and permanent collection range from $9 to $14.50 ($6.40 to $10.30 for students and seniors).  

 

Milan

Castello Sforzesco
Website: http://www.milanocastello.it/intro.htm  
Castello Sforzesco, Piazza Castello, 3. Open: Tues-Sun, 9am-1pm, 2pm-5.30pm.

International Center For Photography
Website: http://www.formafoto.it
International Centre for Photography is located at Piazza Tito Lucrezio Caro, 1. Tel: +39 (0)2 5811 8067. Open: Tues-Sun 11am-9pm (Thurs until 11pm). Admission: €6.50.

Palazzo della Permanente
Arturo Martini
Palazzo della Permanente, Via Turati 34 and Fondazione Stelline, Corso Magenta 61. Tel: +39 (0)2 655 1445. Open: Tue-Sun 10am-8pm (Thursday until 10pm). Entry: €8.

 

Miami

Miami Art Museum
Website: www.miamiartmuseum.org  
Miami Art Museum is located at 101 West Flagler Street. Open daily except Mondays.

 

Montreal

Montreal High Lights Festival
February 22 to March 4, 2007
The 8th edition of the Montreal High Lights Festival Montreal High Light Festival’s cultural segment, sponsored by the Sun Life Financial Performing Arts, announces its impressive event program, which is sure to take the bite out of winter.  From Thursday, February 22, to Sunday, March 4, 2007, the 8th edition of the urban winter festival will send temperatures soaring with performances by all manner of artists from here and abroad. Local Montrealers and tourists alike will have the privilege of discovering, or perhaps rediscovering, some of the world’s most talented performing artists. 
This winter’s festival will also feature sports and family activities with the Montreal Downtown & Underground Event, gastronomic delights with the Air France Wine and Dine Experience presented by American Express and festive events with the Hydro-Québec Celebration of Light and the Montreal All-Nighter, whose respective programs will be made public next January.
For information, please call 1-888-477-9955 or visit www.montrealhighlights.com .

 

Biodôme de Montreal (Botanical Garden)
www.museumsnature.ca
jardin_botanique@ville.montreal.qc.ca
Montréal Botanical Gardenis located at 4101 Sherbrooke Street East. Open: Tuesday to Sunday. 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Closed on December 24 and 25. Information:  (514) 872-1400 (Telephone)
.

Les Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal
www.grandsballets.com
info@grandsballets.com
Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier, Place des Arts at 175 Sainte-Catherine Street West.
Tickets: (CAN) $29 to $95; Group Rate available; telephone: (514) 842-2112 / 1 866 842-2112 (Toll Free)

Montreal Symphony
http://www.osm.ca  or http://www.osm.ca/index_en.cfm

Place des Armes and other venues

Museum of Fine Arts (Jean-Noël Desmarais Pavilion)
Website: http://www.mbam.qc.ca 
The Museum is located at 1380 Sherbrooke Street West. Open Tuesdays through Sundays.

Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal
www.macm.org
Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal is at 185 Sainte-Catherine Street West. Open Tuesday
to Sunday, 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Wednesday, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Admission: (Can)$8; group rate available.  Free admission for all every Wednesday evening, 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. Open holiday Mondays. Information:  (514) 847-6226 (Telephone) or info@macm.org

 

 

Moscow

Bakhrushin Theatre Museum
Bakhrushin Theater Museum is located at 31/12 Ulitsa Bakhrushina. Metro Paveletskaya. Tel: +7 (095) 953-4470.

 

 

 

New York

Mark your calendars in the month of February for two important art shows taking place in New York.
The Art Show
February 22 to 26, 2007
The show presents 70 of the nation's most prominent art dealers who will exhibit paintings, sculpture, drawings, prints, and photographs by artists of all periods at the nineteenth annual The Art Show. Organized by the Art Dealers Association of America (ADAA), the exhibition will run from February 22 through February 26, 2007,
The show is presented at the Seventh Regiment Armory, Park Avenue at 67th Street. All proceeds from the regular show admissions benefit Henry Street Settlement, one of New York City's oldest and most comprehensive social service agencies.
Running concurrently with The Art Show is The Armory Show otherwise know as the International Fair of New Art devoted exclusively to contemporary art. In its ninth annual exhibition, The Armory Show 2007 will present 148 international galleries, including many of the most important contemporary dealers showcasing new art from around the world.
 Located in the well-known Passenger Terminal Pier Complex on the west side of Manhattan on 12th Avenue and 55th Streets. More information at www.thearmoryshow.com

A Sleepover At AMNH Offered To Children And Adults
The American Museum of Natural History officially launched its sleepover program, called A Night at the Museum, to the public on Saturday, January 13, 2007.  The overnight expeditions will last from 5:45 p.m. until 8:00 a.m. the next morning, and are open to children, ages 8–12, and their accompanying parents or guardians. The young explorers will experience the wonder and magic of the Museum’s most famous displays after dark, including a 65-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex in the famed fossil halls, a herd of wild bison in the Hall of North American Mammals, and the Space Show in the Hayden Planetarium at the Rose Center for Earth and Space before settling down to sleep under the Blue Whale. 
Sleepover participants are asked to bring along their own sleeping bags, toothbrushes, toothpaste, comfy clothes for exploring and sleeping, pillows, and a flashlight with extra batteries (teddy bears and other stuffed creatures are optional).  Sleeping cots will be provided for everyone.
Sleepover Program Fees
Individual fees (for both children and adults) are $79.00 per person.  Members are $70.00 each.  Group admission is $75.00.  For more information call 212-769-5565 or check the Museum Web site at www.amnh.org/sleepovers. To register for a sleepover, call 212-769-5200. But hurry, tickets are going fast!
 
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American Museum of Natural History
Website: www.amnh.org    
Gold
To August 19, 2007
Showcasing a vast array of extraordinary objects gleaned from the geology and cultural anthropology holdings of major museums and private collections around the world, Gold will present the fascinating scientific and cultural story of this rare and prized element. The influence of gold throughout history will be examined through the currency of ancient civilizations, displays on the Gold Rush that shaped the American West, and contemporary pop culture items. Historical exhibition highlights will include enormous nuggets of gold such as the famous Latrobe Nugget, a specimen of rare natural crystallized gold; gold bars; rare doubloons retrieved from sunken Spanish galleons; the first gold coins minted in ancient Lydia (now Turkey); gold textiles; and gleaming pre-Columbian jewelry and other objects from the Museum's own collection.
Visitors will experience firsthand the alluring splendor of the finest gold specimens on Earth and learn how gold is located, mined, processed, and turned into both beautiful and useful objects. Among the treasures on display is a reproduction of a 3,000-year-old map–the Turin Papyrus found in Egypt–that pinpoints the location of regional gold deposits. Compelling modern objects that may include Olympic medals, Academy Awards Oscar statuettes, and best-selling gold records, will illustrate the powerful hold that gold continues to have on our imagination. And visitors will discover that gold has amazing physical properties such as extreme malleability, reflectivity, and conductivity that make it invaluable for technological uses from telephones and televisions to satellite circuitry and astronauts' visors.
Throughout the exhibition, there will be numerous opportunities for visitors to explore the unique properties of gold. They can walk through a room completely covered in a single ounce of gold flattened to exquisite thinness, and guess the amount of gold ore found in a boulder.
Human Origins
Permanent
See the remarkable history of human evolution, from earth’s earliest ancestors to modern man. The new exhibit, which opens February 7, combines the most up to date discoveries in the fossil record with the latest in genomic science to explore the most profound mysteries of humankind—who we are, where we came from, and what is in store for the future of man. The new 10,000 square foot Spitzer Hall of Human Origins offers the most comprehensive evidence of hum an evolution ever assembled with over 200 casts of the rarest hominid fossils and artifacts documenting how modern humans evolved over millions of years from earlier species and showing how new DNA evidence reveals how closely related we are to each other and to our primate ancestors.
The Butterfly Conservatory
To May 28, 2007
Now in its ninth year, the Butterfly Conservatory within the museum houses tropical and subtropical butterflies. A wonderful learning experience.
The American Museum of Natural History is located at Central Park West and between West 77 and 79 Streets.

Asia Society
Website: www.asiasociety.org/arts    
Asia Society and Museum is located at 725 Park Avenue at 68th Street. Open Tuesday - Sunday, 11:00 am - 6:00 pm, with extended evening hours Fridays until 9:00 pm. Closed on Mondays and major holidays.  Admission fee.

Frick Museum
Website: www.frick.org  
George Stubbs (1724 – 1806): A Celebration
February 14 through May 27, 2007
The exhibition of approximately twenty paintings by the celebrated artist, comes in early 2007 to The Frick Collection, its only North American venue. The exhibition marks the bicentenary of Stubbs’s death by presenting some of his greatest contributions to the tradition of British eighteenth-century painting, all notable for their originality and beauty. The exhibition exclusively draws upon British-owned examples, some of which have never crossed the Atlantic Ocean, and thus offers an important viewing opportunity in this country. Stubbs is renowned for the precise and noble treatment of animals in a style ordinarily reserved for the human figure, and he spent many years studying and documenting the anatomy of horses, dogs, and wild animals. His understanding of the physical structure of these animals provided him with the exceptional ability to convey accurately their beauty, strength, and dignity. The Frick showing will devote much attention to animal paintings and will also feature quintessential English landscape and genre scenes, representing nearly the full range of work in oil that Stubbs produced over the course of his career.  
The Frick is located at 1 East 70 Street.

Guggenheim Museum of Art
Website: www.guggenheim.org

Spanish Painting from El Greco to Picasso: Time, Truth, and History
To March 28, 2007
The exhibition presents a panoramic overview of the history of five centuries of Spanish art. Approximately 140 paintings by Spanish masters, including El Greco, Diego Velázquez, Francisco de Zurbarán, José de Ribera, Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, Francisco de Goya, Juan Gris, Joan Miró, Salvador Dalí, and Pablo Picasso, have been culled from private and public collections throughout Spain, Europe, and the US, in this first historical overview of Spanish painting to be seen in New York.
Unlike other overviews that display paintings in a strictly chronological order, Spanish Painting from El Greco to Picasso: Time, Truth, and History is presented in fifteen distinct sections, each based on a theme running through the past five centuries of Spanish culture. These thematic axes reveal the connections and affinities between the old masters and the modern era through a series of carefully chosen, content-based clusters, each based on a theme running through the past five centuries of Spanish culture. Accordingly, within each section of the exhibition works from different periods appear side by side, offering often radical juxtapositions that cut across time to reveal the overwhelming coherence of the Spanish tradition. As viewers move through the exhibition, these sections not only articulate the dominant trends of the Spanish School but reveal the Spanishness of great twentieth-century artists who lived abroad—Picasso, Gris, Miró, and Dalí.
The origins of each of the exhibition’s themes lie in the culture of sixteenth-century Spain, which was itself heavily influenced by the Counter-Reformation. This religious impulse sets the tone for many of the works in the exhibition, even in a genre as apparently worldly as the still life, which are featured in the largest section of the exhibition, Bodegones. A uniquely Spanish term for still life, bodegón refers to the pantries, or bodegas, where the pictured objects were kept. Early examples by artists like Juan Sánchez Cotán and Francisco de Zurbarán feature humble objects inscribed with transcendental values but depicted with the utmost naturalism against an inky black background that alludes to the void beyond worldly concerns. The fruits, vegetables, and other perishables in many of these paintings evoke a sense of transience even as they are precisely arranged along rigid sills, implying the timelessness of mathematical law. Over 300 years later, this “mineral” quality would serve as an important precedent for the Cubists, in particular the fragmented style of Juan Gris. In his canvases, as in much of Picasso’s early work, the transcendent geometries of the seventeenth century take on a modern, wholly unreligious character, updated to a new cultural moment but still constituting an inescapable historical model.
In the section titled “Childhood” the exhibition examines typical representations of children over the past five centuries.

Juan Pantoja de la Cruz    Pablo Picasso
Until the late eighteenth century, Spanish society distanced itself intellectually and emotionally from the notion of childhood, due largely to the high rate of infant mortality and prejudicial views that childhood was dangerously close to original sin and brute nature. Thus, when portraying children, usually for heraldic reasons, painters tended to exaggerate potential adult features to the point of caricature. The first painter to break free from this rigid, theatrical stance was Velázquez, who revealed childhood as an essentially fragile state every bit as interesting as any other stage of life. His contemporary Bartolomé Esteban Murillo did much to formalize this humanizing approach through a remarkable series of genre paintings, but it was Goya who first matched Velázquez’s skill at handling this subject. Operating under Enlightenment ideas, Goya presented from an existential perspective, as a moment of purity or innocence. Nearly a century later Picasso would pick up this thread, painting his own offspring with perceptive grace as he explored the dignity of childhood.
This exhibition was organized by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation and the State Corporation for Spanish Cultural Action Abroad (SEACEX).
The Guggenheim is located at1071 Fifth Ave. at 89th St., 212-423-3500.

Metropolitan Museum Of Art
Website: www.metmuseum.org  
Glitter and Doom: German Portraits from the 1920s
To February 19, 2007
Political, economic, and social turmoil shaped Germany’s short-lived Weimar Republic (1919–1933). These pivotal years also witnessed an incredibly creative period in German literature, art, music, film, theater, and architecture. In painting, a trend of matter-of-fact realism took hold. Disillusioned by the cataclysm of World War I, the most vital German artists moved towards what became known as a Neue Sachlichkeit (New Objectivity), in particular, a branch known as Verism. Looking soberly, cynically, and even ferociously at their fellow citizens, these artists found their true métier in portraiture, as seen in the 40 paintings and 60 works on paper featured in “Glitter and Doom.”
The exhibition features gripping portraits by ten renowned artists: Max Beckmann, Heinrich Maria Davringhausen, Otto Dix, George Grosz, Karl Hubbuch, Ludwig Meidner, Christian Schad, Rudolf Schlichter, Georg Scholz, and Gert H. Wollheim. German museum collections in Berlin, Cologne, Dresden, Düsseldorf, Hamburg, Frankfurt am Main, Mannheim, Münich, Stuttgart, and Wuppertal have lent works to the exhibition. Additional portraits on loan from museums in Paris, Madrid, New York, and Toronto, as well as from private collections in Germany, Australia, New York, and Chicago, are included.
Set in Stone: The Face in Medieval Sculpture
To February 19, 2007
Set in Stone” presents more than 80 medieval sculpted heads, half from the collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art and half selected loans from American and European collections. Because historical events isolated these objects from their original settings, they became objects that could be collected, and objects whose lost histories curators and scholars would hope to recover. The exhibition considers several artistic and historic themes, including: the destruction of statues as an act of iconoclasm, the evolving notions of the “portrait,” the use of science in the search for provenance, and more. Created from materials as diverse as marble, limestone, polychromed wood, and silver gilt, the carved heads date from the third century A.D. through the early 1500s and represent French, German, Italian, Spanish, Byzantine, English, and other medieval sculptural traditions. The exhibition draws together science, connoisseurship, archaeology, and history to examine these stunning works from different points of reference.
The Metropolitan Museum is located at 1000 Fifth Avenue at East 82 Street. Museum is open daily except Mondays, from 9:30 am to 5:30 pm except on Fridays and Saturdays when it remains open to 9 pm. Parking facilities available.
Barcelona and Modernity: Gaudí to Dalí
March 7, 2007–June 3, 2007
The first comprehensive survey of its type ever mounted in America, this exhibition will explore the diverse and innovative work of Barcelona's artists, architects, and designers in the years between the Barcelona Universal Exposition of 1888 and the imposition of the Fascist regime of Francisco Franco in 1939. The exhibition will feature some 300 works, including paintings, sculpture, drawings, prints, posters, decorative objects, furniture, architectural models, and designs. Barcelona and Modernity will offer new insights into the art movements that advanced the city's quest for modernity and confirmed it as the primary center of radical intellectual, political, and cultural activities in Spain.
Venice and the Islamic World, 828–1797
March 27–July 8, 2007
This exhibition will examine the relationship between Venice and the Islamic world over a thousand-year period, focusing on artistic and cultural ideas that originated in the Near East and were channeled, absorbed, and elaborated in Venice, a city that represented a commercial, political, and diplomatic magnet on the shores of the Mediterranean. The underlying theme of the exhibition will focus on the reasons why a large number of Venetian paintings, drawings, printed books, and especially decorative artworks were influenced by and drew inspiration from the Islamic world and from its art. "Orientalism" in Venice was based on direct contact with the Islamic world, which brought about new technological, artistic, and intellectual information. A continuous thread throughout the exhibition deals with the works of Islamic art that entered Venetian collections in historical times and explores the nature of the artistic relationship between Venice and the Mamluks in Egypt, the Ottomans in Turkey, and the Safavids in Iran.
A symposium will be held on Sunday, April 22, 2007, in conjunction with this exhibition. The symposium is free with Museum admission and does not require tickets or reservations. For more information, please contact lectures@metmuseum.org
The Metropolitan Museum is located at 1000 Fifth Avenue at 82 Street. Open: Weekdays and Sundays 9:30 am to 5:30 pm; Fridays and Saturdays from 9:30 to 9pm; closed Mondays except specific holidays.

The Cloisters at Fort Tryon Park (An extension of the Met Museum)
The Abbey At Saint-Guilhem-Le-Désert
Ongoing
The Abbey located  near Montpellier, France, was a regular stop on the medieval pilgrimage route to Santiago de Compostela in Spain. The 140 architectural elements from Saint-Guilhem that were used to reconstruct the 12th-century cloister in New York were acquired by George Grey Barnard around 1900 and purchased for The Metropolitan Museum of Art by John D. Rockefeller, Jr. The stone has recently been cleaned by Museum conservators, the plaster walls have been resurfaced, and a new lighting system has been put into place to supplement the natural light, creating the sense of an outdoor cloister as the Museum’s original designer intended.
The Cloisters opened as a branch of The Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1938 devoted to the art and architecture of medieval Europe. 
Recorded Information: 212-923-3700. To get to the Cloisters, take the M4 public bus a block east from the Met Museum at Madison Avenue and 93rd Street to the bus’s last stop (Fort Tryon Park–The Cloisters).

Museum of Modern Art (MoMA)
Website: www.moma.org
Armando Reverón
February 11–April 16, 2007
This retrospective exhibition introduces the work of the celebrated Venezuelan artist Armando Reverón (1889–1954) to international audiences. The exhibition is divided into sections of figurative and landscape painting, and also includes the life-sized dolls and many of the imitation practical objects that Reverón and his partner Juanita Ríos created to fill their secluded home in the small Caribbean village of Macuto. Early in his artistic career, Reverón painted coastal landscapes with monochromatic palettes imitative of the bright white light of the seashore. These highly tactile paintings are unique in early modernism, and seem to anticipate later monochromatic abstract art. Later, Reverón began to paint depictions of industrial activity in a nearby port. Reverón’s figurative works seem to replicate the perceptual experience of puzzling out forms in shadowy interiors. Surprisingly, the subjects of these figure paintings were, increasingly, not human figures but Reverón’s life-sized dolls. The exhibition will be accompanied by an illustrated catalogue, the first major publication on Reverón in English. 
Jeff Wall
February 25–May 14, 2007
Jeff Wall (Canadian, b. 1946) is widely recognized as one of the most adventurous and inventive artists of his generation. This retrospective surveys his career from the late 1970s to the present through some forty works. The exhibition features his major lightbox photographs and trace the evolution of his principal themes and pictorial strategies.
Following the New York showing the exhibition travels to The Art Institute of Chicago, and concludes its tour at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in the fall of 2007.
MoMA is located at 11 W. 53rd Street.

Neue Galerie New York
Website: www.neuegalerie.org        
Josef Hoffmann: Interiors, 1902-1913
Through February 26, 2007
Josef Hoffmann (1870-1956) is recognized as one of the leading figures in the modern movement. The four featured interiors will be a girl’s bedroom from the Max Biach residence (Vienna 1902), a bedroom from the Hans Salzer residence (Vienna 1902), the dining room from the residence of Jerome Stonborough and Margaret Stonborough-Wittgenstein (Berlin 1905), and the dining room from the residence of the Swiss painter Ferdinand Hodler (Geneva 1913). Each interior will be furnished with numerous objects original to those rooms: furniture, wall and floor coverings, textiles, lighting, ceramics, glass, and metalwork. Many of these products were produced under the auspices of the influential Wiener Werkstätte, of which Hoffmann was the artistic director.
Van Gogh and Expressionism
Opens March 2007
Neue Galerie is located at 1048 Fifth Avenue & East 86 Street.

The New York Botanical Garden
Website www.nybg.org  
Advance purchase of tickets is advised, especially for December 23–January 1.
Open year round, the NY Botanical Garden is located at 200th St. and Kazimiroff Blvd. in the Bronx. Transportation to the Garden is available via the MetroNorth rail line from Grand Central Station in Manhattan. Parking also available.

New York Historical Society
www.nyhistory.org
The New York History Society has published its Programs & Exhibitions booklet for Winter/Spring 2007 and is available at the website above. The institution offers historical lectures, art exhibits, musical explorations and much more centering on both the city and the state’s rich heritage.
Located at 170 Central Park West at77 Street. Open Tuesdays to Sundasy 10 am to 6pm.

The Whitney Museum of American Art
Website: http://www.whitney.org/noflash.html  
Terence Koh
January 19 - May 2007
For his first solo museum show in the United States, Terence Koh is creating a new installation for the Whitney's Lobby Gallery. In Koh's immersive, typically monochromatic environments in which minimalist and baroque aspects of his sensibility vie for dominance, a seemingly unknown ritual is about to take place, where a sense of loss simultaneously suggests regeneration. From drifting powder silencing rooms, and constellations of cryptically linked objects that move from literally disjunctive realms (upstairs/downstairs, inside/outside, dark/light) as well as more conceptual ones, to pristine, perfectly crafted containers that become coffins for shattered glass and mirror, the glitter of black beads, burnt objects, residing within, Koh's gestures evoke isolation and secrecy, but also protection and ecstasy.    
Gordon Matta Clark
February 22, 2007-June 7, 2007
During the brief but highly productive ten years that he worked as an artist, and even more so since his death, Gordon Matta-Clark (1943-1978) has exerted a powerful influence on artists and architects who know his work. This retrospective will bring together the breadth of his practice to reveal the unique beauty and radical nature of his punnings, plans, performances, and interventions evident in the many media in which he worked: the sculptural objects (most notably from building cuts), drawings, fims, photographs, notebooks, and documentary material.
Lorna Simpson
March 1, 2007-May 6, 2007
One of the leading artists of her generation, Lorna Simpson is well known for her photographic and film works, which often examine racial and gender identity. In works such as Call Waiting (1997), she depicts people of color engaging in intimate yet incomplete onversations that elude easy interpretation but seem to plumb the mysteries of identity and desire. Organized by the American Federation of Arts, this comprehensive first mid-career survey will feature her image and text works, serigraphs on felt, film installations, and a selection of recent work.
The Whitney Museum is located at 945 Madison Avenue between 74th and 75th streets.
Open Wednesday–Thursday 11 am–6 pm; Friday 1–9 pm (6–9 pm pay-what-you-wish admission); Saturday–Sunday 11 am–6 pm. Closed Mondays and Tuesdays.
The Museum is open Tuesdays for prearranged school programs. For more information, please contact the Education Department at schoolvisits@whitney.org, (212) 570-7721 or fax (212) 570-7711.

 

Paris

Musée de l’Orangerie
Website: http://www.musee-orangerie.fr
Monet’s Water Lilies
Ongoing
Monet’s water lilies artworks languished for decades in a gloomy netherworld in the Orangerie after a botched museum renovation in the 1960s. However, a major revamp of the museum, which reopened on May 17th after eight years, has changed all that.
The eight works, painted between 1914 and 1926, were donated by the artist and hung at the Orangerie in 1927, a year after his death. Impressive in size—each is two meters high; and one is 17 meters long—the paintings help illustrate Monet's influence on nudging art towards abstraction. Some even capture the mysterious sunset light at Giverny, an effect that could woo even jaded anti-Impressionists. The museum also houses the Jean Walter and Paul Guillaume collection of Impressionist and post-Impressionist works by Cézanne, Renoir, Soutine, Picasso, Modigliani and others..
Musée de l’Orangerie, Jardin des Tuileries. Tel: +33 (0)1 44 77 80 07. Métro: Concorde. Open: Weds-Mon, 12.30pm-7pm (until 9pm on Fridays)

Jeu de Paume
Website: http://www.jeudepaume.org
Jeu de Paume, 1, place de la Concorde. Open daily except Mondays.

Musée de Quai Branly
Website: http://www.quaibranly.fr  
The museum’s permanent collections area presents the great geographical regions in which the Musée de quai Branly’s remarkable collections originated: Oceania, Asia, Africa and the Americas. The visitor makes his way fluidly across them, taking in the major crossroads between civilizations and cultures: Asia-Oceania, Insulindia, and Mashreck-Maghreb. The 3,500 artifacts are presented so as to highlight the historical depth of the cultures that produced them, and the many different meanings that the works themselves possess. The museography encourages the visitor to take the time to inform himself on major thematic areas: masks and tapa in Oceania, costume in Asia, and African musical instruments and textiles form the subjects of a series of fascinating video presentations.
The museum is located at 27, 37, 51 quai Branly 206, 218 rue de l'Université 75007 Paris. Phone: 01 56 61 70 00. Open Tuesday to Sunday, from 10 a.m. to 6.30 p.m.
Admission fee.

National Museum of Natural History
Muséum Nationale de l’Histoire Naturelle, Grande Galerie de l’Evolution, 36, rue Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, 5th arrondissement. Métro: Jussieu or Gare d’Austerlitz. Open: Sun-Fri 10am-6pm, Sat 10am-8pm. Tel: +33 (0)1 40 79 30 00.

 

Philadelphia

Philadelphia Museum of Fine Art
Website: www.philamuseum.org  
The museum is located at 26th Street and the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. Open Tuesdays through Sundays.

University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology & Anthropology
Website: http://www.museum.upenn.edu  
Amarna, Ancient Egypt's Place in the Sun
Through October, 2007
Tutankhamun, ancient Egypt's famous boy pharaoh, grew up 3,300 years ago in the royal court at Amarna, the ancient city of Akhetaten, whose name meant the "Horizon of the Aten." This extraordinary royal city grew, flourished - and vanished - in hardly more than a generation's time. A new exhibition offers a rare look at the meteoric rise and fall of this unique royal city during one of Egypt's most intriguing times. Talks, tours, Saturday rash courses on ancient Egypt, theater in the galleries, family workshops, even a "Hollywood on the Nile" film series, are all part of the Year of Egypt.
The exhibit will feature more than 100 ancient artifacts, some never before on display - including statuary of gods, goddesses and royalty, monumental reliefs, golden jewelry, as well as personal items from the royal family, and artists' materials from the royal workshops of Amarna. Most of the show's artifacts date to the time of and the Amarna Period, including many objects excavated almost a century ago from this short-lived royal city. With background information about the childhood home and unique times in which Tutankhamun lived, Amarna is a complementary exhibition to the nationally traveled, blockbuster exhibition from Egypt, Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs. Penn Museum is partnering locally with The Franklin Institute ( website: http://www2.fi.edu) which will host the blockbuster Tutankhamun show opening February 3, 2007.
Penn Museum's renowned Upper and Lower Egyptian galleries, recently refurbished, offer visitors a rich opportunity to view a wide variety of ancient Egyptian artifacts from several millennia. Materials range from monumental architecture to sculptures, pottery, jewelry, tomb goods, and mummies.
- The University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, located at 3260 South Street in Philadelphia. Tel: (215) 898-4000. Museum hours are Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.; Sunday, 1 to 5 p.m. Closed Mondays, holidays and summer Sundays, Memorial Day through Labor Day weekends. Admission
- The Franklin Institute Science Museum is located at 222 North 20th Street in Center City Philadelphia, at the intersection of 20th Street and the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. Open daily. Admission

 

Rome

National Gallery of Modern Art/ Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna
www.gnam.arti.beniculturali.it

 

San Francisco

San Francisco Symphony
Website: http://www.sfsymphony.org  
September 2006 to June 14, 2007 season
For its 95th season, the San Francisco Symphony under Music Director Michael Tilson Thomas has prepared a rich program that reaffirms its mission: to give fresh interpretations of canonical works and highlight the best music of today. Expect concerts of the usual suspects—Beethoven, Mozart and Brahms—but also look out for some young stars, such as Joshua Bell, Midori and Sarah Chang, all violinists. The program includes the world premiere of John Adams’s “A Flowering Tree”, a one-act opera (March 1st-3rd).
San Francisco Symphony performs at Davies Symphony Hall, 201 Van Ness Ave. Tel: +1 (415) 864-6000.

 

Stuttgart, Germany

For more information on Stuttgart, go to  www.stuttgart-tourist.de

Le Corbusier House/The Weissenhof Museum
Website: www.weissenhof.de   
Ongoing  
The Weissenhof Settlement has opened its museum in the Le Corbusier House. When it was founded in 1927, the Weissenhof Settlement was considered the most progressive architectural initiative of its time. In 33 houses with 63 apartments, a total of 17 architects from Germany, France, Holland, Belgium and Austria implemented their ideas of "functionalism." Among the architects, all of whom were under 45 years of age, were Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Walter Gropius, Le Corbusier, Hans Scharoun and others. 

Mercedes Benz Museum
www.stuttgart-tourist.de
A prominent local landmark for car lovers of all ages since its opening earlier this year.  Nearby is the Gottlieb Daimler Memorial Sight, where one can visit Daimler’s former workshop in his garden house where he and Wilhelm Maybach secretly invented the world’s first sprinting motor in 1883. 

Art Museum Stuttgart
www.kunstmuseum-stuttgart
Pictograms: The Signs of Loneliness
To February 25, 2007
Fire exit signs, arrows, no smoking signs - modern humanity is surrounded by pictograms. Essential elements of a universally understood code, they naturally occupy a central position in any discussion surrounding the role of signs in art. In fact, as early as the beginning of the 20th century artists were already working on the development of an international language which went beyond the written or spoken word. Using some 350 exhibits from Germany and abroad, the exhibition traces the previously little explored art history of the pictogram right up to the present day. At the end one is faced with the fascinating question: what happens when an artist takes the mundane sign, intended to be read quickly, intuitively and unambiguously, and throws it into the arena of art where everything is open to interpretation,

 

Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

Art Gallery of New South Wales
Website: http://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au   
Art Gallery is located on Art Gallery Rd, The Domain, Sydney. Tel: +61 (0)2 9225 1744. Admission: A$10. Open: daily, 10am-5pm.

 

Washington, D.C.

National Gallery of Art
Website: www.nga.gov  
The National Gallery is located on the National Mall between 3rd and 7th Streets at Constitution Avenue NW. Open: Monday through Saturday from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. and Sunday from 11:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.  Free admission.

The Phillips Collection
http://www.phillipscollection.org  /
Moving Pictures: American Art and Early Film
February 17–May 20, 2007
This exhibition will present American realist painting from the late 19th and early 20th centuries side-by-side with the earliest experiments in film. Approximately 100 works, including nearly 60 short films (a few minutes long) by Thomas Edison, the Lumière Brothers, and the Cinématheque Française, along with works by American masters such as George Bellows, William Merritt Chase, Thomas Eakins, Maurice Prendergast, and John Sloan, will provide a new context for looking at the artists’ choice and presentation of subject matter. For the first time, film will be fully integrated into the history of American art. Moving Pictures is organized by the Williams College Museum of Art.
The Phillips Collection is located at 1600 21st Street, NW. Open daily except Mondays with extended hours Thursday and Sundays. Admission

Smithsonian Museum
Website: www.smithsonian.org
The Smithsonian Information Center in the institution's first building, popularly known as the Castle, which is open daily 8:30am-5:30pm. The Center serves as the focal point for information about the Institution's 17 museums and National Zoo in Washington, D.C., and 2 museums in New York City. This distinctive red, sandstone building is centrally located on the National Mall, and may be entered from either Jefferson Drive on the north or through the Enid A. Haupt Garden on the south. Admission free at most of the museums.

 

Zurich

Kunsthaus Zurich
http://www.kunsthaus.ch/
Kunsthaus Zurich is located at Heimplatz 1, 8001 Zurich. Open: Tue-Thu 10am-9pm; Fri-Sun 10am-5pm. Tel: +41 (0)44 253 8484. Tickets: SFr16.