Beautiful

The Healing Power of Art

Episode 51: Brooke talks with Nancy Marshburn on-site about her Healing Power of Art series which are part of the Harvest exhibition at the Anne Neilson Fine Art Gallery in Charlotte, North Carolina. Marshburn uses her 20 year experience as a medical artist to combine art and science and anatomy and beauty.

Art has the power to heal. It evokes an emotional response, and emotions have an effect on the body’s physiological responses. Medical studies document the favorable therapeutic impact of visual arts: Looking at art can change brain wave patterns, the autoimmune response and neurotransmitters that shift the body from stress to relaxation. It also can modulate attitudes from fear to acceptance, from negativity to hope. Excerpt from Harvest exhibition press release from Anne Neilson Fine Art Gallery.

Re-Pear, Pastel, 14″ x 10″

Lemon-Aid, Pastel, 12″ x 9″

Artichoke Heart-beat, Pastel, 9″ x 12″

A Stent in Time Saves Fine, Oil, 9″ x 12″

Featured Image: Transplant Pastel, 11″ x 14

All images used with permission.

Emancipating the Past: Kara Walker’s Tales of Slavery and Power

Episode 52: “I wanted to make art where the viewer wouldn’t walk away, he’d get pulled into history, into fiction, into something totally demeaning and possibly very beautiful.” -Kara Walker

Kara Walker has created art that is unquestionably provocative, challenging and thought-provoking. Her silhouette images present the brutality of slavery in a way that is both demeaning and beautiful.

Brooke talks with Jennifer Navva Milliken of the Bellevue Arts Museum in Bellevue, Washington about Emancipating the Past: Kara Walker’s Tales of Slavery and Power, which runs through November 27, 2016. Milliken gives a brief biography of Kara Walker and explains the challenges and rewards involved in curating this powerful and moving exhibition.

Kara Walker
African/American edition 22/40, 1998
Linocut. 44 x 62 in.
Photo: Courtesy of the Jordan Schnitzer Family Foundation
Photo: Frank Ross

Kara Walker
The Emancipation Approximation (Scene #18), edition 7/20, 1999-2000
Screenprint. 44 x 34 in.
Photo: Courtesy of the Jordan Schnitzer Family Foundation

Kara Walker
The Keys to the Coop, edition 39/40, 1997
Linoleum block. 46 X 60 1/2 in.
Photo: Courtesy of the Jordan Schnitzer Family Foundation

Kara Walker
An Unpeopled Land in Uncharted Waters: Savant, edition 19/30, 2010
Etching with aquatint, sugar-lift, spit-bite and dry-point. 27 X 17 in.
Photo: Courtesy of the Jordan Schnitzer Family Foundation

Kara Walker
Harper’s Pictorial History of the Civil War (Annotated): Confederate Prisoners Being Conducted from Jonesborough, edition 21/35, 2005
Offset lithography and screenprint. 39 X 53 in.
Photo: Courtesy of the Jordan Schnitzer Family Foundation

Featured Image:
Kara Walker
An Unpeopled Land in Uncharted Waters: No World, edition 19/30, 2010
Etching with aquatint, sugar-lift, spit-bite and dry-point 27 X 39 in.
Photo: Courtesy of the Jordan Schnitzer Family Foundation

Art and Stories from Mughal India

Episode 47: In the first half of the 15th Century (CE) Zahirrudin Muhammad Barbur led his armies from Central Asia to decisive victories in battles at Panipat, Khanwa, and Ghagra on the Indian Sub-Continent. Through these victories Barbur, who claimed a maternal descent from Genghis Khan and paternal descent through the Turco-Mongol conqueror Timur, established the foundation of the Mughal Empire, which would dominate large portions of present-day India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan for the next three-hundred years.

The Cleveland Museum of Art is presenting Art and Stories from Mughal India through October 23, 2016. This exhibition presents works of art from this thoroughly fascinating historical era. Brooke talks with Sonya Rhie Quintanilla, the Cleveland Museum of Art’s curator of Indian and Southeast Asian Art about this world-class exhibition. Their conversation provides glimpses into the artistic expression of an empire that created the Taj Mahal, among countless other gifts to world culture, and which closely examined and attempted to reconcile Islam, Christianity, Hinduism and other religious traditions.

An excellent app dedicated to the exhibition is available on the App Store on Apple devices. Search CMA Mughal in order to download a tour, a hundred images from the exhibition and an audio glossary.

The dream of Zulaykha, from the Amber Album, about 1670. Mughal India. Opaque watercolor and gold on paper; 32 x 24.4 cm (page); 21.9 x 15.4 cm (painting).
The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift in honor of Madeline Neves Clapp; Gift of Mrs. Henry White Cannon by exchange; Bequest of Louise T. Cooper; Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund; From the Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection, 2013.332 (recto)

: Women enjoying the river at the forest’s edge, about 1765. Mughal India, Murshidabad or Lucknow. Opaque watercolor and gold on paper; 33.1 x 24.9 cm (page); 30.5 x 22.2 cm (painting). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift in honor of Madeline Neves Clapp; Gift of Mrs. Henry White Cannon by exchange; Bequest of Louise T. Cooper; Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund; From the Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection , 2013.351 (recto)

: Nur Jahan holding a portrait of Emperor Jahangir, about 1627; borders added 1800s. Mughal India. Opaque watercolor and gold on paper; 30 x 22.1 cm (page); 13.6 x 6.4 cm (painting). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift in honor of Madeline Neves Clapp; Gift of Mrs. Henry White Cannon by exchange; Bequest of Louise T. Cooper; Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund; From the Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection, 2013.325 (recto).

: Layla and Majnun in the wilderness with animals, from a Khamsa (Quintet) of Amir Khusrau Dihlavi (Indian, 1253–1325), about 1590–1600. Attributed to Sanwalah (Indian, active about 1580–1600). Mughal India, made for Akbar (reigned 1556–1605). Opaque watercolor, ink, and gold on paper; 24.9 x 16.8 cm (page); 18.6 x 16.2 cm (painting). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift in honor of Madeline Neves Clapp; Gift of Mrs. Henry White Cannon by exchange; Bequest of Louise T. Cooper; Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund; From the Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection, 2013.301 (recto).

: Posthumous portrait of the Mughal emperor Muhammad Shah (r. 1719–48)holding a falcon, 1764. Muhammad Rizavi Hindi (Indian, active mid-1700s). Mughal India, probably Lucknow. Opaque watercolor with gold on paper; 28 x 23.8 cm (page); 14.4 x 10.3 cm (painting).The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift in honor of Madeline NevesClapp; Gift of Mrs. Henry White Cannon by exchange; Bequest of Louise T. Cooper; Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund; From the Catherine and Ralph Benkaim Collection,2013.347 (recto)

Image 11. Brooklyn Museum_Architectural panel_86.189.4

Image 10. AsianArtMuseum_Wine Cup in the Shape of a Turban Gourd

Clockwise: Pierced railing, about 1655. Mughal India. Marble; 33.5 x 64 x 5.5 cm. Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, The Stuart Cary Welch Collection, Gift of Edith I. Welch in memory of Stuart Cary Welch, 2009.202.67. Image© President and Fellows of Harvard College

Architectural panel, 1700s or early 1800s. Mughal India. Marble inlaid with variegated semiprecious stones; 46.4 x 24.4 x 7.5 cm. The Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Gary Smith, 86.189.4

Ring, 1700s–1800s. India. Gold, enamel, and chased stones; diam. 2.3 cm. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Edward L.Whittemore Fund ,1944.68

Hookah bowl, about 1700. Mughal India. Gold on blue glass; h. 19.8 cm. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cornelia Blakemore Warner Fund, 1961.44.

Wine cup in the shape of a turban gourd, 1625–50. Mughal India. Nephrite. Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, The Avery Brundage Collection, B60J485. Photograph © Asian Art Museum of San Francisco.

Featured Image: The Annunciation, from a Mir’at al-quds (Mirror of Holiness) of Father Jerome Xavier (Spanish, 1549–1617), 1602–4. Mughal India, Allahabad, made for Prince Salim (1569–1627). Opaque watercolor, ink, and gold on paper; 26.2 x 15.4 cm (page); 20.6 x 10.2 cm (painting). The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund, 2005.145.2.

Psychic Compound

Episode 46: The C24 Gallery in New York City is featuring the creations of London artist Nick Gentry in an exhibition entitled Psychic Compound, which will run through September 2, 2016. Gentry incorporates found objects such as film negatives, VHS tapes, X-rays, and floppy discs into his paintings; paintings that are not only striking portraiture but also thought provoking insight into the ever accelerating speed of technological innovation and obsolescence.

Brooke talked with Gentry and exhibition curator Michelle Maigret about Psychic Compound, the inspiration for and influences on Gentry’s art, and about the arc of his career to this point.

Laura Spong at 90

Episode 1: Brooke talks with Wim Roefs of the if ART Gallery in Columbia, South Carolina about the Laura Spong at 90 exhibition.

Ninety year old abstract expressionist Laura Spong was doing her art in South Carolina for many years before people “got it.” She says “It’s mostly just putting it on the canvas and then reacting. The first line I put up, I react to that to do another line, so it builds itself in that way. It’s frustrating, because it almost feels like you don’t have any control over the creativity.”

Not one to put on airs, Spong doesn’t pontificate about the meaning or importance of her work, but her resume speaks for itself. She has been featured at Charleston’s Spoleto Arts Festival, the Greenville County Museum of Art, the South Carolina State Museum, Charleston’s Smith Killian Fine Art, as well as on the set of the Lifetime television show Drop Dead Diva.

Let's Talk Art With Brooke

Perspective is Everything