The Fenimore Art Museum in Cooperstown, New York, has announced its 2016 schedule of new exhibitions running April 1 through December 31.  The season is filled with a wide-range of exciting exhibits featuring world-renowned artists such as Ansel Adams, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, and James Abbott McNeill Whistler among others.

“As one of the finest rural art museums in the country, the Fenimore prides itself in offering a variety of outstanding exhibitions each season and this year is no exception,” said Fenimore Art Museum President and CEO, Dr. Paul S. D’Ambrosio.  “Visitors to Cooperstown will be amazed by the diverse collections on display, which include well-known artists such as American photographer Ansel Adams and French painter Henri Toulouse-Lautrec.  Anyone visiting the museum will find something fascinating.”

The season opens April 1 with six exhibitions including Ansel Adams: Early Works (April 1 – September 18, 2016), Traditions of Celebration and Ritual: The Thaw Collection of American Indian Art (April 1 – December 31, 2016), A New York View: Country Landscapes by Robert Schneider (April 1 – December 31, 2016), Project 562: Portraits of Native America Now(April 1 – September 19, 2016), and The Clothing Project (April 1 – June 5, 2016).

The summer season is highlighted by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec in Bohemian Paris (which includes La Boheme costumes from The Metropolitan Opera, May 28 – September 5, 2016), The Perfection of Harmony: The Art of James Abbott McNeill Whistler, Featuring Lithographs from the Steven Block Collection at the Speed Art Museum, Louisville, Kentucky (May 28 – October 2, 2016), Scott McKowen’s Shakespeare Illustrations (June 17 – September 5, 2016).

Our fall season includes The Instruction of Young Ladies: Arts from Private Girls’ Schools and Academies in Early America (September 24 – December 31, 2016), Arnold Newman: Luminaries of the Twentieth Century in Art, Politics and Culture (October 19 – December 31, 2016), The Clothing Project: A Victorian Holiday (September 24 – December 31, 2016).

For more information on our 2016 exhibitions, related programs, and our $2.00-off admission coupon, please visit FenimoreArtMuseum.org.  The Fenimore Art Museum is open April 1 – December 31.  Spring hours: 10:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday (closed Mondays).  Summer hours: open daily 10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. (beginning May 10).

This exhibition season is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.

 

Upcoming 2016 Exhibitions:

 

Ansel Adams: Early Works

April 1 – September 18, 2016

Ansel Adams: Early Works focuses on the masterful small-scale prints made by Adams from the 1920s into the 1950s. In this time period Adams’ technique evolved from the soft-focus, warm-toned, painterly “Parmelian prints” of the 1920s; through the f/64 school of sharp-focused photography that he co-founded with Edward Weston and Imogen Cunningham in the 1930s; and, after the War, towards a cooler, higher-contrast printmaking approach.

Several singular examples are included in this exhibition including an extraordinarily rare print of Moonrise, Hernandez. It is one of the earliest extant – with its light gray (rather than deep black) sky with wispy clouds, it is almost “day and night” when compared to his much more common, much darker, printings from the 1970s and 1980s.

The exhibition is sponsored in part by The Morgan McReynolds Group at Morgan Stanley. Support also provided by a Market NY grant through I LOVE NY/NewYork State’s Division of Tourism as a part of the Regional Economic Development Council awards.

 

Traditions of Celebration and Ritual: The Thaw Collection of American Indian Art

April 1 – December 31, 2016

Since ancient times, Native American peoples have celebrated their beliefs and practices through daily, seasonal, and special occasion rituals, affirming their life and identity. Both art and ritual are powerful expressions that honor mythological beings, spirit beings, and ancestors – conveying the spiritual power of the natural world. In this exhibit, see over 50 art objects from the Thaw Collection created by Native American men and women for specific rituals and ceremonies. Discover the arts associated with fundamental aspects of Native American life – the hunt and harvest, feasting, warfare, adornment, and shamanism.

 

A New York View: Country Landscapes by Robert Schneider

April 1 – December 31, 2016

Contemporary painter Robert Schneider embodies the traditions of the American Tonalist School, incorporating loose brushwork and muted colors into his rural landscapes of New York State. The work recalls many late 19^th and early 20^th century American landscape paintings and reveals a uniquely personal view of our region.

 

Project 562: Portraits of Native America Now
Photographs by Matika Wilbur
April 1 – September 19, 2016

Directed by acclaimed Northwest Coast contemporary photographer Matika Wilbur, Project 562 is a national documentary project dedicated to photographing contemporary Native America. The 2010 U.S. census shows approximately 5.2 million Native Americans living in the United States; and despite the cultural, economic, and political variety/progression of Native Americans several misleading and stereotypical images dating back to the 19^thcentury still prevail at large. Project 562 (the first undertaking of its kind) will dramatically change that. Wilbur is supplying original photographic images and oral narratives from all 562 Tribal communities throughout the United States, organizing and presenting compelling portraits and stories from elders, culture bearers, linguists, teachers, activists, artists, professionals, and other contemporary Indians.

 

The Clothing Project

April 1 – June 5

The Fenimore Art Museum and The Farmers’ Museum have an extensive and intriguing clothing collection. Throughout 2014 and 2015, Curatorial Fellow Mary Alexander blogged about her review of the collection and the treasures she found there. The exhibit includes 16 of the best, brightest and most popular picks from the blog, as liked by over 1,000 followers. From an 18^th century corset to a 1920s ball gown and a child’s mourning costume, these unique pieces will be on display for the first time this spring at the Fenimore Art Museum.

 

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec in Bohemian Paris

(Installation includes La Boheme costumes from the Metropolitan Opera)

May 28 – September 5, 2016

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec is most famous for his posters that depict the nightlife of Paris, although he only created thirty, of which thirteen were actually intended as cabaret and theater advertisements. The rest were used to advertise books, products such as bicycles, and a professional photographer. His images captured the imagination of his contemporaries and generations to follow, as well as helped define the end of the 19^th century period and what is known as “La Belle Epoque.” They remain a testimony to his artistic acumen and his enduring art.

This exhibit, from the collection of Herakleidon Museum, Athens, Greece, uses examples of Lautrec’s sketches, drawings, books, albums, and original posters to examine his artistic process.

The exhibit also incorporates costumes from several of the Metropolitan Opera’s productions of La Boheme – Puccini’s unforgettable tale of love, youth, and tragic loss during “La Belle Epoque.” With more than 1,200 performances, La Bohème is the most frequently staged opera at the Met. Other select pieces from the Met’s archives including, photographs, playbills, jewelry, and props will also be on view.

The exhibition is sponsored in part by Nellie and Robert Gipson.

 

The Perfection of Harmony: The Art of James Abbott McNeill Whistler,

Featuring Lithographs from the Steven Block Collection

at the Speed Art Museum, Louisville, Kentucky

May 28 – October 2, 2016

James Abbott McNeil Whistler (1834-1903) influenced two generations of European and American artists in the late nineteenth century. As provocative in personality as he was in art, Whistler was a major player in the artistic turmoil of the times. Whistler’s new approaches included a disdain for the narrative and moral traditions of French and British art and the promotion of his belief in “Art for Art’s sake” meaning that art was an end in itself. He was skilled in multiple media creating over 500 oil paintings in addition to pastels, watercolors, drawings, and exceptional prints. His etchings, lithographs, and drypoints—executed with meticulous care on the finest papers—gained him substantial fame.

This exhibit encompasses a sampling of Whistler’s subjects and media. The Steven L. Block Collection from the Speed Art museum, forming the core of the exhibition, is a comprehensive and rich resource to study the full range of the artist’s lithographic career. It is complemented by etchings and drawings from the Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute, and paintings from other private and public collections.

 

Scott McKowen’s Shakespeare Illustrations

June 17 – September 5, 2016

In a celebration of Shakespeare during the quadricentennial of his death, artist Scott McKowen reveals an impressive array of highly detailed pencil sketches, original scratchboard engravings, and finished “colorized” works in an exhibition of Shakespeare theatre posters designed for venues in both the U.S. and Canada.  Discover how McKowen conceptualizes the final artwork by distilling the play down to a single, memorable image.

McKowen, an American artist based in Stratford, Ontario, Canada, is an engraver, illustrator and graphic designer specializing in theatre and performing arts.

 

The Instruction of Young Ladies: Arts from Private Girls’ Schools

and Academies in Early America

September 24 – December 31, 2016

The curriculum for “young ladies” who attended private boarding schools and female academies in early America included a wide range of artistic endeavors in addition to the reading, writing, and arithmetic emphasized in public schools of the time. Students were taught pictorial needlework, weaving, rug hooking, drawing, and painting in multiple media, and, to demonstrate their skills, produced samplers; pictorial rugs; painted and embroidered landscapes, memorial scenes, maps, and still-lifes; and more. The exhibit will focus on those works at the same time it explores the history of private female education in the United States and the key role of women educators in the growth of this country’s educational system.

 

Arnold Newman: Luminaries of the Twentieth Century in Art, Politics and Culture

October 19 – December 31, 2016

Arnold Newman: Luminaries of the Twentieth Century in Art, Politics and Culture is an exhibition of the innovative minds and personalities that defined a century as seen through the eyes of one of its own; Arnold Newman. Recognized as the ‘Father of Environmental Portraiture,’ Newman’s work is collected and exhibited in major museums and collections around the world. With over 60 portraits, including Pablo Picasso, Igor Stravinsky, Martha Graham, John F. Kennedy, and Woody Allen, this collection brings to light the names and faces that gave rise to the ideas and concepts that have shaped our world.

 

The Clothing Project: A Victorian Holiday

September 24 – December 31, 2016

Our Clothing Project exhibit transitions into the fall and winter with a look at the Fenimore Art Museum and The Farmers’ Museum collection of apparel for the colder months. The exhibit includes seldom seen winter clothing from upstate New York’s past including mittens, muffs, capes, dresses, hats, and more.  Just in time for the holidays!

 

Ongoing Exhibits:

Eugene and Clare Thaw Collection of American Indian Art

The Coopers of Cooperstown

Fine Art from the Permanent Collection

American Memory: Recalling the Past in Folk Art