Collections: Contemporary Art

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Object of the Month: July 2010: A Little Taste Outside of Love

Eugenie Tsai on July 2, 2010

It's big and sparkly like the proverbial girl's best friend, but that's not the only reason I like Mickalene Thomas's, A Little Taste Outside of Love.

Mickalene Thomas (American, born 1971). A Little Taste Outside of Love, 2007. Acrylic, enamel and rhinestones on wood panel, Overall: 108 x 144 in. (274.3 x 365.8 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Giulia Borghese and Designated Purchase Fund, 2008.7a-c. © Mickalene Thomas

It's also a smart tongue-in-cheek riff on the familiar tradition of depicting the nude—woman of course—in the history of western art. In this work, Thomas explores the idea of self-representation. By making an African American woman the subject of the painting she recasts traditional depictions in European paintings of black women as maids and servants.  (If you are familiar with art history, think about Edouard Manet's Olympia, which shows a pale courtesan reclining on white sheets with a maid of African descent offering a bouquet of flowers from an admirer.) In A Little Taste Thomas also tweaks European taste for "oriental" themes by removing the nude female body from the sexualized space of the harem and inserting it into an interior that makes reference to taste of the 1970s—the decade in which the artist was born.

You can see the influence of the 70s and the black power movement in the luxuriantly patterned textiles and the woman's Afro hairdo.  Informing Thomas's painting are her mother's photographs from the 70s,  Blaxploitation movies, and images of iconic black women.  I like the interior setting which has a big personality.  The patchwork of swatches rendered in gaudy and sometimes clashing patterns suggests a room that is filled with spacial ambiguities. All of the sparkling multicolored rhinestones applied to the surface heighten the decorative qualities of the piece, pushing the glitz factor beyond conventional good taste. Here, Thomas has forged an innovative pictorial language that draws on tradition to create something new and very contemporary. I'm proud that she's a Brooklyn artist!!!

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Get a Key, Unlock Doors

Tessa Hite on June 3, 2010

Last time you were at the Brooklyn Museum, you probably didn't notice the hidden door next the portrait of George Washington in the Luce Center for American Art, but now you can see what's inside once you have a key!

Key to the City, by Paul Ramírez Jonas, allows every New Yorker a chance to go behind the scenes by giving you a key to locked doors all over the city.  From June 3^rd to June 27^th, Creative Time will have a kiosk in Times Square, where they will bestow you a key and a sitemap, guiding you on a scavenger hunt across the five boroughs.  There are over 20 sites, including the Brooklyn Museum, Gracie Mansion, and the Bronx County Courthouse.

Tell us about your discoveries, post photos to our flickr group, or tweet about them using hashtag #keytocity.

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Peace, Love and Posters

Marguerite Vigliante on November 18, 2009

The other day I started blogging about the museum's cool collection of psychedelic posters.  These posters were displayed mostly in hippie boutique windows and on the streets of the Haight-Ashbury district in San Francisco from the mid 1960's through the early 1970's.  Although they were produced as advertisements for concerts, these posters became the background of the psychedelic scene and were works of art in their own right.

David Singer (American). [Untitled] (Boz Scaggs/Cold Blood...), 1971. Offset lithograph, Sheet: 21 7/8 x 28 in. (55.6 x 71.1 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Designated Purchase Fund, 73.39.27. ©Bill Graham Archives, LLC, www.Wolfgangsvault.com.

The posters were created by a diverse group of talented artists hired by concert promoters Chet Helms and Bill Graham.  The principal designers in the group were Wes Wilson, Victor Moscoso, Stanley Mouse, Alton Kelley and Rick Griffin, who were often called the "Fillmore Five".  Some of the artists, such as Moscoso and Bob Fried, had formal art training while others, like Greg Irons and David Singer, were mostly self taught.  A few were natives of San Francisco, many others migrated there.  They were possibly drawn to the artistic climate and the sense of freedom and experimentation that had been emerging in the San Francisco area since the 1950's.  Bonnie MacLean was the only female artist in the group steadily employed in making posters.

  

Left: Greg Irons (American). [Untitled] (Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young), 1969. Offset lithograph, Sheet: 21 1/8 x 14 in. (53.7 x 35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Designated Purchase Fund, 73.39.193.  ©Bill Graham Archives, LLC, www.Wolfgangsvault.com. Right: Bonnie MacLean (American). [Untitled] (The Doors/Chuck Berry), 1967. Offset lithograph, Sheet: 21 1/16 x 14 in. (53.5 x 35.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Designated Purchase Fund, 73.39.100. ©Bill Graham Archives, LLC, www.Wolfgangsvault.com.

What these artists had in common was that they attempted to unify, through their art, the ideas and spirit of the counterculture movement of which they were a part.  With the use of florescent color, surreal imagery and, often times, to the uninitiated, illegible text, they vividly captured the heady vibe of the time. This may have been easy for them to accomplish because, it has been said, they were stoned much of the time!  Their imagery often made subtle, and sometimes obvious, reference to the flourishing drug culture.  The loud, vibrating colors in their work also echoed the high-decibel music and light shows which these artists were commissioned to advertise.

  

Left: Bob Fried (American). [Untitled] (Big Brother and the Holding Co....), 1968. Offset lithograph, Sheet: 21 7/8 x 13 13/16 in. (55.6 x 35.1 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Designated Purchase Fund, 73.39.123.  ©Bill Graham Archives, LLC, www.Wolfgangsvault.com. Right: Lee Conklin (American). [Untitled] (Steppenwolf/Staple Singers/Santana), 1968. Offset lithograph, Sheet: 21 1/8 x 14 1/8 in. (53.7 x 35.9 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Designated Purchase Fund, 73.39.133. ©Bill Graham Archives, LLC, www.Wolfgangsvault.com.

Although each artist developed a very distinct style of expression, you can see various influences in their work, from Early American illustrators, the Vienna Secession and the Art Nouveau style, to comic book art, pop culture and advertising graphics.  They manipulated these forms, used bizarre optical effects and collage, and sometimes photography.  Two of the photographers whose work was incorporated into the poster designs were Herb Greene and Jim Marshall (who was the chief photographer at the 1969 Woodstock Music Festival).  Greene and Marshall are also featured in the current museum exhibition Who Shot Rock & Roll:  A Photographic History, 1955 to the Present.  Check out the blog next week for more on these posters and the artists that created them.  Please also visit the museum's Contemporary Collection pages to view more posters and the rest of our contemporary collection.

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