Aphotographer Returns To His Home Town Of Detroit To Capture A City And Its People, Bent But “unbroken.” 

How does your garden grow? 

Not very tall, if it’s full of dachshunds.

This peculiar illustration comes from the guest book of the Hewitt family, the founders of the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum. The book spanned more than 50 years and included signatures and more involved artwork and poems.

Lacking context or explanation, “Dachshund Nursery” was probably done by Caroline King Duer, a frequent visitor to the Hewitt’s Ringwood Manor, in 1896. Learn more from cooperhewitt‘s blog.

Elizabeth Taylor

Yemenite Jewish children, Sana'a, Yemen, Circa 1909. By Hermann Burchardt.

just opened:

“HYSTERIA: Spatial Conversations with Florine Stettheimer”  Rosson Crow

Sargent’s Daughters Gallery, 179 East Broadway, NYC

In this recent body of work, Crow debuts a new technique of Xerox transfers layered with painting on the canvases. Crow has long been fascinated by history and the psychology of interior spaces, and has addressed subjects as varied as French Revolutionary interiors, New York City graffiti and the films of Alfred Hitchcock. This exhibition represents Crow’s response to the paintings of Florine Stettheimer (1871-1944), a New York artist whose paintings date from the 1910s to the 1940s.  Although considered a very important artist of her time, (Marcel Duchamp organized her retrospective exhibition at MOMA in 1946, and she was included in the first Whitney Biennale in 1932) Stettheimer’s works are relatively unknown today as she steadfastly refused to sell or show them in galleries.  Since her death, they have often been dismissed as overly “feminine” and “eccentric” and today Stettheimer remains known mostly to a growing cult of women artists on both sides of the Atlantic who love and claim her influence. - thru May 17

Brad Wilson’s Affinity II series of animal portraits || See gallery

Photographer Brad Wilson, based in Los Angeles, started his Affinity series of animal portraits in 2010. These are the second part of this series. Brad takes the pictures in a photographic studio, just feet away from the animals. Some, such as the mountain lion and tigers, are deadly. 

An auctioneer scores a book deal, a museum receives a $70 million gift, and Sotheby’s announces the sale of an extraordinary work by Lucian Freud — this and more in this week’s news.

Read more in ARTPHAIRE.

Lucian Freud, “Head on a Green Sofa (1960-61)” Estimate: 2,500,000-3,500,000 GBP. Courtesy of Sotheby’s.

Meeting with the Jewish Shepherd Avraham Herzlich in the field with his goat outside Tapuach (at צומת תפוח)

Irving Penn.

The Hand of Miles Davis, New York, 1986. Selenium-toned gelatin silver print, printed 1992. 49.9 × 49.5 cm. One from an edition of 9.

The Hand of Miles Davis, New York, 1986. Gelatin silver print. signed, titled, dated, annotation ‘Print made September 1986’. (43.2 x 43.5cm.) Christie’s.

The Hand of Miles Davis, New York, 1986. Selenium-toned gelatin silver print, printed 1992. 50.8 x 48.9 cm. One from an edition of 16. Hamiltons Gallery, London, Phillips.

The Hand of Miles Davis, New York, 1986. Selenium toned gelatin silver print, printed 1992. 47.8 x 47.8 cm. One from an edition of 15. Hamiltons Gallery, London, Phillips.

art history meme • [6/9] paintings: francisco goya - el quitasol (the parasol)

The Parasol is one of a cartoon series of oil on linen paintings made by the painter Francisco Goya. This series of paintings was specifically made in order to be transformed into tapestries that would be hung on the walls of the Royal Palace of El Pardo in Madrid, Spain.

In his paintings, Goya often joins French fashion to the Spanish one. The woman in this particular painting is sitting on the ground, possibly resting from a long walk. She is dressed in French style, according the time period. She is holding a fan in her right hand, while a little dog is cuddled in her lap. The young man is holding the parasol (umbrella) in order to shade the woman’s face. He is dressed in the so-called majo style, meaning he is dressed like a poor person for the time period. His hair gathered in a net, and his belt is made of colorful silk. In the background we can see dark clouds in the sky and the trees swaying in the wind, possibly signaling a storm coming. The painting has very calm warmth it emits, which is then offset by the tree that seems to be blowing in pretty strong wind. The way the boy is standing, with one foot on the rock and one not, he seems to be triumphantly shading the woman from the harmful rays of the sun, and the possible storm.

HBD, #Chagall.

Here’s his painting, Self-Portrait with Seven Fingers which hangs at stedelijkmuseumbureauamsterdam