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 Director's Letter
Last week we had a special visit from Victoria Rogers, vice president for arts at the Knight Foundation. The DIA team showed her our amazingly beautiful and finely installed Dance! exhibition. During our walk through, we described the museum's strategies for carefully creating the visitors' experiences in each gallery, our ideas for engaging the community in the exhibition-making process, and the evaluation approaches we use to achieve meaningful results. Along the way, we admired some radically uplifting masterpieces too. I am curator to the bone; I research art, enjoy its beauty, and love its power to move the spirit. Since being at the DIA, however, I have expanded my understanding of a work of art by also learning how to think about our visitors and how they connect in personal ways to our collection. We are world leaders in the art museum industry at making these kinds of connections and creating meaningful visitor experiences. Furthermore, we continue to experiment and innovate in the area of interpretation and gallery presentation. A key example of our work in this field is the upcoming reinstallation of our entire Asian collection. As part of the Asian art reinstallation, we have been experimenting with a novel (for a museum of this stature) community engagement tool for our Japanese collection. We have created a collaborative team composed of both staff and community members to work on the "early concept phase," which is the first step in a permanent collection reinstallation. Members of our community applied for and earned places on the team as consultants, and we have tasked them to work with our curator, interpretive planner, and other staff members.
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The team members (staff and non-staff, experts and non-experts) has been meeting for the past ten weeks, immersing themselves in the Japanese collection, discussing and exploring it from their own experiences, and proposing stories that we will present in the galleries. Contributing from their different backgrounds and perspectives, the entire team will be thinking about relationships between art, people, and the stories the museum tells. The DIA's goal is to present our collection in new ways that will be relevant, meaningful, and inspiring to our diverse communities--of course Asian Americans, but also African Americans, Latinos, Arab Americans, and all the groups we serve. So far the preliminary results of the team's work are very exciting, and I am eager to keep you up-to-date about our progress in future director's letters. In the meantime, the DIA team showed Victoria Rogers the place where the Asian team meets, which I call the "the creative room," located next to the galleries currently displaying the inspiring Detroit Public Schools student show (above left). I encourage you to come check out both. During the rest of Victoria's visit, we shared with her some of our upcoming projects and how we envision the DIA participating in our community life. I am happy to see our museum continuing to move away from the old model of a static institution that only shows art to a dynamic destination in a lively dialogue with the community and playing a role in making the world a better place for all. Stay tuned! 
Salvador Salort-Pons
Director
Detroit Institute of Arts Back to top |
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Exhibitions DANCE! AMERICAN ART 1830 TO 1960 Through JUNE 12
SPECIAL EXHIBITION GALLERIES, SOUTH
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Jitterbugs
(II), ca. 1941, oil on paperboard; William H. Johnson, American. Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the Harmon Foundation. 1967.59.611
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Dance in this country is a melting pot, melding the moves of the earliest European settlers,
African Americans, and later immigrants into an American style evident in many of the works in this exhibition.
The blending of cultures can be seen as early as the 1800s with
jigging, a percussive dance with Irish/Scot and African-American influences. Jigging can be seen in William Sidney Mount's
Bar-Room Scene and again in the artist's
Dance of the Haymakers, which shows two men jigging with their arms raised above their heads, a Scots-Irish practice.
The
cakewalk was the most famous dance created by African Americans prior to the twentieth century. Its roots however are in the
quadrille, a French-based set dance popular among Southern slaveholders. In a sly parody, black dancers made fun of the dance's genteel manners and adapted its erect posture and precise patterns by adding syncopated walking steps and a fast-paced, high-kicking promenade. It became a highly competitive dance form involving acrobatic stunts. The winner won a highly decorated cake, hence the name.
By the time of the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s and '30s, African American social dances enlivened that of the mainstream public in dances like the
Charleston and the
Lindy Hop. The Lindy Hop, named after Charles Lindbergh's 1927 transatlantic "hop," was a fusion of jazz, tap, and the
Charleston. The Lindy Hop, in turn, was recast as the Jitterbug, a broadly accessible version of the dance, that became an international sensation and formed the basis of the sock-hop culture of the 1950s and beyond.
Members see the exhibition free, but admission is on a timed basis. Tickets should be reserved in advance by calling 313.833.7971, visiting
DIA.org, or stopping by the box office at the museum. There are no ticket handling fees for members.
For the general public, tickets are $14 for adults, $10 for Wayne, Oakland, and Macomb county residents, $7 for ages 6-17, and $5 for Wayne, Oakland and Macomb county residents ages 6-17. There is no admission charge for school groups visiting the exhibition, but groups need to register in advance. Buy or reserve tickets
here or by calling 313.833.4005.
The exhibition is free with museum admission every Friday. The exhibition is also free on Sunday, May 8, Mother's Day, and Wednesday, May 18, National Museum Day.
The exhibition has been organized by the Detroit Institute of Arts. Support has been provided by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Endowment for the Arts. Additional support has been provided by the Marjorie and Maxwell Jospey Foundation and an ADAA Foundation Curatorial Award and the Association of Art Museum Curators.
Support for the catalogue has been provided by the Ida and Conrad Smith Fund.
Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this exhibition do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Above:
The Charleston
, 1926, oil on canvas; Frank Myers, American. The Irvine Museum
Back to top FIFTY YEARS OF COLLECTING
DETROIT INSTITUTE OF ARTS' FRIENDS OF PRINTS, DRAWINGS AND PHOTOGRAPHS ANNIVERSARY EXHIBITION Through June 18, 2016
Schwartz Gallery of Prints and Drawings
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No. V of Barcelona Series, 1944, lithograph; Joan Miró, Spanish. Gift of Dr. and Mrs. Barnett Malbin.
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What do an early nineteenth-century lithograph by Eugene Delacroix and a mid-twentieth-century one by Joan Miro have in common? Or, for that matter, what do those two works have in common with a German-expressionist print, 1930s photographs, or a large book featuring photolithographs, letterpress printing, and collage by a contemporary artist?
All are gifts to the DIA made by members of the Friends of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs and are included in the current exhibition on fifty years of collecting by the group. They show the breadth of interest in mediums and styles by the groups' members.
From the early years of lithography is Eugène Delacroix's realistic
The Ghost of Marguerite Appearing to Faust of 1828, a gift of Mr. and Mrs. Bernard F. Walker. More than one hundred years later is Joan Miró's
No. V, Barcelona Series (left), of 1944, representing the twentieth-century's move to abstraction. It is a gift from Dr. and Mrs. Barnett Malbin.
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Roadside Stand Vicinity Birmingham, Alabama, 1936 (printed later), gelatin silver print; Walker Evans, American. Gift of Beverly Franzblau Baker in memory of Morris D. Baker.
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Max Beckmann was a celebrated German expressionist painter and printmaker and his drypoint
The Negro, a gift of Ann Kirk Warren, is representative of his distorted forms.
Kiki Smith collaborated with poet Mei-mei Berssenbruge on
Endocrinology, an artist's book of twenty photolithographs on handmade Nepalese paper with collaged photolithogrphed text on machine-made paper. The 1997 volume is a gift of Corrine Lemberg.
Two photographs capture different aspects of American life in the 1930s. Bernice Abbott's early 1930s
New York at Night, a gift of Warren and Margot Coville, captures the modern metropolis aglow with lights. Walker Evans documented the people and places of the rural south, as seen in the 1936
Roadside Stand Vicinity Birmingham, Alabama (left), a gift of Beverly Franzblau Baker in memory of Morris D. Baker.
79th Annual Detroit Public Schools Student Exhibition Through June 5
Kirby Door Galleries
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Rumination, photograph; Danielle Williams, Grade 11, Renaissance High School.
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This year's Detroit Public Schools Student Exhibition features more than 270 imaginative works, ranging from paintings, prints, drawings, photography to mixed-media, ceramics, videos, and jewelry. Created by Detroit Public Schools students in grades K-12, the art works on view in the galleries on the Kirby Street side of the building, were made by some 230 students from twenty-two schools.
Visit the DIA's
Facebook page for videos of some of the students with their artworks.
The 79th Detroit Public Schools Student Exhibition was organized by the Detroit Institute of Arts and the Detroit Public Schools and is made possible with support from the Ruth T. T. Cattell Education Endowment Fund. Additional support was provided by the Detroit Public Schools Foundation.
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Detroit Film Theatre
The DFT is dark for the month of May, but the lights come back on in June with films from Cinetopia, which each year presents dozens of notable new international, independent, and documentary films selected from some of the world's most innovative film festivals, including Sundance, Tribeca, and South by Southwest. While the ten-day festival schedules holds screenings in many places in the Detroit and Ann Arbor areas, the DFT portion of the event runs June 3, 4, and 5 in the theater and the museum's lecture hall. Highlights include documentaries on two of the world's great filmmakers: De Palma, a portrait of director Brian De Palma, creator of Carrie and Scarface, among others, whose comments in the film amount to a veritable master class in filmmaking; and Lo and Behold: Reveries of the Connected World, which features director Werner Herzog asking questions about the way in which we connect with each other in the virtual world and exploring ways in which new technologies lead us to new ways of exploring ourselves as well as the universe.
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Also on the June DFT schedule is The Idol (left), a biopic based on the true story of Mohammad Assaf, a young Gazan wedding singer determined to find a way to show his vocal talents to the world, and his unlikely climb to the summit of Cairo's hit TV show Arab Idol (a Middle Eastern version of American Idol). Later in the summer is Black Girl (La Noire de...), the first feature-length film by Senegal's Ousmane Sembène--widely considered to be the pioneer of sub-Saharan African cinema. The film tells the story of a young Senegalese maid's forced exile when her white employers want to use her as a servant at their home in the south of France. Also playing is Sembène's 1963 twenty-minute short Borom Sarret, a vivid portrait of a Dakar cart-driver's daily struggle for survival. There are three Animation Club weekends during the course of the summer, one each month. The animated features play both Saturday and Sunday afternoon. For more DFT information, including dates and times, or to purchase tickets, click here. Back to top |
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DANCE AROUND THE CLOCK There's a whole lot of dancing going on in conjunction with the Dance! exhibition, including a day's worth of activities this Sunday, May 8, starting with an opportunity to literally join in the dance. No experience is necessary to take part in Dancing in the DIA: The Sleeping Beauty Ballet at 11 a.m., a creative movement class that introduces various dance moves from the ballet, combined with an enchanting story and, best of all, lots of costumes. All ages are welcome to participate. Dance Now Detroit follows at 12:30 p.m. with performances by several groups that exemplify the vitality of choreographers working in metro Detroit. Canvas to Dance with Lisa Lamarre and Dancers features dances inspired by works of art in the exhibition and begins at 2:15 p.m. End the afternoon with the Detroit Revival Project at 3:30 p.m., when ARTLAB J and contemporary dance company DDCdances collaborate with contemporary music ensemble ConTempus for a performance.
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If you've always wanted to be a dancer or see what it takes to get to the stage, check out one of the demonstrations by Michigan natives and world-class dancers Nehemiah Kish (far left), principal dancer with the Royal Ballet in London, and Precious Adams (left), a ballerina with the English National Ballet in London. Kish and Adams begin the demonstrations with a ballet class, followed by a rehearsal, and ending with the pair performing excerpts from Swan Lake. Demonstrations are Friday, May 14, at 7 and 8:30 p.m. and Saturday, May 14, at 1 p.m. Learn more about ballet in Conversations in Dance: American Ballet at 3:30 p.m., Sunday May 15 in a discussion between Oakland University's Elizabeth Kattner and the University of Michigan's Beth Genne, moderated by Debra Bernstein-Siegel, also from Oakland University. Finally, for Friday Night Live on May 27, catch the part satire, part comic strip, part emotional roller coaster performance of Austin Selden and Sarah Konnor's take on Diego Rivera's Detroit Industry murals. For information on all DIA and community Dance! programming, click here. For information on all DIA and community Dance! programming, click here. Back to top |
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LET'S TALK ABOUT IT
There's a lot to talk about this month in the four
Arts and Minds lectures dealing with American art and collectors.
Things kick off on Saturday, May 14 with a 2 p.m. lecture on the sculpture of California-based artist
Kenneth Price, who transformed and redefined traditional ceramics into highly original sculptural clay forms, several of which have recently been installed in the DIA's contemporary art galleries.
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Apple Orchard, 1892, oil on canvas; George Inness, American. Gift of Baroness von Ketteler, Henry Ledyard and Hugh Ledyard, in memory of Henry Brockholst Ledyard
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Go back nearly one hundred years for the Sunday, May 15, lecture "Surface and Depth: The Landscapes of
George Inness," which examines how the nineteenth-century American artist used his understanding of contemporary scientific and religious ideas that shaped his lifelong attempt to evoke in his work the presence of a spiritual world beyond the visible one.
Explore the artistic exchanges between European art and the development of American modernism with
Dance! exhibition curator Jane Dini in her Thursday, May 19, talk "Crossovers: American Dance and Its European Antecedents at 6 p.m. Dini looks at how American dance forms developed from cultures around the globe and how, in the same way, images depicting such scenes were indebted to European sources.
Lastly, on Sunday, May 22, at 2 p.m., learn about Detroit industrialist and art collector
Charles Lang Freer's deep attraction to the simple forms, spare decorations, and monochrome glazes Korean ceramics of the Joseon period (1392-1910) led him acquire objects from that era. But then his taste changed in 1896, and he turned to collecting the celadon ceramics and stoneware of the earlier Goryeo dynasty (918-1392). Tours and benefit reception at the
Freer House, located on Ferry Street a block north of the museum, follow the lecture.
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News and Notes In the Shop
Don't miss the final days of Children's Book Week, now through May 8, to make a purchase from the Museum Shop's selection of artful titles for kids of all ages. Children's Book Week, established in 1919 by the nonprofit literary organization Every Child A Reader, aims to instill a love of reading in children. Also ending May 8 are the shop's Members' Double Discount Days, at the main Museum Shop, the Dance! exhibition shop, and online. Members can use their 20 percent off discount to stock up on gifts for upcoming spring occasions--Mother's Day, Father's Day, and graduations. Or pick up the fully illustrated Dance! catalogue along with other exhibition-themed merchandise. Coloring Not Just for Kids
If the sight of a pristine array of sixty-four Crayola crayons takes you happily back to childhood, then stop by the artist demonstration Coloring Well with Richard Stocker on Sunday, May 15, from noon until 4 p.m. Not just for kids anymore, coloring is a way to reconnect with who you are and to what matters in life. Socker's nature-based designs provide the opportunity to practice the meditative act of applying color to paper. Coloring, either done as a group or individually, helps to focus the mind and relieve stress. Time Change We've had to change in the start time for the May 22 performance of Puppets Kapow. Originally scheduled for 2 p.m., the program now starts at 1 p.m. Coming in June
This summer, the DIA transforms into the Detroit Institute of Awesome with weekends filled with activities especially created for kids and their grown-ups. Make an art project or take a guided family tour of the collection. There are also special family program every Saturday and Sunday afternoon, including animated films, puppet shows and artist demonstrations. Awesome weekends start Saturday and Sunday, June 4 and 5 and run through the weekend of August 20 and 21. Check the awesome activities at dia.org. Back to top |
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| Detroit Institute of Arts
5200 Woodward Avenue
Detroit, Michigan 48202
www.dia.org
313.833.7900 Comments or questions about the newsletter? Please contact us: [email protected] ADMISSION
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$ 6 youth (6-17)
The museum is free for members and residents of Wayne, Oakland, and Macomb Counties
Contact the Membership HelpLine at
313.833.7971 or [email protected] For group sales (15 or more) contact 313.833.1292 or dia.org/grouptours
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Lighted, secure self-parking is available in the museum parking lot, between John R and Brush behind the museum, for $7. |
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