A Natural Gift for Art
Gondelor et ses petits
Jean Arp: A COLLECTION OF WOOD RELIEFS AND COLLAGES
In keeping with the art theme for this week, allow me to introduce to you the talented works of Jean Arp. His reliefs and collages are the subject of a major exhibit at Blain|Di Donna, a gallery located inside the Carlyle Hotel on Madison Avenue. Since its opening late last year, the gallery has been THE destination for serious art lovers and collectors. Jean Arp, A Collection of Wood Reliefs and Collages, will be on view starting today, November 1st until Tuesday, December 11th, 2012. The core of this whimsical and colorful exhibition is a collection of unique painted wood reliefs and collages coming on public view for the first time in America.
This group of works by the artist, demonstrates the importance of the interplay between form and color, as well as the developmental nature of the works’ physicality–from the streamlined surfaces of his paper collages to the heightened sculptural dimensionality of the wood reliefs.
De continent qui aurait
Arp’s forms are amoebic, embryonic, and referential of natural organisms. The “moving oval,” (you simply have to see it in person, it’s gorgeous!) so evident in these works, was the basic form that the artist referred to throughout his oeuvre, and which he never relinquished. The colors are vivid and joyous. Arp’s ambition was to harmonize man and nature and he used his art as a vehicle to achieve this. He aimed to create art as nature creates life, and his collages and reliefs employed a fittingly biomorphic vocabulary.
Sans titre
All images courtesy Blain | Di Donna
“The cycles of nature and of art—from collage to wooden form to print to painted form—are reconciled, as light and dark, sun and night are included in a redemptive circle of creative energy.”
Mary Ann Caws, Distinguished Professor of English, French and Comparative Literature
at the Graduate School of the City University of New York
Mary Ann Caws, Distinguished Professor of English, French and Comparative Literature
at the Graduate School of the City University of New York
Arp and the print publisher Louis Broder collaborated on many projects and publications, beginning in 1957. Their most ambitious was an album published in 1966 titled Le Soleil recerlé (The Re-circled or Re-ringed Sun). Arp created the paper collages in this exhibition as a prerequisite for this publication’s prints and then created the unique painted wooden reliefs on view. Therefore, each medium informs the other directly, forging their interdependence; spatial tensions result from their oscillating relationship between flatness and depth, light and dark. Early Friday morning, I will post more pictures of the press preview on our Facebook Page. Say tuned!
BLAIN|DI DONNA is located at: 981 Madison Avenue, New York City. The opening reception for the show is today, Thursday, November 1st from 6:00 – 8:00 PM.
