According to the Director of AGWA, Dr Stefano Carboni, that is exactly what the 90 artists included in the Van Gogh, Dali and Beyond: The World Reimagined exhibition did. And it was through their ponderings that they reinterpreted the genres of landscape, portraiture and still life. How incredibly lucky are we in Perth, the only venue in the Southern Hemisphere to get to see this exhibition of 130 works. The likes of Van Gogh, Dali, Richter, Cezanne, Toulouse-Lautrec, Bacon, Matisse, Picasso, Miro, Duchamp, Kahlo and more all in one space, right here … in Perth! I was so fortunate to get to the media viewing, and as you can probably tell it blew me away. Here’s the first peek.
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Salvador Dali Illumined Pleasures 1929 © 2013 Salvador Dali, Gala-Salvador Dali Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS) New York
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I grew up pondering over Dali pictures during my university days, so to see this one in person was a dream.
‘Perth will be the only city to host this superb display of works by some of the most celebrated artists working from the late nineteenth century to today. More than half the artists appearing in The World Reimagined have never before had their work on display in Perth, making it a must-see exhibition,’ said Stefano.
Director of MoMA, Glenn D. Lowry agrees, ‘It’s rare for many of these works to travel across the globe, so it does represent a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for Western Australians and visitors to WA, to view these works in Perth.’
Toulouse-Lautrec images often featured in my psychology textbooks. To be able to look at the actual brushstrokes made it feel like I was in the room while it was being painted … minus the Absinthe though.
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Henri de Touloue-Lautrec La Goulue at the Moulin Rogue 1891-92 The Museum of Modern Art, New York, Gift of Mrs David M.Levy
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I’m not too sure what Frida Kahlo would have thought about her image being emblazoned on a t shirt, but I remember wearing mine for many years until it became threadbare.
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Frida Kahlo Self-Portrait with Cropped Hair 1940 © 2013 Frida Kahlo/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/SOMAAP, Mexico
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So for me the exhibition was quite personal, making me ponder about my uni days. It seemed to be the same for a lot of people, with many finding it hard to move past the first painting in the exhibition, … the famous Olive Trees.
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| Vincent van Gogh, 1889 The Olive Trees. The Museum of Modern Art, New York Mrs John Hay Whitney Bequest |
The paintings, sculpture, drawings, photographs, prints and media works in Van Gogh, Dalí and Beyond are drawn from MoMA’s renowned Collection.
Even this initial viewing changed how I pondered about the world …
Emerging into the cultural centre the buildings that I usually ignore took on some very different forms … tall baguettes filled with smoked salmon and cream cheese, long stemmed glasses of white wine replaced the Bankwest Tower and trees became ice creams … while I may not have been inspired to paint, (you can thank me later), it definitely inspired me to go buy lunch, relax and reimagine life as it may have been all those years ago.
Perth certainly is growing a fascinating art scene. More to come in future posts.
Exhibition opens June 22
For more information go to http://www.artgallery.wa.gov.au
