{"id":735,"date":"2018-06-04T16:44:19","date_gmt":"2018-06-04T23:44:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/?p=66592"},"modified":"2018-06-04T16:44:19","modified_gmt":"2018-06-04T23:44:19","slug":"matisse-drawings-come-to-long-beach-through-the-eyes-of-ellsworth-kelly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/hi-lo\/art\/matisse-drawings-come-to-long-beach-through-the-eyes-of-ellsworth-kelly","title":{"rendered":"Matisse Drawings Come to Long Beach Through the Eyes of Ellsworth Kelly"},"content":{"rendered":"

Photo courtesy of the Long Beach Museum of Art.<\/em><\/p>\n

One of the most important abstract artists in the country, the late Ellsworth Kelly\u2019s (b.1923, d.2015) bold, bright, monochromatic sculptures, shaped canvases and line drawings earned him international acclaim in the 50s.<\/p>\n

However, one of his last projects before he passed away in 2015 was not to practice his own art, but to offer an exploration of another artist\u2019s work, that of Henri Matisse (b.1869, d.1954), one of Europe\u2019s most influential modern painters.<\/p>\n

Matisse Drawings: Curated by Ellsworth Kelly from The Pierre and Tana Matisse Foundation Collection<\/em> will open at the Long Beach Museum of Art (LBMA) on June 9 and run through September 3 as the only West Coast venue to show the exhibit on its international tour and as its finale.<\/p>\n

Matisse Drawings<\/em> \u201cprovides the unique opportunity to view the work of a modern master through the eyes of one of the greatest abstract artists of the twentieth century,\u201d stated the release.<\/p>\n

Organized by the American Federation of Arts, the exhibition shows 45 of Matisse\u2019s original drawings from 1900 to 1950, including sketches and finished pieces, offering a window into his process as an artist.<\/p>\n

With Kelly\u2019s presentation of these works, drawings placed in a single row, evenly spaced and housed in off-white mats within pale wooden frames, sans wall labels, viewers scan expect to walk \u201cthrough an Ellsworth Kelly composition to see Henri Matisse drawings,\u201d Stromberg stated.<\/p>\n

\u201cPicasso made me want to paint, but Matisse drawings made me want to draw,\u201d Kelly said during an interview with John Stromberg (reproduced in the exhibition catalogue).<\/p>\n

Alongside Matisse\u2019s works, nine of Kelly\u2019s large-scale botanical prints, Suite of Plant Lithographs<\/em> (1964 -1966), will be on view in a separate gallery, according to the LBMA.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe plant drawings… are exact observations of the form of the leaf or flower or fruit seen,\u201d Kelly stated in 1969 on his lithograph series, according to the museum. \u201cNothing is changed or added: no shading, no surface making. They are not an approximation of the thing seen nor are they a personal expression of an abstraction…. My lesson was to see objectively to erase all \u2018meaning\u2019 of the thing seen. Then only, could the real meaning of it be understood and felt.\u201d<\/p>\n

Realized in 2014 when Kelly was 91 years old, included in Matisse Drawings<\/em> are studies of body movements, fully realized renderings, sketches that led to major works, such as The Dance<\/em> (1931) from the collection of The Pierre and Tana Matisse Foundation. Many of the drawings had never been displayed to the public before the tour.<\/p>\n

Overlapping with Matisse Drawings<\/em> will be Vitality and Verve III: Transforming the Urban Landscape<\/em>, a second summer exhibition from the LBMA running June 30 through September 9 in curatorial partnership with Los Angeles\u2019 Thinkspace Projects alongside support from POW! WOW! Long Beach.<\/p>\n

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