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NEW SCULPTURES FOR THE NASHER SCULPTURE GARDEN AT THE PEGGY GUGGENHEIM COLLECTION, VENICE

As part of the on-going partnership between the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation and the Nasher Foundation, new loans of sculptures by major 20th century artists are being displayed in the Nasher Sculpture Garden at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice, from May 1999. This brings to Venice large outdoor works by Anthony Caro, Max Ernst, Henry Moore, Germaine Richier, and Joel Shapiro as well as steel chairs by Scott Burton. They are being shown together with works from the Peggy Guggenheim Collection (by Arp, Duchamp-Villon, Ernst, Giacometti, Gilardi, Marini, Minguzzi, Mirko, Moore, Richier, and Takis) and from the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation (Caro, Merz).

Anthony Caro’s Sculpture Three (1961) is one of his earliest works: bolted and painted steel ‘I’ beams are composed in a radical, tough manner that ushers in his mature style. Its stark but eloquent simplicity contrasts with the hermetic and architectonic forms of First Light (1990-93), a later work recently given to the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation (see Press Release no. 71), which is displayed nearby. The Genius of the Bastille (1960) by the Surrealist Max Ernst (Peggy Guggenheim’s second husband) is a bronze totem crowned with a bird-like creature which may be Ernst’s own alter ego, Loplop King of the Birds. Henry Moore’s abstract Working Model for Oval with Points (1968-69), in polished bronze, dramatizes the space that sculptural form surrounds. Le Griffu (1952) by Germaine Richier, one of France’s greatest post-war figurative sculptors, celebrates a French Folk spirit in the form of a capering semi-human creature. Joel Shapiro’s monumental polished bronze Untitled (1983), abstract and geometric though it may seem, has a physical vitality borrowed from the human figure. Scott Burton, who became famous for chairs and benches, endlessly varied in metal and stone, which confidently unite art and utility, is represented with Two Chairs in lacquered steel.

The Nasher Collection, to which these sculptures belong, has been assembled over the past thirty- five years by Mr. Nasher and his late wife Patsy, and is based in Dallas, Texas. It is generally regarded as one of the finest collections of modern and contemporary sculpture in the world. When the agreement between the Nasher and Guggenheim Foundations was signed, in 1995, Mr. Nasher stated: “It gives me great pleasure to enter this association with the Guggenheim, an institution that is unique by virtue of its broad international perspective. I am thrilled to become an active part of a museum that is truly at the vanguard. We live in a world that is continually being reshaped before our very eyes. Culture plays an important educational and mediating role in the process of communication across political boundaries.”

In 1995 the Peggy Guggenheim Collection exhibited Alberto Giacometti in the Guggenheim and Nasher Collections. In late 1996 more than 70 sculptures from the Nasher Collection were shown in The California Palace of the Legion of Honor in San Francisco. From February to April 1997 105 works from the Collection were exhibited by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York. Entitled A Century of Sculpture: The Nasher Collection, the exhibitions were curated by Carmen Gimenéz and Steven A Nash.

THE SOLOMON R. GUGGENHEIM FOUNDATION

Currently the Nasher Foundation is developing plans for the Nasher Sculpture Center to be built on a two-acre site in downtown Dallas adjacent to the Dallas Museum of Art. The major component of the center will be an outdoor garden in which approximately 20 works from the Nasher Collection will be on display and periodically rotated with other pieces from the Collection. The Center, which will be entirely funded by the Nasher Foundation, expects to open in 2001.

Mr. Nasher has also committed to give $7.5 million dollars to support construction of a new art museum on the Duke University campus that will bear his family’s name. The University is currently evaluating several internationally prominent architectural firms to design the Nasher Museum of Art. Construction of the $15 million dollar facility is expected to begin in 1999.

Raymond D. Nasher Although born in Boston, Mr. Nasher has lived most of his life in Dallas, Texas. He has three daughters, Andrea, Joan and Nancy, who share his interest in and commitment to the arts. His business endeavors have been in real estate development in the areas of housing, shopping centers, and office buildings He also developed banking interests and is currently Chairman of Comerica Bank-Texas, the successor to his Norta Park Bank. He holds a BA from Duke University, a Master’s degree in Economics from Boston University, and a Doctorate of Humane Letters from Southern Methodist University. Moreover, he has served on the Boards of Duke University, and the American University. In governmental affairs, Mr. Nasher served on the President’s Commission on Urban Housing, as Executive Director of the White House Conference on International Cooperation, on the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities, and as a United States Representative to the General Assembly of the United Nations. He is a member of the Peggy Guggenheim Collection Advisory Board.

Mr. Nasher began collecting art with his late wife Patsy Nasher, over thirty years ago, forming a collection that represents many of the major movements of 20th century sculpture. The world- renowned Nasher Collection, which was exhibited in 1987-88 at the Dallas Museum of Art, the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, the Reina Sofia Museum, Madrid, the Forte Belvedere, Florence and the Tel Aviv Museum, comprises more than 700 works of contemporary and Modern art. Highlights of the collection are works by Abakanowicz, Arp, Brancusi, de Kooning, Duchamp- Villon, Gaudier-Brzeska, Giacometti, Lichtenstein, Long, Matisse, Moore, Newman, Picasso, Rodin, Segal, David Smith, and Di Suvero.

The Nasher Sculpture Garden The Nasher Sculpture Garden at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection is the only European venue where works from the Nasher collection are on continuos display. The agreement to make long-term and changing loans of major works of modern and contemporary sculpture to the Peggy Guggenheim Collection is only one element in a comprehensive association between the Guggenheim and The Nasher Foundation, which also involves the loan of sculpture to other Guggenheim museums, exhibition and catalogue projects relating to 20th century sculpture, and consultancy in the development of the sculpture holdings of the Guggenheim museums. In 1995, financial support from the Nasher Foundation made possible the completion of the landscaping of the garden of the Palazzo Venier dei Leoni (home of the Italian branch of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation), according to a design by Venetian architect Giorgio Bellavitis.

THE SOLOMON R. GUGGENHEIM FOUNDATION

The exhibitions of the Peggy Guggenheim Collection are made possible by the support of the Peggy Guggenheim Collection Advisory Board, the Regione Veneto and: ______INTRAPRESÆ COLLEZIONE GUGGENHEIM Aermec iGuzzini illuminazione Arclinea Istituto Poligrafico Automotive Products Italia e Zecca dello Stato Banca Antoniana Leo Burnett Popolare Veneta Lubiam 1911 Barbero 1891 Luciano Marcato Bisazza Rex Built-In DLW AG Sàfilo Group Gretag Imaging Group Swatch Gruppo 3M Italia Wella Gruppo Imation Italia Zucchi-Bassetti Group

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THE SOLOMON R. GUGGENHEIM FOUNDATION