Sacred Scars, Shadowed Ground

Sacred Scars, Shadowed Ground is a visual narrative of my walks on the battlefields of Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania County. Last fall, I spent a week observing and listening to the fields, trying to grasp the emotion of the ground. Today, the battlefields are beautiful, tranquil examples of central Virginia countryside, but we know that they hold stories of sadness, horror, bravery, courage, sacrifice, rage, fear, and relief. Some of the stories are famous. Most art forgotten almost as quickly as they began, lost in the blood and chaos of war. Many stories include some of the most famous people in American history, but a vast majority are of anonymous men and women. Native Americans speak often about “listening to the land”, connecting with an environment that has strong feelings associated with it. I’ve tried to listen to these fields and capture with my images the emotional essence of the stories that are still being written.”

Larry Stuart www.larrystuartstudio.com

The Bloody Angle: Confederate Works

The Jackson Death Room Elwood Sunrise

Jackson’s Trail

Sacred Scars, Shadowed Ground Images of the Fredericksburg & Spotsylvania county civil war battlefIelds 2/17-3/16/11 Chatham Manor Frederickburg & Spotsylvania National Military Park, Virginia

Judy Cotton’s “The Fates” acquired by New Britain Museum of American Art

It is always fun hearing from our customers.

Dear Metroframe,

Judy Cotton’s large painting, “The Fates” has just been acquired and now hangs in the Contemporary Galleries (next to a Louise Nevilson) of THE NEW BRITAIN MUSEUM of AMERICAN ART.

You might recognize the frame! Yale Kneeland

Robert Brinker at Francis M. Naumann Fine Art

“Robert Brinker” is the first solo show of paintings by Robert Brinker to be held at Francis M. Naumann Fine Art. The eight large paintings and smaller studies in this exhibition were produced over the course of the past year, but they mark the culmination of a ten- year exploration of integrating figurative elements derived from the print media and translated into abstract patterns. The artist described the process employed in making these new paintings: “I begin by tracing lines from many sources such as coloring books, comics, and traditional Chinese paper cuts… The finished collage is then scanned into the computer where I can further manipulate it… I use these lines as a template that I overlay on some of the original source materials and begin to create the composition, colors and details… In the paintings (as opposed to the collages and preliminary studies), I am able to better explore the space by manipulating the paint, creating subtle fades in the lines and backgrounds or through flat fields of color. ” Francis M. Naumann Fine Art January 13 – February 24, 2012

FRAMING SPECIFICATIONS AND ADVICE

FLOATING FRAMES

Deep Floating Profile: 121 Type: floating frames for 1-1/2″ deep canvas paintings Wood & Finish: maple wood frame with clear lacquer finish Purchasing Options: joined wood frame Framing Advice: fitting floating frames

GALLERY FRAMES

Standard Profile: 101 Type: standard gallery frame Wood & Finish: maple wood frame with white opaque finish Purchasing Options: joined wood frame with splines Custom Wood Spacer: 1/2″ wood frame spacer Custom Wood Strainer: 3/4″ wood frame strainer Framing Advice: fitting floating frames Framing Advice: fitting gallery frames A centennial exhibition of Will Barnet’s work

The Arkansas Arts Center will display more than 75 drawings given to them by the artist in honor of his long-time friendship with former director Townsend Wolfe.

Will Barnet As a student Barnet studied at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. In 1930 Barnet continued his studies at the Art Students League of New York, beginning his long association with the school where he concentrated on painting as well as printmaking, In 1936 he became the official printer for the Art Students League. There, he later instructed students in the graphic arts at the school. Barnet continued his love of teaching with positions at the Cooper Union, at Yale University, and at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. He has taught artists including Cy Twombly, Tom Wesselmann, Eva Hesse, James Rosenquist, Mark Rothko and Donald Judd. A devoted printmaker, and with a technical expertise encompassing lithograph, woodcut, serigraph, and intaglio, Barnet has treated printmaking as a serious undertaking in its own right. His work has entered virtually every major museum in the United States including: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The National Gallery of Art, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, The Whitney Museum of American Art, and The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Portrait of Sully De Vito 1928 E.D. Poem 1989 Whiplash 1958 A Peaceable Kingdom 1946

Art by Will Barnet © Will Barnet, courtesy Alexandre Gallery, New York. Photography, Cindy Momchilov, Camera Work, Inc.

Arkansas Arts Center The Arkansas Arts Center was created in 1960. It was decided to select drawings as the collection’s primary concentration believing they could make a unique contribution to the field. The Arkansas Arts Center has been committed to building a collection of unique works on paper, primarily American and European, from the Renaissance to the present. Arkansas Arts Center

‘Will Barnet at Arkansas Arts Center: A Centennial Exhibition” October 7, 2011 – January 15, 2012 Arkansas Art Center

FRAMING SPECIFICATIONS AND ADVICE

METRO GALLERY FRAME

Standard Profile: 106 Type: Standard Gallery Frame Wood & Finish: maple wood frame with clear lacquer finish Purchasing Options: joined wood frame Custom Wood Strainer: 3/4″ wood frame strainer Custom Frame Mat: 8 ply antique white museum mat Custom Frame Acrylic: UV acrylic cut to size Custom Frame Backing Board: archival coroplast cut to size Print by Print: Series from Dürer to Lichtenstein at The Baltimore Museum of Art

This is an exhibition of more than 350 prints by American and European artists working in series from the late 15th through the 21st centuries, including Canaletto, Marcel Duchamp, Pablo Picasso, and Ed Ruscha. The exhibition presents a rare opportunity to view 29 series of multiple images in complete sets—revealing the true vision of the artist, print by print.

From Albrecht Dürer’s 16 woodcut illustrations for The Apocalypse (c. 1496-1498) to Roy Lichtenstein’s seven Monet- inspired color lithographs and screenprints Haystacks (1969), Print by Print demonstrates how serial printmaking has been a vital practice for artists to explore styles, subjects, and techniques for more than 500 years. The exhibition draws from the BMA’s renowned print collection to explore six broad themes—narrative, design, places, imagination, appropriation, and war. These series show a wide range of printmaking techniques, from etchings and engravings to lithographs and screenprints, and vary considerably in number and scale from Picasso’s two compelling images for The Dream and Lie of Franco (1937) to Sonia Delaunay’s 40 brilliant color stencils in Compositions, Colors, Ideas (1930).

All of the series, portfolios, and sets of prints in the exhibition are from the BMA’s collection of more than 65,000 works on paper, including drawings and photographs, from the 15th century to the present. Considered one of the most significant collections of works on paper in the country, it is also a comprehensive resource for the study of Western printmaking. More than half of the works in the exhibition have never previously been on view at the Museum.

Print by Print is the culmination of a collaboration between the BMA and the Museums and Society program at The Johns Hopkins University. The works and themes were selected by students participating in JHU’s Spring 2010 course: “Paper Museums: Exhibiting Prints at The Baltimore Museum of Art.” Rena Hoisington, Curator of Prints, Drawings & Photographs, worked with students to select and write labels for the series on view. In addition to selecting the objects, two students worked with the BMA over the summer to develop educational materials for the exhibition.

Harry Callahan at 100 at National Gallery of Art

Harry Callahan Eleanor, Chicago, 1948 gelatin silver print overall Harry Callahan Eleanor, (image): 11.59 x 8.5 cm New York, 1945 gelatin (4 9/16 x 3 3/8 in.) silver print overall National Gallery of Art, (image): 21.2 x 16.83 cm Washington, National (8 3/8 x 6 5/8 in.) Gallery of Art, Collection of Harry Washington, Gift of Callahan Estate Joyce and Robert Menschel Harry Callahan Cape Cod, Harry Callahan Ansley 1972 gelatin silver Park, Atlanta, 1992 print overall (image): gelatin silver print 23.7 x 23.9 cm (9 5/16 x overall (image): 15.72 x 9 7/16 in.) National 15.72 cm (6 3/16 x 6 Gallery of Art, 3/16 in.) National Washington, Gift of Gallery of Art, Joyce and Robert Washington, Gift of Menschel Susan and Peter MacGill

Harry Callahan Kansas Harry Callahan Morocco, City, 1981 dye 1981 dye imbibition imbibition print overall print overall (image): (image): 24.3 x 36.7 cm 24.2 x 36.7 cm (9 1/2 x (9 9/16 x 14 7/16 in.) 14 7/16 in.) National National Gallery of Art, Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Washington, Gift of the Very Reverend and Mrs. Collectors Committee Charles U. Harris One of the exhibitions we worked on this summer is the Harry Callahan exhibition for the National Gallery of Art (NGA). Because the NGA is one of my favorite museums, I started to do a little research on the photographer and the museum. The exhibition marks the centenary of his birth (1912 – 1999). It is on view in the West Building of the NGA from October 2, 2011 – March 4, 2012. www.nga.gov/callahan

Harry Callahan was born in Detroit. He began to photograph in 1938 and was self taught. His talent was immediately recognized. In 1946 László Moholy-Nagy hired him to teach at the Institute of Design in Chicago. There and at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) he taught generations of younger photographers. The exhibition of some 100 photographs explores all facets of Callahan’s art, from its genesis in Detroit in the early 1940s and its flowering in Chicago in the late 1940s and 1950s to its maturation in Providence and Atlanta from the 1960s through the 1990s.

NGA photography collection This could not have a better story. In 1948 Georgia O’Keefe visited the museum to determine where she was going to donate Alfred Steiglitz’s photography collection. One year later she donated 1311 works which became the beginning of the NGA’s photography collection. “Stieglitz worked for the recognition of photography as a fine art—the National Gallery means something in relation to that.” We all owe a debt of gratitude to these two pioneers of fine art. In fact, Sarah Greenough, the Senior Curator of Photographs at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, has just written “My Faraway One: The Letters of Georgia O’Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz“.

The NGA now has 10000 photographs in their collection. A separate department of photographs was established in 1990. Among the greatest strengths of the collection are groups of photographs by several major twentieth-century American practitioners: Paul Strand, Ansel Adams, Walker Evans, Frederick Sommer, Robert Frank, Harry Callahan, Irving Penn, and Lee Friedlander. Modeled after the Stieglitz collection, each of these holdings include works from throughout the photographer’s career and illustrates all aspects of the artists’ contributions.

Videos and podcasts The NGA has a feature on their website that has videos and podcasts about all aspects of their collection from conservation, to talks on individual artist’s work, to exhibitions. The viewer gets to meet the conservators, curators, and collectors that have and continue to contribute to this wonderful institution. It is art history at it’s best. www.nga.gov/podcasts/index.shtm

Michael Bentley Abstract Landscapes; large works on paper We recently met Michael and his wife Elizabeth when they came to our production center to pick up their frames for their upcoming show at the Gruen Gallery in Chicago. Bentley has been a customer since 2003. He is a very accomplished artist and he clearly was not afraid to tackle a large scale framing project. All of the frames were oversize with the largest 48″ x 96″. The Bentley’s were in Wisconsin visiting family. They were going to personally drive the framed artwork to their gallery in Chicago. They are used to being on the road. They have homes in Nova Scotia, Canada and Santa Fe, NM. Beautiful settings for inspirations for his landscapes.

The show opens Friday September 9th at the Gruen Gallery in Chicago. gruengalleries.com michaelbentleystudio.com

Brian Ulrich: Copia – Retail, Thrift, and Dark Stores, 2001-11 at The Cleveland Museum of Art

It has been a busy summer. One of the projects we were working on was the Brian Ulrich exhibition at the Cleveland Museum. After looking at these images, I share Brian Ulrich’s opinion about our consumer society and the excess and waste it creates. A reminder to all of us why photographers are important and how museums help the rest of us understand why. The following is the Cleveland Museum’s description of the show.

The Cleveland Museum of Art presents the first major museum exhibition of contemporary photographer Brian Ulrich’s work from a decade-long examination of the American consumer psyche in Copia—Retail, Thrift, and Dark Stores, 2001-11. From the Latin word for “plenty,” the artist’s Copia series explores economic, cultural and political implications of commercialism and American consumer culture. The exhibition, featuring almost 60 photographs, will be on view from August 27, 2011 to January 16, 2012 in the museum’s east wing photography galleries.

“I had to see if people were indeed patriotic shopping in response to the events on September 11th,” says Brian Ulrich, photographer, referring to the beginning of his decade-long investigation. “Not only was it clear that this was the case, but standing in a big box store or shopping mall, I could see the entire trajectory of the 20th century economy and ideology playing out in the excess of goods and overwhelmed stares of the shoppers. Ten years later, I hope that these photographs serve to add as a marker in which we can learn about our behaviors, habits, comforts and purpose.”

The body of work in the exhibition, curated by Tom Hinson, the museum’s curator emeritus, is divided into three parts: Retail, Thrift and Dark Stores. For the work included in the Retail phase (2001-06), Ulrich traveled extensively throughout the United States. He initially used a hand-held camera with the viewfinder at waist level, which allowed him to remain anonymous while documenting shoppers engrossed in navigating the abundance of goods found in vast enclosed malls and big- box stores. The second phase, Thrift (2005-08), focuses on thrift stores, the collecting places for discarded and unwanted consumer products, and its workers, as they tried to bring order to the vast amounts of donated, discarded and unwanted consumer products. The concluding group, Dark Stores (2008-11), features images in which Ulrich explores the impact of the 2008 financial crisis with haunting architectural landscapes of abandoned buildings and empty parking lots that have become commonplace in towns across America. Photographs from the Cleveland area are featured in the Retail and Dark Stores sections of the exhibition.

More programming information and details are available at www.ClevelandArt.org.

The Snowy Day and the Art of Ezra Jack Keats at The Jewish Museum

We always like to know more about the exhibitions we frame. I was not familiar with Ezra Jack Keats’s work before we started working with the Jewish Museum on this exhibition. I think you will agree his work is wonderful and it is an exhibition the whole family will enjoy. He has also been honored for his contribution in the civil rights movement. Another example of an artist changing the way we perceive the world.

The following is the Jewish Museum’s description of the show. This is the first major United States exhibition to pay tribute to award-winning author and illustrator Ezra Jack Keats (1916-1983), whose beloved children’s books include Whistle for Willie (1964), Peter’s Chair (1967), and The Snowy Day (1962), opens at The Jewish Museum on September 9, 2011 and remains on view through January 29, 2012. Published at the height of the American civil-rights movement and winner of the prestigious Caldecott Medal, The Snowy Day became a milestone, featuring the first African- American protagonist in a full-color picture book. The Snowy Day went on to inspire generations of readers, and paved the way for multiracial representation in American children’s literature. Also pioneering were the dilapidated urban settings of Keats’s stories. Picture books had rarely featured such gritty landscapes before.

Ezra Jack Keats papers, de Grummond Children’s Literature Collection, McCain Library and Archives, The University of Southern Mississippi. Copyright Ezra Jack Keats Foundation.

Craig Kosak – Myth and Legends

Craig Kosak has been a customer for many years and it’s always fun to see his new work. His work captures the West and Southwest with what I would call a magical realism. He describes his process as “ Rather than faithfully documenting the flora and fauna, I strive to capture the feeling and emotions these trips provide. Each trip consists of both a journey through the outer world, and an inner journey of self discovery. These paintings are about both worlds and how they relate.” He has exhibitions opening in Sante Fe August 19th at Giacobbe-Fritz Fine Art and September 15th at the National Museum of Wildlife Art. Craig has been featured in the American Art Collector magazine, Southwest Art Magazine, and the Sante Fean Magazine. In addition to Sante Fe, his work can also be seen in galleries in Kirkland, WA, Jackson, WY, and Ketchum, ID. To learn more visit his website.