A Beautiful Mind: Agnes Martin, Minimalism, and the Feminist Voice

“When I think of art, I think of beauty. Beauty is the mystery of life,” minimalist artist Agnes Martin once explained. “It is not in the eye; it is in my mind. In our minds there is awareness of perfection.” In the first comprehensive survey of her art at the Tate Modern, in London, England, the exhibition Agnes Martin strives to guide viewers to that “awareness of perfection” Martin strove to embody in her minimalist, geometrically founded art. Rather than the cold, person-less brand of modernist minimalism, Martin’s work personifies the warm humanity of Buddhist editing down to essentials. At the same time, surveying Martin’s art and thinking allows us to revisit the feminist critiques of minimalism and shows how Martin’s stepping back from the bustle of the New York art scene freed her to find “a beautiful mind” — not just for women, but for everyone. Please come over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "A Beautiful Mind: Agnes Martin, Minimalism, and the Feminist Voice."

Can a Classic Museum Really Be Made Modern?

Every new cultural institution hopes for “The Bilbao Effect”—the economic boom the faltering, former industrial city of Bilbao, Spain, enjoyed after the 1997 rise of architect Frank Gehry’s game-changing design for the Guggenheim Bilbao Museum. But even old cultural institutions want some of that same magic. So, when Gehry came to see Barnett Newman’s The Stations of the Cross with artist friend Ellsworth Kelly at the Philadelphia Museum of Art back in 2006, the museum’s then director and CEO, Anne d’Harnoncourt, approached Gehry about “doing something special” there, too. However, instead of a new signature “Gehry” look, d’Harnoncourt requested “a quiet intervention”—an underground “Philadelphia Effect.” In Making a Classic Modern: Frank Gehry’s Master Plan for the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the PMA finally unveils their “master plan” for revitalizing their classic main building first opened in 1928 for the 21^st century. The big question hanging over this whole decade-long, estimated half billion dollar project remains: can a classic museum really be made modern? Please come over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "Can a Classic Museum Really Be Made Modern?"

How to Open a New Old Museum

In 1923, during an exhibition of his art collection that would become the Barnes Foundation in Merion, Pennsylvania, two years later, Dr. Albert C. Barnes told an interviewer, “I am trying to do the biggest thing for Philadelphia that any one man has attempted.” Nearly nine decades later, the grand reopening of the Barnes Foundation in its new location on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway in Philadelphia is attempting something even bigger—the opening of a new old museum that will make both the fans of the old place and fans of the new place both happy. With a beautiful new $150 million USD building and campus surrounding Dr. Barnes’ priceless old collection, it’s hard for anyone to complain. Please come over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "How to Open a New Old Museum."

[Image: View of the Barnes Foundation looking south east at night. The Barnes Foundation Philadelphia. © 2012 Tom Crane.]

[Many thanks to the Barnes Foundation for providing the image above and other press materials as well as for inviting me to the press preview.]

Will Damien Hirst Dot the Art Market to Death?

Just when you think a contemporary art megastar such as Damien Hirst has done his worst to make a mockery of the modern art world, he finds a new weapon or, in this case, returns to an old one—dots. Most famous for his The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, an embalmed tiger shark in a glass case, Hirst penchant for controversy doesn’t always go big. In fact, he’s decided to go small, but on a grand scale, with lots and lots of dots. Hirst convinced gallery owner Larry Gagosian to allow him to take over all 11 of Gagosian’s galleries around the globe and flood them with a new crop of the same “spot paintings” he did years ago in a “retrospective” of new works on an old theme. Even worse, Hirst won’t even be painting all the new spot paintings himself. For everyone who hates contemporary art and its excesses, Hirst’s spotlight on spots may send them over the edge and tip the art market itself into oblivion. Please come over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "Will Damien Hirst Dot the Art Market to Death?"

[Image: Damien Hirst. Image source: Mark III Photonics/Shutterstock.com.]