Saturday, December 4, 2010

On Collecting Art: John & Dominique de Menil- the collection











On Collecting: John & Dominique de Menil- the buildings

The Menil Collection, 1987
Renzo Piano



Rothko Chapel w/ Broken Obelisk, 1972
Barnstone and Aubry







Cy Twombly Gallery, 1995
Renzo Piano and Richard Fitzgerald








Byzantine Fresco Chapel, 1997
Francois de Menil








Dan Flavin Installation at Richmond Hall, 1996








On Collecting Art: Eli & Edythe Broad

For the Broads, collecting began in the 1980's and during a resurgence of a figurative art trend. Their collecting vision is representative of the California pop aesthetic of abstraction and the flattened picture plane.


White Squad V, 1984
Leon Golub



And Thus... (present tense), 1996
Kara Walker


As their collecting matured, they began to explore the growing accessiblilty of contemporary art, always keeping an eye on its relavance to the mirror of the social outlook of the modern Los Angeles context.

Away From The Flock, 1994
Damien Hirst




Untitled (for Leo Castelli), 1977
Donald Judd





Actual Size, 1962
Ed Ruscha



Untitled (Your body is a battleground), 1989
Barbara Kruger







Recently, the Broads have completed construction on The Broad Contemporary Art Museum at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art designed by Renzo Piano. Their collection represents some of the greatest "blue chip" artwork available in the Contemporary Art world and receives worldwide recognition as such.







Tulips, 1995-2004, and Balloon Dog (Blue), 1994-2000
Jeff Koons



Back Seat Dodge '38, 1964
Edward Kienholz

On Collecting Art: Duncan Phillips

The Repntant St. Peter, c. 1600-1605
El Greco


Deer In The Forest, 1913
Franz Marc

Asheville, 1948
Franz Marc

Duncan Phillips was a pioneer in history of American Art collecting. The legacy of his efforts make up a remarkable dialogue of French Impressionist and American modernism of the early part of the 20th Century.



Luncheon Of The Boating Party; Auguste Renoir



Phillips was ambitious in his appreciative endeavours of art. In the 1920's he pursued collecting, founding a museum, and art criticism. The results were are rich contribution to American scholarship and a national treasure trove of important paintings and scultptures.




For Phillips, the collection and the writing existed in a symbiotic relationship- verbalized aesthetic ideas as counterparts of the visual perceptions that initiated a profound movement adding insight and sympathy for pictorial and decorative art that continues to be a sincere, inspiring gift.




"I bring together congenial spirits among the artists from different parts of the world and from different periods of time and I trace their common descent from old masters who anticipated modern ideas. ...Thus I demonstrate two things-- the antiquity of modern ideas [and] the modernity of some of the old masters, and I prove... that art is the universal language which defies classification according to any chronological or national order" -Phillips Collection In The Making