Kimbell Art Museum

SEE THE RARE PAINTING “CRUCIFIXION” BY EL GRECO

ON VIEW NOW AT THE KIMBELL ART MUSEUM

El Greco, Crucifixion, c. 1570.
Oil on canvas, 13ľ x 10˝ in. (34.9 x 26.7 cm). Fayez Sarofim Collection, Houston

El Greco, c. 1570
Crucifixion
Oil on canvas, 13 3/4 x 10 1/2 in. (34.9 x 26.7 cm).
Fayez Sarofim Collection, Houston

Visitors to the Kimbell will have the extraordinary opportunity to view a rare painting on copper of Christ on the cross by the Spanish master El Greco. The painting comes from the collection of Mr. Fayez Sarofim of Houston, who has generously placed it on loan at the Kimbell through early December as part of the Museum’s continuing “Guest of Honor” series.

The painting is small in scale yet powerful in conception. Christ’s limp body hangs from the cross while a mass of dark clouds billows up from the horizon. Adding to the drama of the sky is a bolt of lightning that cuts across the top of the composition and passes directly behind Christ’s head. Beneath him spreads a desolate landscape enlivened only by the ghostly silhouette of a hilltop town and a stand of trees. The copper support plays a role in the evocation of light emanating from within the scene: its shiny surface acts like a mirror, reflecting light back through the paint.

The Sarofim Crucifixion is generally dated around 1570, while El Greco was still living and working in Venice or shortly after his move to Rome at the end of that year. It was during his two-year stay in Venice that he discovered the dramatic palette that would become a defining feature of his art. The Sarofim Crucifixion shows a Venetian approach to color, and Venice may well have been where he decided to try his hand at painting on copper.

Visitors will have the opportunity to view the Sarofim Crucifixion near one of El Greco’s later masterpieces from Toledo, the Portrait of Dr. Francisco de Pisa, in the Kimbell’s permanent collection. Admission is always free to view the Museum’s permanent collection.

For additional information please contact:
Jessica Brandrup, Head of Marketing and Public Relations
jbrandrup@kimbellmuseum.org or
Sonya Cisneros, Public Relations and Marketing Assistant
scisneros@kimbellmuseum.org or
call: (817-332-8451) or
log on to http://www.kimbellart.org

Butchers, Dragons, Gods, and Skeletons:
An Exhibition of Film Installations by Philip Haas Inspired by Works in the Collection

July 19–October 25, 2009

The Kimbell Art Museum has commissioned the distinguished filmmaker Philip Haas to create a series of film installations that interpret and elaborate upon paintings and objects in the museum’s permanent collection. The installations feature poetic and sensuous moving images that appear on unconventional screen configurations and are enhanced by architectural and sculptural effects as well as original music. One moment the images form themselves into an uncanny re-creation of the chosen piece from the collection, the next they give a vivid new form to ideas and visual delights it has suggested. In this way the installations are both beautiful works of art in themselves and invitations to look at art with imaginative abandon. They will complement a full display of the Kimbell's permanent collection, each occupying a space near the work to which it relates.

The first installation in the series, Haas’s response to Annibale Carracci’s The Butcher’s Shop (early 1580s), has already been shown to acclaim at the 2008 Venice and Toronto film festivals. At least four further installations are planned for the exhibition. The subjects are: the Red-Figure Cup Showing the Death of Pentheus and a Maenad by the ancient Greek vase painter Douris (c. 480 B.C.); a Chinese scroll painting, Arhat Taming the Dragon (early 14th century); Apollo and the Continents by G. B. Tiepolo (c. 1739); and Skeletons Warming Themselves by James Ensor (1889).

Before becoming a filmmaker, Philip Haas studied art history at Harvard. He has made documentaries with artists as well as a number of feature films, including the Oscar-nominated Angels and Insects (1995).

Private Collection, Texas: European Masterpieces from Texas Homes, Past and Present

November 22, 2009–March 21, 2010

Paul Cézanne, Trees and Rocks, Near the Château Noir,
oil on canvas, c. 1900–1906,
The Dixon Gallery and Gardens, Memphis;
Museum purchase from Cornelia Ritchie and Ritchie Trust No. 4, 1996.
Formerly in the collection of Montgomery (“Montie”) Ritchie, Canyon, Texas.

The Kimbell Art Museum is organizing an exhibition of major paintings and sculptures bought by Texans for their private collections between 1900 and the present. The exhibition will focus exclusively on the art of Europe and the ancient Mediterranean from about 700 B.C. to the 1950s, with approximately 90 works. Featured artists will include Rembrandt, Guido Reni, Angelica Kauffman, Monet, Caillebotte, Cézanne, Picasso, Magritte, and Max Ernst.

Since the first decade of the 20th century, when wealth in Texas began to reach a national scale, private individuals have collected works from the art of the American West to contemporary academic painting from America and Europe. By the time of the oil boom in the 1920s, a pattern of discerning collecting was established that emphasized European art from antiquity to the modern masters. The men and women who purchased these works hailed from all parts of the state, though most were from the five major cities.